Hello users of hexbear the mod team wanted to make this post as the past couple weeks of federation have been quite eventful.

First off, I want to apologize to any hardship, stress, discomfort, alienation, or any negativity users have experienced as a result of federation. I want to especially extend apologies to marginalized comrades and those that have voiced their disapproval, disagreement, or concern about federation.

Second, in every vote based discussion we have had on federation, the votes for federation and votes for federation with large instances have trended to be near-overwhelming majorities. In the spirit of operating the site in accordance with the desires of most users, we have gone with these decisions.

Third, I want to remind everyone that you are able to set your default feed in your user settings. This is an important tool, as setting your feed to Local prevents posts from federated instances from showing on your feed. You may further curate your feed by setting it to Subscribed, and ensuring that you are only subscribed to communities you wish to see posts from. The Subscribed feed allows you to for example unsubscribe from the_dunk_tank while subscribing to all the other hexbear communities, preventing you from seeing federated instance posts as well as the_dunk_tank posts mentioning other federated instances.

We are now federated with two instances with more than 200 daily active users:

lemmy.ml

lemm.ee

Forth, I wish to remind everyone that there is a pinned post in the hexbear community that allows users to nominate a federated instance for defederation, it can be found here: https://hexbear.net/post/277518

In closing, we would like to state that this post is also a space for Hexbear users to comment on how federation has been for them.

As we are in one of those weeks when decades happen on this site, your feedback is crucial to us in deciding the direction of this forum. As such, we ask of you two questions:

  1. What are your thoughts on the Fediverse, and how has your experience changed through federation?

  2. What would you like to be done going forward, in an ideal situation?

Once this feedback is collected, we will sift through the answers to find the most popular measures advocated for, as well as the overtones of the experiences submitted, and plan what is to be done accordingly.

07

Other instance users, if you comment on this thread, you will be banned from hexbear and your comment will be removed.

  • Egon [they/them]
    ·
    10 months ago

    tl;dr:

    • The site needed something new. It was stale. So many low effort posts.
    • The vibes weren't ever cozy
    • The vibes didn't suddenly turn bad, they were off before. We were constantly arguing over petty shit. It was common discourse to complain about the bad vibes as well. People kept assuming the worst of each other.
    • All the strugglesessions people like to bring up were pre-federation hostility too.
    • The vibes in the mega and cytube are still cozy.
    • The liberals have forced us to put effort into our thoughts.
    • Federating allows us to keep the fediverse from turning into a nazi bar. The fact that it is not run by CIA ghouls means we don't get deleted like on reddit.
    • The site was once more focused on organising and agitating. It changed away from that. I think it is okay that it changes back to focus more on that again.
    • Pre-federation we also had wreckers. There's a reason we have a rule against wrecker-jacketing. Anyone disagreeing used to be accused of being a wrecker.
    • Federation has encouraged more creativity, I see less reposts of the same old memes, I see less low effort posts in general.
    • We are arguing less amongst one another.
    • Federation is good for hexbear and hexbear is good for the wider fediverse.
    • We should vet the mods of sites we think we would federate with.
    • If we are going with the airlock idea, then I think it should be reversed. Hexbear stays federated, we have one instance that's only federated with hexbear for the "cozy vibes."
    • Zodiark
      ·
      2 days ago

      deleted by creator

      • Egon [they/them]
        ·
        10 months ago

        It seems to me like you and I more or less agree. I don't think posting is praxis because someone on the internet begins agreeing with me. Two socialists sitting at home posting all day have about the same real-world impact as two libs posting all day. Believing that posting is in itself praxis is sort of like believing voting is praxis to me.
        I think posting is praxis in the sense that posting can be understood as a shorthand for agitprop, which helps radicalise others. I think the west is generally under the hegemony of capitalists, which means the general culture is capitalist as well, which means that a lot of people in the west aren't leftists, which means that the leftists in the west needs to work against this cultural hegemony. I think this work is in fact important in that it can radicalise new people, which can then go out and affect real world change.
        In other words posting is kind of praxis if your posting makes people go outside and do leftist activism.
        I don't think that should ever be the focus of any one persons organising though - Or if it is, they shouldn't write posts on a niche forum, but instead produce actual mass-distributed agitprop.
        I think the point about the site functioning as an organising space is very good, and one I read and agreed with before as well. My experience was that that function was more present earlier, and I think a site more focused on agitating and educating will also be one more focused on organising. My general experience of the site before was not one with fertile grounds for organising.

      • Mardoniush [she/her]
        ·
        10 months ago

        In fairness, Hexbear's party line has always been that Hexbear is not a substitute for real organising and activism. It's a place to shitpost, at most a place for agitprop.