Meta appeared to be blocking links to Pixel powereda decentralized platform for sharing photos, on facebook, according to both users on Bluesky and <a target="_blank" data-i13n="elm:context_link;elmt:doNotAffiliate;cpos:3;pos:1" class="link " href="https://www.404media.co/meta-is-blocking-links-to-decentralized-instagram-competitor-pixelfed/” rel=”nofollow noopener” target=”_blank” data-ylk=”slk:404 Media;elm:context_link;elmt:doNotAffiliate;cpos:3;pos:1;itc:0;sec:content-canvas”>404 Media. A small group of posts that linked to “pixelfed.social” was removed, with facebook's “Spam Community Standards” used as justification.
When asked to comment, a Meta spokesperson said deleting the posts was a mistake and they would be restored.
Pixelfed runs on the ActivityPub protocol and is part of the broader “diverse” of decentralized publishing platforms. It works very similar to instagram in its ability to let you share, like and comment on images, but because it's in ActivityPub, your posts could appear in other apps or be transferred to completely different photo sharing shots if you wish. Meta is slowly adopting parts of ActivityPub into Threads, making it possible to publish to Threads and Mastodon at the same time, for example.
The timing of these eliminations is enough to make anyone suspicious. Meta just announced some pretty dramatic changes to how it plans to moderate speech on its platforms. The company decided to end its third-party fact-checking program and change its hateful conduct policy last week. The company's looser standards now allow speech that would be defined as hateful under any normal circumstance. based on what cabling was able to unearth.
It's not far-fetched to imagine that users might consider switching to an alternative like Pixelfed in response, and the platform did just that. share saturday that he was “seeing unprecedented levels of traffic on pixelfed.social.” It's also not unreasonable to imagine that the new, right-leaning Meta could preemptively block its competitors, just as x did with links to Mastodon and Substack.
