The PHP community has always been distinguished by its Open Source values. The same principles that guide us in software development – transparency, collaboration, community control, and free exchange of information – should also apply to our digital communication spaces. The large, centralised social media platforms increasingly run counter to these values: Opaque recommendation algorithms, systematic behaviour evaluation, and an infrastructure that structurally favours disinformation, hate speech, and authoritarian tendencies are now the rule rather than the exception.
Our online spaces as a PHP community should be free from this algorithmic manipulation and the fascist tech bros who drive this infrastructure. This is exactly where the Fediverse, ActivityPub, phpc.social, and phpc.tv come into play.
The Fediverse and ActivityPub
The Fediverse offers a fundamentally different architecture for social networks. Instead of centralised platforms controlled by corporations, it consists of many independent servers (instances) that can communicate with each other. This is similar to how email works.
The technical foundation for this is ActivityPub, an open, decentralised standard from the W3C that was published in January 2018. It defines how servers communicate with each other and how clients, such as our apps, interact with servers.
The protocol works with the Activity Streams 2.0 format, which is based on JSON-LD. Each "actor" (essentially a user account) has an inbox for incoming messages and an outbox for outgoing activities. When you create a post, follow another user, or share a post, these activities are packaged as structured messages and distributed to the appropriate servers.
The key difference is that there is no central authority controlling everything.
Each server can set its own rules and moderation guidelines. Communities can thus organise themselves and set standards that fit their values.
Decentralisation significantly reduces the risk of censorship and exploitation. Users are no longer at the mercy of the rules and algorithms of a single corporation. They are free to choose platforms that cater to different niches and target groups without fear of arbitrary censorship or algorithmic suppression.
Mastodon
Mastodon is the best-known platform in the Fediverse and the most direct alternative to Twitter. The Mastodon server is free software that has been developed under the GNU Affero General Public Licence (AGPL) since 2016. Many of the Mastodon clients are also free software.
The chronological timeline without an algorithm is perhaps the most important difference. Your Mastodon timeline simply displays all posts from the accounts, groups, and hashtags you follow in chronological order – newest first.
There is no tracking of your behaviour. There is no algorithmic manipulation that pushes you into a filter bubble or floods your timeline with "recommended" content that you never requested. What you see is not determined by an opaque AI, but by your own decisions about who you follow.
For many who have become accustomed to algorithmic feeds, this may seem strange at first. But that is precisely where its strength lies: You are in control. You can hide unwanted content with filter functions. You can use lists to organise your timeline into thematic mini-timelines. But no one but you decides what you see or do not see.
There are no ads: Mastodon instances are typically funded by donations, not advertising. This means no commercial breaks, no selling your data to advertisers, and no optimisation of the platform for "engagement" at the expense of your mental health.
Advanced privacy settings: On Mastodon, you can individually specify who can see each post: everyone (public), only accounts that follow you, only specific accounts, or "unlisted" (public, but not in public timelines).
Community moderation: Each Mastodon instance has its own code of conduct and its own moderation team. If you do not like the moderation on one instance, you can switch to another and take your followers with you. This decentralised moderation prevents the arbitrariness we know from centralised platforms.
phpc.social: The Mastodon instance of the PHP community
The PHP community operates phpc.social.
The mission of phpc.social is clear: To create a safe and friendly space for discussions within the PHP community. A code of conduct is enforced by a volunteer moderation team. phpc.social is a lively hub for PHP discussions, framework development, package releases, tool recommendations, Open Source, and much more.
By the community, for the community: php.social embodies the Open Source principles that are important to us as people who work with PHP: transparency, collaborative participation, respect, and community-oriented development.
PeerTube
PeerTube is the YouTube equivalent in the Fediverse: a free, Open Source and decentralised video hosting platform that is also based on ActivityPub.
PeerTube uses a clever technical solution: peer-to-peer technology (WebRTC P2P) for distributing videos. When you watch a video on PeerTube, you do not just download it from the server, you also share parts of the video with others who are watching the same video.
This distributes the load across many peers when a video goes viral, preventing a central server from becoming overloaded. This makes PeerTube more scalable and sustainable.
Censorship resistance: videos are treated like torrents. Even if a PeerTube instance goes offline, users who have already seen the video can continue to seed it. This makes it more difficult to delete content completely.
There are no algorithms. PeerTube does not use opaque recommendation algorithms that determine what you see next. Content discovery is transparent and community-driven rather than algorithmic, so you are not kept on the platform for as long as possible.
Creator autonomy: On PeerTube, creators have full control over their content without fear of sudden demonetisation or algorithmic discrimination. Monetisation is done through donations, crowdfunding or subscriptions – directly from the community, without a corporation taking a cut.
Federation: Different PeerTube instances can connect and share content. You can follow a PeerTube channel from your Mastodon account and new videos will appear in your Mastodon timeline. This interoperability is a core feature of the Fediverse.
phpc.tv: The PeerTube instance of the PHP community
The PHP community operates phpc.tv .
phpc.tv provides a space for PHP-related video content: conference talks, tutorials, demos, live coding sessions and more. Just like phpc.social, it is a community project – by the PHP community for the PHP community.
Transparency through community funding
Both platforms, phpc.social and phpc.tv, belong to the community, but are at different stages: While phpc.social has long been donation-based and completely transparent about its finances, phpc.tv was only launched last night by Anna Filina. Currently, there is no way to financially support the operation of phpc.tv, but it can be assumed that Anna is working on enabling donations here as well. As soon as that is the case, I will support the operation of phpc.tv in the same way that I already do for phpc.social.
With phpc.social, everyone can see how much money is being raised, what it is being spent on, and who is supporting the platform through donations. This transparency is a fundamental difference from commercial platforms.
It creates trust and accountability. The community finances the platform, so the platform belongs to the community. Those who actively contribute have influence over the direction of the project.
Funding through monthly or annual donations also creates a more sustainable foundation than advertising or venture capital. The platform does not have to grow, grow, grow to satisfy investors. It only has to raise enough money to cover its operating costs.
Join in!
With phpc.social and phpc.tv, the PHP community has launched two remarkable projects that show what digital community spaces should look like: They are open, transparent, community-controlled, and free from algorithmic manipulation and fascist tech bros.
These platforms need all of us. They need:
- Users who actively post, discuss and engage
- Moderators who help maintain a friendly and safe space
- Financial supporters who help cover operating costs with monthly or annual donations
- Technical contributors who help with administration and development
The big tech corporations and their algorithm-driven platforms will not disappear on their own. But we do not have to depend on them. With the Fediverse, there is already a functioning alternative that aligns with our Open Source values.
phpc.social and phpc.tv are examples of how community-driven, decentralised social networks are not only possible, but already a reality. They show that we can create digital spaces that belong to us – not Mark Zuckerberg, not Elon Musk, and not any tech corporation.
Let us build and maintain these spaces together! The future of social media should be decentralised, transparent and community-driven. The future is the Fediverse.
