mekka okereke Oct 7, 2025

I gotta admit, I am loving how little of the conversation is just "BlueSky bad! Mastodon good! 🤡" and how much of it is "BlueSky is not ideal for Black users, but let's be for real, neither is Mastodon. We don't have control over BlueSky, but we do have some agency with Mastodon. How can we make Mastodon better? Where are we with improving the issues that make this place unwelcoming for Black users? Clearly, more Black users chose BlueSky than Mastodon. Have we addressed the reasons why?" ♥️🥹

Seriously, I count ~5 conversations in the improvement framing direction. I love to see it! Shame on me for having lower expectations.

I'm unapologetically backing improvements across ActivityPub and ATProto. I back Hachyderm/Mastodon and BlackSky. You can just back both teams! Nothing in the rules says you can't do that!

Show threadMastodon MigrationOct 7, 2025

@mekkaokereke

On the subject of improving Mastodon. This may be an opportunity to rekindle developer attention on the 'Followers Only' dogpiling harassment vector. Felt like some progress on the issue was made back in November, but don't know where it stands now.

cc: @stefan

Show threadStefan BohacekOct 7, 2025

@mastodonmigration

I wonder if @scottjenson might be interested in connecting with
@mekkaokereke, that is, if he'd like to share some thoughts.

(Unless you two already spoke, in which case, please disregard!)

Show threadStefan BohacekOct 7, 2025

@mastodonmigration But yes, that particular issue, I have not heard/seen any updates either.

@scottjenson @mekkaokereke

Show threadScott JensonOct 7, 2025

@stefan @mastodonmigration
Yes, @mekkaokereke and I spoke about to how best present Quote Posts and his advice had a direct impact on what we shipped. We're about to reach out for another round of discussions with a wide range of people (but I don't think we've contacted Mekka just yet)

It's so tempting to take the engineering approach and think "this feature will do it!" when we likely need to back up and talk about bigger issues such as culture and moderation.

Show threadMastodon MigrationOct 7, 2025

@scottjenson @stefan @mekkaokereke

It is great to see this conversation take off. You did a fabulous job with quote posts and it would be wonderful if this issue could get the same kind of careful attention. Completely agree that a proper requirements driven approach is warranted. Thank you.

Show threadScott JensonOct 7, 2025
@mastodonmigration always happy to chat
Show threadMastodon MigrationOct 7, 2025

@scottjenson
@mekkaokereke
@stefan

Great. Just to be really clear. What seems to be the issue is a type of hidden dogpiling or 'brigading.'

A tight group folks who's purpose is to harass someone follow each other, 'the brigade'.

One of them composes a harassing post specifically targeting someone who they @ mention, and post it using "Followers Only" reply controls.

The rest of the 'brigade' piles on.

The post is only seen by the targeted person(s) and the harassers.

Show threadScott JensonOct 7, 2025
@mastodonmigration @stefan
Can you help me understand how followers only posts are harder for moderation to catch? I understand they are not public but they can still be reported? I'm trying to tackle this problem from the moderation agle as a server block helps so many more people (if we can pull it off)
Show threadevanaOct 7, 2025

@scottjenson @mastodonmigration @stefan followers-only posts require the *victim* to report the attack. Depending on the volume and ferocity of the harassment, the victim may not be in a position to do this (either due to harassment across several channels, or unawareness of reporting and moderation options).

As an example, I piled into this thread to help out with an example, but I wouldn't have seen it to help out if it were "followers only".

I can see the positive value in being able to restrict a discussion, but it seems like "all my friends plus one more" might be a dangerous model.

Take all this with a grain of salt, as I haven't actually been subject to this kind of abuse, and am privileged in a bunch of ways which probably shield me from having to consider the worst of it.

Show threadScott JensonOct 7, 2025

@evana @mastodonmigration @stefan This is very helpful thank you. The workaround suggested is to have new filter that blocks all followers only posts that also include you. For this to be effective, it would need to default to being ON, which might rub many the wrong way. Defaulting to OFF means victims need to find and turn this on (which seems unlikely)

I'm trying to brainstorm other solutions that offer more protection (but I'm coming up short) Are there any others?

Show threadevanaOct 7, 2025

@scottjenson @mastodonmigration @stefan I don't have good ideas yet, but a couple probably-obvious observations:

* New and less-technical users are probably more likely to completely exit the platform due to harassment
* Experienced and technical users will probably have connections and better ability to bring tools into play
* Followers-only specifically separates the participants from any other network than the original poster. This probably needs to be communicated _really clearly_
* I can see followers-only as a good solution for sensitive discussions, but you want the recipients to understand that the information is sensitive so they don't allude to it/repost it without that privacy
* There's a tension between privacy defaults and broadening the web of social connection and discovery. The most private default would remove a lot of the social network value, so you'll rarely get a clear "win" without at least some damage to other cases

Show threadScott Jenson

@evana @mastodonmigration @stefan Agree with your points but we're still circling around the issue of how likely this happens (and how)

I DONT want to imply I don't believe people that say it happens, I'm just trying to understand the broader flow, i.e. how can a Brigade operate in secrecy? It just seems very fragile as they likely do other things that get them banned. Have we seen a large scale brigade that worked this way for a while? What causes them to trip up? Let's focus on that.

Oct 7, 2025 at 9:30pmWeb
Show threadinfinite love ⴳOct 8, 2025

@scottjenson @evana @mastodonmigration @stefan

> they likely do other things that get them banned

not necessarily? think of a messaging app that supports group messages. you create a group chat with your buddies and one other person. the person being added can:

- not accept the invite
- remove themselves from the group
- block people in the group
- report messages in the group

in the last scenario, mods do not have full context. the user has to attach any relevant context.

Show threadinfinite love ⴳOct 8, 2025

@scottjenson @evana @mastodonmigration @stefan but because there is a private aspect, you would be free to act differently than you would otherwise act in public, and your only avenue for consequences would be *if* the added person reports y'all.

so the gap here is that people aren't being made aware that they can/should report such harassment. i don't think doing away with private posts solves anything.

one thing that could be done is to filter followers-only like mentioned-only, but...

Show threadinfinite love ⴳOct 8, 2025

@scottjenson @evana @mastodonmigration @stefan ...such a change might be unexpected if not communicated appropriately ahead-of-time. in effect, it would collapse the "public"/"followers"/"direct" into just "public"/"not public".

you'd probably also want the filter to be a bit smarter about what counts as "unsolicited", because even public mentions can be "unsolicited".

and of course i'd be remiss to leave out my usual advocacy for allowing people to create explicit contexts which they control!

Show threadevanaOct 8, 2025

@scottjenson @mastodonmigration @stefan I suspect in some cases, the brigades happen on servers with loose moderation (whether that's intentional, understaffed mods, cultural gaps, etc).

And, as mentioned elsewhere, if the target is new or a frequent target of harassment, they may not trust the moderation team. Right now, I think the moderation teams generally don't have visibility into this activity -- this means that they probably handle it less effectively, *increasing* the distrust of moderation from the targets. (And, if we assume that the targets are generally more-marginalized to begin with, they may have a learned distrust of authority to begin with.)

I'm not sure that removal is the only option (and I don't understand which bits are client and server here), but it seems like both a client "do you want to participate in this conversation" and a moderator "user X was added to a conversation in this pattern" as default behaviors would be a starting point.