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this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2023
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. A showerthought should offer a unique perspective on an ordinary part of life.
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Could I think of the federation as like nations giving each others' citizens a visa, or is that too off the mark to use as a metaphor?
I think it kinda works, but it misses the mark in that you don't need to 'travel' to another server to see the communities and posts from that server.
It's more like every instance is a post office, and when you make a post or comment at your local post office, they also send it out to a bunch of other post offices. So when you rock up to your local post office (instance), you can see all the activity at that post office, but also all the activity that has come in from federated post offices.
I think it's too far off. It's more like countries joining European Union - they are still individual countries, but they share stuff with all other countries that are part of the union/federation.
I think the original analogy works better.
If an EU country goes rogue, other EU nations can't just isolate it and bar it's citizens from entry. There is no expulsion from the EU AFAIK. But Lemmy instances can block another instance fairly easily and unilaterally - like how nations can refuse visa to citizens of a rogue nation. And Lemmy instanced are expected to federate with most other instances, just like countries are expected to grant visas to most other countries - unlike joining the EU, which is a whole big process and all EU members have to agree (there are no vetoes in Lemmy federation).
But most importantly, the EU members are required to act as one in many circumstances - most laws apply across all EU members, EU negotiates trade deals as a block, etc. That is not true for Lemmy instances. Each is completely independent and makes its own laws - and must only comply with some very loose principles (which boil down to "don't be a total jerk") to not be isolated from other instances. This is much closer to the kind of independence countries have, than EU members.