Meta’s decision to work towards federation does need to be taken with a lot of salt. Corporations using open platforms or open source to make their money has always resulted in power imbalances that, left unchecked, may become impossible to solve without concessions from said corporation, or else [X] thing just gets hung out to dry.
You have to hope the people running that company understand that these problems exist, and actively work against ruining everything for everyone else that relies on it.
“Off the record” largely implies that an NDA would be involved, considering “confidential information that should not be shared with others.”