this post was submitted on 04 Sep 2024
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Any arguments against separating identity from instance/platform? (single identity across the fediverse) (lemy.lol)
submitted 2 months ago by matcha_addict@lemy.lol to c/fediverse@lemmy.world
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I am sure it was discussed here before, but I can't find a good way to search this community.

Are there any arguments against having a user's identity federate, and be compatible across platforms?

For example, let us say I sign up with my instance, matcha_addict@lemy.lol

But what if I go on mastodon, and I want to have my own micro blog. Or maybe go to write freely and post some blog posts. I'd have to make a different account on each one.

What if mastodon or write freely could just let me log in with my lemmy account (or lets call it federated account). This has several benefits:

  • users don't have to scratch their head on if I am the same person or not across these platforms
  • theoretically, someone following my feed can get updates on what I do on multiple platforms

Now I understand this would be difficult to implement and iron out all the edge cases, but am I missing anything on why it wouldn't be a desirable feature, given it is implemented?

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[–] dch82@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 months ago (2 children)

IMO, if you choose a common username (except for alt accounts) for all your platforms (in my case, dch82) it's fairly easy to find all the accounts. If you want to, you can also link your other platforms in the bio.

[–] matcha_addict@lemy.lol 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

If you choose a username, and I sign up with your same username before you do, then now you're screwed. So I agree this is a solution, but it is not without faults. No one prevents someone from signing up with your username (either maliciously or they just liked the same name)

[–] MartianSands@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

That's going to be a problem whatever solution you come up with, because of the federated nature of the lemmy system.

There's no central authority to hand out usernames, so if two people sign up to different instances with the same username, any design which didn't attach instance name to each username would fail. The only way around it would be for each instance to contact every other instance which exists, including the ones which haven't federated yet, and negotiate ownership of the new username, and that's just not possible

[–] matcha_addict@lemy.lol 4 points 2 months ago

That's fine. I may be matcha_addict@lemy.lol someone else might be matcha_addict@someOtherInstance.com, but I am the only matcha_addict@lemy.lol and anytime someone sees that full ID, they know for a fact it's me. But if they see matcha_addict@mastodon.social, they cannot know for sure.

[–] jelloeater85@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

You can also setup a little linktree page and just have all your profiles link to that so you don't have to update 10000 links on every profile.