[OscarCunningham]

I think Scott Alexander's recent post about this made a good point. (https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/moderation-is-differen...) He draws the distinction between censorship (stopping people from getting messages they want to recieve) and moderation (stopping people from getting messages they don't want to recieve). With those definitons censorship is bad and moderation is good.

Mastodon isn't as simple as the model he imagines (simple click-boxes to select what kind of messages you want) but it does give you moderation (on your local instance) while still letting you avoid censorship (by moving instances if necessary).

[jorgesborges]

It’s ironic that the top comment to that post was removed.

[msravi]

The only correct answer to that should be that you let people maintain their own filters (blocklists and allowlists) so they can see messages they want to receive and not see what they don't want to. Also, you might let people apply such community created lists, that they can subscribe to.

Unfortunately, Mastodon rather than doing that, gives complete control to the server administrator to "moderate" their instance. The result is that you end up having isolated echo-chambers, with each server blocking all other servers that don't agree with their viewpoint.

[jonathanstrange]

That solves almost no problem. Libel and slander will continue to affect you, there will continue to be toxic communities who instigate violence and violate local laws, and the feature encourages echo chambers and fragmentation. The worst system is when other people can see comments to your posts that you cannot see when you've blocked the commenter. It's the best system for smear campaigns and targeted character assassination. You'll never get a job and everybody hates you, and you'll have have no idea why.