Mastodawn

École des Bro-Arts

Ofcom is undertaking a paid survey for people who work for companies in scope of the UK #OnlineSafetyAct. If any of y'all are running Mastodon/Akkoma/Pixelfed/etc servers and have some kind of legal entity for doing so, drop me a line and I'll make an introduction.

I'm gonna ask if that's *just* companies or if any community forum counts.

École des Bro-Arts 3d ago

Just heard back from the #OnlineSafetyAct survey folks: they'd also like to hear from people who run informal/volunteer community sites. Anyone who runs a Mastodon instance, Pixelfed server, PHPBB forum, etc. and has any UK users.

If you'd like me to put you in touch with the survey group, feel free to DM me, or email [email protected], with your name, email, and the site you run. I'll pass that on to Serrula Research, which is running the survey for Ofcom.

tetchy af 3d ago

@aphyr I wonder whether I want to sign up. I made the determination that my users might be UK domiciled but I don’t have target users as I have no sign ups and no intention of doing so.

Maybe? Sure? I’ll do it.

École des Bro-Arts 3d ago

@af Okie doke. Name, email, and forum?

Lx Leckford 3d ago

@aphyr What would be good would be to include people who’ve closed down or reduced services in anticipation of the Online Safety Act but they’re likely to be hard to recruit

École des Bro-Arts 3d ago

@lx I'm not the surveyor here, sorry. Just a random instance admin.

Christopher M0YNG 2d ago

@aphyr maybe? Mastodon.Radio is hosted and I live in the UK. It wouldn't be hard for ofcom to work this out.
What's the confidentiality situation with this research?
I'd rather not appear under ofcom's nose in a list of sites to pay close attention to...

École des Bro-Arts 2d ago

@M0YNG I have no idea, sorry! They promise a certain degree of anonymity in the survey, but I can't vouch for the research firm.

Neil Brown 4d ago

@aphyr Nice way to gather a list of fedi servers in scope of the OSA :)

⊥ᵒᵚ Cᵸᵎᶺᵋᶫ∸ᵒᵘ ☑️4d ago

@neil @aphyr but not the ones run by people with no lawyers :-(

@falken @neil @aphyr
I don't think you have to have a lawyer to participate. It sounds like the survey is for "companies", so even a "sole proprietorship" would be a company.

@aphyr We're constantly told by people "Ofcom have no choice in this, they're just poor innocent victims that have to enforce a law set down by idiots". Frankly, why even bother engaging with them if that's the case? Reminded of a famous lecture - "Don't Talk To The Police".

École des Bro-Arts 3d ago

@ret erm... both of us have talked a fair bit, publicly, about our struggles with the OSA, right? Weren't we both in their webinars and meetings?

I feel like the cat's probably out of the bag there haha

@aphyr for sure. I think I’ve been jaded by any involvement I have had with them though. It’s just staffed by people who either believe their own hype and are actively invested in this attack on freedom of expression, or people who are ambivalent and just there for the cushy job/pension. Talking to them has achieved precisely nothing so far, try as many of us did to change things. I think energy is better spent either protecting ourselves from them (driving more people to decentralised platforms and out of their reach) or undermining their efforts in any legal way possible.

École des Bro-Arts 3d ago

@ret sure, that's fine. I didn't mind getting $60 to tell them the same stuff I wrote them in an email though, haha.

Jigme Datse 3d ago

@aphyr My understanding is it may actually apply even if none of your users are in the UK. But since I'm just me, and I've just not had the spoons, I haven't confirmed that.