I have an account on a mastodon instance and I read that I could access the threadiverse from there, but I didn’t find any way to do it that works. What is the relationship between these things?

  • ImplyingImplications
    221·
    1 year ago

    Mastodon is free open source software that allows anyone to run a social media website similar to Twitter. The site can federate (share content and interactions) with other sites via the ActivityPub protocol.

    Lemmy is free open source software that allows anyone to run a content aggregator website similar to Reddit. The site can federate (share content and interactions) with other sites via the ActivityPub protocol.

    The ActivityPub protocol is like the protocol that runs email (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, SMTP). Any servers using SMTP can exchange email with any other server also using SMTP. However, the ActivityPub protocol is pretty complex, and software using it can implement it in different ways. Mastodon, Lemmy, and other software using ActivityPub don’t always interact with each other seamlessly.

    One day there may be an overarching “fediverse” app that allows users to navigate through all popular software using ActivityPub, but right now you’re best to create a different account for each software.