I wanted to open up a post to discuss the two main methods of federation: allow-list and block-list. As well as see how the majority of users felt with regard to the methods.

Due to some of the issues raised with the method of vote counting this will be considered only a check of user sentiment, not a promise of what to do

I will pin two comments, one in favour of a block-list and one in favour of an allow-list approach to federation.

Before the domain issue we were using an allow-list, this means that any instance that wants to be linked to hexbear must reach out to us or be nominated by a user for addition to the allow-list.

The benefits of this is that we are not automatically linked with any instance that spins up. The downside is that we miss federation with any small lemmy instance as well as with any other activity-pub instance (mastodon, peertube, etc.)

Lemmy.ml and lemmygrad.ml both use a block-list approach and for what it's worth they have done well, the majority of reactionary instances already block us (lemmy.world, sh.itjust.works, lemmy.ca, sopuli.xyz, slrpnk.net) and the pedo/porn/nazi instance are already on the hexbear block-list.

The biggest upside of a block-list approach is that new single person instances that get created will link up with us without any extra steps, and the biggest downside is that it will add an extra step for moderation (adding a new shitty instance to the block-list after they show their shit)

Within the following spoiler will be the hexbear allow-list and block-list.

Discussion may be had within comments, if you have specific instance additions/subtractions from the allow-list or block-list please comment underneath the respective pinned comment.

For example if you wish to add lemmy.ca to the block list comment under https://hexbear.net/comment/5951093

Hello users of hexbear, or shall i say chapo.chat, we fucked up, and i fucked up like three times making this post.

Yes, hexbear.net has expired. Yes, we were aware of this possibility. We have gradually lost contact with the access owner (prior admin) for the domain registration. We attempted to make a migration plan, but we were disarmed by the reappearance of the party in question in September 2024 and repeated assurances that they would a) transfer credentials and b) continue payments until they were able to do the former.

We accept full responsibility for this. We should have been more aggressive about this and continued our alternative despite these reassurances. This is our fuck up, and we can't offer anything besides our continued apologies and our plan of action going forward and an explanation of what happened:

Over the time of chapo.chat and hexbear.net the admins that purchased the domain, established the donation accounts, and the server accounts have left. One of the primary admins has gone inactive and returned many times, over a year ago some of the newer admins began asking the older admins to give full access to the domain, servers, and donations. These requests were not met, despite warnings of this exact event.

At the moment we do not have access to hexbear.net and there is a strong chance we will not get it back without participating in the auction, which is already over $300. Choosing to abandon the hexbear.net domain will cause federation problems and considerable technical issues which would lead to potential extended downtime.

During this downtime we would be reestablishing access to the new domain (or hexbear.net if we win the auction), access to server ownership, and donation accounts. This would be distributed among a number of admins so that we can prevent this from happening again.

Chapo.chat has the same access problem that led to the current state of hexbear.net so it is to be considered temporary.

I will do my best to answer questions

Some are invisible on white bg, but this might be way easier to fix on the browser end

I'm sure you all remember the very very funny time we voted to ban the admins of DBZero but stay federated with the instance. It's still very funny, but it turns out that banning them has had an side effect that I, at least, didn't consider at the time: their mod actions don't federate anymore either.

See Hexbear post here: https://hexbear.net/post/4342876
After commenting, I went to look at what people were saying on the original post, and as you can see yourself, the post has been deleted on .ee and DBZero. Looking in the modlog over there it was deleted almost immediately after posting, but still exists as a federated post.

The above post is a non-issue and I don't have examples of harmful content making it through, but the implication here is that db0 and unruffled's (and indeed any admin or mod we've banned without defederating from) attempts to remove harmful content will not federate, unintentionally exposing our users to it.

Unless our admins have some way to bridge the gap I'm afraid we may have to defederate in order to maintain the safety of our user base.

Hello users of Hexbear, there have been many changes and some drama the past few months.

The recent changes we've been making have been an attempt to create a more safe and welcoming environment for many demographics that have been overlooked in the past.

For any of our comrades that have been unintentionally hurt in this process, we apologise and hope to find a solution that accommodates as many people as possible while still meeting the needs of the marginalised groups who need a space like this the most.

The intent of this post is to provide a space for all users to air grievances with regard to the site. As well as provide suggestions for specific things that could be changed to address your grievance. Comments insulting the mod team or those without a specific means to address your problem may be removed. No commenter will be sitebanned, unless it clearly breaks the code of conduct.

I don't know, but this comment from @[email protected] has given me some stuff to think about.

People should not think less of you on the base of the amount of sex you have, and you shouldn't either.

This is a nice thought, but insults based on amount of sex are absurdly common. I have seen quite a few people on this site who still do these insults, and it doesn't get removed when I report it. The incel article from a while go was about how we should critique incels for their misogyny rather than them failing to have sex, I see this as pretty similar to the arguments about not body-shaming fascists in that most of the people who will get hit by the insult are not the actual target. From what I remember, that article good job explaining why these insults are harmful and how they hurt a lot of people who they really shouldn't, unfortunately the discussion on that post was very off topic. In my experience, most people who have sex fail to recognize that not everyone who is celibate is an incel ("If so many terrible people have sex and you can't, that must mean you are worse than they are!").

I would say that insults based on amount of sex a person has should not be allowed, but I am very pessimistic about this actually leading to a change in site culture.

Once again, please assume good faith, even if you disagree with the take. If you think I mean something weirdly reactionairy by this post, ask me wether that is what I mean, instead of just saying that's what I mean please.
I don't want this to become a strugglesession, I just feel like this would be a good discussion to have. If this does become hostile, then please lock/remove it mods.

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/52495952

Full resolution drawing is HERE

Progress pictures are HERE

Beware this angel, he acts animalistic on purpose despite being as sentient as you or me, eats demon bones and smells like wet dog

This is a VERY belated Christmas themed drawing that I started in December (shh). I was originally going to have him have his tattoos, but they looked weird so I decided against it. I really enjoyed drawing this, especially the parts with fur! Been trying to improve more on drawing textures lately!

Hey, sorry Carcosa and others if this isn't the right place but I don't have the energy to get myself back on the matrix shit.

I have a very simple proposal which I believe will not stigmatise anyone nor stifle discussion etc, but would benefit a vulnerable segment of the hexbear community. I don't know if this is actually "simple" in practice because I don't know if the codebase supports this.

• confine all in-depth discussion about drugs and drug use to the c/drugs community
• remove c/drugs from the local/all feed
• link, clearly, to c/drugs from the sidebar so it is easy for people to find the community and the information or discussions they are interested in

Speaking as a trans person, this is hands down the best site for my people on the entire internet. We are a statistically vulnerable population, we need safe spaces for our discussions, we can rarely participate in the rest of the internet and/or real life without running into some fuckin bullshit that we shouldn't have to. Hexbear is different. Hexbear provides it all.

Speaking as an active drug addict, multiple-time relapser and veteran fuckup, I believe the recovery community is similarly statistically vulnerable, has to live in a world that normalises alcohol and other types of drug consumption, etc.

Speaking as somebody who was at one time a habitual methamphetamine user, I can attest to the fact that for some of us (and I've heard of this before I ever got that far down the path) the way, for example, news sites / tabloids etc, love to put a meth pipe on the cover or headline article whenever they have an excuse to attract attention- simply seeing those photos can be a relapse trigger.

A photo of a filthy pipe that I did not choose to look at but was right there on the cover of a fucking newspaper while I was in a shop, has in the past triggered me into recurring dreams of getting high, followed by days that feel like lost progress as I found myself fighting intrusive thoughts, impulses and romantic nostalgia trips that would have led nowhere good.

I've lost a lot of people to addiction, a variety of ways. My community, the trans community, notoriously loses a lot of our people to addiction.

I believe it would be wise for us to start posting with consideration about these topics and to be aware that there are users amongst us who are white-knuckling their way through a process of recovery that will take some of them years if not the rest of their lives.

I think it's worth the small burden of effort on the part of the drug using and drug agnostic segment of the community to post with an eye to harm minimisation and that includes protecting our recovering users from relapse triggers.

It should be on us, the posters, and on the site (if it's feasible) to put these discussions in a place which has to be actively sought out to be found.

We can provide the signposts in the sidebar, I don't think acknowledging that drugs exist is the problem here, it's the fact that c/all can throw a curve-ball at you at any time. We shouldn't expect recovering addicts to visit the drugs community and elect to block it, we should hold ourselves accountable and recognise that what might feel like a harmless discussion might be somebody else's trigger point.

I'm thinking very specifically of the ketamine discussion in c/cth yesterday. It's hard to talk about these things without potentially triggering that "romantic" connection some of us have with our drugs of choice. It would be better and more thoughtful to partition these discussions away from the most prominent and accessible feed.

Again, sorry for not visiting on matrix. I hope this post is appropriate. I'm just trying to be informative and I think I've recognised a pretty serious blindspot in our otherwise excellent site culture.

I hope the changes I propose are already supported by the software. I don't think I'm asking for much. I've probably written more on the topic than I needed to. But I don't think this is the sort of change that would or should upset the community.

Please.

Edit: If we have a recovery community it should probably be treated likewise. The post titles alone can be a trigger.

and I don't have a solution for how to treat alcohol in this. It's not a major issue that I've noticed but I just don't know. Alcoholism is one of the most destructive and the most pervasive. But THAT might be a bone of contention for some users so I elect to leave it out of this proposal.

I am not DOSing Hexbear, higher traffic from VPN IP addresses is expected because there's fewer IP addresses per user.

Rate limiting by IP address is an anti-privacy op

Edit: Maybe the rate limit can be increased for login requests?

Hi y'all Am new here!

Hey, I’m Avery!

I’m a senior professional & technical writer & journalism student. I’m an independent writer & audio production specialist with six & a half years in local broadcast radio.

I run a website where I review wrestling, indie games, & more. I’m a butch trans thing and a digital resource fairy as a hobby.

visit my site here dyingsignsl.love

Just a suggestion from a literal newbie : how about a sobriety instance? Just curious.

Aaaaaaaaaa hi everyone I wasn't expecting so many new friends so fast and I should sleep

I don't know what I'm doing

I am very new and very dumb.

Please give me directions that are /srs

I will most likely not detect sarcasm and struggle without explicit instructions.

I am on mobile currently. I'm supposed to be asleep. I am not asleep. I'm hyperfixated on new internet place.

I haven't quite figured out the UI yet but it might just not be optimized for mobile. Is there an app or should I just wait until I get back on my PC?

Hi! I just joined due to the enshittification of bluesky and hope to find new community here. I'm a goth trans woman interested in art, music and fashion. I have a few questions before i post:

1. i know selfies aren't allowed due to opsec but can i post selfies with my face cropped out to show off my outfits?

2. Can i share art i make even though it might be recognized from elsewhere and people could with some effort tie the artwork to my real identity?

Thanks for any clarification!

Hello comrades. In the interest of upholding our code of conduct - specifically, rule 1 (providing a friendly, safe and welcoming environment for all) - we felt it appropriate to make a statement regarding the lionization of Luigi Mangione, the alleged United Healthcare CEO shooter, also known as "The Adjuster."

In the day or so since the alleged shooter's identity became known to the public, the whole world has had the chance to dig though his personal social media accounts and attempt to decipher his political ideology and motives. What we have learned may shock you. He is not one of us. He is a "typical" American with largely incoherent, and in many cases reactionary politics. For the most part, what is remarkable about the man himself is that he chose to take out his anger on a genuine enemy of the proletariat, instead of an elementary school.

This is a situation where the art must be separated from the artist. We do not condemn the attack, but as a role model, Luigi Mangione falls short. We do not expect perfection from revolutionary figures either, but we expect a modicum of revolutionary discipline. We expect them not simply to identify an unpopular element of society , but to clearly illuminate the causes of oppression and the means by which they are overcome. When we canonize revolutionary figures, we are holding them up as an example to be followed.

This is where things come back to rule 1. Mangione has a long social media history bearing a spectrum of reactionary viewpoints, and interacting positively with many powerful reactionary figures. While some commenters have referred to this as "nothing malicious," by lionizing this man we effectively deem this behavior acceptable, or at the very least, safe to ignore. This is the type of tailism which opens the door to making a space unsafe for marginalized people.

We're going to be more strict on moderating posts which do little more than lionize the shooter. There is plenty to be said about the unfolding events, the remarkably positive public reaction, how public reactions to "propaganda of the deed" may have changed since the historical epoch of its conception (and how the strategic hazards might not have), and many other aspects of the news without canonizing this man specifically. We can still dance on the graves of our enemies and celebrate their rediscovered fear and vulnerability without the vulgar revisionism needed to pretend this man is some sort of example of Marxist or Anarchist practice.

Hello users of hexbear when this post is approximately 24 hours old we will have a downtime lasting about an hour for maintenance and upgrading to lemmy version 0.19.7

https://join-lemmy.org/news/2024-11-08_-_Lemmy_Release_v0.19.6

contains some of the changes, some notable ones are:

• Automatically remove tracking parameters from URLs

• Fix bug when commenting in local-only community

• Fixing peertube and ordinary video embeds

Also a reminder about Hexbear Proposals chapo.chat matrix room.

This will be a place for site proposals and discussion before implementation on the site.
Every proposal will also be mirrored into a pinned post on the hexbear community.

Any other ideas for helping to integrate the two spaces are welcome to be commented here or messaged to me directly.

Within Hexbear Proposals you can see the history of all site proposals and react to them, indicating a vote for or against a proposal.

Sending messages will be restricted to verified and active hexbear accounts older than 1 month with their matrix id in their hexbear user profile.

All top level messages within the channel must be a Proposals (idea for changing the site), Feedback (regarding non-technical aspects of the site, for technical please use https://hexbear.net/c/feedback), or Appeals (regarding admin/moderator actions).

Discussion regarding these will be within nested threads under the post.

To gain matrix verification, all you need to do is navigate to my hexbear userprofile and click the send a secure private message including your hexbear username.

it links to https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/users/01-getting-started.html/docs/en/users/03-votes-and-ranking.html which doesn't load, returns 404

"Imperialism leaves behind germs of rot which we must clinically detect and uproot from our land but from our minds as well." - Frantz Fanon

Hello users of Hexbear, the intent of this announcement is two-fold the first is that we would like to do another community moderator drive, if you have a community idea or want to help an existing one then please send an application either through hexbear or matrix direct message.

The call for new mods is crucial to our efforts to reduce racism and misogyny on the site, we need users to report and enough mods to be able to quickly act on the reports throughout the day and night. Also, CW or content warnings are essential to the safe browsing of Hexbear.

In addition, comments or posts removed for racist or misogyny will also be accompanied by escalating temporary bans. Upvotes will not be the single reason for a ban, however they may be used in conjunction with other posts/comments/upvotes. Consider this post the warning, however, mods are encouraged to reach out to hexbear users before a long duration ban.

The second is to increase transparency with regard to the site while not repeating the mistakes of previous attempts that were ultimately counterproductive, in part due to wreckers.

Previous attempts to increase site transparency and user participation were targeted by wreckers through increasing the intensity and frequency of struggle session drama.

Using matrix's increased level of user permissions as an anti-wrecking measure while having an increased barrier to sending messages with a clear process to gaining the ability to send messages, we hope to mitigate wrecking attempts.

Leading to the creation of the Hexbear Proposals chapo.chat matrix room.

This will be a place for site proposals and discussion before implementation on the site.
Every proposal will also be mirrored into a pinned post on the hexbear community. Any other ideas for helping to integrate the two spaces are welcome to be commented here or messaged to me directly.

Within Hexbear Proposals you can see the history of all site proposals and react to them, indicating a vote for or against a proposal.

Sending messages will be restricted to verified and active hexbear accounts older than 1 month with their matrix id in their hexbear user profile.

All top level messages within the channel must be a Proposals (idea for changing the site), Feedback (regarding non-technical aspects of the site, for technical please use https://hexbear.net/c/feedback), or Appeals (regarding admin/moderator actions).

Discussion regarding these will be within nested threads under the post.

To gain matrix verification, all you need to do is navigate to my hexbear userprofile and click the send a secure private message including your hexbear username.

In closing, I want to state that this site would not exist without the volunteer labor of the moderators, who I am deeply grateful for.

I would also like to take this moment to remind people that lemmy direct messages are not encrypted, and finally please use this post to discuss these changes, share community ideas, or express interest in moderation.

In light of recent events which have really been blown way out of proportion, I would like to suggest a system to help us reach democratic decisions for these kinds of things, since for me at least, one of the most highlighted issues out of this was the fact that users were completely in the dark about the problems until they were simply notified about the decisions taken to solve them.

My idea is to initially have a normal post where the problem is described in detail and the admin/mod team can possibly suggest a course of action a priori, and discussion is then made where the users express their opinions on the stated problem and course of action if there is one, along with their suggested solutions.

Then the post gets locked and it enters a voting stage, where a group of actions can be voted upon, preferably with Yes/No answers, and a deadline for this stage to end.

Then the results can be viewed by everyone, and the admin/mod team can decide how to move forward.

I realize that this complicates administration, but I hope that implementing such a system will help make this easier to do compared with trying to reach a consensus by discussion alone.

Obviously this should mainly affect meaningful changes to the site, we don't need to make a whole voting process in order to rename a couple of emojis.

like almost a week before. This is in a public chatroom too.

Idk, like I generally really like our mods and admins but this change doesn't really make a ton of sense to me and the way it was decided and messaged made it way worse.

hey comrades,

I've been having this issue that I thought must have been related to me using Voyager, but I just experienced the same thing through desktop firefox.

When I respond to some users the page load times out and says I can't reply, but it has posted my reply (often without upvoting my own comment)

Obviously not thrilled to be tagging people but one user I have noticed it with replying @[email protected], both threads and comments.

Which is extra annoying cause I've been really enjoying nerding out together.

I think it has happened with other users too. (Really regretting not saving the thread that was extra broken I saw earlier in the week.)

I, being used to my password manager doing everything, failed to save my password when I made my Hexbear account. The application has since been accepted, but when I try to reset the password the bear icon spins for a while before resetting to the reset password button.

I have tried multiple browsers and devices. I assume this is because I've never logged in to the account and that's why it doesn't want to work. Can anything be done?

modlog link (CW for misogyny and transphobia): https://hexbear.net/modlog?page=1&actionType=All&userId=2019549

sorry to be an armchair admin but noticed this user around today. took a look at their modlog and noticed they have a previous siteban and today had posts removed for overt misogyny and transphobia (the transphobia was a necro of a year-old bookclub thread about Feinberg... bizarre).

anyway, i noticed they've only received a 2-day ban just from the CTH comm. i guess this is in line with the new policies around combating misogyny, but imo this should be a pretty clear cut case for a perma site ban. user from another instance with a previous ban, pops up today and starts posting vile misogyny and seeking out old posts to do transphobia on. why give them a third chance?