What is the Fediverse?

File:Fediverse logo.png

Fediverse logo

The Fediverse is a giant Network of Social Media Platforms.

Imagine

Imagine Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & Co were all part of one giant network. That's basically what the Fediverse is, except the parts are less well known, free software & federated replacements to those.

In the Fediverse you can use your "Twitter" account to interact with "Facebook" users, share "Instagram" posts, comment under "Youtube" videos, listen to "Bandcamp" music, follow "Wordpress" blogs, take part in "reddit" discussions and more.

What are Fediverse projects?

Fediverse projects are the different software parts of the Fediverse. Many of them are replacements for more well known Social Media platforms.
See below which software emulates which other Social Media platform:

	classic Social Media	Fediverse replacement
microblogging	Twitter	Mastodon, Ecko, Pleroma, GNUsocial, Misskey
Social network	Facebook	Friendica, Diaspora
photoblogging	Instagram	Pixelfed
videoblogging	Youtube	Peertube
(macro)blogging	Wordpress	write freely, Plume
Book cataloguing	Goodreads	Bookwyrm
audioblogging	Spotify, Bandcamp, Soundcloud, ...	Funkwhale
forum	reddit	lemmy

What is "Federation"?

The email allegory

Everybody knows you don't need to be on the same email Provider to communicate via emails. You can send a mail from riseup.net to gmail.com and the other way around. That's about the same way that "federation" in the Fediverse works. Federation just means that different or decentral servers or instances can communicate with each other via a protocol. Just like email uses POP, IMAP or SMTP protocols for federation, the Fediverse uses mostly ActivityPub.

Further Reading

How do I get an account?
Getting started with your Fediverse account
Best practices
Fediverse - the advanced page on the Fediverse

External Links

Fediverse Guides

The Fediverse: the distributed social network
Guide to the Fediverse
DE: Fediverse – So geht gutes Social Media
DE: Das Fediverse