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remove spinster app

Andreas Demmelbauer requested to merge redplanet/fdroiddata:master into master

Let's remove spinster from the f-droid main repo.

So, there are already a few people who want this app removed because of - allow me to summarize - hate speech against trans people.

What is the Spinster App?

Spinster is a Mastadon app based on tusky. The main changes are:

  • Changed name, logo and styling including (advertising their own fediverse instance spinster.xyz)
  • Selected spinster.xyz as the default instance (again: advertising their own instance)
  • Removed the instance blocking list (where spinster itself was also included)

The Maintainer of tusky: Conny Duck also asked already in an open statement to take down the spinster app:

Hello @ fdroidorg it has come to my attention that you are hosting a barely modified version of @ Tusky branded to a hateful Gab instance full of TERFs in your main repository. I suggest you nuke that app immediately if you don't want to be suspicious of supporting hatespeech. !5799 (merged)

So, ok, it's technically ok to fork an app, removing anti(?)-features and to republish it under a new name when the licence allows it.
Even, if the maintainer of the "original project" is obviously against it.
Buuut... is this really how we want to deal with free and open source software?
I don't talk about the right for doing this.
I talk about f-droid supporting this fork by giving it a platform.

Okay, so much on how this app got produced. Nasty. But legal. But still nasty.

Oh and one last thing about the app:
Spinster also got already banned from google play store for "Violation of User Generated Conetnt (UGC) policy". Let's take this as a hint. (But also, ... don't use it as the base for the decision)

What is spinster.xyz?

spinster.xyz is a fediverse instance - its server is based on gab.com software (which its companion app got declined from fdroid store for stated reasons) which is again forked from mastodon.

Their claim on the front page is:

A women-first social network. Feminist, federated, and free.

Sounds nice, but let's have a closer look ...

According to their about-page Alex - one of the founders - also actively contributed to the gab.com software.

When evaluating which platform to use, we felt the Gab UI was the most similar to Twitter, and therefore would be the easiest to massively migrate people off of that platform - so we forked Gab's code and made our own version (with some changes, like the colors, timeline options, removing groups, etc). @ alex has also contributed code to Gab itself, which benefits us because we are able to merge those changes.

Well, a founder supporting gab - which is known for hate speech - by contributing code ... i would take also this one as a hint.

A few insights

Spinster has a whole moderation handbook.
Anyways, let's have a look into the network:

I guess these cites are for themselves not enough to block a whole network. But when you poke into the network more deeply, this is kinda the general undertone (between also a lot of uncontroversial stuff ... e.g. personal stories or whatever)

Anyways, I found a lot of hate speech which is hidden behind layers of irony, sarcasm, leading questions, stories, jokes, memes, cites, etc.

Arguments are often based on denying the existence of trans. Basically, telling that a group of people have no right to be treated the way they feel comfortable with ... or how they identify.
Also, there is often the general idea of trans people are a threat to "real" woman.

Moderation

I reported all of the postings above (around Dec. 2nd, 2pm CEST).

The moderation reacted around 1.5h later by sending me a message:

Hi

Please note that abuse of the "report" button may be considered spam.

If you disagree or do not want to engage in conflicts with other Spinster users, please exit these conflicts and use the "mute" or "block" buttons.

Please see Spinster's rules: https://spinster.xyz/about and Mod handbook: https://handbook.spinster.xyz/ to understand Spinster's moderation practices. [...]

In my opinion, the moderation should have at least deleted the demonisation posting.

I didn't find any personal threats or whatever, but it's still a propaganda machine and echo chamber working against very personal self determination.

I hope we're done here* :)

Edited by Andreas Demmelbauer

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