TL;DR: Major social networks and their corporate collaborators get a lot of grief for censorship, and as a result alternative arrangements have sprouted. Through highly touted new ways to organize online, such as the so-called Fediverse, open source social networks like Mastodon claimed to be a real answer. However, controversial platform Gab is testing supposed free speech advocates and their commitment to principle.

Gab Faces New Censorship Fight From Mastodon

By most popular media accounts, the federated universe (The Fediverse) of interconnected servers for web publishing and file hosting was supposed to be a place where freer speech could thrive away from Silicon Valley’s lock on social networking. Self-hosting microblogging site Mastodon was considered something of an exemplar for the idea, allowing seemingly anyone a network node to enable seamless interaction across connections.

Embattled social network Gab evidently believed Mastodon and its Fediverse affiliation would be a perfect place to park its platform. It has been summarily banned, kicked off, and deplatformed in various capacities since its inception. The politically and philosophically Right-leaning Twitter alternative has even been booted by PayPal and Stripe, causing it to seek funding through cryptocurrency.

By 4 July 2019, however, members of the Mastodon community took notice of Gab’s moving into their territory. “So, #Gab did it,” explained blogger Avatar X, “They launched on the #Fediverse based on Mastodon and since they brought in 1M users. Gab is actually now the biggest #Mastodon node by far. Mastodon Social is now actually third place behind Pawoo from Japan which is second.” Not everyone was pleased.

Gab Seeks to Monetize and Platform Racist Content While Hiding Behind the Banner of Free Speech

In fact, Mastodon released an official statement, condemning Gab’s entrance into their hub. They positioned themselves as “completely opposed to Gab’s project and philosophy, which seeks to monetize and platform racist content while hiding behind the banner of free speech,” Mastodon stressed. In reactions, they’ve gone so far as to create a “new server covenant,” which “means we only list servers on joinmastodon.org that are committed to active moderation against racism, sexism and transphobia,” and described Gab as a “hijack” of their “infrastructure.”

Mastodon goes on to detail how “Tusky (Android) and Toot! (iOS) have blacklisted Gab’s domains from their login screens. Gab users will not be able to use these apps to access or post from Gab. We do not currently know if any other apps are doing the same,” and how most “servers in the fediverse are already blocking the Gab domains and we have done the same at mastodon.social.”

Gab responded by claiming, “The Mastodon community is sabotaging their own app developers with mass flagging/reporting of any app that does not block Gab’s domain.” More recently, the company has remained defiant, telling followers, “Mastodon can’t stop us. No host can stop us. App Stores can’t stop us. I want you all to realize how big what we’ve done is. Yes, we need to polish and fine tune the system over the next few weeks, but now the system as a whole is unstoppable. That’s a big deal.” In perhaps the greatest bit of irony, debate between the two communities is happening over their sworn foe, and lone in-common hatred, Twitter.

DISCLOSURE: The author holds cryptocurrency as part of his financial portfolio, including BCH.

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