Re: Fact-checking and community notes on the Fediverse

tl;dr: You can already do web annotation via ActivityPub by sending objects
like {"type":"Annotation","@context":"http://www.w3.org/ns/anno.jsonld"} to
your ActivityPub outbox via HTTP POST.

sadly there are too many 'ActivityPub Implementations' that are not
"ActivityPub
Conformant Servers
<https://www.w3.org/TR/activitypub/#specification-profiles>" and do not
even try to implement the 'object creation' requirements of ActivityPub.
But if they haven't implemented the already-standard way of creating
annotations, we shouldn't make more new alternatives, we should encourage
folks to do what has been standardized for 5+ years.

imho there is no need for an `Annotate` activity.

You can already POST an `Annotation` to an ActivityPub outbox. The
ActivityPub outbox MUST accept it and then MUST wrap it in a `Create`
activity.

It's not an accident that, other than a small media type parameter, this is
exactly how W3C's Web Annotation Protocol says to create an annotation
<https://www.w3.org/TR/annotation-protocol/#create-a-new-annotation> in a
collection.

We don't need an activity for every kind of thing, e.g. 'Annotate'. There
are other vocabularies for things, e.g. the Web Annotation Data Model
<https://www.w3.org/TR/annotation-model/> and w3c protocols for it.
ActivityPub already provides activities to describe the lifecycle of
things, and requirements that an outbox server wrap unexpected things in a
`Create` activity to start logging those lifecycle events.

New vocabulary and behaviors are not at all necessary, and will only
fragment efforts even more.

The Web Annotation Data Model is already sufficient to be used as the
request body of the already-standard mechanism in ActivityPub to create
things: just POST it to your ActivityPub outbox (which *MUST* wrap it in
'Create' if its not an Activity).

It would be very confusing if, in addition to the already standard
{type:'Create',object:{type:'Annotation'}}, there were a bunch of
{type:'Annotate',object:{type:'Note'}}.

This is a good time to remember that there is nothing in ActivityPub that
requires that oubox submission `type` be defined by AS2
and that `{}` is a valid AS2/AP object.

On Thu, Jan 23, 2025 at 11:33 AM Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name> wrote:

> One possible interaction flow is this.
>
> Let's suppose an actor distributes the following activity:
>
> {
>
>     "@context": "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams"
> <https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams>,
>     "id": "https://social.example/user/17/create/337"
> <https://social.example/user/17/create/337>,
>     "actor": "https://social.example/user/17"
> <https://social.example/user/17>,
>
>     "type": "Create",
>     "to": "as:Public",
>
>     "object": {
>        "id": "https://social.example/user/17/note/1221"
> <https://social.example/user/17/note/1221>,
>        "type": "Note",
>        "to": "as:Public",
>        "attributedTo": "https://social.example/user/17"
> <https://social.example/user/17>,
>        "content": "<p>Large Marge had died that very night ten years
> before!</p>",
>        "published": "2025-01-23T20:15:00Z"
>     },
>     "published": "2025-01-23T20:15:00Z"
>
> }
>
>
> This creates a public note (or short text) with some questionable facts
> included.
>
> Another actor could publish an annotation on that object, to give further
> context for readers:
>
> {
>
>     "@context": [
>        "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams"
> <https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams>,
>        "https://annotate.example/ns" <https://annotate.example/ns>
>     ],
>     "id": "https://factcheck.example/user/338/annotate/47"
> <https://factcheck.example/user/338/annotate/47>,
>     "actor": "https://factcheck.example/user/338",
>
>     "type": "Annotate",
>     "to": "as:Public",
>
>     "object": {
>        "id": "https://factcheck.example/user/338/annotate/47",
>        "type": "Note",
>        "to": "as:Public",
>        "attributedTo": "https://factcheck.example/user/338",
>        "content": "<p>This is a variation of the <a href='
> https://w.wiki/CpRq'>vanishing hitchhiker</a> urban legend.</p>"
>        "published": "2025-01-23T20:45:00Z"
>     },
>     "target": "https://social.example/user/17/note/1221",
>     "published": "2025-01-23T20:45:00Z"
>
> }
>
> "Annotate" is not a standard activity type in ActivityPub; I added a
> fictional "annotations" context document here.
>
> Servers that receive this annotation might include it when they
> redistribute the Note object to ActivityPub clients:
>
> {
>     "id": "https://social.example/user/17/note/1221"
> <https://social.example/user/17/note/1221>,
>     "type": "Note",
>     "to": "as:Public",
>     "attributedTo": "https://social.example/user/17"
> <https://social.example/user/17>,
>     "content": "<p>Large Marge had died that very night ten years
> before!</p>",
>     "published": "2025-01-23T20:15:00Z",
>     "annotations": {
>          "type": "Collection",
>          "id": "https://other.example/system/annotations/
> social.example/user/17/note/1221",
>
>          "to": "as:Public",
>          "items": {
>             "id": "https://factcheck.example/user/338/annotate/47",
>             "type": "Note",
>             "to": "as:Public",
>             "attributedTo": "https://factcheck.example/user/338",
>              "content": "<p>This is a variation of the <a href='
> https://w.wiki/CpRq'>vanishing hitchhiker</a> urban legend.</p>"
>             "published": "2025-01-23T20:45:00Z"
>          }
>     }
> }
>
>
> This is actually kind of a tricky situation, since usually the properties
> of the object as defined by the sending server, and available by fetching `
> https://social.example/user/17/note/1221`, would be considered canonical.
> The `annotations` property is managed by a different server, without the
> control or even knowledge of the original actor or their service.
>
> The annotations here are public; within the AP authorization model, it's
> also possible to restrict distribution and access to the annotations (with
> a different "to" property).
>
> I think the work needed here would be as follows:
>
> - Define a context doc for `Annotate` and `annotations`
> - A FEP or another document describing how these can be used
>
> Obviously, this is just the protocol layer; it doesn't even begin to
> explore the options for actually setting up a network of fact checkers or
> establishing trust in those fact checkers.
>
> Evan
>
> On 2025-01-23 11:33 a.m., Adam Sobieski wrote:
>
> Evan,
>
> Ok. I will take a look at ActivityPub server-to-server interactions and
> think about methods where fact-checking information, e.g., annotations or
> community notes, are distributed via ActivityPub.
>
>
> Best regards,
> Adam
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name> <evan@prodromou.name>
> *Sent:* Thursday, January 23, 2025 10:38 AM
> *To:* Adam Sobieski <adamsobieski@hotmail.com> <adamsobieski@hotmail.com>;
> Emelia S. <emelia@brandedcode.com> <emelia@brandedcode.com>
> *Cc:* public-swicg@w3c.org <public-swicg@w3c.org> <public-swicg@w3c.org>
> *Subject:* Re: Fact-checking and community notes on the Fediverse
>
>
> Hey, Adam. So, I'd prefer to use methods where the fact-checking
> information is distributed via ActivityPub.
>
>
> Evan
>
>
> On 2025-01-14 6:31 p.m., Adam Sobieski wrote:
>
> Social Web Incubator Community Group,
>
> Hello. I am pleased to share some preliminary brainstorming and ideas
> about decentralized fact-checking and argumentation using P2P filesharing
> networks.
> Hopefully some of the following ideas can be of use for the Fediverse,
> e.g., for the discovery of existing annotations.
>
> Introduction With respect to sharing Web Annotations, uses of P2P
> networks have been previously explored (Segawa, 2006). Providing users with
> access to these kinds of networks from their Web browsers, today, is
> possible with WebRTC (Werner & Vogt, 2014; Ersson & Siri, 2015).
> P2P filesharing networks could be of use for decentralized fact-checking
> and argumentation. Facts or claims could be stored in entries, a special
> kind of file resource.
> By creating and sharing digitally-signed user feedback, notes, comments,
> or annotations with respect to those facts or claims in entries, users
> could express their determinations with respect to the veracity of facts or
> claims and could also present arguments for or against them (Bex, Snaith,
> Lawrence, & Reed, 2014).
> Entries could contain one or more references to paraphrases of content
> from locations on the Fediverse (see: Appendix A). Annotation objects from
> the Fediverse could be indexed and redundantly stored on P2P filesharing
> networks.
> Uses of Embedding Vectors
> Instead of, or in addition to, using cryptographic hashes to index and
> address content on P2P networks, digitally-signed entries for facts or
> claims could be indexed and addressed using embedding vectors (Zaarour &
> Curry, 2022).
> As considered, entries would be a special kind of file resource where
> their embedding vectors, embedding vectors verifiably for selections of
> other resources' contents, would be stored inside of them (see: Appendix A)
> rather than obtained from processing them with AI models.
> Indexing and addressing entries thusly would allow them to be merged or
> wrapped, e.g., to add paraphrases, digitally signing them at each step,
> without having to reindex them. Modifications, however, would result in
> changes to entries' cryptographic hashes.
> Deep learning can be used to detect and identify sentential paraphrases
> (Zhou, Qiu, Liang, & Acuna, 2022). More elaborate uses of language models
> could be utilized for inquiring and reasoning about whether sentences
> occurring in contexts were paraphrases.
> With respect to fact-checking on the Web, scenarios to consider include
> both fact-checking content which was expressly indicated to be a fact or
> claim by their authors, e.g., using custom elements, and fact-checking
> arbitrary selections of documents' content.
> Explorations with respect to fact-checking arbitrary selections of content
> include the open-source Citation Needed project by the Future Audiences
> team of the Wikimedia Foundation.
> The Prompt API
> Exploration is underway into providing APIs for accessing language models
> in Web browsers; the Web Machine Learning Working Group is developing the
> Prompt API.
> With access to language models in Web browsers, users might be able to
> obtain embedding vectors for portions of content in Web documents. These
> embedding vectors could be used to search for other content, e.g.,
> annotations, including on P2P networks.
> Custom Elements HTML5 custom elements could allow facts or claims to be
> expressed in documents, e.g., to add visual indictors near them or enable
> special context menus for them, while specifying values for embedding
> vectors computed for them using AI models (see: Appendix C). Appendices
> Appendix A shows a markup sketch for an entry, a created entry wrapped to
> add a paraphrase to it.
> Appendix B shows that embedding vectors could be added to Magnet URIs and
> Metalinks.
> Appendix C shows that HTML5 custom elements could be used for asserted
> facts or claims which refer to entries on P2P networks by means of one or
> more embedding vectors.
> Appendix D shows an approach involving shortcodes for authors using
> content-management systems to be able to easily add facts or claims to
> their content.
> Bibliography
> Bex, Floris, Mark Snaith, John Lawrence, and Chris Reed. "ArguBlogging: An
> application for the argument web." *Journal of Web Semantics* 25 (2014):
> 9-15. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1570826814000079
> Ersson, Kerstin, and Persson Siri. "Peer-to-peer distribution of web
> content using WebRTC within a web browser." (2015).
> https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:819420/FULLTEXT01.pdf
> Segawa, Osamu. "Web annotation sharing using P2P." In *Proceedings of the
> 15th international conference on World Wide Web*, pp. 851-852. 2006.
> http://ra.ethz.ch/CDstore/www2006/devel-www2006.ecs.soton.ac.uk/programme/files/pdf/p45.pdf
> Werner, Max Jonas, and Christian Vogt. "Implementation of a browser-based
> P2P network using WebRTC." *Hamburg* (2014).
> https://inet.haw-hamburg.de/teaching/ws-2013-14/master-project/Prj1-report-werner-vogt.pdf
> Zaarour, Tarek, and Edward Curry. "SemanticPeer: A distributional semantic
> peer-to-peer lookup protocol for large content spaces at internet-scale." *Future
> Generation Computer Systems* 132 (2022): 239-253.
> https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167739X22000590
> Zhou, Chao, Cheng Qiu, Lizhen Liang, and Daniel E. Acuna. "Paraphrase
> identification with deep learning: A review of datasets and methods." *arXiv
> preprint arXiv:2212.06933* (2022). https://arxiv.org/pdf/2212.06933
>
>
> Appendix A: Sketch of an Entry for a Fact or Claim
>
> <action kind="add-paraphrase">
>
>   <base>
>
>     <action kind="create">
>
>       <base />
>
>       <time>2024-01-14T00:01:00Z</time>
>
>       <v id="v-1" model=" urn:ai:model:llama:3.2:90B">...</v>
>
>       <metalink id="source-1">
>
>         <file name="article1.html">
>
>           <url>https://www.example1.com/user1/article1.html</url>
>
>         </file>
>
>       </metalink>
>
>       <selection source="source-1">
>
>         ... <select v="v-1">A sentence.</select> ...
>
>       </selection>
>
>       <signature>...</signature>
>
>     </action>
>
>   </base>
>
>   <time>2024-01-14T00:00:00Z</time>
>
>   <v id="v-2" model="urn:ai:model:llama:3.3:70B">...</v>
>
>   <metalink id="source-2">
>
>     <file name="article2.html">
>
>       <url>https://www.example2.com/user2/article2.html</url>
>
>     </file>
>
>   </metalink>
>
>   <selection source="source-2">
>
>     ... <select v="v-1 v-2">A paraphrase.</select> ...
>
>   </selection>
>
>   <signature>...</signature>
>
> </action>
>
>
> Appendix B: Adding Embedding Vectors to Magnet URIs and Metalinks Embedding
> vectors could be added to Magnet URIs by means of adding a key: xv.
> Embedding vectors could be new components of metalinks.
> <metalink xmlns="urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:metalink">
>   <published>2009-05-15T12:23:23Z</published>
>   <file name="example.txt">
>     <url>http://www.example.com/example.txt</url>
>     <vector model="urn:ai:model:llama:3.3:70B">...</vector>
>   </file>
> </metalink>
>
> Appendix C: Custom Elements for Facts or Claims A custom element could be
> used to signify an asserted fact or claim, referring to an entry on a P2P
> network by means of embedding vectors alongside other information. Via a
> JavaScript library, and perhaps WebRTC, clients could participate in P2P
> networks and retrieve entries, feedback on entries, or both.
> Notice that, for the special file type of entries, those embedding vectors
> within them and not of the XML file itself are utilized with respect to
> storing and addressing the resource on P2P networks.
> <verifiable-claim see="magnet:?xv=...">Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis
> nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo
> consequat.</verifiable-claim>
> Appendix D: Content Authoring with Shortcodes How might authors easily
> add facts or claims to their content? With respect to popular
> content-management systems, the syntax for so doing could resemble that of
> existing shortcodes like [quote].
> [claim]Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris
> nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.[/claim]
> During content-publishing processes, authors' content-management systems
> (e.g., Drupal, WordPress) – or configurable plugins or extensions for these
> systems – could handle searching for existing paraphrases, adding new facts
> or claims (if needed) to P2P filesharing networks, obtaining the data for
> use in the see attributes, caching these data, and generating markup.
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Emelia S. <emelia@brandedcode.com> <emelia@brandedcode.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, January 13, 2025 11:21 AM
> *To:* Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name> <evan@prodromou.name>
> *Cc:* public-swicg@w3c.org <public-swicg@w3c.org> <public-swicg@w3c.org>
> *Subject:* Re: Fact-checking and community notes on the Fediverse
>
> This is already something on the list of things that the ActivityPub Trust
>  & Safety Taskforce is working on:
>
> [image: 4.png]
> <https://github.com/swicg/activitypub-trust-and-safety/issues/4>
>
> Idea: Annotations / Labeling of content · Issue #4 ·
> swicg/activitypub-trust-and-safety
> <https://github.com/swicg/activitypub-trust-and-safety/issues/4>
> github.com
> <https://github.com/swicg/activitypub-trust-and-safety/issues/4>
>
> The Web Annotations model could work, but the discovery of annotations
> that exist is the hardest part, I've started solving that in
> https://github.com/ThisIsMissEm/annotations-service where I use the
> sha256 hash of the Object ID as the annotation collection ID, giving a very
> simple way to fetch all annotations for a given object.
>
> I do want to investigate what an Annotate activity would look like, but I
> suspect this would just be an announcement of sorts "hey, there's this web
> annotation over here for this target"
>
> Yours,
> Emelia
>
> On 13 Jan 2025, at 04:23, Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name>
> <evan@prodromou.name> wrote:
>
> We don't have an easy way for remote actors to annotate content on the
> Fediverse.
>
> The biggest use case for this is to have permissionless fact-checking or
> community notes. A fact-checking service could annotate a remote content
> object like a Note or a Video with additional fact-checking information,
> and compliant clients or servers could show the fact-checking information
> when showing the Note.
>
> I think there are some tricky parts to this structure, which I believe
> suggests that we should start working on it.
>
> Evan
>
>
>
>