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The open source federated equivalent to Instagram is Pixelfed: https://pixelfed.org https://pixelfed.org There's an Android app for it called PixelDroid: http

The open source federated equivalent to Instagram is Pixelfed: https://pixelfed.org https://pixelfed.org There's an Android app for it called PixelDroid: https://gitlab.shinice.net/pixeldroid/PixelDroid https://gitlab.shinice.net/pixeldroid/PixelDroid

yosito 5y ago
Pixelfed is the kind of project I'm talking about. It's a great start of a project that needs a lot more work to become usable as a serious photography platform. I wish more people would put their effort into improving projects like Pixelfed rather than building front ends for Instagram that get shut down.
pcora 5y ago
How does Pixelfed makes money?
- Jolter 5y ago
  Looks like Patreon if you read the web site. And Liberapay, I guess. It’s an open source “host your own” software, I don’t think they are trying to monetize beyond paying a living wage for the developer.
- messo 5y ago
  It is not a company, but a federated network – anyone can run their own server and interact with the all other nodes (much like email). The software is open source and is a community effort, although the lead developer got a grant [1] that allows him to spend time to improve the project over time. 1: https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed#pixelfed-sponsors https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed#pixelfed-sponsors
stuart78 5y ago
I’ve been thinking of looking for this for quite some time, thanks for sharing. I miss Instagram all the time, but the experience got worse every year. Too many ads, too much wandering from the photo-first product I fell in love with, too much Facebook.
j1elo 5y ago
Here's something I never seem to get a clear picture of, with these federated options. The typical explanation that makes the concept easy to understand is that federated services are "like email, we can have different providers, e.g. you might have a gmail account and I might have a yahoo or outlook address, and we'd still be able to communicate". I think that's a very good way to put it, but the issue is that with email providers most users have an account in a company that is well established and its future continuity is not in doubt, at least in a span of months or couple years. And even if yahoo happened to close their email service, there are good software solutions that are mature and can be easily found and used to move your emails from one IMAP address to another. Now, with federated options, I see all these funny looking domaim names, which I'm sorry but to me they scream "I'll be gone by next week (or month or year)". In general, apart from the most prominent federated instances -those that typically belong to the creators or are endorsed by them-, there is a lot of small instances that don't transmit a lot of confidence in their long-term existence. And I get it, these are hosted mostly by users of the network. But the thing is that I'm a user, not a sysadmin. I have enough work already at work, and for this kind of use I'd really like to not worry about hosting a service by my own (especially after seeing this list of requisites! [0]) or that the instance I chose 6 months ago is now disappearing without notice. Are any fediverse implementations working on this issue, such like promoting an instance rating / trust system, or something like that? Apart from, of course, tooling to make migration a one click process. [0]: https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.html https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.htm...
- commoner 5y ago
  Most fediverse services have a website that provides a list of instances with statistics. The site is usually named "join" + the name of the service. For Pixelfed, the list of instances is at joinpixelfed.org and it's in beta: https://beta.joinpixelfed.org https://beta.joinpixelfed.org That list omits the largest instance (https://pixelfed.social https://pixelfed.social). There are also third-party websites that provide statistics on fediverse nodes. The-Federation.info has a list for Pixelfed: https://the-federation.info/pixelfed https://the-federation.info/pixelfed If you want to choose an instance that will last, one of the most popular instances is usually a safe bet. On the other hand, if you are mainly interested in certain topics or if you want to interact with users from a certain region, some smaller instances may have like-minded communities that would be more appealing to you.
cmckn 5y ago
Seems really cool, I'm going to spin up an instance. Their homepage is a bit odd though; very low density and you have to scroll alllll the way down to find the "Run your own server, or join one" links.
- cmckn 5y ago
  Yikes, so much for that; getting it running is like building a model airplane: https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.html https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.htm...
  - commoner 5y ago
    The Pixelfed repo includes a Docker Compose file that is easier to set up: https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/blob/dev/docker-compose.yml https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/blob/dev/docker-compose... Another option is to set up Yunohost (free) or Cloudron (freemium), both of which support Pixelfed and a variety of self-hosted services: https://github.com/YunoHost-Apps/pixelfed_ynh https://github.com/YunoHost-Apps/pixelfed_ynh https://www.cloudron.io/store/org.pixelfed.cloudronapp.html https://www.cloudron.io/store/org.pixelfed.cloudronapp.html

yosito 5y ago

Pixelfed is the kind of project I'm talking about. It's a great start of a project that needs a lot more work to become usable as a serious photography platform. I wish more people would put their effort into improving projects like Pixelfed rather than building front ends for Instagram that get shut down.

pcora 5y ago

How does Pixelfed makes money?

Jolter 5y ago
Looks like Patreon if you read the web site. And Liberapay, I guess. It’s an open source “host your own” software, I don’t think they are trying to monetize beyond paying a living wage for the developer.
messo 5y ago
It is not a company, but a federated network – anyone can run their own server and interact with the all other nodes (much like email). The software is open source and is a community effort, although the lead developer got a grant [1] that allows him to spend time to improve the project over time. 1: https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed#pixelfed-sponsors https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed#pixelfed-sponsors

stuart78 5y ago

I’ve been thinking of looking for this for quite some time, thanks for sharing. I miss Instagram all the time, but the experience got worse every year. Too many ads, too much wandering from the photo-first product I fell in love with, too much Facebook.

j1elo 5y ago

Here's something I never seem to get a clear picture of, with these federated options. The typical explanation that makes the concept easy to understand is that federated services are "like email, we can have different providers, e.g. you might have a gmail account and I might have a yahoo or outlook address, and we'd still be able to communicate". I think that's a very good way to put it, but the issue is that with email providers most users have an account in a company that is well established and its future continuity is not in doubt, at least in a span of months or couple years. And even if yahoo happened to close their email service, there are good software solutions that are mature and can be easily found and used to move your emails from one IMAP address to another. Now, with federated options, I see all these funny looking domaim names, which I'm sorry but to me they scream "I'll be gone by next week (or month or year)". In general, apart from the most prominent federated instances -those that typically belong to the creators or are endorsed by them-, there is a lot of small instances that don't transmit a lot of confidence in their long-term existence. And I get it, these are hosted mostly by users of the network. But the thing is that I'm a user, not a sysadmin. I have enough work already at work, and for this kind of use I'd really like to not worry about hosting a service by my own (especially after seeing this list of requisites! [0]) or that the instance I chose 6 months ago is now disappearing without notice. Are any fediverse implementations working on this issue, such like promoting an instance rating / trust system, or something like that? Apart from, of course, tooling to make migration a one click process. [0]: https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.html https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.htm...

commoner 5y ago
Most fediverse services have a website that provides a list of instances with statistics. The site is usually named "join" + the name of the service. For Pixelfed, the list of instances is at joinpixelfed.org and it's in beta: https://beta.joinpixelfed.org https://beta.joinpixelfed.org That list omits the largest instance (https://pixelfed.social https://pixelfed.social). There are also third-party websites that provide statistics on fediverse nodes. The-Federation.info has a list for Pixelfed: https://the-federation.info/pixelfed https://the-federation.info/pixelfed If you want to choose an instance that will last, one of the most popular instances is usually a safe bet. On the other hand, if you are mainly interested in certain topics or if you want to interact with users from a certain region, some smaller instances may have like-minded communities that would be more appealing to you.

cmckn 5y ago

Seems really cool, I'm going to spin up an instance. Their homepage is a bit odd though; very low density and you have to scroll alllll the way down to find the "Run your own server, or join one" links.

cmckn 5y ago
Yikes, so much for that; getting it running is like building a model airplane: https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.html https://docs.pixelfed.org/running-pixelfed/prerequisites.htm...
- commoner 5y ago
  The Pixelfed repo includes a Docker Compose file that is easier to set up: https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/blob/dev/docker-compose.yml https://github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/blob/dev/docker-compose... Another option is to set up Yunohost (free) or Cloudron (freemium), both of which support Pixelfed and a variety of self-hosted services: https://github.com/YunoHost-Apps/pixelfed_ynh https://github.com/YunoHost-Apps/pixelfed_ynh https://www.cloudron.io/store/org.pixelfed.cloudronapp.html https://www.cloudron.io/store/org.pixelfed.cloudronapp.html