Throwback to this unique plushie I made back in 2023. I tend to forget about it but I actually love it! Look at that little guy!

@p @epsi @Stellar @NonPlayableClown Are they actually going to leave #4chan then? Make a new forum? Spin up their own #rebased / #Soapbox / #Mastodon instance on the #Fediverse?

Seems like many users are leaving for #8chan tho.

Very excited to be at an in-person @Mastodon aperitivo at #IJF25. @andypiper is welcoming us all and setting the stage. The #fediverse can help build a more free, more international, more democratic social web.

Pixelfed before v0.12.5 has a vulnerability where it could leak your private posts, regardless of whether you are a Pixelfed user or not.
Admins should update ASAP.

When following someone from a different server on the Fediverse, the remote server decides whether you are allowed to do that. This enables features like locked accounts. Due to an implementation mistake, Pixelfed ignores this and allows anyone to follow even private accounts on other servers. If a legitimate user from a Pixelfed instance follows you on your locked account, anyone on that Pixelfed instance can read your private posts.

I wrote a blog post about how I found the vulnerability, how disclosure coordination went and general ramblings about Fediverse safety:
https://fokus.cool/2025/03/25/pixelfed-vulnerability.html

I just discovered why some of my followers from larger #Mastodon instances (like mastodon.social) would mysteriously unfollow me after a while!

A pull request was just merged in Mastodon that fixes a critical bug in their follower synchronization mechanism.

Turns out Mastodon implements the FEP-8fcf specification (Followers collection synchronization across servers), but it expected all followers to be in a single page collection. When followers were split across multiple pages, it would only see the first page and incorrectly remove all followers from subsequent pages!

This explains so much about the strange behavior I've been seeing with #Hollo and other #Fedify-based servers over the past few months. Some people would follow me from large instances, then mysteriously unfollow later without any action on their part.

Thankfully this fix has been marked for backporting, so it should appear in an upcoming patch release rather than waiting for the next major version. Great news for all of us building on #ActivityPub!

This is why I love open source—we can identify, understand, and fix these kinds of interoperability issues together. 😊

@GossiTheDog "Mastodon" really needs to get cracking on full data portability, IMHO.

It's a shame this hasn't been pushed higher up on the list of things to do.

I think many people have invested quite a bit of time and effort into their posts and profiles, and moving all that data, or somehow managing a switch-over doesn't seem to be that simple, if at all possible.

New: Fediverse Report 109

This week, an essay about #Bluesky's proposal for setting user preferences on their accounts. This allows people to indicate how they want their data to be handled off-protocol. I wrote about how the #fediverse can improve on this, using its strengths of many different communities, each with its own culture and values.

Also:
- Next week is the digital conference @fediforum
- A research dataset to compare Threads and Mastodon users

Read at:

Mastodon Pro Tip: Ever miss "that good post" you made a while back? Just search for it! Type in the search bar:

from:me word

And there it is.

My campaign on Instagram and Facebook for a migration to the Fediverse. Funnily enough, it brought a lot of new friends from the Fediverse itself.

What's up with mastodon.social instance @Gargron?
Yesterday it was cdn.concert.io and today it's admanager.concert.io.

There is absolutely no explanation over why they are integrated with the instance. Once again thanks to #TrackerControl which exposed these integrations.

It's time to ditch the mastoson.social instance.

Saddling small sites with the same duties as huge platforms means many will shut down in a hammer blow to net plurality.

We'll be left with the Sophie’s choice of monopoly services; the incubators of online harms.

URGENT: The UK government must change the Online Safety Act to protect safe, non-commercial blogs, forums and fediverse.

Write to your MP to #SaveOurSites 🌐

https://action.openrightsgroup.org/save-our-sites-write-your-mp

During my talk today at the Fediverse House, I quoted @danirabbit :

RE: https://mastodon.online/@danirabbit/113919277314661343

I think I just onboarded someone to the fediverse. I didn’t say “decentralized” or “open source” or “server” or even mention email lol I just said “It’s like you can follow anyone from any social network and there’s no ads”

@newyorktimes's veteran tech reporter John Markoff interviewed some of #TeamFediverse including @Gargron, @reckless1280 and our CEO @mike for a feature on the rise of decentralized social media. “It goes back to the original principles where the internet started out as decentralized,” Eugen Rochko told Markoff. Here's the full story [may be paywalled].

We're so excited to develop these conversations further at SXSW this weekend — check out the itinerary and sign up to join us at #FediverseHouse at the second link.

https://flip.it/NcjhLL

https://lu.ma/xbve5fa0

I'm finally unveiling the #ActivityPub project that has been consuming my weekends: Encyclia, an #ORCID bridge that will make ORCID records followable and interactable on the fediverse. 🙂

It's early-stage and the ORCID following function is not publicly available yet. We're seeking community feedback on functionality and safety aspects. Read more at https://encyclia.pub or follow @encyclia for news!

As a part of this socially-asocial #Fediverse network I would like to talk to you on the other side of the ocean.

I rarely write posts in #English and I only have very few followers that are not #Czech or #Slovakian, so I'm not sure if this ever reaches my target audience of this post - the #USA citizens.

I am seriously concerned about what is happening lately with your country, who was supposed to be (or was acting like) a #democracy beacon. Yet, somehow you managed to reach the point, where #president, who most of you (!) elected is felon, who pardons criminals and does pretty rude political statements to country, who is losing lives of it's citizens only because they have chosen the path of being a #free nation.

As a person from central #EU I must admit this is seriously hard to watch as I expected your society to be #freedom and #liberty friendly and yet I see your president fueling #propaganda from #Russia and bullying president of #Ukraine.

I do not think this is a great way to #StopWar - this is a way to lose it. I'm hell-of-a-sure that befriending pretty much dictator of #Russia while his propagandists talks about nuking Washington is not a good idea, but somehow your president believes it is.

Please reconsider and act, this is not funny and people are dying. Your voices need to be heard or somehow you might find out you live in country you never imagined...

Holy shit, the Fediverse is really getting on my nerves again. IT'S SO FULL OF PANIC AND FUD, HOLY SHIT.

And sadly, I have many people in my Timeline again who are boosting all these panic posts... "xyz has enshittified, it's so horrible!! I don't care what xyz actually says, I just read what I want to read and hey it's sooo bad for the FOSS community, isn't it?".

It's so annoying... PLEASE read the blog post that @finn and I have written...

https://steffo.blog/outrage-warps-reality/

Regarding Firefox: Sure, the change is sus. But do we factually know more? No? Just guesses? THEN DON'T SPREAD IT LIKE WILDFIRE! :drgn_scream_angry:

I heard from multiple people that the change might just be because the American Law System sucks and that it is required. (Other browsers like ungoogled-chromium have the same issue too, apparently.) I mean, the use could also just mean "hey, now Firefox is legally allowed to give the data you input in Firefox to the websites". Do you know what Mozilla plans? If not, then don't spread guesses like they're facts. Thank you.

We at Vivaldi are the only browser company with a Mastodon server. We have chosen to support the Fediverse in every way we can. We will continue to do so as we need options away from Big Tech.

https://social.vivaldi.net/

#Vivaldi @Vivaldi

@Gargron we need to create a world where people thrive and live full lives at peace with each other and nature wherever they are. Its not utopic, its a necessity for our survival.

And the #fediverse you are helping in its baby steps is an integral part of that journey. You are already an inspiration for many.

@mkljczk@fediverse.pl You do realise that there are no algorithms here in the #Fediverse so "engagement bait" isn't a thing here?

Important edit:
Meanwhile, the admin responded and clarified the situation. It was a configuration mistake. #antifa was auto blocked because of spam (if I got this correctly?) and #NoAfD basically for the same reason. The latter, however, wasn't resolved that fast because it has never been reported. Which is believable because it's super German specific.
https://floss.social/@admin/114041817627451631

Original:
@admin I'm sorry, what?!

@OddDev Thanks for reporting; this has been fixed.

There is a small number of hashtags that trended early in the history of the "trending hashtags", and not since then, that had a misconfiguration applied to them some years ago.

Because Mastodon has still not improved the trending hashtags admin feature since then, there are no admin tools to manage hashtags that aren't trending, so the only way we can (quickly) resolve this scenario is once they are discovered and reported.

Update: they’ve reportedly reinstated the #antifa hashtag. As well as #noAFD, which was, apparently, also blocked.

***

Hey FLOSS.social, do you understand that “antifa” stands for “anti fascist?” Do you know what folks who are anti-anti fascist are? That’s right, they’re fascists.

While you’re at it, you might also want to look up what the “F” and the “L” in your name stand for.

If they don’t fix this ASAP, I’d recommend a swift #fediblock by any instance that isn’t fascist.

Important edit:
Meanwhile, the admin responded and clarified the situation. It was a configuration mistake. #antifa was auto blocked because of spam (if I got this correctly?) and #NoAfD basically for the same reason. The latter, however, wasn't resolved that fast because it has never been reported. Which is believable because it's super German specific.
https://floss.social/@admin/114041817627451631

Original:
@admin I'm sorry, what?!

#Fediverse #Mastodon #FLOSS #antifascism

I’m curious. This place has a very vocal anti-capitalist community, anytime moneys come up people shout about donations. When it comes to consent and Trust & Safety I’ve seen many people attack devs. Yet, when #Mastodon was asking for donations to fund a position it was largely crickets. #IFTAS has done great work and set out to be a great benefit to the #fediverse and #OpenSocialWeb yet they’re struggling to keep the lights on. How can that be? So many of you are always talking about donations so why are projects underfunded and servers shutting down due to lack of funding? Where are you passionate and vocal lot? https://wedistribute.org/2025/02/iftas-funding-crisis/

When I come across a long post in my feed, after a certain number of words it's cut off and, if I want to see the rest, I have to click Read More. Is this not the case for everybody?

I just saw someone complaining about the length of someone else's post and it got me wondering.

does a preview object have to have it's own unique ID: https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-preview ???

/cc @evan @trwnh @johnonolan

We're not only building Pixelfed, but also Loops, a TikTok alternative!

We need your support now more than ever, please spread the word about our Kickstarter!

The future is federated, and belongs to the people.

Boost if you agree ✨

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pixelfed/pixelfed-foundation-2024-real-ethical-social-networks?ref=1hx75e