The Beehaw project is entering some significant challenges

There is a lot of discussion happening in the background of our project here. We could not anticipate all of the challenges that we were going to face a few years ago. One of the reasons for this was because we had no idea what our choice of a platform would bring.

Specifically, we chose Lemmy as the software that we would use to launch our endeavor to attempt a safe space for marginalized persons online.

In the first year or so, this choice was completely successful for a very small number of users. And then we all experienced an enormous influx of users when Reddit announced/implemented their shutting down of third party apps.

Since then there has been a huge number of people that have joined the Beehaw project. This tsunami of users initiated technical problems, and otherwise, that we could not foresee.

Thankfully and fortunately, we have had a couple of incredibly knowledgeable persons that have swooped in to ’save the day’ and keep this site running.

Unfortunately, these persons will NOT be able to continue to support the Beehaw project much further. They have life commitments and other factors, including careers and family life, that will prevent them from contributing to our project in an ongoing fashion.

All that being said, Lemmy (the software that Beehaw runs on) development is incredibly slow and is riddled with problems that makes administration/moderation very painful.

Therefore, we are left with some options that may feel uncomfortable to us. For example, we may want to consider leaving the Fediverse for another software platform that does NOT include ActivityPub. To explain, Fediverse/ActivityPub are very positive concepts on the foundational level. However, the Beehaw project is struggling to include this because most of our moderation/content/ethos is being jeopardized from OTHER federated instances (i.e. it, mostly, is NOT coming from within our own Beehaw registered user base).

The aforementioned persons, that have ’swooped in to save the day’, have been discussing/working with us to come up with the best solutions that would enable the Beehaw project to continue while NOT needing incredibly experienced/technically adept persons around.

Right now, we are testing alternative software platforms and evaluating them based on everything that we want Beehaw to become in the future.

Thank you all for your continued support of the Beehaw project and entrusting us to make this happen.

shortwavesurfer,

I can understand, but this would not be fun at first. I subscribe to a number of beehaw communities because they are the the biggest in their niche like technology. The beehaw communities are often even bigger than the same communities on instances like lemmy.ml.

6daemonbag,

I’d hate to see y’all go but the growing pains are quite obvious and I would understand the departure. Lemmy has become the only social media platform that I use and I’ll be sticking around here for time being.

Notnotmike,
@Notnotmike@beehaw.org avatar

Agreed. I like the positive vibe of beehaw, but I’m really here for the Reddit alternative and for the fediverse. I don’t want a walled garden, I want to be exposed to other communities, I just want them to be civil is all.

I already have accounts on other instances, so I’ll likely switch to an alternative instance and be very sad for it. But I respect the admin’s right to do it.

HelixTitan,

Maybe I am the weird one, but I always saw this “federation” as weird. It seems like a halfbaked idea. I don’t think much is lost. Only downside is user count might be small

furrowsofar,

Regarding Federation … The web, email, Usenet, the internet itself, these are/were all federated platforms. They are also all open and always have issues with bad actors.

The other side of it, it is all a work in progress especially lemmy. So it is all half baked in that sense. Especially in the case of bad actors, there are known things to address but no solutions. People do not even agree in what a bad actor is until things get extreme.

RiikkaTheIcePrincess,
@RiikkaTheIcePrincess@kbin.social avatar

Well, that's kinda sad.

Sign of federated-not-Reddit-thingle carking it? Maybe. Sign that it's about time for myself to give up and leave? Maybe.

I blame everyone. Boo, us! scowls scoldingly at all, including itself

Cube6392,
@Cube6392@beehaw.org avatar
  1. Do what must be done, anyone who wants both the beehaw experience and the lemmy experience can handle two accounts
  2. Please pin this post, so people know what’s being discussed
db0,
@db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Is finding a new sysadmin an impossible task?

Quexotic,

I’ll follow if it’s time to go. I understand. Thank you.

MJBrune,

It’d be a huge disappointment to see beehaw defederate everything. I’d be even more disappointed if it moved to common web forums or something else. One thing that’s lost is the ability to let other communities in.

I don’t know if it’s possible but you could deny federation by default for every other instance until their mod team sets up a communication line to make moderation easier towards both communities.

That said I suspect this response comes from the recent federation poll where it sounded like a lot of people wanted to federate back into the larger instances again. Beehaw doesn’t have the mod team to really do that and in some ways it’s counter to keeping the space nice since those instances aren’t moderate with being nice as a priority.

alyaza,
@alyaza@beehaw.org avatar

That said I suspect this response comes from the recent federation poll where it sounded like a lot of people wanted to federate back into the larger instances again. Beehaw doesn’t have the mod team to really do that and in some ways it’s counter to keeping the space nice since those instances aren’t moderate with being nice as a priority.

we’re working on coding the results and i’ll just say that no, this was neither prompted by the survey nor are its results informing what’s being talked about here.

ShellMonkey, (edited )
@ShellMonkey@lemmy.socdojo.com avatar

Just unticking the federation option would allow for a lot more direct control in itself. Pethaps more of a discussion of what the challenges of losing a couple technical resources are could help bring out some solutions. Maintaining an instance at a base level is pretty easy, performance is another matter perhaps.

leetnewb, (edited )

Selfishly, I would like to see beehaw remain on the fediverse. I enjoy the community, the curation, and desire for strong moderation. It is a great window to the broader fediverse link aggregator community. Beehaw’s ideals and structure clearly appealed to many Redditors and the like. The concept of federated communities seemed appealing, and beehaw is an important voice in the evolution of the moderation of a federated network.

However, the sacrifice that the admins have had to put into making the platform survive while the software finds its uncertain way through a mountain of growing pains seems unsustainable (just my pov through the last 3 months) - not just on the technical side. There’s that saying - when you find yourself in a hole, quit digging. It’s hard to see how moving from Lemmy to something more sustainable, if it exists, would be the wrong move.

Painful decisions rarely come with a flashing light that scream “now’s the time” - but the loss of your major technical contributors sounds stunningly close.

Edit> fixed a typo or two

Empricorn,

Every single part of Beehaw seems ill-suited to the fediverse. I joined (like many) after Reddit shit the bed by banning 3rd-party apps. I wrote a thoughtful (mandatory) application essay and… silence. Never heard back. Later, I reacted to a particularly bad take in a Beehaw thread and was told that I wasn’t “being nice” like the rules required… Bitch, I’m not even a part of the your “community”! You chose to federate with the rest of us! I guess what I’m trying to say is byeeeeeeeee! Go start your own little puritan community somewhere I don’t have to encounter it…

apotheotic,

You know how on reddit, and many other platforms, subcommunities within those platforms have rules? Like some subreddits had a no image macros rule? If you posted an image macro to one of those subs, and get warned or your post is actioned, that entirely on you and not on the community. it doesn’t matter if you’re “part” of that community, you should abide by the rules of that community when you post in it.

Of course, you’re welcome to wilfully ignore or go against the rules of the communities you post in, but aside from being just a generally dick move, you also put yourself in the sights of the moderation of that community.

Bitch, I’m not even part of your “community”! You chose to federate with the rest of us!

And you chose to post in this community - abide by the rules or the moderators have every right to tell you you’re breaking the rules, or take action if it continues.

I think, based on the attitude you’ve displayed here, I can see why you were not deemed a good fit for the community when you applied.

ShittyKopper,

The wording in the parent comment also seems to imply the Fediverse is just Lemmy/kbin, which is a weird self-centric take I see here (i.e. on Lemmy) a lot.

A lot of the broader fedi that has access to adequate moderation tooling are doing just fine and don’t seem too “ill-suited”. It’s really just Lemmy that’s like this.

I’m not entirely sure I’ll attempt joining “the new Beehaw” wherever it may set up shop (y’all are a bit too serious news-y for my liking, personally), but all the federated interactions I had with the folk from Beehaw had been quite positive, and it’s kinda sad to see y’all go. But I can definitely understand the reasons why, and I do have my own gripes with Lemmy (both the software and the unfortunate community it has picked up) as well.

Very_Bad_Janet, (edited )

I understand what you said about community rules. But the funny thing about the Fediverse and how people receive their posts is that it's not uniform. I'm in kbin on a phone and I don't see who is posting from what instance unless I click further. Same for the community or magazine someone is posting in - I can see that on my feed but once I click on a post I cannot see it. I've joined many communities and magazines and they are only identified by the topic name in my feed, not the instance. I cannot see any community or magazine rules from my feed or inside the posts.

Just saying that easily identifying a group's rules is more of a challenge in the Fediverse (this is not an argument to ignore rules).

apotheotic,

Mmhm, I can empathise with that. Although, it does still fall upon the user to ensure they’re abiding by the rules of the communities they interact with, but regardless of that responsibility, I do understand its tricky.

MJBrune,

One, there was a point where the application system was bugged and some applications were lost so they had to stop processing applications. This is an issue on lemmy not on the mod team. Additionally, because lemmy is not setup for the sort of application process the mod teams want, there is no way to notify a rejected application. Your application might have been rejected.

Two, by replying here you are choosing to encounter this community. Don’t be surprised when you get moderated for not following rules.

Three, no one will miss these sorts of interactions. It’s not puritan to want to avoid something that takes away from your enjoyment rather than adds to it. Clearly at one point you thought so to and wanted to join. Perhaps though you only wanted to be a bad actor in the community and the application process worked as intended.

Rentlar,

Your conduct here is indicative of why you might not have been accepted into Beehaw or had mod action taken against you. I can understand your frustration, but federation (as it is right now) is a two-way street: The servers share posts, but users are expected to behave according to the rules of the server they are posting to.

You are capable of not posting in Beehaw, and you are welcome to block Beehaw communities as you wish, if you don’t like Beehaw’s rules, mods, or expectations we have on your behaviour.

GoldenCow,

deleted_by_author

    •
    Empricorn,

    Are you 12? I’m not rich and I don’t use Beehaw, but you should understand what an insignificant amount of money $4701.66 in modern times truly is…

    GoldenCow,

    deleted_by_author

    •
    ShellMonkey,
    @ShellMonkey@lemmy.socdojo.com avatar

    And an instance that from what I gather is host to several thousand users would require some significant hardware and support infrastructure which may consume $4,000 in a couple months of operations. Your situation may be unfortunate but to many trying to support a large community it’s a pittance.

    Empricorn,

    Because I live in the US, I’m a “colonialist” and rich? lol You’re misunderstanding. That’s a lot of money to *me" (as a non-rich person), but not to a corporation. Even a non-profit one could probably make that in a weekend with a few phone calls…

    geophysicist,

    Both of you are great examples of why beehaw is thinking about defederating. Please try to be polite, as per the rules of this instance.

    apotheotic,

    I presume they would use the remaining balance to continue to fund the beehaw project in whatever form it takes

    MJBrune,

    That money is to support beehaw the community not beehaw the lemmy instance. The lemmy instance only gets the money because it supports the community. So if the lemmy instance becomes unnecessary for the community then it gets shut down. The community can use the money in another way. Currently that money isn’t earmarked for anything.

    furrowsofar,

    Frankly as far as I am concerned they can do what they want. It is all for services rendered in my mind. I am not sure that many of us can fully understand the effort these people have put in. Very few of us, maybe none of us, are really pulling our full weight in terms of moderation effort and especially market rate man-hour costs. If we were, I am not sure this they would need to be thinking about changes.

    alyaza,
    @alyaza@beehaw.org avatar

    If you leave lemmy what exactly are you planning on doing with the $4,701.66 balance?

    this would just go toward whatever service we use since it’s all just site infrastructure money

    Illecors,

    Beehaw is a big part of the fediverse. May I suggest you have a look at fediseer? It’s the principle of public private key cryptography applied to lemmy whitelists. I can help you set it up - just reach out!

    sculd,

    If there are moderation issues, wouldn’t it be easier to recruit more moderators?

    The current number of moderators is small and I am sure a lot of people might want to step up to help.

    Penguincoder,

    If there are moderation issues, wouldn’t it be easier to recruit more moderators?

    No. The tools needed for successfully moderating Lemmy federated items, is severely lacking. The primary devs do not seem interested in making this area a priority either from their own efforts, or others submitting PRs for such. More moderators won’t help when the ability to moderate isn’t there.

    GhostMagician,

    Makes me wonder if a fork will happen in the future. Wonder if offerings will be much different a year from now, and if options like kbin will be more polished by then.

    ShittyKopper,

    Everyone wants a fork. Nobody wants to be the fork.

    We need a small group of motivated and skilled developers to get together and decide “we’re doing this”, and actually go beyond announcing an empty Git repo. (i.e. actually have some usable code to show for)

    Dealing with a codebase as janky and large as Lemmy is unfortunately beyond my skillset, otherwise I’d love to get involved myself.

    Cube6392,
    @Cube6392@beehaw.org avatar

    All fediverse code is weird. Lemmy is extra weird on account of being written in a systems language

    ShittyKopper,

    Picking a fedi server software is just picking how much (and what kind of) jank you’re willing to tolerate. The features are always secondary.

    BitOneZero,
    @BitOneZero@beehaw.org avatar

    Everyone wants a fork. Nobody wants to be the fork.

    Rust and ORM makes changes incredibly slow and even recent editions like sanitizing for JavaScript exploits have been buggy.

    We need a small group of motivated and skilled developers to get together and decide “we’re doing this”, and actually go beyond announcing an empty Git repo.

    Lemmy had one major thing that kbin and other apps did not have in 2023… a working API. And that happened to be what Reddit decided to start charging for in May. Kbin is right now adding an API, but it isn’t compatible with Lemmy. Lemmy could also use a streamlined API, there is opportunity right now to make a combined Lemmy and kbin API since federation normalizes a lot of the features between the two. I hope people see this opportunity that is open right now and the one big strength.

    ShittyKopper, (edited )

    I don’t think an API is the thing that matters here. There are quite a lot of things you can’t hack on with a client alone and actually needs server side support to function (actual moderation tooling is a prime example)

    Also most APIs aren’t “designed” per se and just expose the internal representations of the projects they’re of. A “common” API would either be too “wide” enough to be unusable (hello, ActivityPub C2S) or would severely limit experimentation and innovation (good luck on building microblogs in the Lemmy API) without having so many extensions that essentially end up being a third, completely different API.

    BitOneZero,
    @BitOneZero@beehaw.org avatar

    I don’t think an API isn’t the thing that matters here.

    because of the negatives in your statement, it isn’t clear what you mean.

    I think the API is why June 2023 there was a huge surge of users coming to Beehaw and Lemmy platform. There were tons of forum software out there, and even kbin, but Lemmy took off because it had an API

    ShittyKopper,

    fixed that part, words are hard

    The thing I’m trying to say is that “having an API” does not matter in the long term if the API does not expose the functionality needed to use it properly.

    And TBF if someone joined Lemmy only because it had an API and nothing else then they’re gonna be in for a very rude awakening sooner or later as the troubles of federation that previous (mostly microblogging) platforms have encountered and attempted to solve (not to mention novel problems due to the community oriented nature of Lemmy) start to show up.

    This is only going to get worse, and throwing “more API” into the fire won’t fix any of the important problems at hand.

    BitOneZero,
    @BitOneZero@beehaw.org avatar

    Your entirely reply seems to dismiss the entire purpose of an API.

    An API is a way to allow other developers to work almost entirely independent, and even create compatible servers with wildly different implementation - while still servicing clients.

    You seem to be advocating a model that predates API, back in the 1980’s or something. As right now kbin users are having to resort to scraping content off off HTML pages as a form of API.

    ReversalHatchery,

    I don’t think a fork would be a solution to this problem. The problem is not that the maintainers don’t accept contributions, but that no one is making the necessary contributions.

    Amamsa,

    Serious question; would it help if some of us left beehaw? I’m part of that influx and i first joined lemmy.world. Then i understood that it would be better to spread out among other instances and i created a few more accounts, one of them here on beehaw, because i really like the spirit of it. But if it would help, i would be willing to leave beehaw to help you cope with the load. If enough people would feel the same, it might lighten the load? Another option might be to close the instance for new people, until these issues are solved? I’m sure people would understand the reasoning for doing so?

    If you would leave the fediverse, i would not follow. I’m not that big on social media anyway, the fediverse being the only exception.

    Penguincoder,

    Serious question; would it help if some of us left beehaw?

    No. As noted in the post, the largest aspect of issues are other users and content federating to Beehaw. Less users on Beehaw won’t address that.

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