The Fediverse, ActivityPub, & The IndieWeb #

If you’re as active in the same nerdy online circles I am, you’ve probably heard all three of these terms. There’s also a good chance you’re confused how they’re all related. Well, let’s fix that:

The Fediverse #

Alright, that’s a lot to dissect, so let’s break it down.

interconnected servers […] independently hosted […] can communicate with each other

So, basically, a bunch of people are running their own servers but they can talk to one another because they’ve agreed on a standard.

[…] create so-called identities

so, make an account

These identities are able to communicate […]

but this account is recognized by other servers.

So, what this is getting is that you might have something that’s less like Twitter where everything is on one centralized network and more like email. You can have an @gmail.com, an @hotmail.com or make your own - I could (but don’t) have an @opguides.info.

Already based on that simplified explanation this has a few benefits:

1. You can be host your own server if you really want, so you can control your data
2. You can be a part of a server that has as tight or loose of rules as you want. Don’t want racists hanging around, then don’t let them.

There are many fediverse services. The most well known one being mastodon which is basically a Twitter clone BUT the weird thing is there are multiple instances. So, like email, you might have an account at https://merveilles.town or https://chaos.social/about or something else entirely, but regardless of what you use they can communicate.

Mastodon has many great instances - more on that in a bit. The bigger picture is that federation can be used for something like a YouTube clone (which is what PeerTube is), streaming audio (which is what Funkwhale is), being-a-better-insta-than-insta (which is what PixelFed is), event planning (see Gath.io), and quite a few other things if you go looking. The point being, for each of these, an (optionally) unified identity can be used and the server you use (or host yourself) can choose who to federate with (talk to). This means it:

• Is censorship resistant

• Allows you to join a community that doesn’t allow the things you like

• Lets you control your data as much as you want to.

It’s a win-win-win. In most systems, these sound contradictory. How can something be censorship resistant, but still have communities with whatever rules they like? Well, the key word there is communities, and that it is plural. These communities are still separate, it’s just that they can federate if and only if they want to.

If a server is full of racist jerks, nobody will federate with them. They can post all they want on their server, but their reach is limited. Yes, this makes echo chambers worse (in both directions) but, it’s a hell of a lot better than the alternative.

Alright, so, this is cool but whenever somebody talks about all of this fediverse stuff, this is only part of the picture. So, next let’s talk about…

ActivityPub #

The website for ActivityPub, activitypub.rocks says:

Which, uh, I don’t know if sounds exciting so much as it sounds like a description of a Rockwell automation retroencabulator.

So, in English, it’s a way for services/websites to talk to each other … which is a form of the above-mentioned federation. So, basically, it’s one way that things can federate. It’s the protocol.

While not the best analogy, it’s not totally wrong to say that ActivityPub is the language things talk to each other in (usually) while the act of talking to one another is federation. So, with the fediverse being the universe of these things that are all talking together, ActivityPub is the way they (usually) talk.

Speaking of both Federation and ActivityPub, usually the IndieWeb will also get mentioned, so…

The IndieWeb #

Uhh, wow, that doesn’t tell us much. The website goes on to say basically everything I said about what the fediverse is in the first place. The main thing I want to point out from that website is actually this:

Which is basically a fancy way of saying when you do something on your own website, it should automatically post links to all the things, and your website should automatically fetch the replies from all the things.

Along with that, clearly a big part of the indieweb is being independent, so, big corporate websites, even if they fit everything else don’t count.

Putting it all together #

Let’s go backwards then, by letting me pretend this is an FAQ between two of my characters:

But wait, there’s more! #

While this article is supposed to be about the fediverse, activity pub, and the indieweb, it would be incomplete without mentioning the overall point of all of this: trying to return to a time when the internet wasn’t dominated by monolithic, global-scale systems. These are good for some things, sure, but they’re really suck for others. A few other things are helping with this:

Webrings #

Which, is exactly what this website is a part of. Rather than put the button to go to the next website though, I’ll just link the list: https://webring.xxiivv.com. Being a part of a webring is basically a part of having an indieweb website now.

Decentralized networking #

While it’s sure as hell taking its sweet time to get there, there’s some really neat projects that are trying to make the backbone of the internet decentralized. The idea here is that it’s a bit weird that if you were to instant message your neighbor that it has to go over your cell carrier’s or ISPs network instead of your presumably-close-enough Wi-Fi routers just … talking. It’s almost a little too obvious to the point that it sounds dumb it doesn’t work this way already.

To various degrees and in different ways, project like yggdrasil, ipfs, cjdns + hyperboria, and beaker among many, many others are trying to make this future a reality.

The not http-web #

When you go to a website and do (almost) anything, all of the content is severed over the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (or HTTPS, the secure variant). HTTP is great, it’s allowed us to make the bad as internet we have today. But, it can sometimes be a bit too freeing. That freedom is why we have a lot of websites which sucks for screen readers, are full of obnoxious ads, etc. So, there are alternatives.

The big two are Gopher and Gemini, and at risk of pissing people off by treating them like they’re the same thing, they’re both very limited. You can display text, images, etc. but the way those websites actually arrange the content and show it to you is up to your browser. The websites themselves only provide the content, they leave it up to the browser to decide how to display it. If you want to try out a browser, see Castor and noodle around. (or maybe bombadillo if you’re a TUI person)

If you want to know more in a not incorrect and at least less-simplified way, give Gopher, Gemini and The Smol Internet (Tales From The Dork Web #22, Steve Lord) a read.

1. Webmentions don't always use ActivityPub but often do. This is enough into the weeds that I don't know all the details. If you do and want to submit something explaining it on this page it would be welcome.
2. ...ish. The way Webmentions work is weird. Generally anything using ActivityPub will work, but some things that don't can also be made to work and that's still called a WebMention. This post isn't meant to get to technical about how they work, and frankly I don't know.