this post was submitted on 11 Dec 2023
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Newbie question here... What's the difference between federated and de-federated?
So you need to look at the number of de federations. That is basically how many other instances have blocked them and do not receive content from them to their feed. You can still go to all these instances using their respective urls and see what they are like. The reasons for blocking them vary depending on the instance. Edit: They can still be federated with other instances that don't block them creating their own little fediverse bubbles.
Federated means that any instance that is federated with them receives their content and can bee seen on that instance.
Defederated means they are not federated anymore, thus blocking both users and content.
It's usually done to combat content you don't want on your instance
Ok ok... So me using Lemmy.world is a specific instance of Lemmy, so it's almost like its own server? And other instances (maybe lemmy.unitiedstates?) is its own federated instance likely related to just U.S. posts and it can communicate with other instances? Do de-federated instances have no other communication with instances?
Apologies if these are silly, I feel like a dum dum because everyone else seems to grasp this except me.
When you use Gmail to send an email to Outlook, those two servers are federated.
Defederation blocks communication between servers.
You pretty much got it! One nitpick, your example of Lemmy.unitedStates is not NECESSARILY a federated instance, just an instance. It may or may not be federated with other instances.
De-federated instances lose communication to/from the instances that said "im gonna de-federate from these Nazis", so again you pretty much got it right :) not silly questions at all! It's a new concept to many people and I promise you MANY people have and will ask these "dumb" (but not actually) questions!
Got it! Tysm for the help I'm learninnnnng
Defederated means that the server has been forbidden from connecting and communicating with specific other servers that have decided to defederate with it, so users from the server can't see or interact with users and posts on the server that defederated it and vice versa. Hopefully I was clear and coincise.
One way to think of it is to think of each instance as a person/account, and every instance that they federate with is someone they follow, and anyone that they're defederated with is someone they've blocked.
So if one instance follows (federates) with another, that instances users will see posts and users from that other instance.
If an instance blocks (defederates) with another, it prevents the instance from sending or receiving any new posts or comments with the blocked instance, cutting all communication. In the case of Poast at the top of the list, 1474 instances decided to block it and prevent any new posts or comments from that instance showing up to their users.
Instances that aren't explicitly federated or defederated yet (unknown) are sort of in a limbo, they won't be seen at all by any users unless someone from either instance actively searches for a community from the other vir via a direct community link in the searchbox, then those server will follow (federate) with each other.
I hope that made sense, I'm trying to think of better ways to word this but I'm not sure if it's a good explanation or not.