Fediverse

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Fediverse logo proposal
Fediverse logo proposal (mono)

Fediverse (a portmanteau of "federation" and "universe") is the ensemble of federated servers that are used for web publishing (i.e. social networking, microblogging or websites) and file hosting. On different servers (instances), users can create so called identities. These identities are able to communicate over the boundaries of the instances because the softwares running on the servers support one or more communication protocols which follow the open standard.[1] As an identity on the fediverse, you are able to exchange private messages or other data with other identities or to follow posts by other identities. In some cases, you can even show or share data (video, audio, text and other files) publicly or to a selected group of identities and allow other identities to edit your data (i.e. a calendar or an address book).

History[edit]

In 2008, the social network identi.ca was founded by Evan Prodromou. He published the software GNU Social under a free license (GNU Affero General Public License, AGPL). Besides the server, identi.ca, there were only few other instances existing, run by persons for their own use. This changed in 2011/2012 when identi.ca switched to another software called pump.io. Several new GNU Social instances were created. At the same time as GNU Social, other projects like Friendica, Hubzilla [2], Mastodon or Pleroma [3] integrated the OStatus protocol, thus extending the fediverse.

In the meantime, other communication protocols have evolved which are integrated to different degrees into the platforms. In January 2016, the W3C presented the ActivityPub protocol, aiming to improve the interoperability between the platforms. At the present time (August 2018), this protocol is supported by thirteen platforms (see the table below).

Communication protocols used in the fediverse[edit]

These communication protocols which follow the open standard are used in the fediverse:

Fediverse software platforms[edit]

The softwares spanning the fediverse are all free. Some of them are vaguely Twitter-ish in style (for example Mastodon, or GNU Social, similar in activities and their microblogging function), while others include more communication and transaction options that are instead comparable to Google+ or Facebook (such as is the case with Friendica and Hubzilla).

The following software platforms span the fediverse by using the listed communication protocols:

Platform Name Type ActivityPub DFRN diaspora* Open Cloud Mesh OStatus
WebSub 		WebDAV WebFinger Zot
CloutStream Professional Social Network Yes No No No No No Yes No
diaspora* Social Network, Microblogging No [7] [8] No Yes No No No Yes No
Friendica
(f. Friendika; orig. Mistpark) 		Social Network No Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes No
Funkwhale Audio, sound hosting Yes No No No No No Yes No
GNU MediaGoblin file, image, audio, video hosting No [9] No No No No No Yes No
GNUsocial
(f. StatusNet; orig. Laconica) 		Microblogging No [10] [11] No No No Yes No Yes No
Hubzilla
(f. RedMatrix; orig. Friendica-Red) 		CMS, Social Network, Microblogging, Wiki, Blogging, Image gallery, File hosting Yes No Yes No Yes [2] Yes Yes Yes
Mastodon Microblogging Yes [12] No No No Yes No Yes No
Misskey Microblogging with style Yes No No No No No Yes No
Nextcloud File hosting Yes No No Yes No Yes Yes No
ownCloud File hosting No No No Yes No Yes Yes No
PeerPx Image hosting Yes No No No No No Yes No
PeerTube Video hosting Yes No No No No No Yes No
PixelFed Image hosting Yes No No No No No Yes No
Pleroma Microblogging Yes No No No Yes [3] No Yes No
Plume Blogging Yes No No No Yes No Yes No
postActiv Microblogging No [13] No No No Yes No Yes No
Prismo Link-sharing Yes No No No No No Yes No
pump.io Microblogging No [14] No No No No [15] No Yes No
Socialhome Website No No Yes No No No Yes No
Write.as Blogging Yes No No No No No Yes No

Actual spreading[edit]

The statistic service the-federation.info states for the 18th of August 2018 following data about the fediverse. The statistics do not reflect the whole fediverse. [16]

  • Number of instances (servers): 2,291
  • Number of identities: 2,474,835
  • Number of posts: 9,837,589
  • Number of comments: 4,415,169

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Mastodon User Guide". Archived from the original on 2017-04-09. 
  2. ^ a b framagit.org/hubzilla/. "gnusoc · master · hubzilla / addons". Retrieved 2018-07-17. 
  3. ^ a b pleroma.social. "Pleroma". Retrieved 2018-07-17. 
  4. ^ github.com/friendica/. "DFRN2" (PDF). Retrieved 2018-08-18. 
  5. ^ wiki.geant.org. "Open Cloud Mesh". Retrieved 2018-08-18. 
  6. ^ project.hibzilla.org. "Zot Protocol". Retrieved 2018-08-18. 
  7. ^ diaspora*. Support ActivityPub #7422. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  8. ^ diaspora*. Let's talk about ActivityPub. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  9. ^ GNU MediaGoblin. Move federation code to ActivityPub spec #5503. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  10. ^ GNU social. Support ActivityPub #256. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  11. ^ GNU social. Plugin. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  12. ^ Mastodon. ActivityPub support #1557. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  13. ^ postActiv. ActivityPub support #97. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  14. ^ pump.io. ActivityPub support #1241. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  15. ^ pump.io. OStatus #8. Retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  16. ^ the-federation.info. "The Federation - Welcome to the new social web". Retrieved 2018-08-18. 

External links[edit]

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