atomicpoet

Thank you so much for the well wishes.

For me, this really is the best path forward. Writing takes a lot of effort, and I like having full ownership of the stack where my work lives. Part of that ownership also means deciding how I want to interact with others—including having the option to de-federate if needed.

I know my approach to community management is a little different from most here. Even though I was on Reddit for 18 years, I’ve always felt somewhat anti-Reddit. My focus isn’t really on freedom of speech so much as freedom of association.

That’s why I don’t believe every community has to—or should—be open to everyone. Some people are a natural fit, and some are not—and I tend to be more careful about where I draw that line.

This is not the case. I will still be moderating communities. The difference is, I will be owning the servers as well.

(by the way, if someone called someone else ‘bro’, would they not be considered civil on !fediversenews@piefed.social? What if they call you ‘bro’ ?)

Here’s the approach I’d take now:

1. Reach out personally—not as a mod—and politely ask them to ease off.
2. If it continues, follow up as a moderator with a clear warning.
3. If the warning is ignored, then consider further action.

!fediversenews@piefed.social seemed like it was a general community, but your decision about it made it more of a small community with stricter rules, and it seems this is where the issue comes from. If people had known from the start that it was mostly your community with your rules, they would have probably posted on fediversenews@venera.social and let you do whatever you want on !fediversenews@piefed.social

The majority of people on !fediversenews@piefed.social actually came from @fediversenews@venera.social, which migrated over to Piefed. Most of them already know me, so I don’t think they would have gone to !fediverse@piefed.social instead—many of them aren’t even familiar with how Piefed itself is structured. That’s something I’m actively working to change.

And just for context—!fediversenews@piefed.social exists because @fediversenews@venera.social was one of the very first communities on the Fediverse focused on Fediverse news. The only problem was that Friendica really isn’t well-suited for forum-style discussion, so I created a new home for it on Piefed.

In other words, if you want a community to reach a wider audience, the rules need to be acceptable by a wider audience as well

On that point, I see it differently. The way I see it, I’m providing these communities with an audience, not the other way around. A lot of people join in or comment because they’re already familiar with my Akkoma account first.

And honestly, “Lemmy” specifically isn’t even my focus. My communities were always aimed more at microblog audiences, and Lemmy engagement has just been incidental.

“bro” is a commonly accepted term on the Internet today. If I had to ban it on my communities, I would add this in the rules, even potentially with a link to a post with an extensive list of banned terms. That way it’s clear for everyone.

The challenge with listing every banned word is that someone will always find a way around it. They’ll use a term not on the list and then claim, “It’s not banned, so it must be fine.” That’s why I prefer to keep it simple with the guideline: Be civil.

That said, on !videogames@piesocial I wrote up a detailed explainer and linked it directly in the sidebar. I plan to do the same for all my communities—and since we co-moderate one together, I’d really value your feedback on that.

There are two options for you…

My preference is to start Piefed communities myself because they’re portable. If I ever spin up my own Piefed server, I can migrate them over. That flexibility matters to me.

But just as important, I’ve been an early adopter of Piefed and probably one of its most vocal evangelists. When I create a new community, it often gains traction quickly simply because I’m already out there championing the platform.

That’s really why I start new communities—to keep momentum going and to help Piefed grow.

We are probably going to disagree here, but messaging people about using a word as common as “bro” today and threatening them from a ban if they reiterate doesn’t really seem kind or gentle.

Let me ask you honestly—not rhetorically—what would you see as both practical and kind in a situation like that? I truly want to understand.

I’ll say again: I don’t think it’s realistic to list every possible insult or epithet in the sidebar. That’s why I’ve tried different approaches.

I’ve been on the other side of power tripping, on a movies community no less…

So have I. That’s exactly why I started !movies@piefed.social. A moderator there didn’t like my reviews and removed them without explanation, so I decided to create a new space where that wouldn’t happen.

From that point on, I promised myself that if something wasn’t clear, I’d do my best to make it clear. At first, I did that with public notes, but then I was told private messages were kinder. So I shifted. Then I listened to more feedback—but this time, things still didn’t work out.

And this is where the challenge comes in: moderation takes time, it’s unpaid, and when you step into it, you often end up facing dogpiles and harassment.

The truth is, I’m the main contributor in most of my communities. I spend hours every day creating original posts to keep them alive. Given that, it’s hard to see what purpose it serves me—or anyone—if a wave of people shows up only to harass.

I don’t believe everyone is automatically entitled to participate if what they bring is hostility and outrage. And I hope you’d agree that building a healthy space means drawing that line somewhere.

I’m honestly a bit puzzled why you’d want to put me on blast here. From my side, I thought we had been working together amicably on !movies@piefed.social, and I’ve always appreciated your role there.

As for the recent events, the explanations are straightforward. At first, I thought there was a brigade, so I acted quickly. When it became clear that one of the people wasn’t part of it, I unbanned him, and he took down the thread. Not every ban has been undone, but in the cases where it was uncertain, I reversed course. The main feedback I got was that I should reach out before taking mod action.

So this time I tried to put that feedback into practice—messaging first, in what I thought was a kind and gentle way. Maybe it wasn’t perfect, but I was genuinely trying to reduce toxicity. For clarity: in the last 24 hours, the only bans were for accounts that publicly posted private messages or openly brigaded from this thread and from !asklemmy@lemmy.world.

And I do hope you don’t think “go harass a mod” is the right response to situations like this. If something like that ever happened to you on !movies@piefed.social, I would absolutely stand up for you and shut it down without hesitation.