> We're not banning people for buying a video game. Express your displeasure to them if you so wish, but that alone doesn't require our attention.
> Related, please don't post spoilers just to spite people. You can justify it to yourself however you like, but you're shouting into a crowd here. Not every HP fan knows J.K. Rowling is a piece of shit, and ruining the days of random bystanders ain't the way to go.
> It will cause problems for myself and .lol in general if it continues. Thanks.
That reads like a lot of the users struggle with juggling things that are in conflict.
- JK Rowling is a tervert(!) and I must tell the world.
- Nobody is allowed to enjoy anything that JK Rowling is indirectly involved with.
- This will get me / my server banned from most of the world because nobody cares.
And since there's no way to compromise, they'll sort by priority and whatever is the most important wins.
It's a hard place to be in as a server admin. You can't really ban these folks or you'll be targeted next, and they are part of the community. If you let them do their thing, other servers will nuke you just to get rid of them.
The insane people in that thread aren't kidding when they use the word "genocide". On Reddit, for example, here is someone claiming that Rowling is "actively funding the genocide of trans youth in the UK" <https://np.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/10xubmv/with_the_...>.
I was baffled to see this outrage leak into my feed. I follow some developer accounts and several tech and nature related hashtags, but people keep boosting the posts related to this story. It’s a shame, I hoped that Mastodon would offer a good place for discussion between humans, and not the Twitter-like experience.
With regards to the game itself, it is impossible to find any objective information about gameplay or performance online, and all the usual tech publications, including gaming subreddits and forums are either boycotting it or published scathing non-reviews. Any over what?! Looking at the player stats on Steam, the game is enjoying a massive popularity. I think it might be the first time a media product was too big for the outrage crowd to cancel
I tried Mastodon for a little bit but quit because the community was too much like this.
How's anyone supposed to take you seriously if you perceive an existential threat from a children's author expressing their opinion? One comment I saw claimed that she was literally killing them. I mean...
There are many Mastodon servers and thus communities. exactly with twitter, reddit, etc. it's full of everything, pick what you like. (Reddit makes this easier, Twitter tries to push the most controversial shit in your eyes. On Mastodon instances you see the local stuff mostly.)
Meta: apologies for the hot-button-issue-adjacent submission. I'm much more interested in seeing how the fediverse handles data portability in this sort of relatively large-scale shutdown than in trying to make a statement one way or the other on the issue at fault.
- The "account" primitive is just a key pair, but you can layer more auth requirements on top of that.
- All messages are always signed by your key pair end to end.
- Server admin can't read your DMs or edit your messages. The worst they can do is see public posts or delete events.
- You can move your messages between servers with via piped CLI commands.
Anyway I know there are reservations, but ultimately I think it got many of the "account" things right as compared to other fedeverse projects where the "webmaster" is still a big deal. Ideally the server side of things would be unimportant, the clients can offer compelling experiences, and people can create their own internet cul-de-sacs in a more chill way...
Maybe nostr is not "the thing" but it's better than the mastodon paradigm.
It's important to note that you can't take your posts or DMs with you when you migrate Mastodon instances.
I had to migrate a couple weeks ago because my old instance broke for 6 days while the administrator was on vacation and incommunicado, with no backup admins. https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/mastodon2.html
Who would have guessed struggle sessions[1] would come back like this in the digital age? Imagine dying and going to hell and trying to explain to Mao his legacy in terms of Harry Potter, J.K Rowling, Video Games, Mastodon and so forth.
With a perfect example of struggle sessions being found in the thread that trynewideas linked to. What miawgogo and others put nathan, the server owner, through is something to behold.
Don't forget the struggle session that results from nathan, the server's owner, admitting that he was unaware of the alleged bigotry[1] in the Harry Potter books/films. The resulting taunting of him for his ignorance by another (who, I am willing to wager a very large sum of money, was no more aware of said bigotry when originally consuming the works) ought to appear in the dictionary as an example in the definition for "struggle session".
[1] My understanding is that the alleged bigotry is said to be anti-semitism
If you consider Twitter to be toxic, wait until you experience Mastodon. It's the homeland of the most unhinged activists. Correction: sadistic bullies that have no life.
They've build tools to find out who plays/streams this game and then spam the chat. They bully people to unfollow said players. They post game spoilers everywhere on social media. They report Mastodon users playing the game, demanding a ban. And when the mod does not comply, they circle and attack the mod. The mod...whom specifically managed a LGBTQ+ instance.
The game is now antisemitic too, because it contains some ancient horn artifact?
There is no end to their sadism and pettiness. And when the damage is done, they'll high five each other and consider it another win for the humanitarian cause.
> If you consider Twitter to be toxic, wait until you experience Mastodon.
I noticed this immediately on several Twitter alts I explored and immediately stopped using them. They were massive echo chambers and circle jerks. Some of them would even turn on each other and implode over incredibly minor things.
I remember message boards imploding in the early 2000s, but that usually took years, massive circles of people leaving, and changing of hands to achieve...this was like that on a speed run; and they mostly all went back to Twitter.
This is just one of many Mastodon instances which are undergoing an extinction event which involves: turning against themselves and destroying each other. This time, it is over a children's video game.
It is really amusing to watch this when the world just ignores them and continues to play the Harry Potter wizard video game as usual and are talking about it on Twitter.
At the end of the day, there is only a few people that are winning and JK Rowling is one of them, despite not even being directly involved with the game and will earn millions out of it regardless with the complainers wasting their time and winning nothing.
This Mastodon instance lives up to it's domain really well: mastodon.lol
(Edit: I’m not saying there aren’t toxic people on Mastodon, because obviously they’re going to be on any large site. I’m disagreeing that it’s worse than Twitter. It’s all about who you interact with.)
I guess my thoughts are: isn't this activism, though? "They are using their time to impart the results that they want. They're developing the tools and implementing them to get their opinions and actions across to as many people as possible."
Is someone finding that annoying or distasteful, or thinking "wow, they have a lot of time on their hands" valid reasoning to calling them "evil and disturbed", or are people just not wanting to put the equal amount of effort to resisting/subverting that?
> The game is now antisemitic too, because it contains some ancient horn artifact?
No. The game is accused of being antisemitic because it portrays goblins with antisemitic stereotypes - greedy, gold-hoarding, hook-nosed bankers and money-lenders.
Although this isn't entirely exclusive to JKR, as Tolkein had similar issues with his original portrayal of dwarves (which he later tried to rectify,) and this sort of portrayal goes far back in folklore and was purposely rooted in antisemitism. Given JKR's other views and her recent open hostility towards what you would consider "the woke", people aren't willing to assume she was simply naive.
If you're interested in the context surrounding this controversy here are some sources. A google search can uncover more.
I wouldn't say evil, but reading through the comments makes it clear a lot of these people need therapy.
Surprisingly, it reminded me a lot of right wingers dressed up in body armor with a rifle that couldn't run a mile to save their life (or the life of the man next to them). Theres a performative element to both; They're LARPing, trying to regain a sense of control and meaning.
Until people can learn to live peacefully in a world where others oppose or are even just indifferent to things they feel strongly about, there is no real point in getting too attached to online communities. All eventually spiral into self destructive toxicity and we are left looking for alternatives.
There was an article featured the other day about how some communities on some subreddits become hostile when the community size gets too large [0] [1]. The article estimated that the critical size was Dunbar's number (150) raised to 2.5, which gives about 300k.
Mastodon.lol looks to have been around 67k up until recently [2] (which gives an exponent of about 2.2).
Something I want to point out about this: Nathan has been harassed and bullied as the only moderator on a server with 50-100k users. He's very clearly been burnt out for a while and has been struggling to cope.
A lot of people are trying to make this about the Harry Potter game, but it really isn't. Any conflict being aimed at him would have put him over the edge, it just happened to be this.
He has always tried to protect the majority of users over what any subgroup wants. He was pretty harsh as a moderator, but genuinely wanted to do the best he could.
This isn't a trans thing or a Nazi thing, this is just about burnout.
Nathan made some bad choices and said some things he really shouldn't have. He should have found a way to bring more moderators on, but he didn't. He tried to do everything on his own and it broke him.
Nathan isn't a bad person, he just got pushed too far and he snapped.
Well that is a hilarious failure, lol. All over the new Harry Potter wizard video game. It is just a game.
Just another Mastodon instance destroying itself, when JK Rowling isn't even involved in the game and still makes millions out of it. All of this outrage is just a leaf falling out a tree.
from what i understand, he was getting tons of harassment because he wasn't folding to the outrage mob and decided it wasn't worth the stress of keeping it up. i wouldnt call it a toddlers playground
So.. these random mastodon servers are islands and if they shut down you have to migrate your shit? Tbh I’ve barely paid any attention to mastodon but crap like this just makes me have less interest in it. Yay decentralization! …
Mastodon is a huge mess, and these servers shut down constantly. Imagine trying to use email but the server is run by a single stranger who gives up after 2 years and you have to reset all of your account emails.
The only feasible end result is that everyone picks one large corporate server or hosts their own. Like how email works.
In my understanding it's similar to email. We can email each other on different hosts just fine, but if my host goes down, so does my email address, and my previous emails.
[+] [-] trynewideas|3 years ago|reply
Context seems related to the new Harry Potter game: https://mastodon.lol/@nathan/109836004635134601
> We're not banning people for buying a video game. Express your displeasure to them if you so wish, but that alone doesn't require our attention.
> Related, please don't post spoilers just to spite people. You can justify it to yourself however you like, but you're shouting into a crowd here. Not every HP fan knows J.K. Rowling is a piece of shit, and ruining the days of random bystanders ain't the way to go.
> It will cause problems for myself and .lol in general if it continues. Thanks.
[+] [-] luckylion|3 years ago|reply
- JK Rowling is a tervert(!) and I must tell the world.
- Nobody is allowed to enjoy anything that JK Rowling is indirectly involved with.
- This will get me / my server banned from most of the world because nobody cares.
And since there's no way to compromise, they'll sort by priority and whatever is the most important wins.
It's a hard place to be in as a server admin. You can't really ban these folks or you'll be targeted next, and they are part of the community. If you let them do their thing, other servers will nuke you just to get rid of them.
Will Mastodon get shadow banning?
[+] [-] peppermint_gum|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TMWNN|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shantara|3 years ago|reply
With regards to the game itself, it is impossible to find any objective information about gameplay or performance online, and all the usual tech publications, including gaming subreddits and forums are either boycotting it or published scathing non-reviews. Any over what?! Looking at the player stats on Steam, the game is enjoying a massive popularity. I think it might be the first time a media product was too big for the outrage crowd to cancel
[+] [-] burnished|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] terfcomment|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] refuse|3 years ago|reply
How's anyone supposed to take you seriously if you perceive an existential threat from a children's author expressing their opinion? One comment I saw claimed that she was literally killing them. I mean...
[+] [-] pas|3 years ago|reply
https://infosec.exchange has ~50K users, interesting threads (this one was on HN recently https://infosec.exchange/@SecurityWriter/109777576538835360 )
[+] [-] pixelat3d|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Lammy|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fleddr|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stereosteve|3 years ago|reply
Maybe nostr is not "the thing" but it's better than the mastodon paradigm.
[+] [-] defrost|3 years ago|reply
* What tools | methods exist to fetch total members at Mastodon.lol on a daily basis.
* Ditto for individual names and their new migrated names.
Are any HN users planning to grab data and graph present the diaspora to other instances | falling out of sight?
[+] [-] Saris|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lapcat|3 years ago|reply
I had to migrate a couple weeks ago because my old instance broke for 6 days while the administrator was on vacation and incommunicado, with no backup admins. https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/mastodon2.html
[+] [-] EMIRELADERO|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] narrator|3 years ago|reply
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Struggle_session
[+] [-] TMWNN|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pram|3 years ago|reply
“Griffindor scarf is a hate symbol.”
[+] [-] TMWNN|3 years ago|reply
[1] My understanding is that the alleged bigotry is said to be anti-semitism
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] fleddr|3 years ago|reply
They've build tools to find out who plays/streams this game and then spam the chat. They bully people to unfollow said players. They post game spoilers everywhere on social media. They report Mastodon users playing the game, demanding a ban. And when the mod does not comply, they circle and attack the mod. The mod...whom specifically managed a LGBTQ+ instance.
The game is now antisemitic too, because it contains some ancient horn artifact?
There is no end to their sadism and pettiness. And when the damage is done, they'll high five each other and consider it another win for the humanitarian cause.
They're evil and disturbed.
[+] [-] partiallypro|3 years ago|reply
I noticed this immediately on several Twitter alts I explored and immediately stopped using them. They were massive echo chambers and circle jerks. Some of them would even turn on each other and implode over incredibly minor things.
I remember message boards imploding in the early 2000s, but that usually took years, massive circles of people leaving, and changing of hands to achieve...this was like that on a speed run; and they mostly all went back to Twitter.
[+] [-] rvz|3 years ago|reply
It is really amusing to watch this when the world just ignores them and continues to play the Harry Potter wizard video game as usual and are talking about it on Twitter.
At the end of the day, there is only a few people that are winning and JK Rowling is one of them, despite not even being directly involved with the game and will earn millions out of it regardless with the complainers wasting their time and winning nothing.
This Mastodon instance lives up to it's domain really well: mastodon.lol
[+] [-] Waterluvian|3 years ago|reply
It’s quite possible to join a server that focuses on a specific hobby and generally avoid any of that horribleness.
[+] [-] jdlshore|3 years ago|reply
(Edit: I’m not saying there aren’t toxic people on Mastodon, because obviously they’re going to be on any large site. I’m disagreeing that it’s worse than Twitter. It’s all about who you interact with.)
[+] [-] MattDemers|3 years ago|reply
Is someone finding that annoying or distasteful, or thinking "wow, they have a lot of time on their hands" valid reasoning to calling them "evil and disturbed", or are people just not wanting to put the equal amount of effort to resisting/subverting that?
[+] [-] krapp|3 years ago|reply
No. The game is accused of being antisemitic because it portrays goblins with antisemitic stereotypes - greedy, gold-hoarding, hook-nosed bankers and money-lenders.
Although this isn't entirely exclusive to JKR, as Tolkein had similar issues with his original portrayal of dwarves (which he later tried to rectify,) and this sort of portrayal goes far back in folklore and was purposely rooted in antisemitism. Given JKR's other views and her recent open hostility towards what you would consider "the woke", people aren't willing to assume she was simply naive.
If you're interested in the context surrounding this controversy here are some sources. A google search can uncover more.
[0]https://www.forbes.com/sites/danidiplacido/2022/01/05/the-ha...
[1]https://www.jta.org/2023/02/10/culture/are-the-goblins-in-th...
[+] [-] kryogen1c|3 years ago|reply
I wouldn't say evil, but reading through the comments makes it clear a lot of these people need therapy.
Surprisingly, it reminded me a lot of right wingers dressed up in body armor with a rifle that couldn't run a mile to save their life (or the life of the man next to them). Theres a performative element to both; They're LARPing, trying to regain a sense of control and meaning.
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] peterashford|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xwdv|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abetusk|3 years ago|reply
Mastodon.lol looks to have been around 67k up until recently [2] (which gives an exponent of about 2.2).
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34713553
[1] https://maximumeffort.substack.com/p/scaling-problems-in-soc...
[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20221122205835/https://mastodon....
[+] [-] Lammy|3 years ago|reply
75k as of November last year when registration was closed: https://mastodon.lol/@nathan/109374989892780399 (https://archive.ph/IXKx3)
12th largest instance listed on https://instances.social/list/advanced#lang=&allowed=&prohib...
[+] [-] SanjayMehta|3 years ago|reply
Frankly this seems to be manufactured outrage: do these people have nothing better to do with their time?
[+] [-] nipponese|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yucky|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] grapesurgeon|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] rolenthedeep|3 years ago|reply
A lot of people are trying to make this about the Harry Potter game, but it really isn't. Any conflict being aimed at him would have put him over the edge, it just happened to be this.
He has always tried to protect the majority of users over what any subgroup wants. He was pretty harsh as a moderator, but genuinely wanted to do the best he could.
This isn't a trans thing or a Nazi thing, this is just about burnout.
Nathan made some bad choices and said some things he really shouldn't have. He should have found a way to bring more moderators on, but he didn't. He tried to do everything on his own and it broke him.
Nathan isn't a bad person, he just got pushed too far and he snapped.
[+] [-] rvz|3 years ago|reply
Just another Mastodon instance destroying itself, when JK Rowling isn't even involved in the game and still makes millions out of it. All of this outrage is just a leaf falling out a tree.
Dear, Oh dear.
[+] [-] a1445c8b|3 years ago|reply
1. Some HP video game is release;
2. Users who bought it mentioned it in mastodon.lol;
3. Other users want to ban them because...JK Rowling is...a Nazi(?);
4. Other users posted spoilers because...JK Rowling bad and anyone who does not know that deserves getting their day ruined(?);
5. Mastodon.lol owner chide these other users and gets harassed as a result;
6. Mastodon.lol owner decides to shut down site;
Is mastodon.lol really just a toddlers’ playground rather than a town hall?
[+] [-] grapesurgeon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] haunter|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] helf|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Gigachad|3 years ago|reply
The only feasible end result is that everyone picks one large corporate server or hosts their own. Like how email works.
[+] [-] npteljes|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brianjking|3 years ago|reply