Hello there!
It has been a while since our last update, but it's about time to address the elephant in the room: downtimes. Lemmy.World has been having multiple downtimes a day for quite a while now. And we want to take the time to address some of the concerns and misconceptions that have been spread in chatrooms, memes and various comments in Lemmy communities.
So let's go over some of these misconceptions together.
"Lemmy.World is too big and that is bad for the fediverse".
While one thing is true, we are the biggest Lemmy instance, we are far from the biggest in the Fediverse. If you want actual numbers you can have a look here: https://fedidb.org/network
The entire Lemmy fediverse is still in its infancy and even though we don't like to compare ourselves to Reddit it gives you something comparable. The entire amount of Lemmy users on all instances combined is currently 444,876 which is still nothing compared to a medium sized subreddit. There are some points that can be made that it is better to spread the load of users and communities across other instances, but let us make it clear that this is not a technical problem.
And even in a decentralised system, there will always be bigger and smaller blocks within; such would be the nature of any platform looking to be shaped by its members.
"Lemmy.World should close down registrations"
Lemmy.World is being linked in a number of Reddit subreddits and in Lemmy apps. Imagine if new users land here and they have no way to sign up. We have to assume that most new users have no information on how the Fediverse works and making them read a full page of what's what would scare a lot of those people off. They probably wouldn't even take the time to read why registrations would be closed, move on and not join the Fediverse at all. What we want to do, however, is inform the users before they sign up, without closing registrations. The option is already built into Lemmy but only available on Lemmy.ml - so a ticket was created with the development team to make these available to other instance Admins. Here is the post on Lemmy Github.
Which brings us to the third point:
"Lemmy.World can not handle the load, that's why the server is down all the time"
This is simply not true. There are no financial issues to upgrade the hardware, should that be required; but that is not the solution to this problem.
The problem is that for a couple of hours every day we are under a DDOS attack. It's a never-ending game of whack-a-mole where we close one attack vector and they'll start using another one. Without going too much into detail and expose too much, there are some very 'expensive' sql queries in Lemmy - actions or features that take up seconds instead of milliseconds to execute. And by by executing them by the thousand a minute you can overload the database server.
So who is attacking us? One thing that is clear is that those responsible of these attacks know the ins and outs of Lemmy. They know which database requests are the most taxing and they are always quick to find another as soon as we close one off. That's one of the only things we know for sure about our attackers. Being the biggest instance and having defederated with a couple of instances has made us a target.
"Why do they need another sysop who works for free"
Everyone involved with LW works as a volunteer. The money that is donated goes to operational costs only - so hardware and infrastructure. And while we understand that working as a volunteer is not for everyone, nobody is forcing anyone to do anything. As a volunteer you decide how much of your free time you are willing to spend on this project, a service that is also being provided for free.
We will leave this thread pinned locally for a while and we will try to reply to genuine questions or concerns as soon as we can.
Any de-federated instance doesn't have the money or resources to start DDOS attacks. You know who does? Large corporations who feel attacked at the very existence of large platforms such as lemmy.world.
Who do we know with those resources, funding, knowledge of software (in general, as well as able to place specific people to learn about certain FOSS projects that have their code available), and the desire to spend such resources?
You know it's Reddit Co, we know it's Reddit Co. They know they're doing it too.
Fuck Spez and his bullshit army. I hope they can sleep well in their suburban McMansions while they sell out their future.
Conspiracy is one thing, this is just obvious.
It's shockingly cheap and easy to DDOS people, especially if you know something that makes them exceptionally vulnerable as is mentioned in the post above. Small-time wanna-be hackers can put their allowance savings into getting a DDOS running just to be spiteful little shits.
Sure, could it be a corporate attack? Of course it could be. But could it also be some spiteful little fanboy who just wants to piss on people who want to do their own thing? Of course it could be that as well. And dismissing that as impossible is simply wrong.
I guess, but a little fanboy won't be able to afford to do it day after day for months. Big corpo surely can
Did you read the first sentence? You would be surprised how cheap it is, and it's why we need more people in cybersecurity. Also, even if it required a wealthy fanboy, those exist, you know. You don't need millions of corporate dollars to fund this kind of thing. These conspiracies don't help anything.
Yeah, no.
DDOS attacks cost very little, and most people could easily afford to buy access to a network for ddosing a site like Lemmy.world.
We regularly have to deal with students who have bought DDOS attacks because they want to try to get exams cancelled and such.
DDOS attacks are easy to do, and it's incredibly simple to find a botnet of infected PC's. What isn't simple is actually hacking into a database.
It is almost definitely not Reddit. Reddit fanboys, maybe. But DDoS attacks are highly illegal and not completely untraceable. If it was tied back to Reddit in any way, it would be a lawsuit waiting to happen and horrible PR.
same thing happened when people were leaving reddit in droves going to voat.co
Woah, when was this
A few years back: https://www.dailydot.com/debug/voat-ddos-attack/
Edit: this article gives the background for why people were leaving in droves at the time: https://www.businessinsider.com/reddit-rival-voat-attacked-by-hackers-2015-7
Thanks this was super informative. Fuck Reddit
1st The if Warfare: never underestimate your enemy. It can be alarming what resources people are willing to expend for terrible reasons - narcissism, ego, and spite being the top 3 IMO.
For instance: Musk is the pettiest man on the planet. The rich dingus who killed himself and others in that underwater deathtrap was all ego all the time. Oh and funny forget all the whales that keep making microtransactions and p2w in games a profitable business model.
I'm not saying it isn't Reddit, but it doesn't have to be them - or even just them. Reddit, for instance, could be quietly contributing to the problem while somebody else takes the brunt of the blame. It would make sense, too. The enemy of their enemy is an awfully convenient tool/patsy/unknowing smokescreen for a given value of friend.