this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2023
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Ill be honest, voting being public is a big deterrent from kbin for me, after having experiences in the past of having people harass me on the assumption that I had downvoted their content.
The risk of being targeted for harassment over a downvote basically cements kbin as an unusable platform for me.
E: And, on thinking about it? It also has me doubting the quality of kbin sourced content. Downvotes on reddit style forums, which this is, work as a community driven content filter. Actively discouraging the use of that filter means higher quality posts are harder to discern. And sifting through more chaff per good post is not appealing.
I see where you're coming from, but this to me seems more like a property of the fediverse than an issue with Kbin in particular. Right now, anyone can make an instance and choose to show downvotes. Someone could make their own instance, gather downvotes federated from other instances, and make a list of who's downvoted who. Being on an instance that doesn't show downvotes doesn't hide your downvotes from everyone — just you and others on instances that don't show them.
On this end, I feel that Kbin instances are just being transparent about the publicity of your votes. If anyone can see your downvotes just by looking at an instance that shows them, I think it's important that people are aware of that. Showing public votes is sort of telling you, "Hey, people can see how you voted on the fediverse," and that's preferable to pretending that nobody can see them.
That just drives me to use instances that dont federate with instances who show that information.
Like. Lets apply that logic elsewhere. I could make an instance that makes your ip address public, because that information is also available. Could stick it next to your username.
Would you use that service? Or do you prefer using an instance who keeps the information they can access private?
Obviously, if my instance was sending my IP address off to other instances, I would get off that instance. However, downvotes are different situation. To my knowledge, for votes to work and be somewhat reliable, instances need to have a user attached to each vote. It would be very problematic if an instance was sending userless votes and other instances were just accepting them without issue. Nothing about the fediverse requires sending my IP off to other instances, whereas votes need to have corresponding users to be trustworthy.
Yes, thank you, obviously my exaggerated example to highlight the point was exaggerated. But you get my point, yes?
E: here, since you responded my just describing the function of how votes work. Lets try a different example.
Servers can track what posts you look at. That is something they can do, and many websites do. Would you be pleased to have every single post you viewed listed on your profile?
Kinda? Your example wasn't really an exaggeration of the situation with downvotes but a different situation entirely, so it didn't really address my point. Again, as long as there are downvotes on the fediverse, the people behind them will be visible to anyone who wants to know just by looking at an instance that shows them. Thus, being on an instance that doesn't show who you downvoted doesn't make your downvotes more private than if you were on an instance that did.
I 100% get being worried about people seeing who you downvoted, but in that case, I'd suggest being on an instance that just doesn't have downvotes. Those exist, and I've seen plenty of people who prefer things that way.
EDIT: A bit of clarification.
Not having downvotes at all makes the exact reason I dont like kbin even worse. A lack of downvotes is, in part, what made facebook so vividly toxic and rife with hate speech and fake news. When a site lacks upper moderation and a method of inter-community moderation, there is no way to filter out bad content and bad users.
Removing downvotes is something wanted by people who dont want content filtered. Showing downvotes is something wanted by people who want to weaken filters. Weak or nonexistent filters is what allows the worst aspects of the internet to fester and rot.
I did literally say I am drawn towards instances that would refuse to federate with privacy free instances, which includes the ones that make votes public. In the exact same way I would not want federation with instances that make your ip or view history public.
I mean beehaw has no downvotes and they're not toxic at all if viewed from within their instance.
Understandable. I don't view showing downvotes as weakening filters—I see how it could deter downvoting to some extent, but in my experience, it leads to people handing out downvotes less freely and when it's more justified as opposed to not downvoting at all. Nevertheless, I see where you're coming from, and I want to stress that I think it's completely fair to not want people to see if you've downvoted them.
Note: I don't think defederating from an instance prevents them from seeing your content (according to this thread), so I'm not sure if defederation would make your votes private.