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In #Activitypub, replies to a post are a collection of links that are part of the original post. So it’s only natural that the original poster should be in control of what’s in the reply collection. Technically it’s quite simple to implement that the OP (original poster) can decide which replies he/she/they accept or refuse in said collection. It’s up to the developers of ActivityPub implementers like Mastodon et al to make that level of control accessible.
#ActivityPub
This entry was edited (1 month ago)
in reply to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
To make that work, comments would need to be relayed only via the account of the original poster - which isn't the case right now.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
• •

@heluecht Yep. This should be seen as a bug, IMHO. A bit more details on my thoughts at https://social.wildeboer.net/@jwildeboer/112899254853236437 which is a reply to a similar observation you make.

Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

2024-08-03 17:25:15


@michael Yep. And I personally think that’s a mistake that should be fixed. In all AP (ActivityPub) implementations. The original post should be authoritative when it comes to maintaining the reply list. Other accounts can maintain their own copy based on their own rules and decisions, but the reply list of the original post should inform other instances and accounts. This would also be an elegant solution to fetching threads more completely, IMHO.

@Michael Vogel
in reply to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •

When the Social WG discussed about the protocol, I provided commentary. At that point in time, I already had worked with the Diaspora protocol and knew their way of distributing comments. I'm not totally sure anymore, but I can imagine that I suggested that to the WG as well.

But I guess that AP inherited their current behaviour from pump.io. Sadly also LD signatures didn't took of. So we would need a different method of authenticating especially non public posts.

in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •
@heluecht you don't need signatures. Just fetch the replies collection. The OP can use 'Add' or 'Accept' activities to indicate that an object has been added to the replies.
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
Fetching the replies collection doesn't work for non public posts.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
• •
@heluecht @evan Why? Is that a result of current AP implementations or a deeper problem?
@Michael Vogel @Evan Prodromou
in reply to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
Commenting person B can't know which accounts person A, who added the post, has as recipients, so if person C were to request the post from B, B couldn't know and would therefore deny access.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
• •
@heluecht @evan I try to understand from the user perspective. I see a post by account X because person B commented on it. The post by X has a unique id so I can ask for the post and reply list. You are saying I would get neither when the post by X is non-public? Which should mean I shouldn’t see it in the first place when I’m not a follower of X, right?
@Michael Vogel @Evan Prodromou
in reply to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
When A and B are followers of X and both are replying to X's post - but neither A nor B are following each other, how could A see B's post and vice versa?
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
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@heluecht Again, that's not true. The `followers` collection is public.
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •
@heluecht Are you still involved in development of Friendica? It would be great to see you get more involved in AP.
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
Yeah, I'm still developing Friendica. Concerning AP: I just made a suggestion for the thread completion: https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/thread-completion/4334
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
I would love to help to improve and enhance AP. My only issue could be time related.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •
@heluecht we have monthly meetings. The last one was yesterday. There's also a weekly issue triage meeting, and meetings for all the specific task forces (E2EE, Data Portability, Testing, ...). I hope to see you there!
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
Not every user exposes this collection. And also that doesn't take into account that you can define a different list of receivers for each post. And since you can use BCC, you couldn't even see all receivers in the original post.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •
@heluecht yes it does; you have to a) use HTTP Signature authorization and b) have access to the post.
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •
@heluecht or, you know, OAuth 2.0 authorization for posts on your local server.
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
This only works when all participants in a thread do have a got a list of all participants. But by now there isn't such a list, especially with the usage of BCC.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •

@heluecht I wanted to make it clear that it's entirely possible to handle this case with followers-only or other private addressing. I updated the page on replies on the ActivityPub primer to explain it. I hope it helps for you!

https://www.w3.org/wiki/ActivityPub/Primer/Replies

@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •

@heluecht I think there's a more extensive discussion of threading in my book, too.

https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/activitypub/9781098162733/


ActivityPub

ActivityPub is the new standard for connecting social networks together on the social web. This open, decentralized social networking protocol defines an API for sharing activities to a social network … - Selection from ActivityPub [Book]
O’Reilly Online Learning
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

Michael
Michael
• •

sadly at least mastodon doesn’t work like this at all.

In mastodon only self-replies by the OP are part of the activity pub replies collection, which is the reason that replies don’t federate well, and why we need FediFetcher.

in reply to Michael

Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:
• •
@michael Yep. And I personally think that’s a mistake that should be fixed. In all AP (ActivityPub) implementations. The original post should be authoritative when it comes to maintaining the reply list. Other accounts can maintain their own copy based on their own rules and decisions, but the reply list of the original post should inform other instances and accounts. This would also be an elegant solution to fetching threads more completely, IMHO.
@Michael
This entry was edited (1 month ago)
Unknown parent

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
I recall adding several other comments that were decided to leave to the implementers. For example, I suggested a definition for DMs.
This entry was edited (1 month ago)
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
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@heluecht DMs are any content objects with only actors (no collections) in the addressing properties (to, cc, and so on).
@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
Not really. In Friendica we can decide with each post who should receive it, so we always use to, cc or bcc. The only really usable way would be a special indicator (like the one that Pleroma introduced) or a dedicated endpoint. I know that there been discussions about these two possibilities - but there had been no decision about this.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •

@heluecht
What makes a direct message is that it's direct to specific accounts, not to "all followers" or "the public" or "a contact list".

That's all; it's a very easy concept.

@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
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Since we can address our posts individually, a non public post in Friendica is normally directed to specific accounts. We are using the "litepub" extension to indicate a direct message.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
• •

@heluecht that seems like a meaningless distinction.

If you are sending an image or HTML text to specific people, there's no difference between a "direct message" and a "post".

@Michael Vogel
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
• •
It is handled in different locations. direct messages (at least how we define them) are messages that should be listed at a prominent place, while the other messages will simply be listed in the streams of messages that you might miss or not.
in reply to Evan Prodromou

Michael Vogel
Michael Vogel
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For historical reasons they are stored in different tables.
in reply to Michael Vogel

Evan Prodromou
Evan Prodromou
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@heluecht neat. So, I'm working on encrypted DMs this summer and I find this issue really interesting.
@Michael Vogel
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