In the graph above I've arranged the 28 Threadiverse instances with at least 200 monthly active users (MAU)—orange instances running Lemmy, green Piefed, and red Mbin—on the basis of which instances they defederate.

Each instance has its MAU count listed below it, sourced from the latest MAU figures at Fediverse Observer, with adjustments made to the totals for Piefed (due to undercounting by outdated instances, as noted here; I used @Vicinus@piefed.zip's suggested estimate of 7,200 Piefed users) and Mbin (due to tardigram.com having a duplicate listing).

After adjustments, there are an estimated 43,287 monthly active Threadiverse users (35,184+7,200+903), of whom 87.84% are on the 28 largest instances. The percentages listed alongside the MAU figures correspond to each instance's share of the total MAU count.

Defederation data was sourced from Federation Checker. The tool doesn't support Mbin instances, so I left fedia.io in its own category. If any defederations are missing, feel free to let me know. Ideally such a chart should also include community blocks to better illustrate which instances block what, but that data doesn't appear to be as easily searchable.

I also noticed cases of some instances being listed as being defederated by another instance, despite not appearing on the defederation list for that instance (i.e. reddthat.com and lemmygrad.ml are listed as being mutually blocked, despite neither having the other on their block lists). In testing that federation, I noticed that !wholesome@reddthat.com did not federate to Lemmygrad while !memes@reddthat.com did, so clarification on that matter would be helpful.

While I'll update my generalized chart as needed to correct errors, perhaps at some point an automated federation mapping tool similar to the one feddit.de formerly hosted could be developed to more completely illustrate instance federation.

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[–] Valmond@lemmy.dbzer0.com 112 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Well that's a confusing graph.

[–] SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone 39 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Since defederating is essentially an explicit block list and is directional, my assumption is that the groups that are circled have defederated from the things they're pointing at. I could be wrong.

Map needs a key/legend.

The red circled stuff seems to be only one possible option, but isn't visually very distinct, and the red circle shouldn't be broken like that, just make sure the lines are all visible.

[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 20 points 3 days ago

Apologies for the confusion; didn't want to make it overly cluttered, but in retrospect I see that a legend would have been useful. I'll incorporate suggestions in a revision.

[–] VitoRobles@lemmy.today 16 points 3 days ago

Yeah I cant understand it at all.

[–] mehquestion@lemmy.world 20 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Yeah, as someone who is struggling to understand the concept of federation...this doesn't help me at all.

I guess what its saying, if you're on lemmy.world, you can't access content on lemmy.zip?

[–] lastlybutfirstly@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago (7 children)

If I'm reading it correctly, lemmy.world cut ties from lemmygrad.ml and hexbear.net while hexbear.net and beehaw.org cut ties with lemmy.world. lemmy.zip appears to be connected to everyone.

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[–] kingofras@lemmy.world 60 points 3 days ago (16 children)

I say, I really don’t get why so many people stay over on Reddit.

This might be a micro version of the actual future internet, where we walk away from the global model and split it into ideological countries who believe the best way forward is to stop talking to the other group.

We’ve come a long way from drawing artificial lines on maps.

[–] Cris_Citrus@piefed.zip 89 points 3 days ago (13 children)

The fediverse is great if you fall into the like 5 interests that are pretty well represented here.

But if the communities you wanna engage with aren't really active enough for potential posters to not just forget they exist, or you don't really want to be on a platform where 75% of the front page is news or memes about the state of the world politically, its not neccisarily a great replacement to reddit

For me it happens to cover enough of my bases, but I can get why it wouldn't for many people.

[–] CubitOom@infosec.pub 17 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Just like in real life, one must grow and sometimes create the communities they want to be apart of.

[–] Cris_Citrus@piefed.zip 32 points 3 days ago

While thats true, if my friend whose biggest interests are science informed dog training and animal genetics joins the threadiverse there are not enough people here who genuinely really care about those subjects to actually sustain any of the social connection she's looking for around them.

If my friend who's super into basketball and competitive league of legends join she'd have at least a couple people to talk to, but its fundamentally not what she's looking for to talk to exactly 3 other people who care about the thing she's into.

I try to remember that as much as I love the fediverse and feel at home here, it has real limitations for lots of people, and its okay if its not in a state they can go enjoy very easily. This is a space that I am passionate about and want to contribute to. I don't expect everyone to do labor to invest in a space that isnt their passion just to chat with folks when they have the ability to chat with folks somewhere else, even if that place has bigger picture downsides or harms associated with it.

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[–] kersploosh@sh.itjust.works 49 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The beehaw.org/sh.itjust.works defederation is really one-way. Beehaw defederated from us after some exceptionally bad trolls were operating from sh.itjust.works in 2023. IIRC, they requested that we also defederate from them to really make sure the split was made. We honored their request.

We would happily reconnect if Beehaw decided they want to federate with us again. If not, then that's fine; they have a right to associate with whomever they like.

I believe infosec.pub temporarily defederated from us around the same time for the same reason. It was a rough time.

[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 21 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I'll adjust the graph by the next version to account for it as an exception.

[–] kersploosh@sh.itjust.works 20 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

If you want to complicate the graph further, I believe hexbear federates using an allow list. Blahaj, lemmy.ca, and sh.itjust.works are not on the allow list, so they are effectively defederated. I haven't looked further to see which other large instances may be affected.

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[–] AI_toothbrush@lemmy.zip 29 points 3 days ago (8 children)

Very proud of lemmy.zip! Joined very early on cause the name sounded cool lol, and apparently a lot of others also did. If i remember right we had a vote on defederations and the only major one to happen(or maybe the only one, idk) was exploding heads which was a nazi instance with CSAM on it so that was obvious, even that was mainly cause of the CSAM. I really like the approach of users being able to block instances and communities rather than the instance deciding for me. I still have ml and hexbear blocked tho cause they banned me after i stood up for trans rights or something lol

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[–] leadore@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

OK I think I get how to read this, once I understood the concept. Very nice work.

Maybe it would be a little clearer if the lines where boxes overlap were just slightly offset -- it would help see and distinguish them. For example if the blue box was moved down by just a little more than the width of the red lines, instead of being directly on top of them. If that makes sense.

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[–] AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Thanks for the work, really interesting graph! I think it *might be easier to read if the rectangles were ovals or some morph between rectangle and oval, so that the overlapping groupings are a bit more distinct.

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[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 28 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I really like this but I can not figure it out. Would you be willing to make the data available?

[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 32 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (4 children)

The MAU numbers for instances were sourced from Fediverse Observer and calculated as a percentage of 43,287 for the percentages, but here's a table of the defederation data:

Lemmy
Instance	Defederated
lemmy.world	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
sh.itjust.works	Beehaw, Hexbear, Lemmygrad
lemmy.zip	N/A
lemmy.ml	fedinsfw.app
feddit.org	fedinsfw.app, Hexbear, Lemmygrad
hexbear.net	lemmy.world
lemmy.dbzer0.com	Lemmygrad, Feddit.org
lemmy.ca	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
lemmy.blahaj.zone	fedinsfw.app, Hexbear, Lemmygrad
programming.dev	Hexbear
discuss.tchncs.de	Lemmygrad
sopuli.xyz	fedinsfw.app, Hexbear, Lemmygrad
lemmygrad.ml	fedinsfw.app
lemmy.today	N/A
slrpnk.net	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
feddit.uk	N/A
infosec.pub	fedinsfw.app, Hexbear, Lemmygrad, Lemmy.ml
reddthat.com	N/A
jlai.lu	Lemmygrad
beehaw.org	sh.itjust.works, lemmy.world, Lemmygrad, Hexbear
pawb.social	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
thelemmy.club	N/A
feddit.nl	N/A
Piefed
Instance	Defederated
fedinsfw.app	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
piefed.social	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
piefed.ca	Hexbear, Lemmygrad
piefed.zip	N/A
Mbin
Instance	Defederated
fedia.io	?

[–] Crescent@fedinsfw.app 10 points 3 days ago (3 children)

What the hell are Hexbear and Lemmygrad and what did they do that everyone's blocking them?

[–] yetAnotherUser@lemmy.ca 10 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Lemmygrad and Hexbear (I think) are instances filled with "tankies", which means that they can't shut up about how awesome authoritarian regimes that present themselves as communist, like China, and some others, like Russia, are, despite all the crimes against human rights those countries' governments keep committing (according to tankies, the governments they support don't actually commit any atrocities, it's just "lies spread via anti-communist propaganda", which they also use as a excuse for silencing anyone presenting criticism about their favourite regimes). Please keep in mind that lots of communists don't see countries like China as communist, despite the countries calling themselves that.

As these instances have lots of tankies, they tend to have toxic communities. Their users also tend to hate trans people for some reason, and sometines try to harass people because of it, which is a big no-no to instances that want their trans users to feel safe, such as Blåhaj Zone.

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[–] brognak@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Ok, I'll be the one to ask: What happened that 6 instances with 13% of the population combined blocked the porn instance?

[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (7 children)

As many instances were already blocking the original lemmynsfw.com, I suspect most do it as a means of moderating the feeds of new users who might not want to see porn. An alternative to this (as mentioned by @Cricket@lemmy.zip) would be blocking access to its communities (versus the instance itself) by default, allowing users to see replies from fedinsfw.app users and unblock the communities should they wish to. In either case, I think user retention is better served by limiting access to such content to those who are specifically interested in it.

For Multiverse and apparently Blahaj specifically, they defederate it over CP concerns due to it hosting a 'Fautbait' community.

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[–] Jayjader@jlai.lu 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I could have sworn that hexbear defederated from jlai.lu. there was a whole spat between our instances a while back.

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[–] taiyang@lemmy.world 15 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Things that pop out to me:

The Internet was made for porn, both in users and less defederating.
The main blocks really are mostly the Triad (grad, hexbear and ml) which I get. I personally don't mind tankies despite the instance I'm on, but they can sometimes echo Russian propaganda that's demonstrably false. Communism as a concept is ok, though.

The Beehaw thing predates me, I heard they're nice people, though. I also agree with the sentiment that more fringe groups and random porn might scare away newbies, so I get why things are the way they are.

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[–] nanometer1625@thelemmy.club 3 points 2 days ago

This looks like a job for... The Defedestrator

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