Preamble

blob.coffee is currently a one-user instance. Nonetheless, I decided to write down a proper code of conduct for two reasons:

1. I want to hold myself accountable to a well-defined set of rules, as a sign of respect for the rest of the Fediverse.
2. It is probable that I will invite other people to this instance (or even open up registrations – but don’t count on it). In this case, a code of conduct will already be in place.

This code of conduct contains three main parts: the general principles of moderation, that describe the spirit of the law; the inviolable rules, that describe the behaviours that would usually lead to an instant ban; and the additional rules, that describe the behaviours that would usually lead to an admonition.

General moderation principles

(or: the spirit of the law)

The blob.coffee moderation team is guided in their activity by the following principles:

1. This instance promotes and defends the well-being and the safety of all its users and of all the other people, both in and out of the Fediverse.
2. This instance does not tolerate any behaviour or social movement that discriminates, harasses, harms, or promotes the discrimination of other people. This instance is against nazism, fascism, and white nationalism.
3. Freedom of speech by itself does not justify any person’s behaviour. To determine the actions to take, the moderation team will always consider the context and the effects of a user’s conduct onto other people.
4. This instance has specific rules, as listed below, but the moderation will be flexible to follow the principles described in this section. The moderators have the final word in what is accepted in this instance and what is not.
5. The moderation team will be accountable for their activity, both to the blob.coffee users and to the other members of the Fediverse. Every change in this code of conduct will be announced publicly by the moderators.

In particular, the purpose of the moderation team is to make blob.coffee a safe and friendly community for the following groups of people:

• people of colour
• ethnic and religious minorities
• trans, non-binary, two spirit, genderqueer, genderfluid, and intersex people
• furry and otherkin people
• lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, and polysexual people
• asexual, gray-ace, and aromantic people
• polyamorous people
• people with visible or invisible disabilities
• neurodivergent people
• survivors of sexual assault or harassment
• sex workers of any gender.

By joining and posting content on blob.coffee, you accept these general principles and the following sets of rules.

Inviolable rules

(or: do this and you’re out)

The violation of any rules in this section will result in a permanent ban without notice, regardless of the user’s intent.

No nazis. Do not promote nazism, fascism, white nationalism, or xenophobia. This includes both explicit apologia and implicit support of such movements, e.g. through dog whistles.

No hate speech. Do not publish material that discriminates and promote hates towards the protected groups of people listed above. In particular, do not engage in homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, enbyphobia, acephobia, arophobia, racism, sexism, misogyny, misogynoir, ableism, anti-Semitism, islamophobia, body shaming, fat-phobia, slut shaming, etc. In particular, TERFs, SWERFs, and free speech absolutists are not welcome on blob.coffee.

No doxing. Do not engage in doxing, i.e. the collection of personal and private information about other people that could be used to harass or endanger them.

No loli. Do not publish sexualized depictions of underage people, not even under content warning. This includes drawings, animations, and written content.

No revenge porn. Do not publish nude or sexually explicit depictions of people without their consent, not even under content warning.

No harassment. Do not engage in any harassing behaviour against other members of blob.coffee, other members of the Fediverse, and other people either online or offline. Do not continue interacting with people who explicitly told you not to engage with them, not even from alt accounts.

No spam. Do not use blob.coffee to engage in spam. Promotion of one’s own work is welcome and even encouraged by this community, but accounts that do not engage in any other kind of activity will be banned.

No pro-ana. Do not publish content that promotes, inspires, or glamorizes eating disorders such as anorexia or bulimia.

No phishing. Do not engage in behaviours that can endanger other people’s computers or sensitive data, including phishing and linking to malware or to unsafe websites.

No ban evasion. Do not create new accounts to evade a previous ban or to get in contact with a user who has already banned you.

Additional rules

(or: we all screw up, but don’t be a dick about it)

Single violations of the following rules will result in a formal, public admonition. This is because I believe in our users’ chance to correct their behaviour and learn from their mistakes. However, users who persist with the violation of these rules or show no interest in apologizing or correcting their behaviour (promptly) will be banned.

No unhidden porn. All erotic or sexually explicit content, including videos, photos, drawings, audio, and text, and all representations of naked people must be hidden with a content warning (CW). Nude or sexually explicit avatars and header images are not allowed.

No unhidden gore. All graphic depictions of violence, bodily harm, and blood must be hidden with a CW, even when it is contained to external websites.

Use seizure warnings. Do not publish videos or animated pictures with blinking lights, or link to pages that have such content, without a CW.

No abusive language. Do not use abusive or offensive language repeatedly, especially if targeted to one or more specific users or to a broad class of people. A one-time usage of slurs, deadnaming, or misgendering might lead just to an admonition in some cases, but the repeated or unapologetic usage of such language will always be considered hate speech and therefore it will be banned without warnings.

No sealioning. Do not pester other users with unwelcome questions. If you are told to stop asking questions or to stop engaging, respect that person’s boundaries immediately.

Non-binding guidelines

(or: how to earn cool points)

Here is a list of recommended, but not enforced behaviours on blob.coffee:

• Use descriptive content warnings for any possibly upsetting content. When in doubt, put a CW.
• Make your content as accessible as possible (e.g. by typing image descriptions, by posting transcripts, by using CamelCase in hashtags, by using CWs for long toots with ASCII art and lots of emoji, etc.).
• Put your pronouns in your bio, if you are comfortable with sharing them.
• Check other users’ bios and pinned toots before sending a follow request, and respect their requirements.
• Report any toots (from this or a remote instance) that you think might violate these rules. When in doubt, do it anyway. If something does not feel right, feel free to send a direct message to any of our moderators.

Federation rules

blob.coffee blacklists instances that do not meet our standards. Blacklisted instances are either silenced or suspended. As a general rule, we usually prefer suspension to silencing, but each case is evaluated on its own.

I will consider an instance for defederation if both of these are true:

1. One or multiple users of that instance adopted a behaviour that would result in a ban, according to our local rules.
2. The administrators and the moderators of that instance did not address the misconduct in a proper and timely manner.

This instance does not federate with those that operate on forks of the Mastodon project created and/or maintained by white supremacists.

The moderation team can rely on information given by other members of the Fediverse to evaluate whether an instance should be silenced or suspended.

Privacy stuff

blob.coffee abides by the standard Mastodon privacy policy.

The blob.coffee moderation team will never ask you for your sensitive data, including your passwords for this or any other sites.

The person behind blob.coffee

The founder and current admin of this instance is @miramarco@blob.coffee (pronouns: he/him).

Any additional changes in the administration/moderation team will be added here.

This instance is hosted on masto.host. This instance is not controlled or funded by any corporation.

About this code of conduct

The last update of this code of conduct was published on October 7th, 2019 (reason: major overhaul of the document, with general principles and new rules).

When choosing the words to describe discriminatory behaviours in this document, I have opted for the forms based on “phobia” rather than “misia”, because more people understand them. I would have preferred not to have to make such a choice, and I hope that it is clear that I do not infer any association between discriminatory behaviours and actually phobic people.

You are welcome to copy and adapt this code of conduct for your own instance. You do not need my permission to do so – but if you tell me, I will be quite happy and headpat myself.