Yesterday was my first bad day on Mastodon, and what happened to me could happen to you, so let me explain what went down, and how I got blocked by a lot of people.
In March, I wrote a post critical of Musk (picture 1). I then asked another Mastodon user (Harriett) whom I have found friendly, if she would help me translate a Danish phrase to English, and linked to the Musk post where the phrase would be relevant.
But yesterday — 4 months later — that blew up in my face. Here is how…
1/7
You see, yesterday someone discovered that my old post requesting translation help had been mirrored onto Bluesky by the so-called bridge system. And that system had made the VERY unfortunate error of removing my link to the context about Elon Musk, and instead now linked to Harriett's profile page.
So it now looked as if I was not talking about Elon Musk, but talking about Harriett (see picture) — as if I was making fun of this Mastodon user behind her back on Bluesky.
2/7
A person saw this unfortunate mishap on Bluesky and rightly found it suspicious looking, so that person then warned Harriett about it. She then got upset thinking I was making posts ridiculing her on Bluesky, blocked me, and then wrote about this to all of us here on Mastodon.
I have no hard feelings about that, because the technical glitch really made it seem like I was a bad person.
But then more people got upset, and a whole thread formed where people agreed I should be blocked.
3/7
And while all of this went down, I was not even here. Because yesterday I hosted a party and was preparing dinner and entertaining guests here in Denmark.
Then late in the evening when the guests went home, I sat down to check in on Mastodon, and all of hell had broken loose.
Because everyone was thinking the Bluesky post came from me, the famous profile Gottalaff now entered the discussion which amplified it to her 33,000 users, and even more people blocked me, called me out etc.
4/7
The only person who stopped to check if all of this was really true was @Gargron. And he wrote a very helpful post explaining that the bad post on Bluesky was created by the bridge system, which had linked to Harriett's profile and thereby changed the meaning of my original post.
But Gargron's post was very technical, and I am not sure everyone understood it, and I was still getting angry responses, and more people blocked me.
So I was very sad to discover all this late last night.
5/7
But here is the lesson we can all learn from this: If you see something strange where someone suddenly seems to change their behaviour and do something malicious, it is important to ask questions before concluding what is going on.
In this case, a post which seemed like it was written by me was actually altered by an IT system that I have never given permission to do so — and it now seemed like I was spreading hatred.
In conclusion: I blame no one for this incident. I fully understand…
6/7
… why someone saw the Bluesky post and wanted to warn Harriett. I fully understand how Harriett could feel shocked that it looked like I was talking about her on another platform. And I fully understand how Gottalaff would amplify that and try to stop me from harassing Harriett.
So please, do not send any negativity their way. Let us just all learn from this:
Never jump to conclusions about other people. If you see sudden strange behaviour from someone, ask questions before concluding.
7/7
@randahl fyi - some of the people in the discussion aren't actually angry over the misinterpretation/changing of the original post, but the fact that the post appears on Bluesky with photo and bio of the user in question ("doxxing").
... others are angry because they believe you don't care about the fact that her details appeared there but only worry about your follower count - while I think it's obvious that what upsets you is being presented publicly as a bad actor.
The awesome @Em0nM4stodon is PSAing about the first case here: https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/114870842797314328
... as for the second I think it's just fallout. Once people get the "bad actor" impression everything else will be interpreted that way as well.
ALERT for Bluesky Bridge Users 🚨 🦋 If you are using a Bluesky bridge on Mastodon, DO NOT TAG Mastodon accounts in your posts without prior informed consent from this person. This could end up showing a preview of this person's profile picture and bio on Bluesky without their consent. Additionally, be careful about how the upcoming Quote Post feature could behave with Bluesky bridges. Some of us don't want our information shared with commercial platforms like Bluesky, and have not consented to this bridge. This practice can even **endanger** some Fediverse users. If you have chosen to share your own data with commercial platforms, make sure you leave the same choice to others. This is important. #Privacy #Mastodon #Bluesky #BlueskyBridge #Fediverse #Consent
@troed @Em0nM4stodon I really don't want to interfere in this situation and won't beyond making the following point, which I hope is helpful to Harriett who I care about and for the general good. My interpretation was that the doxing element caused the greatest distress.. something which I fear may have unfortunately been repeated in the explanation thread above. Perhaps don't repost that screenshot @randahl ?
Peace ✌️
@greenseer @troed @Em0nM4stodon
I understand your concern, and I have now blurred the post to avoid triggering a repeat of the bridge problem.
@kuprijanko @randahl @greenseer @troed @Em0nM4stodon
Yep. The preview is cached.
You could try deleting the post, but I doubt that will matter to Bluesky.
We are on the same page. The problem was that the bridge software did not follow links properly.
It chased a link that was not needed to be searched.
Randahl Fink
Troed Sångberg
Dionne (Greenseer) 🩷🐈⬛🏳️⚧️
Alexander Kuprijanko
SpaceLifeForm
Comfortably Numb