
Pleroma: A Mastodon-compatible open and federated social networking server - ve55
https://pleroma.social/
======
rglullis
If you try Pleroma, do yourself a favor and also install the Soapbox-FE
frontend. Much cleaner, customizable and familiar to Twitter users than the
default one.

Regarding the backend. It does seem that Mastodon was the first one and has
more functionality, but (1) Pleroma is catching up and (2) waaaaay lighter on
resources. Mastodon is built on Rails, requires PostgreSQL, Redis, a task
server (sidekiq) and optionally Elasticsearch. Pleroma goes by with just
PostgreSQL and is built on Elixir.

Regardless of technology, what I'd really like to see in a future version of
these AP-systems is the ability to manage multiple-domains with a single
database / application server. Right now all implementations assume that the
domain of the backend is the domain of every user in the instance. So this
means that if I want to host Mastodon for a user with a custom domain, I'll
have to spin a instance/database just for this user. If I could have a
separate mapping between account / domain, one single instance could manage
everyone.

~~~
searchableguy
[https://soapbox.pub](https://soapbox.pub) for the lazy.

I was thinking of using a fediverse instance for my blog but I am unsure
whether it's a good idea.

~~~
rglullis
What do you mean? To use a Mastodon/Pleroma _instead_ of the blog, or a blog
engine that can interoperate with ActivityPub? If the latter, I can only think
of [https://write.as](https://write.as) for the moment.

~~~
riffic
You can also install this plugin for WordPress:

[https://wordpress.org/plugins/activitypub/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/activitypub/)

The ActivityPub ecosystem is pretty interesting. Look at it closely.

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LukeHoersten
Here’s my Pleroma ansible role if anyone wants to give it a try. Can run on a
Raspberry Pi and supports multiple instances and domains.

[https://src.nth.io/ansible-
roles/file/tip/pleroma/otp](https://src.nth.io/ansible-
roles/file/tip/pleroma/otp)

~~~
rglullis
You should've pushed this to Galaxy! I was looking for an ansible role and
ended up having to make my own.

How are you dealing with the secrets that need to be generated? I couldn't
find anything on the tasks or templates...

~~~
LukeHoersten
I manage it at the playbook level. They go into the role as variables.

I’ve never really used Galaxy. You recommend it? I’ve always felt like I can’t
depend on other people’s roles, especially since roles don’t have their own
variable scopes.

~~~
rglullis
Quality of the roles on Galaxy vary a lot, but there are some that are
certainly useful. Usually the variables get namespaced with the name of the
role, so you'd only get some kind of conflict if you were using two different
code bases for the same role - or if the dev was really sloppy/didn't care
about others integrating their code.

~~~
LukeHoersten
Yeah that makes sense. I’ll take a look. Thanks!

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ProfDreamer
There's also honk[0] which aims to be a small ActivityPub server
implementation with "minimal setup and support costs".

[0]:
[https://humungus.tedunangst.com/r/honk](https://humungus.tedunangst.com/r/honk)

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voppe
I tried both and it's much better than Mastodon IMO due to how much more
lightweight, faster and easier to deploy it is. Maybe it has less features,
but they're fully worth the sacrifice.

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robobro
I love pleroma! I host a bunch of servers.

~~~
mxuribe
I've been using it for some time, and while i'm def. not an expert, i do love
how lightweight is is! It really is a pretty nifty platform for the fediverse!

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toastal
Isn't one of the advantages of Mastodon that it has much better moderation
tools? It's kinda hard to tell by the homepage.

~~~
lainsoykaf
We have more fine grained moderation tools, but they are more complicated.
We're making it easier in our admin frontend all the time, though.

~~~
swebs
Are you with Mastodon or Pieroma?

~~~
lainsoykaf
ah, sorry, pleroma :)

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StavrosK
Does anyone know if this actually works with Mastodon accounts? I tried to
follow mine, but it sent a "follow request" and then did nothing (my account
is open for anyone to follow).

~~~
LukeHoersten
Yeah it definitely works. It uses the ActivityPub protocol which both just
implement. But I use them together all the time.

~~~
StavrosK
Hmm, odd about my account then... Thanks!

~~~
LukeHoersten
What instance?

~~~
StavrosK
Mastodon.host.

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auganov
Any easy to follow along guide where you implement your own compatible
ActivityPub server?

~~~
lainsoykaf
Gargron wrote one: [https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2018/06/how-to-implement-a-
bas...](https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2018/06/how-to-implement-a-basic-
activitypub-server/)

~~~
mariusor
Let's be frank though, that's nowhere near enough for implementing an actual
server.

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miki123211
Federation tech is cool from a software-engineering perspective, but almost
useless from an average Joe perspective.

Centralized services have much better UX, i.e. due to a universal search
mechanism and aren't as confusing. Try explaining to a non-techie that there's
that cool thing called Mastodon, but there's also Pleroma that works with
mastodon, but there is not one instance but many people hosting many servers,
oh, and to use this whole thing, you don't get the Mastodon app, but you have
multiple apps for multiple platforms, each with a different name etc. Oh, and
the whole thing is also sometimes called Fediverse. Also, each instance has a
completely different website and rules, most of those are small and can
disappear any day, and your whole account will disappear with them. If they
grow large enough, the monetization issue will eventually become evident.
There are two solutions, forcing users to pay, making most of them unhappy, or
selling their data, and now we are back to square one. Also remember a lot of
admins push their political views on all users of the instance, much more
aggressively than any mainstream platform. Blocking Gab, an instance often
associated with racist content, is very common, nevermind the non-racist users
on there. Same for basically blocking off Japan as a whole, just because the
japanese sometimes post their anime child porn, which is legal over there. Oh,
and what are those weird addresses? Well, they're kind of like email... So if
they're like email, why don't we use email instead? And so it goes.

Most non-techies don't really care about privacy in the "now I see more
personalized ads" sense. They don't want their future employers / partners /
parents to see their messages, that's why Snapchat and sending content that
automatically disappears has become so popular. The Fediverse actually
sacrifices those "important" kinds of privacy. Basically, As long as you let
open source clients in, your recipient can do anything with your messages with
little friction, and that's not what users usually want.

For most users, Facebook spying on their stuff won't really have a material
impact on their lives. However, if they get into an argument with the admin of
the instance (assuming a friend is hosting it for them), the consequences can
be severe. Imagine if i.e. your techy friend hosted all your social data and
then discovered you had an affair with his wife. He could, as revenge, publish
all your embarassing photos and direct messages. This sort of thing just can't
happen with Facebook.

Matrix is quite different, the UX is much better, it's great for
enterprises/education/govt, so it doesn't matter that much anyway, it's
filling a previously unfilled niche (easy, realtime chats between
organizations) and lets governments control their data. I think it has a
moderate chance of success. Mastodon, however, is, quite frankly, a failure.

There's definitely a need for a free-speech-respecting, censorship-resistant
social network, but the fediverse is not the right approach.

~~~
auganov
Right, the whole federation model is strictly flawed. The whole point of
Twitter was it was YOU and the whole world. Having your profile held hostage
by some "instance" doesn't make much sense. With email (it kind of) works
because your emails aren't public. You don't need to worry about other people
on the same server approving of you.

IMO federation took centralized social media's worst problem and made it
worse!

~~~
mikro2nd
Migrating your profile to another (Mastodon) instance is pretty quick and
easy. Did it just the other day. So in what sense do you mean "held hostage"?

~~~
auganov
I'm ignorant as to how that's done right now. So correct me if I'm wrong but:

To "migrate" you basically want to have all your "followers" follow your new
account. For obvious reasons you cannot just let people arbitrarily make
others follow them. So the process must be mediated by the server(s). If your
original server doesn't like you they can cut off your ability to "migrate".

And on top of that any server that doesn't like you can just cease interacting
with you regardless of whether your "followers" like you or not.

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saint-loup
Is this a reference to Jung or to gnostic thinkers? :)

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ponker
sounds like a type of cancer. open source needs to pay more attention to
branding.

~~~
yborg
Python sounds like a large predatory snake.

~~~
danwills
named monty

~~~
pndy
_You got very good marks._

------
488643689
If these things concern you:

Soapbox is developed by a massive TERF, boyfriend/husband to the founder, and
co-founder of the transphobic, radical "feminist" hate-platform spinster.xyz.
This is where all the TERFs migrated after the reddit ban of
/r/gendercritical, /r/LGBdroptheT, ...

I think in this case, it's really hard to separate the product from the
person, since it's all over the place; he's at the core of organized
transphobia, harassment and hate.

~~~
Hitton
In the age of J.K. Rowling being called TERF could probably majority of
population be called TERFs, I see such labels no longer useful. And unless you
subscribe to notions such as guilt by association, ancestral sin and similar I
don't know how is conduct of developer's spouse relevant.

~~~
Spivak
I feel like the case you're trying to make that JK is a "normal" person and
therefore her views are common. This isn't an instance where someone who
happens to hold an unorthodox opinion is caught by people trying to apply
labels to her. She isn't getting caught up in the fight between feminists and
the broader cultural push for trans acceptance. She's been on the front lines
of this fight for years and years. It just happens that one, people are
starting to actually care about trans people and two, JK decided to start
venting more publicly on the largest outrage machine on the internet.

Very few people are TERFs. It's a relatively uncommon set of beliefs which are
separate from the kinds of views that might get you called transphobic.

