The best part of the fediverse is that anyone can run their own server. The downside of this is that anyone can easily create hordes of fake accounts, as I will now demonstrate.
Fighting fake accounts is hard and most implementations do not currently have an effective way of filtering out fake accounts. I’m sure that the developers will step in if this becomes a bigger problem. Until then, remember that votes are just a number.
I’ve set the registration date on my account back 100 years just to show how easy it is to manipulate Lemmy when you run your own server. Don’t believe everything the internet tells you that includes ChatGPT, the first page of Google’s search results, and the statistics Lemmy servers provide you with.
The problem isn’t that bad because defederating is always an option. To prevent subdomain attacks we need some kind of wildcard defederation system in Lemmy, but after that the whole voting ring issue is just a matter of detection.
That’s exactly what a vampire that was here 100 years ago would say.
This man is over 100 years old
The only real early adopter
Even older than the project itself. Nice… The alfa… The first, the only one
If it becomes too big of a problem, instances will whitelist the most popular instances instead of trying to blacklist all the bad ones.
How would that work? How will new instances/servers ever get a chance to grow if the fediverse only allowed those who are already whitelisted? Sorry for my limited knowledge about fediverse but it sounds like that goes directly against the base principle of a federated space?
It goes against the base principle, but, at the same time, is something quite possible to happen if things get out of control. Decentralization is complex, and brings several challenges for everyone to face.
Happy centennial cake day