Social Networks on the Brink of Revolution: The Call for Fediverse and Allies

One, two, three social networks: Facebook, Instagram, X, i.e., ex Twitter… Different, yet essentially the same: they thrive on millions, even billions of users (Facebook has about three billion) who assess the quality of their social life based on the number of virtual friends/followers and views. They are detrimental as they waste precious personal time on trivial and unnecessary information, create false stars, foster addiction, and offer an illusory reality… They also have their advantages: they have revitalized marketing, spawned a new profession, influencer, and made visible the products of companies that lack funds for marketing campaigns, thus stimulating the growth of their business, often only at the local level. However, after nearly two decades of existence, their technological reach has become exhausted. This does not mean that this form of communication will disappear. Social networks will evolve, analysts and futurists predict, into a new – decentralized form. Existing social networks could, in fact, be replaced by the fediverse (i.e., federated universe), fediverse – a decentralized social medium.

Protocol in Trend

The essence of the fediverse and its impact on social media is the decentralization of platforms. Traditional social networks are centralized and controlled by a single server, while decentralized platforms utilize technologies such as blockchain and peer-to-peer networks to deliver data across multiple servers. The decentralized approach liberates user data so that it is no longer confined to a single server. Users within the fediverse can follow and share content and communicate across various networks. Privacy, independence, and connectivity are at the core of this new form of social networks. The heralds of the fediverse, synonymous with interconnected services powered by the ActivityPub protocol, are decentralized platforms like Mastodon, Hive, Bluesky, and Threads.

Although it has existed for years, since it was adopted by Flipboard, Medium, Mozilla, and Meta, ActivityPub is now in the spotlight and is the key that will unlock the door to a new history of social networks. Meta’s launch of the Threads app as a competitor to Twitter, i.e., X, has sparked interest in this protocol. This standard established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) offers two possibilities. The first is communication between different services, such as Threads and Mastodon, free open-source social media platforms that are increasingly popular alternatives to Twitter and Facebook.

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The second is that users can transfer their accounts from one network to another. They do not have to reassemble followers on a new platform as they can migrate them to any social media that supports ActivityPub. This ability to migrate data distinguishes the fediverse from Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and other social networks managed by centralized companies that collect user data and control content.

Control to Users

ActivityPub enables the decentralization of social networks, giving users the freedom to choose and switch to a new network without losing followers on the one where they have an account, as it is governed by open protocols rather than closed platforms. Open social networking means that social applications built on ActivityPub are interoperable, so instead of re-uploading different versions of a post for each platform, it can be published once and then viewed, shared, and read in any application or program that supports ActivityPub throughout the fediverse, as it functions as a universe of social networks. The goal of ActivityPub is to return control to users and ensure that the social network is greater than any company. With a new standard for social networking that is more open and user-focused, ActivityPub could become more powerful than Twitter and Facebook, but it still needs to be refined and, despite corporate interests, preserve its potential.

Own Audience

Meta’s Instagram head Adam Mosseri stated that the advantage of open social networks is the ability to own one’s audience. For instance, anyone who wants to leave Threads takes their followers and content with them. Another advantage is allowing content within social networks to leave the closed space. To view content on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, an account is required, even just to see posts. The fediverse allows any compatible system to view content just as one can view a webpage in any browser, from Chrome to Edge, or read emails from Gmail to Yahoo or in Microsoft Outlook.

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Social Networks – Users

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In recent months, many tech companies have invested in ActivityPub and the fediverse. They are working with Tumblr, Flipboard, Medium, Mozilla, and Meta. There is also an official WordPress plugin for ActivityPub that will enable the protocol for about half of the internet at once, and developers are already using it to create new, different views on YouTube, Instagram… ActivityPub is already everywhere. It powers Mastodon, a platform that has become a refuge for those abandoning Twitter, i.e., X. It is a social network that functions like X but does not have a single owner; rather, it consists of a group of decentralized servers running free open code. With Mastodon, a user can easily move their profile to another server at any time without losing followers. And for complete control, they can even create their own server.

Decentralized Networking

Although Mastodon is a herald of the fediverse, tech experts claim it is not its future but merely a large social platform based on ActivityPub.

–​ Decentralized social networking is a concept that significantly differs from how the internet currently functions. It means completely separating the user interface from the underlying data. Whenever you log into a new social application, you won’t have to reassemble your audience or find all your friends – all your followers come with you. These things should be part of the internet, not part of an application. Email is the best example of how this system works: it is based on open protocols used by many services, so even though there are many email applications with different features and quality levels, your contacts transfer and will always work –​ said ActivityPub standard co-editor Christine Lemmer-Webber.

Breakthrough Year

The transition to decentralized platforms may take time as their technical complexity is too great for many users, which is why preparation is needed for their use. Although the fediverse is not yet in full swing, its influence is constantly growing.

–​ For now, Mastodon is the main fediverse. There are also other rising players like Pixelfed, a decentralized Instagram, and PeerTube, a decentralized YouTube, but most of the action in the fediverse is happening on Mastodon. It’s hard to say what that exactly means. The platform recently surpassed ten million registered accounts, but that is still much less than on Twitter. Regardless of the numbers, the vibes are good – said entrepreneur and tech manager Anil Dash, head of Glitch and vice president of developer experience at Fastly.

As the potential of the fediverse grows, so does the competition to participate in the bloom of social networks: Artifact and Substack Notes are building their own closed platforms, while Bluesky, Farcaster, Nostr, and others are developing open protocols for the decentralization of social networks. Experts who have long worked on the web have experienced a wide range of interest in its decentralization, from euphoria to lethargy. However, they claim that it will be different with the fediverse.

– The whole thing with ActivityPub is as big as it was in the beginning with HTML. It is the biggest single opportunity I have recognized for the web since its inception – said Flipboard CEO Mike McCue.

Similarly, Mozilla’s director Steve Teixeira stated that 2024 could be a breakthrough year for the fediverse. The biggest test, in his opinion, will be content moderation, which will also be the most challenging. This is the primary product of social business, costly and demanding, and decentralizing this work means that only a few large companies will be able to afford it.