Cross posted here as it was highlighted that the individual is a lead Lemmy developer, raising serious concerns about the direction of Lemmy, a leading Fediverse platform, and the impact on future user adoption.
Hi
There have been some rather concerning actions taken by an admin of the !privacy@lemmy.ml community, dessalines@lemmy.ml. Based on recent moderation decisions and a complete lack of communication, it seems like their account may have been compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.
- Erroneous Rule 4 Enforcement, First Instance: a guide posted to !privacy@lemmy.ml, despite receiving many positive votes and comments, was removed under Rule 4:
If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
However, this post was a guide and not a question, so Rule 4 does not apply. Attempts were made to reach out for clarification but there has been no response, despite their account showing recent activity.
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Erroneous Rule 4 Enforcement, Second Instance: an on-topic informational video also posted to !privacy@lemmy.ml, despite also receiving many positive votes, was again removed under Rule 4. This post was again not asking a question, so again Rule 4 does not apply. Again, no explanation has been given.
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User Bans in Completely Unrelated Communities: user bans of over a month have been applied for not only !privacy@lemmy.ml but several completely unrelated communities:
- !emacs@lemmy.ml
- !personalfinance@lemmy.ml
- !linux@lemmy.ml
- !lemmy_support@lemmy.ml
- !opensource@lemmy.ml
- !india@lemmy.ml
- !asklemmy@lemmy.ml
- !steam@lemmy.ml
- !linux_gaming@lemmy.ml
- !degoogle@lemmy.ml
- !libre_software@lemmy.ml
This is especially concerning given that the above posts have no relation to these communities, and no recent activity has been made in any of them, meaning none of their rules could have been broken. Moreover, a public track record of positive contributions across Lemmy has been established, with many positive votes and comments received over a sustained period. Given all of this, the bans appear to be highly disproportionate, only adding to the growing concerns around moderation practices.
- Repost with Disclaimer Removed: a repost of the guide, despite a disclaimer explaining the original removal appears to be in error and that attempts to contact the admin have failed, despite again receiving many positive votes and constructive comments, was once again removed. Again, no explanation has been given.
Given all of this, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that something is not right. Mistakes in moderation happen but the complete lack of communication, the disproportionate actions, and the ongoing bans from unrelated communities raise serious concerns. It seems as though the account is most likely compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.
Has anyone else experienced similar issues with this admin, or does anyone have more insight into what might be happening?
TL;DR: Admin dessalines@lemmy.ml of !privacy@lemmy.ml appears to be making seriously concerning moderation decisions, including erroneous enforcement of Rule 4 in at least two separate instances, failing to respond to messages, and applying user bans in completely unrelated communities despite a long track record of positive contributions across Lemmy. This has led to speculation that their account is likely compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.
Any thoughts or similar experiences would be appreciated.
Cross post with https://lemmy.world/post/43944126
70 Comments
owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca · 129 pts · 149d
dessalines is known for questionable moderation. Avoid the .ml communities when possible.
Dasus@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 149d
fizzle@quokk.au · 4 pts · 148d
piefed is the way
goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org · 2 pts · 146d
Piefed is just as bad and is designed to mimic the worst parts of reddit
masterspace@lemmy.ca · 89 pts · 149d
This is literally how he always acts. There's a reason that many instances do not federate with lemmy.ml, his instance.
He's incredibly pro communist, pro Russia, pro China, and will ban you for even mentioning that something could be foreign propaganda.
At the end of the day, hopefully your instance builds their server code from source and inspects it to make sure there's nothing nefarious. It would be nice to use a decentralized Reddit like platform not coded by him, but no one else has the time, resources, ability, and/or dedication, to step up.
I would still rather use Lemmy over Reddit, though I did switch to donating to piefed, the Canadian instance runners, over donating to him.
scytale@piefed.zip · 48 pts · 149d
You literally mentioned piefed in your next sentence.
mrmaplebar@fedia.io · 38 pts · 149d
Mbin also exists...
Also, to be fair, the software isn't necessarily problematic like the moderation is. No point throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Zagorath@aussie.zone · 10 pts · 149d
Worth noting that Lemmy receives at least some institutional funding for its development. And I believe some of that funding is contingent on hitting active user goals or similar metrics.
protist@mander.xyz · 3 pts · 147d
Where does that funding come from?
fonix232@fedia.io · 7 pts · 149d
Power tripping people rarely limit themselves to power trip on a single angle.
And while Lemmy's open source, it's a big enough codebase for someone to add a bit of admin override that can go unnoticed for quite a while. Just remember what happened with xz.
mrmaplebar@fedia.io · 8 pts · 149d
Sure, but we allow people to power trip by giving them power in the first place. People choose to use Lemmy and participate in lemmy.ml, directly or indirectly; that gives the maintainers and admins power.
Now, I don't see eye to eye with the tankie crowd. That's fine, whatever. But I can still appreciate the creation of Lemmy as an open software project.
Ultimately FOSS gives us agency. I don't feel that the creators of Lemmy have any power over me personally. They're not very significant, but I do appreciate their project.
greybeard@feddit.online · 5 pts · 148d
I moved onto piefed when the lemmy instance I was on shut down, and I don't regret it at all. It's a solid choice and promotes options in the threadiverse.
Zagorath@aussie.zone · 4 pts · 149d
What's xz?
fonix232@fedia.io · 13 pts · 149d
A utility package for Linux that MANY packages depend on, often including core distro/system packages. It implements LZMA de/compression. Meaning it would come pre-installed on many, many distros.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XZ_Utils_backdoor
Zangoose@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 149d
Tbf Piefed also does have opinionated moderation literally hardcoded into the source code.
It's pretty easy to modify since it's python and not rust, but still not great
admin@scrapetacular.ydns.eu · 11 pts · 149d
In b4 discussion of what constitutes hardcoding
fizzle@quokk.au · 5 pts · 149d
Ok what opinionated moderation?
Zangoose@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 148d
There were a few, not exaustive since it's been a few months since I looked through the source code, some of this might have changed and there's also a few other checks that I'm forgetting:
Edit: the other thing is, a lot of this hardcoded moderation isn't documented anywhere outside of the code, likely because a lot of the measures would be useless if people knew how they worked
Edit 2: updated based on Blaze's reply from another comment, I misremembered the shadow banning, I was confusing it with the federation errors that occur when one user blocks another
Eldritch@piefed.world · 5 pts · 149d
There are some disabled by default, filters built into piefed. That the main Dev uses on their instance. It's not really even remotely the same thing or as controversial. But it's the closest thing piefed has and gets brought up regularly because of it.
Zangoose@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 148d
Honestly I would consider [user-obscured] hardcoded
shadowbanning just as bad.Just because I'm closer to agreeing with the PieFed dev's opinions a little bit more doesn't mean that I'd support
shadowbanning someone because the trivially-evaded checks caught a false positive in the crossfire. Piefed's auto moderation/social scoring is pretty much textbook definition security-by-obscurity. The second anyone knows how it works, it's useless. It will pretty much exclusively catch people who just wanted to post a harmless meme or something.At least (for now) Dessalines isn't hardcoding his tankie beliefs into Lemmy's source code.
Edit: Blaze is right, it isn't shadowbanning, but the rest of my point still stands, added the [] part to clarify
Blaze@piefed.zip · 2 pts · 148d
Piefed doesn't shadowban:
https://lemmy.zip/post/58102975/24342240
Zangoose@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 147d
Thanks for clarifying, I guess I misremembered the shadowbanning part. I think I was mixing together the fact that reputation isn't really transparent (users' reputation can change by even attempting to upload an image that gets flagged, and the vague error means they'll probably try multiple times without realizing they're being moderated) and the fact the communities can autoban any user whose global reputation is low enough.
I still think the security-by-obscurity approach to moderation is inherently flawed though, and I hate to imagine how the dev approaches actual account security if that's their approach to moderation.
lambalicious@lemmy.sdf.org · 0 pts · 148d
Piefed is known to incorporate CCP-style shadow profile and similar measures, such as "Social Credit", so it'd be hilarious to complain about l.ml's alignment to then migrate to piefed of all places.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · 4 pts · 148d
no matter how many times you illusionary truth effect this, piefed users won't be getting mortgages on using antislop abuse.
Why lemmy & dessalines depend on slop is beyond the topic of this crywolf 🧵 ╮(︶▽︶)╭
Die4Ever@retrolemmy.com · 23 pts · 149d
PieFed and Mbin don't share any code with Lemmy at all, they're in totally different programming languages
Grail@multiverse.soulism.net · 10 pts · 149d
Piefed isn't the canadian instance runners, you're thinking of fedecan
toad@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 141d
My hometown have a few tower, but the most infamous is made in that ugly cheap brutalist style and is generally recognized as being an eyesore.
But one day i was invited to somebody who lived in the tower. And I was blown away, but I realized that the main advantage of living in the tower was that when you're in it, you don't see the tower.
My point is that on the so-called tankie instances, at least they're not constantly whining about tankies.
masterspace@lemmy.ca · 0 pts · 141d
Neither are they on the instances that defederate from them.
It's also not like it's an ideological thing. The instances that get defederate from are just filled with obnoxious tankies.
flamingos@feddit.uk · 67 pts · 149d
You were instance banned under lemmy.ml's rule 4, not the privacy community's rule 4. ml's rule 4 is "No Ads / Spamming". This seems to have been prompted by you reposting a removed post, which frankly seems fair despite what I think of ml's moderation normally.
Rule 4 does seem to be a bad reason to remove the original post, though I think it should've been removed simply for how cringe 'cuckloading' is as a term. Stop trying to link sexual deviancy to moral deficiency.
orgrinrt@lemmy.world · 34 pts · 149d
Just jumping in to boost this message, posting your own videos is advertising your channel, probably fine if one and done, but consistently I’d consider it advertising or spamming too. Even if not own videos, just persistently posting videos is bad etiquette and I can see how that’d be construed as spamming too.
This op is cringe either way. “This moderator’s account has been compromised! No other way to explain them enforcing the instance rule 4 after consistently spamming the communities with my videos!”… Jesus christ.
autonomoususer@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 147d
Thanks for the analysis but there is no indication that any video was posted more than once or that the creator is a Lemmy user.
autonomoususer@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 147d
Thanks for sharing this, really appreciate the clarity. Honestly, the interface, which they themselves created, doesn’t exactly make it obvious. You’re absolutely right that the original post doesn’t fall under that rule 4 either. And while I can’t say your sentiment on its content is unreasonable, removing the whole post, despite the constructive comments that were being left, doesn’t actually change the minds of the overwhelming number of users who left positive votes on both occasions.
oce@jlai.lu · 65 pts · 149d
You have been a user for 3 years at least, surely you have heard about the tankie situation on Lemmy? If you don't share these views it's better to ignore/block those three or four instances. It will make your Lemmy experience much more relaxing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tankie
Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 42 pts · 149d
He didn't have his account hacked.
Areldyb@lemmy.world · 39 pts · 149d
This is not evidence of account compromise, whatever you may think of dessalines' moderation decisions.
realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip · 36 pts · 149d
Lmao no. That guy is just a fucking nutjob. It's nothing new really. The only thing compromised is his brain really.
fonix232@fedia.io · 32 pts · 149d
What I find quite ironic is that dessalines started Lemmy to get away from the perceived over-moderation of Reddit... only to do the exact same thing.
Triumph@fedia.io · 27 pts · 149d
*Overmoderation as perceived by a tankie.
ShellMonkey@piefed.socdojo.com · 31 pts · 149d
Multi comms is likely an instance ban, which they hand out freely on the .ml instance for anyone not in line with their ideology.
autonomoususer@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 149d
The above is a complete list. I would have expected to see more than 12 communities for that.
snooggums@piefed.world · 15 pts · 149d
It sometimes only shows if the user has posted or voted or something like that in the listed communites. Can't remember exactly what, but there is something that limits what communities are listed when someone is instance banned, which for lemmy shows as a bunch of community bans.
ZoteTheMighty@lemmy.zip · 31 pts · 149d
For every Lemmy.ml community you're subscribed to, search for a non-lemmy.ml alternative. Almost every one has an alternative now. Subscribe to the new one, unsubscribe from the old, and never look back. This kind of heavy handed and/or opinionated moderation is the status quo there.
drkt@scribe.disroot.org · 30 pts · 149d
ml users are just like that
Deceptichum@quokk.au · 22 pts · 149d
autonomoususer@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 146d
Done, thanks!
AmidFuror@fedia.io · 19 pts · 149d
That user had his brain compromised years ago.
pewgar_seemsimandroid@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 13 pts · 149d
these being deliberate would be less surprising than the account being compromised.
apftwb@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 147d
Hey its me, the real dessalines.
Can I have some money.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 147d
I think that is just how it is over there.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · -3 pts · 149d
I am upvoting this, simply because I find this crywolf hilarious. I’ve seen your authoritarianism dessalines.
How do tankies call this again?
Find out for fucking around too much?
How does the end of your boot taste like now?
rglullis@communick.news · -7 pts · 149d
Please find a better place to air out this dirty laundry.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · 2 pts · 149d
quick praxis: where?
db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 9 pts · 149d
!yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · -2 pts · 149d
’rad, read below
rglullis@communick.news · 5 pts · 149d
Any community that talks about moderation issues. Preferably one that is closer to the users of lemmy.ml.
This is not the place for this. It achieves nothing and gives newcomers the impression that this type of petty drama is an integral part of the Fediverse.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · -2 pts · 149d
so basically what I upvoted earlier
dessalines power tripped his own software.
Uhhhh, are you aware how federated networks initialize?
rglullis@communick.news · 2 pts · 149d
AFAIK, he does not have any power over the other instances and communities that are not hosted over on lemmy.ml?
Not interested in being baited into a pointless discussion today, sorry.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · -2 pts · 149d
He does: it's called association by usage. Guns don't kill people, but their usage is to. lemmy threads with other threadiverse software, but installing lemmy means supporting an authoritarian. Merchants of Death and all that.
Then don't bother commenting on what little history you know🙃
lambalicious@lemmy.sdf.org · 2 pts · 148d
Have you ever transported yourself in a Ford, or derived, vehicle?
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · 0 pts · 148d
Let me teach why we call “cagers” cagers!
Do I need a cager to transport me to Berlin?
rglullis@communick.news · 2 pts · 149d
Non sequitur. The software is free to use, free to redistribute and does not come with any obligation to support the ideologies of the developers. If that was the case, everyone using Linux desktops should be associated with Richard Stallman (author of the GNU project), which is on record defending Epstein by arguing that minors can consent to sexual relationships in exchange with money.
AntiBullyRanger@ani.social · -1 pts · 149d
So, you’ve never dealt with association with killers before?
Funny you mention this. Why did Linus Torvalds then disassociated with Vladimir Putin’s genocide?
BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world · -11 pts · 149d
.ml stands for marxist-lenninist. Why are you even there?
Chozo@fedia.io · 8 pts · 149d
Perhaps OP is a Marxist and/or Leninist.
hyperencabulator@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 147d
I assumed it meant machine learning or something, ty
ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 147d
Downvoted but correct, they used to admit it before the exodus, but after the exodus they started denying it to seem more "general" in an attempt to appeal to everyone that isn't stupid as shit.