Consider Depackaging Librem One Apps

https://puri.sm/posts/curbing-harassment-with-user-empowerment/

That is "harassment", which has nothing to do with the hate speech they are enabling.

I agree with @BrainBlasted here. The measures listed there only hides the stuff from those who don't want to see it. It doesn't actually punish the hatred and violence being espoused.

If they intend to allow community moderation, which I'll be the first to admit is a good goal, this has to be extended to include the ability of the community to suspend accounts altogether. Nothing in that blog post says anything about that. As a result, until that happens, they are still ensuring an unsafe community with no ability to curtail violence inside it.

(Personal opinion, not project maintainer opinion follows)

Note that Kyle is mistaken - all posts on Librem Social are public, and thus will reach the federated timelines of people on other instances. This means that instances exposed to them are vulnerable to have their members recruited into hate groups, and the hateful content harms those it targets on those instances.

I think this is the crucial bit here. I hope people involved in the fediverse communities and development continue to talk to purism and come to some agreement on this.

I don't think this (F-Droid) is the place to have that discussion, this seems like a relatively insignificant side-battle. We are also not Fediverse experts, so making this decision here is very hard to almost impossible without investing a whole lot time into research.

Generally, I'd judge Purism and Gab very differently. While gab pretty much explicitly wants to monetize hate-speech, purism seems at least mostly well-intentioned. I don't think I necessarily agree with their approach to content moderation. And from what @BrainBlasted stated, I believe there's some fundamental flaw in their reasoning about public content and their platform boundaries. At the same time they have some pretty interesting ideas (crowd sourced tagging being one).

For the record, Google is removing all gab apps but not librem social. This doesn't necessarily mean F-Droid has to do the same. But it's one data-point.

All that said, it might just be in Purisms best interest to run their own F-Droid repo anyway. Being independent in that way seems to align pretty well with their approach.

TL;DR: The discussion is valid, I don't see a clear solution to this right now. I don't think removing purism apps from f-droid's repo is a useful way forward for now. Can someone talk to them and tell them that it would be a really good idea to host their own repo?

The end solution doesn't seem clear, but the goal of this, as well as #1736 (closed) and #1722 (closed), is to ensure short-term safety of the people affected by this.

Nowhere was it suggested that this was an end-all be-all solution. In fact, I myself advocated for discussing it with devs who weren't aware of the harm they were inadvertently causing and even going after the site and DNS hosts themselves to cut it all off at the source.

But this harm does still need to be contained in the short term, and F-Droid plays a big role in that ability on non-Apple mobile devices, second only to Google itself in that respect. Google seems to be at least doing most of their part atm, so now the onus is on you.

As this is a containment effort more than anything, temporary removal is a valid option in order to prevent more of what we've seen from 8chan and Gab from spreading, at least in the mobile world, which is even more important than the desktop world given these people often post manifestos as they approach the places they're shooting up.

The appeals can be made to reinstate an app once it's been deemed safe from the harm these kinds of places are known to cause and/or the problem has been shut down entirely.

As you yourself has said, if they want to remain available on F-Droid, they can make a third-party repo. But to have them in the main repo is a safety risk as they'll be exposed to the oppressive ideology on the sites in question.

So I implore you to rethink this. It's only a short-term measure until we can get the sites themselves removed from production. It always was meant as such.

I hope people involved in the fediverse communities and development continue to talk to purism and come to some agreement on this.

To be blunt, I personally spent time talking to the people in charge of their platforms, including the CEO himself. I expressed my concerns multiple times with these people. At this point they are not willing to make a change.

(removed off-topic comments)

On a personal note, although I assume it is well-intentioned, I am somewhat disturbed at the attempt to use tragic events to motivate decisions. I defer to longer-standing projects for their thoughtful responses to similar incidents:

What follows are my responses to technical points raised.

all posts on Librem Social are public, and thus will reach the federated timelines of people on other instances

A solution is already outlined in https://source.puri.sm/liberty/smilodon/issues/2 :

However, Smilodon instances need to interact fairly with existing moderation-oriented instances. We propose that Mastodon (upstream) adopts a "content_moderation" flag, which will be inherited by Smilodon.

...of course the devil is in the implementation. We are working on it.

Unlike other apps, their forks of apps like Tusky, Riot, and K-9 are targeted for using their servers.

Our apps default to our flagship domain, but should work with all compatible servers. If they don't, please file a bug.

All that said, it might just be in Purisms best interest to run their own F-Droid repo anyway. Being independent in that way seems to align pretty well with their approach.

We considered this. We may revisit it, but reproducible builds should make it unnecessary.

[various comments]

In the broadest strokes, Purism favors client-based over server-based solutions. User-based solutions are even better. I would also suggest a close reading of all our "user empowerment" blog posts and our updated "stay safe" guide.

It's a lot to read, and it's just the beginning, but I hope by the end you'll agree 1. it was worth taking the time and 2. even if we disagree on implementation, we all agree that bigotry is bad, diversity is good and all services need to improve.

Constructive feedback, design plans and merge requests that build on our user empowerment principle are always welcome. In general we don't subject authors of unsolicited policy proposals to the scrutiny and interrogation of our internal process. This doesn't mean we don't consider them, or have them in mind moving forward. We don't pretend to know everything, we follow the work of subject matter experts closely (several are mentioned in the blog posts above). In that regard, policy concerns are best addressed "upstream".

I'm not sure this ticket is the appropriate venue for further discussion on my part, the F-Droid maintainers are welcome to contact me directly for clarification before making their decision. I am unlikely to respond to further comments, especially mud-slinging.

Our apps default to our flagship domain, but should work with all compatible servers. If they don't, please file a bug.

It's not that they don't work, but they don't provide options to use anything other than librem.one servers. This seems to be intentional, since the apps they are forked from do not have this restriction.

I am somewhat disturbed at the attempt to use tragic events to motivate decisions

Tell me, when is the appropriate time to make a change, David? If there's a problem, it's in the best interest of most people to get it solved ASAP. There is a problem with "free speech" platforms being hotbeds for violent extremist recruitment and planning. We need to solve it.

In your own words, you plan to "eschew heavy content moderation". Based on the discussion I provided above, this means you will not moderate the type of speech that leads to these events. This has nothing to do with your policy on harassment or opt-in content, but rather the actions you are enabling. The proposal in the Smilodon issue does nothing to fix it.

In that regard, policy concerns are best addressed "upstream".

I'm not sure how much more "upstream" I can go beyond my multiple conversations with Kyle Rankin and Todd Weaver. I read your policies, and I've read the blog posts.

We all agree that bigotry is bad, diversity is good and all services need to improve.

If you agree, listen to the people that are telling you why your current policies are wrong. If you are for diversity, be willing to listen to the view points that come from people with lived experiences that are different from your own.

@david.libremone wrote:

In the broadest strokes, Purism favors client-based over server-based solutions

I like the lines along which you're thinking. A very intriguing approach here is tackling this on protocol level:

I'm guessing Chris and Serge would be very happy about your input and potential collaborations.

@Bubu wrote:

I don't think this (F-Droid) is the place to have that discussion, this seems like a relatively insignificant side-battle. We are also not Fediverse experts, so making this decision here is very hard to almost impossible without investing a whole lot time into research.

My thoughts exactly. I object to taking Librem One Apps down. IMHO this would mostly serve to make F-Droid look unreliable for privacy and free software conscious users. (Purisms target demographic, if I'm not mistaken.)

I also think that as long as an app is available on Google Play, taking the same one down on F-Droid can only be a symbolic gesture with no factual consequences. I don't see how this could protect anyone from alleged terrorism, hate-speech, etc...

I'd also opt for closing this ticket. This is not the place to talk about purism's harassment policies. The apps work with all servers, they are just preconfigured with the librem.one addresses as Dave has pointed out above. Librem.one has pointed out that they are anti-harassment and will have such a policy. I do support the removal of Gab-related apps, but let us not overreact with all apps that connect to services that are disputed by a few people. Otherwise I challenge you to get rid of Tor-related and I2P-related apps first :-).

@sspaeth That's a disingenuous argument and you know it. The issue isn't about the harassment or vitriol itself, as F-Droid's team has already deemed that such a thing isn't grounds for banning an app so long as it's not being actively promoted by said app. The issue at hand is about how the vitriol that's happening is actively being promoted by defaulting to their instance in their apps.

Think about the usage case and how most users will use it. Most people don't take the time to go to two different sites for the same thing, so anyone that uses this app will more than likely use it on Librem's site due to the defaults it has.

And since they've made it clear that they will not remove any antisemitism or other vitriol directed at marginalized groups, only vitriol directed towards individuals, Jewish people who sign up, for example, will be subjected to "kill all the Jews" and Holocaust denial posts, both of which are personal threats to that Jewish person despite being directed towards a group.

The extra steps involved in using the app with another instance constitutes promoting vitriol and harassment, as they're promoting their own services over others by default, and their services are full of harassment and toxicity. If they clean up their instance, then they can come back, but as their service stands right now, it's in violation of F-Droid's rules and needs to be removed.

That's a disingenuous argument and you know it.

OK, I'll bite once and then shut up. I would agree, IF this were a kind of Gab. However, librem.one is a service which is barely set up yet and nobody has shown that it is systematically being used for abusive purposes.

Second, we are talking about the services of a "free-software endorsing" social corporation, which strives for FSF endorsement, and we are not talking about some right-wing nut conspiracy platform, so I would give them a lot of goodwill unless proven otherwise.

Third, and last, the platform says this: https://librem.one/stay-safe/

If you see something illegal, report it to the relevant authorities. They are best equipped to handle illegal content. If you see content you dislike or you are being harassed, block the offending user. If that doesn’t help, document the incident and flag it for moderator action. We empower you to take control, and we do not tolerate harassment.

This does not sound like a platform that takes a "we don't care what's going on" approach, so I stand by my previous statement.

OK, letting this issue rest now.

And again you're using debunked talking points without actually addressing the fact that this is about promoting violence. If you're gonna reply, at least reply with things that are relevant and stop going off topic.

and "the law" here in the USA actively does the same thing to us.

Then try to fix the law, and then Librem issue will be fixed automatically, since Librem is obeying the law. Call you congressman.

Would you tell communists living in post-Reichstag Fire Decree Germany to call their Parliament reps to change the law so that they don't get imprisoned for being communists?

US is 25th in the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index

So it is not clear how post-Reichstag Fire Decree Germany is related to this.

All of this, including your "call your reps to change the law" bit that you started with and the stuff the person I was originally replying to had said, is off topic.

I'm done with you people sidetracking. Either address the point at hand about Librem having the very same harmful users Gab does on their servers and promoting their instance just as Gab's app promotes their instance or admit defeat.

To me it seems obvious at this point that after taking the hand, you'd go for the arm, the shoulder and then the entire body. It is absurd on its face that something like the Librem project would be removed from the F-Droid project, and you're actively contributing to breaking up this community and probably other communities, in the name of a fight against violent fascists or nazists that you identify with practically anyone who disagrees with you, or tries to make a free speeech argument (there are certainly good arguments for and against an "absolute" free speech, but equating people who believe in absolute free speech with Nazis, as you did on the forums, goes beyond reason and IMHO into libel territory).

I know this isn't even the right venue to give this kind of personal answer, but I've gotten too much of this in my mailbox. You are a negative, destructive force in this. Since you find it very easy to say what "must" be done in light of some F-Droid "rules" that only you seem to know in a perfect way, despite not being a member of the F-Droid team, then I'm going to assume I'm entitled to do the same, on my own terms, and say: these "bugs" ought to be closed as WONTFIX well before they reach this stage of the, uhm, "conversation".

It seems obvious that you're trying to misrepresent the situation same as the rest of these "free speech" trolls. What evidence do you have that I'm overstepping my boundaries or being destructive? Without citing evidence, that's just a baseless personal attack that the devs themselves have previously punished people for. (My first thread on the forum had several people making personal attacks against me, and the forum mods punished them for it.)

So if I know the mod's rules, it's because I've seen them in action firsthand. If I'm ultimately wrong about this contradictory enforcement regarding Librem, then let them point out why. You have no points to offer in this post other than that personal attack, so your opinions are as relevant as mine.

I've made my case 5 times now, saying the same thing every time without opposition, despite your claims that people are disagreeing with me.

I need not say any more until the mods can weigh in other than to counter the trolls like yourself and these others who continue making these off topic "points".

Edited for clarity and because I'm tired of repeating myself.

Consider Depackaging Librem One Apps

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