So from what I understand, a "silence" is actually not as bad as I thought it was.
Oliphant SocialOliphant of Wisdom (@oliphant@oliphant.social)No one defederated mastodon.social!
I should be very very clear about this, what's being used is what's called a "Silence".
a "Suspend" is what we call defederation. It breaks all follow relationships and completely closes that server off from the server dong the suspend.
Admins are not suspending mastodon.social. They are putting up a silence:
* New follows from that server will go into your 'follow requests', even if you don't have follow requests turned on
* You won't be able to DM anyone unless you follow them.
It's a temporary measure to mitigate the spam attack.
And the silence is usually removed once Gargron announces the problem is resolved.