How Government Agencies Can Embrace the Fediverse for Public Communications
In recent years, there has been a significant shift in how government agencies communicate with the public. Social media has become an indispensable tool for agencies to disseminate emergency information, public health alerts, engage with citizens, and provide services. Among the various platforms available, the Fediverse and its most popular component, Mastodon, have emerged as potential alternatives to mainstream social media networks.
How Government Agencies Can Embrace the Fediverse for Public Communications
In recent years, there has been a significant shift in how government agencies communicate with the public. Social media has become an indispensable tool for agencies to disseminate emergency information, public health alerts, engage with citizens, and provide services. Among the various platforms available, the Fediverse and its most popular component, Mastodon, have emerged as potential alternatives to mainstream social media networks.
Algorithmic news selection and recommendation engines further complicates the deliverability of important messaging: 48% of respondents worry about missing out on important information due to over-personalised news feeds. Not to mention, placing important safety messages in a social media news feed co-mingles it with a broad range of untrusted news and opinion, competing with disinformation and misinformation across each of the network platforms.
How is the Fediverse Different?
Traditional social media has grown into distinct services that require users to be on the very same service using the very same provider to exchange messages such that, for example, Facebook users cannot communicate with X (formerly Twitter) users directly.
An emergency alert would need to be posted to Facebook and X separately by an agency seeking to reach both audiences. This is because most traditional social media services do not use an accepted technology standard, instead creating “walled gardens” that do not allow the sharing of information outside their walls.
Contrast this with email where users can send to and receive from anyone using an email service. Gmail users can send and receive messages to Outlook users, because email is an accepted technology standard and freely interconnects.
The Fediverse offers this open model like email, but in social media networks. It is a collection of interconnected services that publish social media feeds operated by companies, nonprofits, governments, media organisations and communities, just like traditional social media. But, unlike traditional social media, it uses open technology standards. When a message is posted by one of these providers it is broadcast to the entire network of connected services, and delivered by each service to the relevant audience.
Similar to email, agency alerts are delivered by the agency itself, federating out to the broader network and directly into the inboxes of people who have requested to follow the specific feed. Thanks to the use of technology standards, this removes the walls between networks.
People familiar with the RSS publishing format may find it helpful to think of Fediverse as “Really Simple Social Syndication”. Similar to RSS an agency can publish subscribable feeds, but with the added bonus of social interaction with citizens and stakeholders.
In effect, this combines the deliverability and reach of email with the personalisation and device-alerting capabilities of social media apps.
Mastodon stands out as one of the most popular platforms in the Fediverse, functioning similarly to X but with a focus on privacy and individual controls. Other platforms include WordPress (Web sites and blogging), Pixelfed (photo sharing), and PeerTube (an alternative to Youtube).
All these platforms use the standard Web technology “ActivityPub”, a publishing standard that allows all of these services and content creators to interconnect and interoperate, delivering messages and images and videos to each other.
This then forms the “Fediverse”, a federated universe of standards-based messaging. Just as an agency Web site can be viewed on any browser from any location by any constituent, agency messages published on the Fediverse can be found and followed by any user on any connected platform.
Benefits of Using Mastodon
Mastodon and other Fediverse platforms allow agencies to operate their own servers, giving them complete control over their content and moderation policies. This autonomy can be crucial for maintaining the integrity and appropriateness of government communications.
Deliverability is not subject to third-party rate limits or external content moderation. Examples of the National Weather Service and New York City’s Transit Agency encountering problems with X highlight the precarious nature of relying on a for-profit media corporation to deliver vital public messaging.
Mainstream social media platforms are often criticised for algorithms that can amplify sensational and unsavory content. The Fediverse’s general lack of such algorithms reduces the risk of misinformation and platform manipulation, providing a more straightforward and reliable channel for government alerts and services. The predominant model is a chronological feed of content, searchable by keyword and hashtag.
By not relying solely on mainstream social media platforms, agencies can avoid the potential pitfalls of corporate policies and biases, ensuring a more neutral and independent stance in their communications.
Lastly, the Fediverse is known for its inclusive community standards and customisable accessibility features. This inclusivity can help agencies reach and engage with a more diverse audience.
Disadvantages
One of the significant drawbacks of using Mastodon and the Fediverse is the relatively smaller user base (15 million members) compared to established platforms. This limited reach can hinder the effectiveness of communication efforts today. However, it is important to note that 2024 will likely see the onboarding of Meta’s Threads platform (160 million users) and Tumblr (210 million users). As more and more networks begin to interoperate with the Fediverse, more and more audiences will be able to find and follow an individual agency social media feed, across all those platforms.
The decentralised and varied nature of the Fediverse can be complex for users unfamiliar with its workings. Government agencies might face challenges in training staff and educating the public about using these platforms effectively. Running a Mastodon service requires technical expertise and resources. Government agencies would need to allocate funds and personnel for server maintenance, moderation, and support, which could be more demanding than using a mainstream platform. This can be countered by creating an account on an existing Fediverse service, or following the German and French models, where a central agency operates the service and onboards individual agencies and bureaus independently.
The Fediverse’s decentralised structure can lead to fragmentation, where users are spread across different communities with varying levels of interaction between them. This fragmentation can make it challenging to disseminate information broadly and uniformly. A staggered approach might mean creating an account on an existing, well-connected service, then bringing the social graph – the followers – to an agency-created service at a later date.
Pathways to Adoption
Similar to how agencies create accounts on commercial platforms today, agencies could create an account on an existing service provider, choosing from a general service like mastodon.social, a topic-focused provider such as sciences.social, or a regional service like masto.nyc. All these servers are interconnected, agencies do not need to create accounts on multiple providers. The agency profile would then be something like “@agencyname@mastodon.social” (the Fediverse uses two @ signs).
A quick way to set up a more prominent presence in the Fediverse is to make use of a managed service from a reputable provider like Masto Host or Toot.io and choose a domain name like agencyname.social. This service would be restricted to agency staff, meaning all messages coming from that service would be agency specific. In this example, the profile could be “@alerts@agency.social”.
The last and perhaps most challenging method is to operate a service directly, similar to the governments and agencies listed above. While use of a .gov domain can be a non-trivial request to approve, publishing from an official account on a government domain adds trustworthiness and verification of the message’s source. An address along the lines of social.agency.gov would need to be requisitioned from the relevant agency OCIO or in some cases, the Chief Data Officer. In this example, the ActivityPub profile would be “@alerts@social.agency.gov”.
Each of these options offer the same overall benefit. Just as podcasts are freely available on any and all podcast feed, as we transition to interoperable networks we’ll soon be hearing the call to “follow us wherever you get your social”.
No matter which pathway is chosen, your feed is freely findable and followable from any of the interconnected platforms.
Publishing Workflow
Numerous social media management platforms like Buffer and Fedica support cross-posting to Mastodon. This could be used to mirror content already being posted to agency accounts on X or similar feeds. Chances are the social media team can easily add a Mastodon channel to their existing workflow.
Onboarding and integration advice is freely available from IFTAS, a nonprofit trust and safety organisation focused on supporting a safe and civil Fediverse. Traditional public affairs services are available from agencies like Dewey Square Group and other PR and social media consultants.
In summary, the use of the Fediverse and Mastodon by government agencies offers a new paradigm in public sector communication, marked by increased security, autonomy, and inclusivity. However, it also brings challenges in terms of reach and complexity. As the digital landscape evolves, it is crucial for government agencies to stay informed and agile, adapting their communication strategies to serve the public effectively and responsibly. The decision to use platforms like Mastodon should be a considered one, aligned with the broader goals of transparency, engagement, and public service.
Agency staff that wish to advocate for using the Open Social Web to take better control of social media messaging can use the following high level talking points to begin the conversation.
ActivityPub is the accepted global Web standard for open social networking. It is published by the World Wide Web Consortium, the non-profit body that oversees Web standards.
The Fediverse is the real world collection of platforms, apps, and services that implement ActivityPub. They constitute a “federated universe” of interconnected social networks and can freely communicate with one another.
The Fediverse is considered to be the “next big thing” in social media. See The Verge, the EFF, Fortune, Mark Zuckerberg, and Matt Mullenweg. Usage has roughly tripled over the past year, and as larger platforms begin adopting we can expect a tenfold increase in adoption in 2024. So why should a public agency care?
Autonomy. Government agencies should not be reliant on advertising-driven media companies to broadcast vital public messaging. You wouldn’t let any of these companies restrict access to your public Web site. Why let them restrict who can or who should see your public messages?
Alignment. Support a person-centric, privacy-focused social network environment grounded in diversity and inclusivity. In many ways it is being built to counter the harms of for-profit social media.
I am by no means the only blogger to propose that this is a good way to avoid being locked-in or censored by commercial “Big Tech” or other interests. It turns out that George Peretz had posted something along the same lines as me only a few days earlier (How the Labour Government, and others, should respond to Musk); I was unaware of that post until I ran into it via Seize The Means Of Communication!
I am by no means the only blogger to propose that this is a good way to avoid being locked-in or censored by commercial “Big Tech” or other interests. It turns out that George Peretz had posted something along the same lines as me only a few days earlier (How the Labour Government, and others, should respond to Musk); I was unaware of that post until I ran into it via Seize The Means Of Communication!1 on the Lightly Seared blog much more recently.
Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz went on to cover my post on their For Immediate Release podcast, and in particular Neville asked for me to share more about what I know in relation to existing government or state owned-and-operated Mastodon instances. I’m happy to do so!
Für die vielen neuen Menschen hier gibt es nochmal ein paar aktualisierte Informationen von uns, die wir anheften können:
1. Eine Übersicht über alle Accounts unserer Instanz gibt es unter: social.bund.de/directory (Filtereinstellungen nicht vergessen) 2. Pixis gibt es kostenlos hier: bfdi.bund.de/DE/Service/Publik… 3. Merch verlosen wir immer mal wieder hier oder verteilen es auf Veranstaltungen.
I’m curious to learn of more of these, let me know in the comments if you are aware of others.
If you are interested in managed support for this kind of instance, the team at Mastodon gGmbH would be happy to hear from you to discuss how we can help.
A case for Brazil
Finally, I want to talk briefly (but, only because I must) about X.
We talked about the events of the end of last week, when Brazil’s courts chose to block access to X in that country, on episode 3.19 of the TechGrumps podcast that was recorded this weekend, and should be released any moment.
Along with Musk’s direct personal attacks on the UK Prime Minister and his efforts to spread dangerous misinformation, this is yet another example of Musk, specifically, demonstrating his untrustworthiness, and lack of willingness to be bound by the rule of law – national or international. According to the media, there has been a swift take-up of Bluesky by many Brazilian users; it is difficult to measure Mastodon or other Fediverse instance signups because there are many individual instances that comprise the network, but we know that there was a significant surge of interest at the end of last week.
A lot of people who are up in arms over Brazil banning Xitter aren’t acknowledging the fact that the country cast off a military dictatorship in 1985 and Elon’s openly allied with the neofascist who tried to restore it, with help from Elon Social, just two years ago. Pretty unique situation.
That judge may well have a beef with Musk because of his intransigence but the stakes are much higher than that.
Whichever directions users migrate, the important thing is that more people must leave X as a platform, and disempower Musk’s efforts to disrupt the law.
As I typed this blog entry, my friend Evan Prodromou posted
So, who is in the Free/Open Source software community in Brazil, advising the government on how to move to the Fediverse? And how can I help you?
I don’t speak Portuguese, but add my name and voice to this offer of support!
@evan I am somehow surprised that the actual Brazilian government still doesn't have an instance of some software compatible with activity pub.
Before leaving Brazil, I was part of a group engaged in open government data and civic hacking. I really hope these groups are still strong as they were a few years ago!
By the way, in 2011, I was advocating the City Council of São Paulo to have an identi.ca server, instead of Twitter. This didn't work, but at least I could open up some government data.
… a title which is delightfully reminiscent of Cory Doctorow’s book The Internet Con, subtitled How To Seize The Means Of Computation, which I think about a lot. And obviously, as an historian, I’m very aware of the original quotation from which both of these derive. ↩︎
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The desire to stand out has declined significantly over the last 20 years, according to a new study. That has serious implications for society, business, and communicators.
[T]here is an obvious thing that government could do now and that requires no legislation and costs no money: government could simply shift all the material it currently puts out on X to another platform or platforms
He goes on to mention both BlueSky and Mastodon as obvious contenders.
I certainly agree that governments — and any organisation that values its reputation, for that matter — should be moving away from X, but simply moving to another platform amounts to a sticking-plaster solution at best.
The problem with being on someone else’s platform is that you are giving that someone else control over which messages you see and which of your messages are seen. Indeed, the EU’s Digital Services Act recognises this by identifying Very Large Online Platforms, and imposing additional requirements on them around areas such as transparency and disinformation.
Federated technologies, such as Mastodon (andmanyothersexist) resolve the problem of ownership far more effectively by allowing you install and run your own instance. Many governments — and even the European Commission — already use these solutions, thus putting themselves in control of their own communication and ensuring that individuals can access these communications without putting themselves at the mercy of commercial priorities.
Obviously, there are both costs and challenges associated with running your own instance, but none of these are insurmountable and if organisations truly want to ensure that their communications remain free (as in speech) they really should be investing in the already existing infrastructure that allows them to do so.
Any organisation should be taking steps to protect the integrity of it’s communication. This is especially true in the case of governments, political parties and campaigners, for whom free and open discussions are essential.
Elon Musk's use of his X platform to promote murderous voices of hate is unacceptable. One way of fighting back would be to try to break the co-ordination problem that underpins X's power.
Over the past week, there’s been a noticeable shift away from X in the UK, and it feels long overdue. According to Bluesky’s PR, the platform has seen a surge in new users and activity from the UK. I’ve personally noticed more people finding my profiles on both Threads and on Bluesky, and I’ve seen a significant number of “I just deleted my X account” posts on Threads. However, due to the algorithm, these posts often appear in bursts, sometimes delayed by a day or two.
Over the past week, there’s been a noticeable shift away from X in the UK, and it feels long overdue. According to Bluesky’s PR, the platform has seen a surge in new users and activity from the UK. I’ve personally noticed more people finding my profiles on both Threads and on Bluesky, and I’ve seen a significant number of “I just deleted my X account” posts on Threads. However, due to the algorithm, these posts often appear in bursts, sometimes delayed by a day or two.
My friend Neville Hobson wrote a piece today titled “Finally, the Unravelling of X,” where he discusses this migration, the reasons behind it, and the pros and cons of choosing between Bluesky and Threads. Neville touches on the idea of a “more respectful, decentralized web,” (to quote him on the Fediverse), and even highlights something I said on Threads yesterday. In response to a question about where politicians should go in a post-X world, I suggested that governments should own their own social platforms: I wanted to expand on what I meant by a “sovereign owned/operated Mastodon instance” for the UK Parliament, and why I believe this is important.
One of the major tensions between Big Tech and national governments over the past 15 years has revolved around platform ownership and control. The European Union has even labeled several tech companies as “gatekeepers” in the Digital Markets Act. This term is telling—these companies essentially gatekeep the digital rights, data, and access of national citizens.
If governments are concerned about the dominance of privately-owned online platforms, they have a responsibility to run and own their own. At FOSDEM in Brussels this February, we noticed growing interest in Fediverse platforms and technologies like Mastodon from several national governments and the EU itself. Many of these institutions are already running their own social media instances and actively encouraging their politicians to use them. In the EU, there’s no reason to switch to Threads since Meta has restricted the platform’s availability in the bloc. Moreover, Threads doesn’t allow users to run their own instances, unlike Mastodon or even Bluesky, which, while less common, does technically support setting up a external ATProto instance (I don’t think that’s really happening though? happy to be informed and to learn otherwise – I’ll readily admit that it has not been at the centre of my attention).
For years, governments, newsrooms, and other organisations have protested the idea that private companies should control and limit their messages. A logical response would be for these entities to run their own instances of software like Mastodon—or any Fediverse-compatible, ActivityPub-based service. This would allow them to own their content, domain, and user verification, ensuring greater control and independence.
The UK is lagging behind in this area. While the EU has embraced Mastodon, and in the US, many organisations have moved to Threads, the UK has yet to take similar steps. For example, I follow @POTUS@threads.net and @whitehouse@threads.net from my Mastodon account, because they’ve enabled Fediverse sharing. Even though Threads is owned and operated by Meta, it’s positive that their content can reach into the wider Fediverse. Ideally, Threads will eventually fully integrate with the ActivityPub network, offering a two-way interaction and allowing for account, network, and maybe content portability—hence why I said, “in principle, with federated social accounts, the location does not matter so much, as long as they can be discovered and followed.” Owning the network and identity allows for broader discoverability and avoids corporate chokeholds.
Running digital services requires consistent investment and maintenance.
Discovery isn’t always straightforward, and organisations seek reach and measurement—areas where Fediverse platforms currently fall short.
Deciding who qualifies for an account on a sovereign platform is tricky. While it makes sense for current MPs to have official accounts on a national Fediverse server, it’s harder to justify the inclusion of political parties or other entities on the same platform. This is an area where we need to improve data and account portability as the Fediverse grows.
These are important discussions that we need to be having. Politicians and the media should advocate for greater decentralisation and digital sovereignty to protect the freedom of democratic institutions.
Update 16/08/2024 – my friend Stefan Bohacek reminded me that he put together a useful resource on this same topic several months ago, Fediverse: an overview for government agencies. Well worth sending to your representatives, or sharing with your network if asked.
Update 27/08/2024 – the conversation continues in episode #425 of the For Immediate Release podcast (discussion starts around 13 min into the show). I appreciate Neville and Shel talking about my post here. Take a listen, if you want to hear how they expanded on and debated this idea – available wherever you get your podcasts.
Update 09/09/2024 – I wrote a second piece expanding on this and listing existing governments that are already in the Fediverse.
Update 13/09/2024 – I was reminded of this piece from IFTAS, Open Social for the Common Good, that is also excellent on this topic.
Finally – if you’re leaving X – congratulations – don’t look back.
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The desire to stand out has declined significantly over the last 20 years, according to a new study. That has serious implications for society, business, and communicators.
As X faces increasing challenges & pressures, users are turning to alternatives like Bluesky & Threads. My latest article explores this shift & the potential of federation and identity portability to reshape online interactions.
The question isn't just about where users are going — it's about how these new spaces will redefine our online interactions for the better. Here's my take on a more respectful and decentralized web ⬇️
As a result of X's failure to address hate and disinformation, users are seeking out alternative platforms that prioritise civility, trustworthiness and accuracy, X may find itself increasingly isolated and irrelevant.
