Collecting data effectively means having to make deals with each server operator on case by case basis, and governments can only coerce servers that happen to be in their jurisdiction.
Federated public content in fact makes it easier to gather this data. It enables for many more entrypoints to the data stream. Of course federated content doesn’t have to be public (eg. XMPP) but so far that’s the direction most ActivityPub apps have taken.
The nature of social media is that the content is typically meant to be public. The reason people use social media is to share their thoughts with the world. However, there is plenty of content that’s not public such as private messages people send to one another, or private accounts that don’t publish their content publicly. This kind of content is much more difficult to mine in a federated environment.
Federated public content in fact makes it easier to gather this data. It enables for many more entrypoints to the data stream. Of course federated content doesn’t have to be public (eg. XMPP) but so far that’s the direction most ActivityPub apps have taken.
The nature of social media is that the content is typically meant to be public. The reason people use social media is to share their thoughts with the world. However, there is plenty of content that’s not public such as private messages people send to one another, or private accounts that don’t publish their content publicly. This kind of content is much more difficult to mine in a federated environment.