Context: Lemmy still allow people to comment on your posts or comments after you blocked them:
There is value to the blocked person not being able to find out in any way, whether you've blocked them.
And if they really want to see your content, on federated social media, where you can't enforce a login requirement to view the content, they'll always be able to find your content if they really want to.
Stopping them from being able to comment on your posts would be nice, tho. Even better if they can comment, but it doesn't show up for you or anyone else.
Implementing such a block would be tricky, though. It is not as simple as community bans, as communities are always governed by their home instance.
If you post or comment in a community that isn't local, someone from a third instance could interact with that content without ever communicating with your home instance.
It can still be done, but it's a much more involved implementation than community bans.
Even better if they can comment, but it doesn't show up for you or anyone else.
This would be abused. Imagine I post some manipulated fake news or something. Then I block every single person who points out the bullshit in my post so no one sees it.
reddit implemented that and I’m sure it’s abused
I can tell you it has been abused against me multiple times on Reddit. I called someone out for something wrong or bigoted they posted and they blocked me after responding, making me unable to respond back. And presumably kept posting stuff in the future that I just didn't see, and wasn't able to call out
It's a terrible system as it just allows abuse by bad faith actors more than anything else
This happened exactly as you describe on Reddit.
Ok, but how would blocks removing comments from your posts for everyone, including the blocked user, be any different? That could be abused in the exact same way.
If you're saying blocks should only prevent future comments, this could by all means also work the same way.
The point is that it should work like a shadow ban, and not be obvious to the person you blocked. That discourages them from immediately coming at you with an alt.
The block most platforms use is that if you block someone, none of you can see each others contributions, but your past interactions are still visible to everyone.
I know.
But when did I suggest past activity should be affected, which is what you replied about?
It wasn’t clear to me in your comment but you were suggesting it wouldn’t be retroactive?
If so, then sounds okay, as long as the person knows they have been blocked, would suck to write a well written comment in reply to someone who blocked you, and unknowingly your comment is hidden for everyone because you don’t realise you were blocked.
Why would it be retroactive?
If so, then sounds okay, as long as the person knows they have been blocked, would suck to write a well written comment in reply to someone who blocked you, and unknowingly your comment is hidden for everyone because you don’t realize you were blocked.
That's exactly what should happen. If someone can just instantly know when they get blocked, nothing stops them from instantly signing up with alt account to continue bitching at someone.
This is less of an issue with centralized social media, but with federation you absolutely should take measures like this to curb at least some portion of targeted harassment.
And if you bothered someone enough for them to block you, not being allowed to stand on their soapbox anymore (not being able to make comments on their posts visible to everyone else) is a really weird thing to worry about.
Reddit implemented this, and it was abused heavily to push trolls posts and disinformation up the algorithm, since by blocking people who disagreed with them, after multiple attempts the naysayers could no longer see the posts.
Somebody tested it, and was able to get their testing misinformation posts heavily upvoted after just a few days.
Has happened multiple times to me. I called somebody out for saying something wrong or bigoted or whatever, they blocked me after responding to me, I could no longer respond back to their response. And then presumably they kept saying shit that I was not able to see because I was blocked
It's a short-sighted way of implementing blocking, since it allows for heavy abuse by bad actors
Yeah, there was plenty of discussion on Reddit back in the day about the drawbacks and pitfalls of the blocking system. Surprised to see people calling for its implementation here.
@Blaze@feddit.org, genuinely interested in your opinion on this considering the new information
I would prefer if people I block couldn't see anything I post
Err... you know all these comments are posted publicly and anyone can view them, right?
At least on Twitter before Elon changed things, the same thing applied, tweets were public but you could still block people.
Currently, X displays a “You’re blocked” message when trying to view the profile of a person who’s blocked you. In addition to blocking all posts, it also prevents you from seeing their replies, media, followers, and following list.
I would prefer if people I block couldn’t see anything I post
One of the problems is that if the post is public, anyone you block could just log out and see your post.
Hmmm you're right. Okay.
I would prefer if people I block were hurt a little.
Wowww this comment says a lot. Have you ever considered that if you were given the ability to 'hurt' people who you think deserve it, that other people could use that same ability to 'hurt' people who dont deserve it? Maybe stop focusing on retaliation for dumb internet disagreements and go touch some grass.
Bluesky/twitter/etc are person centric - you follow the person
Lemmy/reddit/etc are topic centric - you follow a community
It makes sense for blocking on Bluesky to completely hide you, you've severed the person - person relationship.
On Lemmy severing a person - person relationship shouldn't disadvantage the user from interacting with the community. Communities don't want duplicate posts so if you post some big news in a popular community now all the users you've blocked would be cut off from that content. Their personal beef with you shouldn't disadvantage them in the communities this way.
This problem can be seen clearly on Reddit where blocking works this way, frequently abused by spammers and powerusers.
I don't think this type of block makes sense for a more forum-like environment. In fact I think it's more absuable for bad actors to be able to conceal their rhetoric from anyone they know would oppose it.
Yep, happened on Reddit exactly as you theorised.
IDK, seems like blocking behaving like that on Lemmy could backfire, actually encouraging abuse.
For example. What happens if someone being malicious blocks you and then starts talking shit about you elsewhere in the comment thread? The person being abused would never know.
It's not even theoretical. Reddit implemented this and the exact behaviour you described happened. Somebody tested and documented it.
I've had multiple occasions where someone on reddit was losing a debate against me and just blocked me, making it impossible to reply and giving them the "last word" to everyone else that can still see the entire comment chain.
This is not how a public forum like Reddit or Lemmy should behave. It makes sense on actual social media platforms like Instagram, but not here
This is one of the major gripes I have with Reddit. So often do people just block me when they are losing a debate against me, making it impossible to reply. A public forum should not behave this way if you want a healthy debate culture
Just a short hypothetical: You start this thread or even top level vomment and I don't agree with you. Then I reply something and block you immediatelly after. That could be another tool for trolls, but I guess there could be some solutions that fix this problem.
(Not dissagreeing with the OP, just brainstorming)
I had a mod do that to me. They replied to my comment with a bunch of false accusations, then deleted my comment and banned me from the community. So, all the people saw was my username with all the accusations below, and I couldn't respond. I just blocked the whole instance and moved on.
Another missing feature is the ability to stop inbox notifications for any any particular comment you made.
Look, sometimes I just want to say something inciteful and then just dip out without the fear of dealing with the fallout, okay?
There's no such thing as "public except for that guy in particular."
If any logged-out rando can see a thing, preventing a specific logged-in user from seeing it doesn't work and shouldn't be tried. It's ridiculous. And it's a great incentive for assholes to just make a new account.
The worst way to do it is how reddit handled it, where any asshole can have the last word, for free. You can't reply to anyone if someone in the thread blocks you. You can't even reply to your own comments in the chain, to notify people, 'hey, some asshole blocked me, I'm not just ignoring you or the argument.'
They wield the instance ban hammer for themselves, while tools for the common plebes are lower priority:-P.
I really don't think blocking should prevent people from replying to you. I believe it should hide the content and not send you notifications, yes.
At the bare minimum, blocking should only prevent you from directly replying. On Reddit, if anyone in the comment chain above the comment you're replying to had blocked you then you couldn't make the comment.
I'm willing to discuss this, my opinions aren't rock solid on this.
In cases of harassment (what I view as the strongest counter argument) I think mods/admin need to take action by banning. Like if someone puts a comment on every post I make saying "JackbyDev is a doodoo head" (or something actually offensive lol) then that's harassment. I'm having trouble thinking of any problematic behaviors that wouldn't qualify as harassment that allowing someone to comment in reply to would actually prevent.
(None of this comment has anything to do with blocking an instance which is a separate topic I have separate opinions on.)
In cases of harassment (what I view as the strongest counter argument) I think mods/admin need to take action by banning. Like if someone puts a comment on every post I make saying “JackbyDev is a doodoo head” (or something actually offensive lol) then that’s harassment. I’m having trouble thinking of any problematic behaviors that wouldn’t qualify as harassment that allowing someone to comment in reply to would actually prevent.
I mod several communities. We are lacking mods, and we can't have eyes on the communities 24/7. Allowing users to have this kind of blocking helps.
Memes about the Fediverse
Other relevant communities: