The point to them is to inform users that it's happening before it happens, so that it doesn't catch people completely by surprise.

The fact that they can't be restricted to this instance alone, and federate to every other lemmy instance, means they become a drama point, but unfortunately, I don't have a solution for that. The moment it becomes an option, I will be using it for threads like that

I appreciate being kept informed to be honest. I'd much rather that than find out after the fact. Apart from anything else it gives the two Admin's a chance to discuss things, something that's clearly paid off here as the the other instance Admin has expressed regret the incident happened and said Admins should do better and the Admin who committed the offence has apologised. I think the apology must've been sincere as @Ada has stayed the decision to defed.

I think defederation threads in general provide utility in the form of transparency and the possibility of feedback. I did not get the sense that there was no interest in input. Hopefully we could try the suggestion from Ategon so that other instances do not see similar posts in the future.

I don't enjoy drama either. The drama infects everything and makes it difficult to have any conversation about the topic at all. There was a good faith discussion on the topic to be had and everyone in the thread made a solid effort to discuss it. It seems like most people got what they wanted as we did not defederate. To be clear, I am happy with this result as well.

I could be wrong, but I thought the intention of the 48 hours was to make it clear that the process would be concise and not dragged out. I think framing the post that way did not have the desired effect, for the reasons that you have listed. Mainly it created a countdown drama. The original post from programming.dev had its own share of drama as well which got carried over into the meta thread to a certain degree and again made the discussion harder than it should have been.

I think there is tension between wanting to create a safe place for trans people, as this is the stated goal of the instance, and wanting to be connected to the larger social media community, as that is part of the fun of a social media platform. As far as I can tell, Beehaw solves this problem by preemptively defederating with most of the Fediverse. This at least avoids all of the drama which is good, but then they are a more isolated instance. Hexbear seems to revel in being problematic for the sake of virtue signaling. I like that Blåhaj has not gone in either of those directions. In fact I think Blåhaj is striking the correct balance for moderation.

The federated nature of lemmy means we need to moderate against transphobia on an instance by instance basis. I think if the mods and admins here continue to be receptive to discussion then in the long run this community will continue to have positive interactions with the majority of lemmy instances. I think the nature of this continual process is not what most people expected from the Fediverse. I recall most people assuming things would settle down after an initial period of defederation. The fact is we are a part of a marginalized minority group which means there is more effort required to make this space happen than a space of similar size that benefits from heteronormative and cis privilege. Communication takes time and energy which our team of mods and admins have to provide for free. The process takes work, but I think the end result is worth it.

What I am hoping is that we will be able to learn from these early experiences and make the process as smooth as humanly possible. I don't believe it will be completely without bumps. Hopefully future defederation threads will minimize drama and maximize efficient and fruitful discourse. edit: typos

i guess it opened up a way to consider staying federated? idk.. it was my first so im not yet exhausted, but i can see that coming along eventually, yeah...

It's to give a timeframe for negotiation between server admins to resolve the issue, for users on both servers a chance to weigh in whether they do or do not support either admin's position (whether admins listen or not), and notice for users who may suddenly find communities they frequented lacking in new posts.

Negotiation across opposing positions is very tough but sometimes a necessary process to promote healthier online discourse. Regardless of the defederation is immediate or not, or if there was no decision to reverse it, there would be drama about it. I think that unless there's a different agreed upon process between server admins to handle issues they may feel is cause for defederation, this is about as smooth and mutually understanding way to go about it as you can.

I think the point is to be informative, also it is important to realize how it affects people which many of the people providing feedback showed. I'm not a believer that Fediverse should cater to "user choice" or "free speech" and I do believe defederation is justified and necessary, but sometimes it is too much, or too early to properly tell.

I can definitely see how it would be unpleasant to have a countdown thread pinned in the feed though, and the announcement of defederation in general. Defederation is an unpleasant subject and does start drama, though I feel it would be just as bad if not worse if we didn't get a warning or announcement. So it is necessary to talk about it and understand how it impacts people, especially with bigger and well established instances.

(I wouldn't say this is necessary for an instance that is new or has never contacted us or vice versa, in that case us defederating them would be as if we never existed to them, this argument about considering impact doesn't apply to threads or any other instance which hasn't gotten off the ground).

Personally I wasn't a fan of seeing the post pinned in my community (especially after lurking on Reddit and seeing a troll post claiming that Snowe needs to hand over Programming.dev to hexbear, made it seem like we were trollbaited) but I'd still prefer it to not noticing anything for months until I inevitably tried to respond or search for something there and couldn't find it, or replied/posted in their communities and get no response. Even though it's unpleasant I'd still take notice over ignorance.

Yes, hello. As an uninvolved person, I would like to say that I was tempted to join the fun simply because it was there, regardless of the request not to.
Sadly, I had no popcorn readily at hand and so had to refrain from stoking the fire.
You are quite correct that these threads attract drama lovers, regardless of background, and it does create more hassle for those trying to maintain order.

Perhaps a one-sided instance-wide announcement, notification or message for users from its admins might be coded in as an option if possible?

Though, then again, that might create a wave of posts asking about what happened and such...

Some level of interaction is needed for these kind of things. The problem is figuring out how to balance them at reasonable levels to avoid exhaustion.

Perhaps an automated bot that temporarily bans users from other instances? Sounds like a fun thing to have around for admins.

Regardless, as long as the windows are open, buzzing flies will always show up sooner or later.

I think these sorts of conflicts between instance administrations should be handled more quietly than this. The 48 hour defedration announcement was the top ranked post when I logged into lemmy world. I don't think conflicts between administration teams should be made this big unless more sensible means of conflict resolution have already failed.

Blahaj's admins had reasonable concerns. Programming dev's admins made reasonable concessions to avoid de-federation. This seems like something that could have, and should have been handled by direct negotiations between the admin teams. Public threads on the issue are valuable for community discussion during a dispute, but they should probably be kept in a place where interested users can find it, rather than a major announcement that users of every instance will be informed of.

It's good to inform users if a community will be defederated. But please keep it as a last resort instead of an opening salvo.

Is there a way to hide individual threads/posts in one's feed?