How to run a small social network (2019)
Many users are rethinking social media as something small, focused, and often self-hosted rather than a giant ad-driven platform. Commenters weigh the appeal and challenges of niche networks — from Mastodon instances and forums to Discord servers and in‑person meetups — highlighting issues like network effects, onboarding enough people to keep a community alive, and the importance of strong moderation and clear culture. A recurring theme is that meaningful social spaces often prioritize trust, privacy, and shared interests over scale and viral reach.
Group- and Topic-Focused vs Person-Focused Networks
- Several commenters want Facebook-Groups/Reddit-style spaces: topic- or community-centric, many-to-many, anyone can post and reply.
- Discomfort with networks centered on following individuals; some explicitly seek topic-only following without user-follow features.
- ActivityPub is seen as flexible enough for topic-following, but existing implementations are usually user-centric and would need deeper changes.
Small vs Large Social Networks
- One view: networks gain value primarily with scale; tiny platforms (≈100 users) lack incentive for content creation.
- Counterview: small, interest-based communities are preferable—less spam, advertising, and influencer behavior; many people only want to share with friends/family.
- Examples of successful small spaces include old forums, vBulletin/phpBB communities, and private Slack/Discord/WhatsApp-like groups.
Self-Hosting, Federation, and Ownership
- Some see “everyone running their own small instance” as a return to the original web ethos and phpBB-era forums.
- Others argue most users don’t want to self-host or manage infrastructure and gain little benefit from it.
- Federation (e.g., ActivityPub) is framed as a way to combine self-hosting with a large userbase, like email.
- There is skepticism toward certain centralized messaging platforms due to perceived trust or jurisdiction issues.
Moderation, Codes of Conduct, and Culture
- Strong, explicit Codes of Conduct are seen as useful “filters” to repel people who don’t fit the desired culture, though some doubt that extremists read CoCs carefully.
- Many argue culture and moderation matter more than wording; “vibes” determine who stays.
- Simple rules like banning politics, or just banning “nutso” behavior directly, are proposed for very small, personal communities.
Engagement and Retention
- Bootstrapping new networks is hard: many projects see an initial 30–50 signups, then rapid decay.
- One product builder highlights that most members lurk and many drop off after a month; ongoing engagement often depends on notifications (email, push, etc.).
- Some note the irony that even tiny communities quickly worry about “boosting engagement.”
Alternative Models: Offline and “Small Web”
- Several celebrate offline meetups as the purest “small social network.”
- There’s visible nostalgia for the early web and “small internet”: independent sites, tildes, experimentation, and non-commercial spaces.