Terminology
During your journey through the Fediverse you may come across words or phrases which are not familiar to you. Here's a non-exhaustive list to help you on the journey.
Word/Phrase | Definition |
---|---|
– A – | |
ActivityPub | The most commonly adopted protocol (language) used by servers in the fediverse to communicate with each other. |
Algorithm | In the context of social media, a set of rules a computer program applies to decide what content to show you |
Alt text | Short for Alternative Text, this is a description of an image on a post to assist screen readers describe images to visually impaired users |
– B – | |
Boost | Share a post with people who follow you |
– D – | |
Defederate | Prevent a user or an entire server from communicating with another server |
– F – | |
Fediverse | The collection of servers, all linked via the internet |
– I – | |
Instance | An alternative named for a Server – a physical device on the internet, running software for the Fediverse |
– L – | |
Like | Indicate to the author of the content that you appreciated it |
– M – | |
Moderation | The process of ensuring a user complies with the rules and guidelines of a server |
– N – | |
Notes | A post – usually consisting of text and images. The term Notes is originally from Misskey and is used by software derived from it, including Sharkey |
– S – | |
Share | Share the post with everyone who follows you |
– T – | |
Toot | A post – typically made up of text and images. The term Toot was coined by Mastodon, but has since been replaced with the generic Post term |