Notices by Tim Chambers (tchambers@indieweb.social)

Right now there are a lot of new eyes on Signal, and not all of them are familiar with secure messaging and its nuances. Which means there’s misinfo flying around that might drive people away from Signal and private communications. 1/

One piece of misinfo we need to address is the claim that there are ‘vulnerabilities’ in Signal. This isn’t accurate. Reporting on a Pentagon advisory memo appears to be at the heart of the misunderstanding: https://npr.org/2025/03/25/nx-s1-5339801/pentagon-email-signal-vulnerability. The memo used the term ‘vulnerability’ in relation to Signal—but it had nothing to do with Signal’s core tech. It was warning against phishing scams targeting Signal users. 2/

Phishing isn’t new, and it’s not a flaw in our encryption or any of Signal’s underlying technology. Phishing attacks are a constant threat for popular apps and websites. 3/

Here are some emerging projects on our radar!

We’re always on the lookout for new digital products, features, or spaces that might promote community cohesion 🤝 and/or civic engagement 🙋

Threaded below ⬇️

2/2 Marc Elias is a damn hero.

Via Griffin:

Marc Elias: "Elias Law Group will not be deterred ... There will be no negotiation with this White House about the clients we represent or the lawsuits we bring."

"Our democracy is in peril, and the decisions made by lawyers and their firms may very well determine the future of the rule of law."

@jeremy @pfefferle Love this.

The failure of big law firms to stand with Covington and Perkins Coie and the craven deal Paul Weiss struck with Trump have had the wholly unsurprising effect of heightening Trump’s campaign against legal representation for those who dispute his regime’s unconstitutional and illegal activities. 7/

@tchambers@indieweb.social @voxpelli@mastodon.social Yeah, that makes sense, thanks for expanding on that!

It would be a workaround to get publication type displayed alongside the publication.

ActivityPub already comes with object types: « Note » for status updates, « Question », « Page », « Image », « Audio », « Video », « Event », and « Article » which is a good descriptor for long-form content I think.
I know some Fediverse solutions (like WordPress) allow you to set a different object type depending on the content.
Some Fediverse clients also try to display the content differently based on the object type.

I am assuming others have made that suggestion before, but maybe it would be interesting for the main Fediverse clients like the Mastodon UI / app to clearly display the object type next to the content.

This is probably even more important for object types that are close to each other. If you see an « Image » post on the Fediverse you immediately know what it is. If you see a « Note » or an « Article » however, only the length really differentiates them (if you’re lucky, since some Fediverse clients like Mastodon are built for Notes and do not even want to display full posts).

All this to say, I am all for adding an obvious sign next to long-form content to indicate that 🙂 . Until Fediverse clients do it, a hashtag can work! I’ll try to remember to do it for my next posts (but only the long ones, « Notes » don’t need to be tagged as #Fediblog!)

@pfefferle We’ve talked about adding the hashtag to federated WordPress posts ; what if the option only added it to « Article » publication types, to avoid tagging short updates or shared pictures as « Fediblog »?

@GossiTheDog Pretty much.

@jeremy I think the better analogy isn't GoToSocial but rather that different TYPES of content might tag based on what they were. Longer form posts specifically from blogs, being #Fediblog tagged, Wikipedia articles that federated could tag as #Wiki and federated podcasts episodes could tag as #fedicast or #podcast

@jeremy @tchambers Yeah, not sure it makes more or less sense to add a specific tag to all ActivityPub enabled content though

@jeremy @voxpelli I'd vote for it for ALL.

For us, 2024 was a year of building on the social web.
✔️ Expanded federation in the U.S., Brazil, Canada, Germany, and the U.K.
✔️ Enabled following accounts from the social web in the Flipboard app.
✔️ Announced @surf, a new browser for the social web.
✔️ Produced new episodes of Dot Social, the fediverse podcast hosted by @mike

Thanks for being on this journey with us! 🚀

Did you do cool stuff in the fediverse this year? Tell us all about it in the comments, where we'll also link to the Dot Social PeerTube account and our Surf signup page.

#Flipboard #Federation #Fediverse #Surf #ActivityPub #DotSocial #SocialWeb #OpenSocialWeb

Free idea: #Ghost and #WordPress blog posts that federate out should in the publishing UX suggest that authors add the optional hashtag #Fediblog to the post. Not mandatory, just a nudge.

Would greatly help with the discovery of cool blogs to follow here. cc: @pfefferle @index

cc:

https://caneandable.social/@WeirdWriter/114197062951945178

@ntnsndr Amen.

@bolts BOOOO!

@legoktm and @mediawiki folks - any chance you could talk up the Fediverse rel= me integration or any other plans for @wikimediafoundation and @announcements at this next #Fediforum ?

@j12t @jon +1 to that.

@cheeaun Are you going to demo the lastest and greatest features of #Phanpy at #Fediforum? I think you are continuing to set the bar for federated UX and think the crowd there will love it.

@samsethi @russell @nathan @dave @adam @StevenB @steven @james @merryoscar

I think just updating them on your progress alone would be a big deal at the show...

cc: @j12t