Asklemmy

It seems like most have this covered, but it is my limited understanding that which instance you pick can defederate from others of their own choosing. This means you can't see their content AFAIK.

TL:DR; ml is for Marxist-Leninist, but each server has their own philosophy and rules, so just comment and post on other servers if you want nothing to do with this. On censorship, modlogs are public so there's no hiding stupid admin actions unlike Reddit.

Hello and welcome to Lemmy! Enjoy your stay, even if it can be a little chaotic the discussion and vibes are generally in a good place for real people to talk, and I think the Fediverse is where the future of our internet should be, open and people-first instead of corporations.

To give you context, the lead developers of Lemmy and maintainers of the lemmy.ml, are Marxist-Leninists, and that's why it's .ml and that's related to the signup process. Esoteric signup processes (most other servers are just describe why you want to join) are there to help prove you're not a bot or troll or are aligned with that server's values. Lemmy.ml is a general topic instance but their moderation has a pro-Russian, pro-China slant, and have been known to ban comments and users speaking against that on controversial (e.g. Ukraine, Gaza, US politics) threads. That's the reality, there is a lot of valid criticism of that from within and outside Lemmy, but that's also their perogative. (That sounds not great, but stay with me here.)

However, being part of the Fediverse, this software extends beyond the developers' own political whims. So, you aren't subject to their philosophy if you don't post on .ml and aren't registered with them. Other servers have different policies, some more laissez-faire like db0 or ee, some very protective like beehaw.

I hope you can understand that even if admins sometimes have power trips, they don't have the power of Spez to kick you off the whole platform or enforce awful rules. If we compare Reddit to a kingdom where you can be expelled at any moderator or admins whim, Lemmy is more like a fiefdom where you can only be expelled from the duchy. If you're an extremely unlikable troll, every server will reject you.

Because these relationships between servers are organic, it's not all sunshine and rainbows and there are a lot of topics people can and will disagree on. Please just try to be reasonable with your fellow user and moderator, try not to get upset if your post is removed (double check the rules of the community AND server you post to) if you get 20 downvotes on something unpopular (though it's avoided on lemm.ee since downvotes are disabled). Modlogs are open so if you think a ban/removal is unfair/unjust, appeal to your mods/admins first, if you think it's still unreasonable or part of a power trip rampage you can have a discussion about it on [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], and mention your old user handle for people to judge whether it was justified or not. Unpopular stuff often doesn't get censored unless it breaks rules, or is just plain mean, trolling, flaming or unproductive.

Think of Lemmy instances like a Discord server. You are joining a community. You are not joining up to a centralized corporate website. There are many lemmy instances. Shop around. lemmy.ml are Marxist-Leninist. It's what the .ml stands for. If that's not for you, find another instance.

The issue you've faced varies instance to instance. If you want complete freedom and censorship resistance, you have to run your own server.

The developers of Lemmy are Communists, they don't hide this fact.

To answer your first question, there are no "free speech" instances in wide use, depending on your point of view an instance might be "censoring" or fighting "misinformation." It's up to you to pick an instance you want.

Lemmy.ml is explicitly a Marxist Leninist instance of the Lemmy software. It's why it's called .ml. You can use a different instance if you aren't a Marxist Leninist. Lemmy.world is a Hitlerite instance.

Federation is censorship resistant, but each instance is still going to remove gross content for the sake of their users and instance culture. You can see removed content in the modlog, it's public for every instance running unmodified Lemmy.

As for why you need to copy/paste the sentence -- It sounds a lot like an anti-spam measure. Captchas and the like are extremely common, I'm surprised you find them novel. Are you asking this because you're planning a spam-attack and need to make sure the spam isn't removed? Your spam will be removed. While it's technically possible to go find, no one will care enough to do so.

The level of censorship is going to be different depending on your instance and where you are posting to. A lot of instances are managed by individuals or small teams out of passion. They can do as they please and don't have to pander to everyone for commercial appeal like Reddit or Tumblr. If someone doesn't like what they're doing they can join a different instance or create their own.

Instances can defederate from each other over these differences. A lot are defederated from the instance Exploding Heads because of their alt right content for example. From what I understand you can also report content to the administrators of your instance if it goes against their rules and I think they can remove it from appearing on your instance (or block the user that posted it). This isn't going to stop it from appearing elsewhere.

lol wut

Censorship resistant - By hosting your own server, you can be in full control of your content.").

Yes, exactly, you can host your own or sign up at one someone's already hosts. The resistance is in the ability to choose which admins you trust and align with your views while still interacting with the rest of us.

The devs run their own and have their own rules and censorship but you don't have to sign up there. Does that help?

There's plenty of censorship on Lemmy, but unlike Reddit, the censorship is orchestrated by the individual server, not by a corporation in control of the whole ecosystem. Go post something pro-capitalist on lemmy.ml, or something claiming climate change is a hoax on slrpnk.net, or something anti-trans on lemmy.blahaj.zone and see how fast it gets taken down - you could consider that censorship, but the reason Lemmy is better than Reddit in this regard is that you can go post that same thing on another instance, in a community that supports those views, and it'll stay up. It's all up to the administration of the individual instance.

Even if you can't find an instance / community that will espouse your unique views, you can create your own, and post whatever you like, and everyone who federates with you will be able to see it. That's how Lemmy is resistant to censorship.

I'm not touching the lemmy.ml question with a ten foot pole, someone else can field that one.

Seems like a simple task to help verify that you are not a bot. It might also help deter applicants who are anti-communist. I guess you solved the problem for yourself by choosing a different instance.

The original developers of Lemmy are communists who were seeking to create a social media space that would be free from corporate censorship and centralization. When they created ml, they decided to have it be geared towards communists and leftists as their specific flavor of the Lemmy community, because that is what interested them.

If you are looking for a less political and more general instance, I’d recommend:

lemmy.world
sh.itjust.works
lemmy.dbzero.com

The .ml admins are, to put it mildly, far left. That's why it's great to have other instances like lemmy.world, feddit.org etc. If you don't agree with how the admins run an instance you can make an account somewhere else without missing out on content.

It's quite resistant to any single entity's censorship, but if you share things most server admins consider unacceptable, other servers will block your server.

lemmy.ml... copy a sentence from the link provided which links to some article called “The Principles of Communism”

At least one of the Lemmy developers is a hardcore communist, and some people see lemmy.ml as a little sketchy for that reason. I see you found another server, which is exactly how federation is meant to work. While the overall culture tends to be left-leaning, most server admins are not hardcore communists and don't censor political positions that aren't advocating violence or discrimination.