this post was submitted on 05 Dec 2023
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[Discussion] alien.top bots (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by InEnduringGrowStrong@sh.itjust.works to c/agora@sh.itjust.works
26 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

English message:

As some of you may have noticed, there's an instance with 1.1M bots reposting reddit posts and comments accross communities in several other instances.  

I expect there are multiple valid opinions on the subject and this thread is meant to get a feeling of everyone's opinion on the situation. 

You might also want to read lemmy.ca's discussion on that here which is a pretty decent thread about the subject.  

Things that I think need to be pointed out:  

  • alien.top currently has 1.1M bots, only 6 of those are weekly users logging in. 
  • together they've made 1.59M comments accross a multitude of communities in other instances.
  • That project claims to be trying to get reddit users to switch to lemmy. 
  • They have a portal to allow reddit users to claim and take over their bot persona. 
  • alien.top has a single local community, the bots all post on different instances with copies of different subreddits.

I don't have an exhaustive list of such communities,  I haven't found an official one.  I'll post a fewfrom my personal blocklist in a comment below. 

And a note on the upcoming 0.19 release: 

  • the new user-level instance block feature will block all the communities of the blocked instances,  but will not block these users' posts or comments if they are done on another instance's community.  

My opinion isn't any more valid then anyone else's so I'll put it in a comment below.

Our users' input is welcomed.

What do you, dear users of sh.itjust.works, think about federation with them?

Thanks

Message français:

Comme certains d'entre vous l'ont peut-être remarqué, il y a une instance peuplée de 1,1M de bots qui copient ees posts et commentaires Reddit dans plein de communautés sur plusieurs autres instances.

Il y a plusieurs opinions sur le sujet et ce fil de discussion vise à prendre le pouls de l'opinion générale sur la situation.

Je vous suggères de lire la discussion chez lemmy.ca à ce sujet ici, discussion intéressante. 

Quelques points qui, selon moi, doivent être soulignés :

  • alien.top compte actuellement 1,1 million de robots, dont seulement 6 sont des utilisateurs hebdomadaires qui se login.
  • collectivement, ils ont déjà fait 1,59 million de commentaires dans une multitude de communautés dans différentes instances.
  • Ce projet proclame essayer de convertir des utilisateurs de Reddit à passer à Lemmy.
  • Il existe un portail pour permettre aux utilisateurs de Reddit de prendre contrôle de leur version bot.
  • alien.top a une seule communauté locale, les bots publient tous sur différentes instances, des copies de différents subreddits.

Je n'ai pas de liste exhaustive de ces communautés, à première vue, je n'en trouve pas une liste officielle.  Je mettrai dans un commentaire ci-dessous quelques communautés que j'ai bloqué au niveau personnel. 

Pour finir,  une note sur la version 0.19 de lemmy qui s'en vient :

  • La nouvelle fonctionnalité pour bloquer une instance au niveau d'un uutilisateur bloquera toutes les communautés d'une instance bloquée, mais ne bloquera pas les publications ou les commentaires de ces utilisateurs s'ils sont publiés dans une communauté d'une autre instance.

Mon opinion n'est pas meilleur qu'une autre et je mettrai plutôt dans un commentaire ci-bas.

Les commentaires de nos utilisateurs sont les bienvenus.

Que pensez-vous, cher utilisateurs de sh.itjust.works de la fédération avec eux?

Merci

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[–] InEnduringGrowStrong@sh.itjust.works 13 points 11 months ago (2 children)

The following is just my opinion.

First, my issues with this as a user. 

The project claims to try to achieve mostly 2 things:  

  • Get redditors to switch
  • Kick-start communities/subreddits

Personally, I don't see how having a copy of your content history really helps in getting a reddit user to switch. 

On kick-starting communities with content, this is debatable. 

Personally, I think it instead creates somewhat of an illusion of content, a firehose of unmoderated reddit content that a lemmy user can't really engage with because the 1M users aren't here, not really, they're on reddit.  You could already feel like a ghost by visiting a reddit thread a few hours old, this just ensures no-one of your interactions do anything.
Plenty of those are meant to be a discussion, in this case, one which you can't be part of.
If I wanted to lurk reddit without any way to interact with them, I'd just go to reddit or use one of the several front-ends like LibReddit. 

The communities themselves are just bots talking to each other. An echo of a conversion that's happening on reddit, with the odd lemmy not realizing they're commenting into the void of reddit bots.  I know I've done just that a few times before realizing the OP or commenter would never get it. 

It is also somewhat difficult to deal with as a user,  because even if you block alien.top in 0.19, it won't do anything.   You'd still have to stay on top of the new instances that pop-up and keep blocking the new ones. 

Now, my issues with this as an admin: 

This firehose is unmoderated and it is unrealistic to expect any lemmy instance to take on moderation for all the spam and gavage that inevitably comes along with it.  It is openly breaking reddit ToS.
Don't get me wrong, I have no lost love for reddit, but such flagrant infringement is bound to attract unwanted legal attention sooner or later.  While "Reddit can suck it" is a vibe I don't disagree with, I'd still rather not deal with their lawyers for hosting stolen content.  

The author's comments are also somewhat problematic in that regard, they're claiming to be "at war with reddit", have publicly flaunted breaking reddit ToS, not caring for either their permission nor the consequences.   Even if they do implement a 2-way bridge with reddit, they'll be insta-banned by reddit.

Seems more like a liability than a positive.

All this for 6 active users that have maybe switched. 

I'd be inclined to block them at the instance level. 

[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 7 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I think the best idea is to just defederate from them for the meantime. They haven't asked us permission to bridge our communities or post their content in our communities and are actively destroying what makes Lemmy nice. Even if the bidirectional bridges end up working, lemmy would be the second class way of seeing that content, and would make Lemmy seem cheap, slow, old, etc compared to Reddit.

[–] Cheradenine@sh.itjust.works 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I can't find it now, but there was a long post on blahaj about it too.

[–] InEnduringGrowStrong@sh.itjust.works 3 points 11 months ago

I suspect that's a discussion most instances will end up having eventually.