Mastodon

Decentralized Application

A federated, open-source microblogging platform built on ActivityPub enabling users to post text, images, video and links across a global network of independently operated instances. Users on any instance can follow and interact with users on any other ActivityPub-compatible server in the fediverse. Each instance sets its own moderation policies; no central authority controls the network. Founded as an alternative to Twitter with a strong emphasis on user control, data ownership, and community-driven moderation.

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Detalhes

Licença Libre (AGPLv3); https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon
Status de Dev 🟢 Ativo
Detalhe do Status de Dev Released (v4.5 released November 2025; active development; 10M+ registered users; ~1M monthly active users)
Proprietário Mastodon gGmbH (German nonprofit, founded by Eugen Rochko); transitioning to new nonprofit foundation structure with board governance including Biz Stone, Karien Bezuidenhout, Esra'a Al Shafei; Felix Hlatky as Executive Director as of November 2025
País Germany (Berlin)
Ano de Início 2016
Stack Ruby on Rails + Node.js (backend); React.js + Redux (web frontend)
Financiamento Personal investment + Donations + Paid services (Patreon originally; donations; Jeff Atwood family €2.2M; Biz Stone; AltStore €260K; Craig Newmark; NLnet grants; paid hosting/support revenue model launched September 2025)
Última Investigação 1 de jul. de 2026

Domínios de Caso de Uso

Co-Creation & Knowledge

Decentralized Application Atributos

Origins Social Network (created by Eugen Rochko as a decentralized, user-controlled alternative to Twitter; motivated by dissatisfaction with centralized commercial social media)
Database PostgreSQL (primary data store); Redis (job processing and caching)
Query Language N/A (no user-facing query language; REST and Streaming APIs for developers)
Data Formats ActivityStreams 2.0 / ActivityPub (JSON-LD); JSON (REST API responses); HTML (rendered posts)
Collaborative Live Editing N/A (asynchronous microblogging; no collaborative editing)
Rich Text Editing Basic text only (posts support formatting via HTML subset; no rich collaborative editing)
Mobile Support Mobile support (official iOS and Android apps; many third-party clients)
Web Support Yes (full web interface at mastodon.social and any instance)
Native Apps Native apps (official iOS and Android; many third-party native clients including Ivory, Tusky, Metatext)
Terms Free SaaS (hosted instances free to join; self-hosting free; Mastodon gGmbH now offers paid managed hosting and support services for organizations)
Funds €2.2M+ from Atwood family; €260K from AltStore; €65K from Global Chinese Community of Universal Digital Commons; €1M one-time payment to Rochko on departure; additional undisclosed donations
Based On ActivityPub (Fed Pro — Mastodon implements ActivityPub as its federation protocol)
Use Case Category Social Network / Media Publishing
User Interface Type Timeline/Feed (chronological home timeline; local and federated timelines; profile pages; notification panel; media gallery)
Offline Capabilities Partial offline (read-only browsing possible offline in some clients; posting requires connection)
Collaboration Features Moderation tools (instance-level and user-level blocking/muting/filtering; content warnings; quote posts with consent controls introduced v4.5); real-time notifications; mentions and replies
Data Portability Full export (account data export including posts, follows, lists, bookmarks in ActivityPub-compatible format; account migration to other instances via Move Account feature preserving followers)
Integration Ecosystem Fediverse (interoperates with all ActivityPub-compatible software: Pixelfed, PeerTube, Misskey, Lemmy, Threads, WordPress, Ghost, Drupal); third-party client ecosystem (Ivory, Tusky, and many others); REST and Streaming APIs; well-documented developer API
Web2 Data Export No (no import from Twitter/X or other centralized platforms; account migration within fediverse only)
Prosocial Coherence High (community-driven moderation; instance-level governance; no algorithmic feed by default; chronological timeline; content warnings as norm; Mastodon Server Covenant for instance operators; no advertising; nonprofit ownership; quote posts designed with consent controls)
Economic Flows None (no cryptocurrency, micropayments, or economic flow features; revenue model is donations and hosted services for organizations)
Governance & Decision Making Foundation-governed (transitioning to nonprofit foundation with board of directors; community governance being implemented 2025; instance operators independently govern their own communities; Mastodon Server Covenant sets baseline standards)
Media / Publishing Yes (images, video, audio attachments; media galleries; alt text for accessibility)
Knowledge Management No
Sensemaking No
Project Management No
Communication Model Asynchronous (Twitter/microblog-style store-and-forward; posts delivered via ActivityPub to followers across instances; real-time timeline updates via streaming API)
Network Resilience High (federated architecture: no single point of failure; instances operate independently; network continues if individual instances go offline; instance operators responsible for their own uptime)
Discovery Mechanism Instance directory (joinmastodon.org instance picker); social graph (follow recommendations; federated timeline discovery); hashtag search across fediverse; new users defaulted to mastodon.social
Max Participants Broadcast (1,000+; individual posts can reach entire fediverse; no architectural participant limit per post)
Data Sovereignty Moderate (data stored on chosen instance server, not locally; account migration preserves followers but posts not automatically migrated; instance operator has access to user data; self-hosting gives full control)