Fediverse Smackdown‽ Threads blocks Flagship Mastodon, Misskey & Bookwyrm Instances (Update: Mastodon & Misskey Flagship Instances Unblocked)
Note: See updates at the end of the article.
After opening up the opportunity for their users to embrace the Fediverse on their accounts, Threads has banned the flagship instances of Mastodon (Social), Misskey (IO) & Bookwyrm (Social), as all three now appear on the Moderated Servers List for bad instances.
I can already hear the Fedipact folks screaming “EEEEEEEEEE” in my ear, along with “I told you so!” & sounding the alarm about Meta moving into the second phase of assimilating all things ActivityPub (do not ask me what the first phase is).
Misskey appearing on the ban list is puzzling, as Misskey (IO) provides a publicly accessible feed in the same way Threads does, as both highlight content from the domain when a person visits the site while logged out (props to @pcottle@threads.net from Meta for revealing how I can view Threads public feed).
Hopefully @syuilo@misskey.io (creator of Misskey) can delegate the task of contacting Meta to an admin, as the Meta ban seems to have been mistakingly applied to the primary Misskey instance. (Note: Many other instances are being blocked for the same reason, so admins should check the list to see if they are on it).
Community Violations‽ Huh‽
Although Misskey's block can be declared an oversight, it is unclear what violations Meta is accusing Mastodon (Social) & Bookwyrm (Social) of doing.
While I doubt @mouse@bookwyrm.social (creator of Bookwyrm) would care about a capitalist mega corporation blocking them (Bookwyrm is anti-corporate), @Mastodon@mastodon.social would probably not be thrilled that Threads blocks them.
It would be wise for @mosseri@threads.net (CEO of Threads) & @Gargron@mastodon.social (Creator of Mastodon) to figure out how to resolve the issue between their instances, as something as simple as a Fediblock could quickly result in many Mastodon & Misskey instances retaliate by blocking Threads out of solidarity with the flagship instances (which is something Meta does not desire).
Related Note: Threads is still muting all Pixelfed instances, as the platform does not provide a publicly accessible feed by default.
Update: Meta has removed Mastodon (Social) from the block list! After news started spreading about the Flagship Mastodon being banned, @shubhankar_91@threads.net (who works at Meta) informed everyone that Threads was investigating why Mastodon was added to the list.
Also, it appears as if mentioning username handles from @threads@threads.net on WriteFreely is currently not working (I am @darnell@threads.net for what it is worth). Previously it did work, which is odd. Hmmm...
Update 2.0: Meta has removed Misskey (IO) from the block list! I am glad as they never should have been on it.
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