@freemo This is implemented in Twitter and it's actually a really nice feature. You could "hide" replies to your own posts. It would then have a little notification to readers saying "some replies have been hidden by the thread poster" and you could click in to see those hidden posts.

It provided what the OP you're quoting wants with reasonable balance for others. And, when you looked at which posts someone chose to hide, it was very revealing about who they are.

I wouldn't mind this feature making its way to Mastodon at all.

@LouisIngenthron as long as readers have the option to turn it off or ignore it i wouldnt have a problem with it..

like there should be a check box, off by default, in settings that says "hide posts the author suggests you to hide"

@freemo @LouisIngenthron I disagree. There should only be the ability to mute the person, the thread and perhaps posts in the thread from certain people for yourself. You can curate the timeline for yourself but leave other people to curate their own timelines. Personally, I have just gotten good at ignoring posts I'm not interested in or have nothing further to contribute to and that fills the gap for me. We can mute threads, but I have wondered if it would be useful to be able to mute branches of a thread. Maybe you are still interested in your thread but not one branch of it as people have veered off the original topic. That could be useful. I don't think it is useful to delete or mute posts for other people and it would be better if we veered away from this curation mindset. Especially if we value decentralisation. We already have enough tools here that encourage division and closing ourselves off from others.

@sim @freemo We're not talking about the timeline, though, we're talking about a thread.

Someone hiding replies from their thread presumably wouldn't prevent the post from appearing in your timeline if you followed the hidden replier and have replies turned on in your home feed.

I think the feature makes sense because most users treat threads they start as their own property. People can come in and join the conversation if they want, but the host should have the right to kick them out of the thread if they disrupt the party. The person kicked out is then free to start their own competing thread.

@LouisIngenthron @freemo I understand threads feeling personal but is kicking someone out of the thread the answer? It means that you become even more closed off and divisive. Is this really what we want to encourage on a decentralised network? Especially when this is encouraged all around us and it is centralising behaviour. It is far better to let people respond and just not reply if you don't have anything else to contribute.

I miss the days when the fediverse was a lot more open and we weren't shutting ourselves off from each other with curation. A lot of people have come over since and decided that we need the same attitudes that you get on corporate centralised platforms. How can we be an alternative to that if we copy them?

@sim @freemo It's a tool. You can use it to close off your world if you want, or you can use it to keep your other followers from having to view nazi trolling.

@LouisIngenthron @freemo Those two things seem the same to me. They are both tools that encourage a filter between open communication.

I would argue that it isn't just a tool. I have seen the fediverse change in its attitude over time, and I don't know if this is just because of the various people involved as humans often filter themselves or if the tools change us and how we communicate with each other. I would also argue that I have more fear being here than I used to and it is hard to pinpoint where that comes from.

@sim @freemo If you think nazi trolling is "open communication" then you and I have very different definitions of that term.

@LouisIngenthron

I was just about to say something similar... the other thing that prevents open communication is if you go to a thread and there is so much hateful spam that doesnt even attempt to be constructive or have a conversation that the thread becomes tedious to follow or interact on at all.... so people who want a conversation just avoid it and the problem gets worse.

The only way to have healthy open communication is if you have filtering on some level... obviously filtering can be abused too so you have to address both sides for the viewer.... this I like louis's solution, one that empowers everyone to see what they want.

I mean hell i shouldnt be **forced** to see something just because I need to have open communication... if i dont want open communication, as idiotic as that is, that is my right.. I should be able to see what i want to see, and filter what i dont.

@sim

@freemo @LouisIngenthron I find the spam to be more of a time waster than anything else. Not pleasant to deal with. But I suppose that is the point behind it. It would be interesting to find a middle ground and for the tools we have to reflect this while keeping in mind that tools do have an impact on how we interact with platforms and with each other.