Many computer users use a modified version of the ActivityPub social network every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of ActivityPub which is widely used today is often called "Mastodon", and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the ActivityPub social network, developed by the W3C.
There really is a Mastodon, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the social network they use. Mastodon is the frontend: the program in the system that lets you interacts with the posts of all the people you follow. The frontend is an essential part of a social network, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete social network. Mastodon is normally used in combination with the ActivityPub social network: the whole system is basically ActivityPub with Mastodon added, or ActivityPub/Mastodon. All the so-called "Mastodon" distributions are really distributions of ActivityPub/Mastodon.
@mewmew "Mastodon is the frontend: the program in the system that lets you interacts with the posts of all the people you follow. The frontend is an essential part of a social network, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete social network."
I don't believe that's right. As I understand it, "Mastodon" does not refer solely to a frontend but to a codebase with multiple parts including both a frontend and a backend. And even that distinction is sketchy.
@mewmew Mastodon is not useless by itself. A Mastodon instance can function without a wider social network.
@rah @mewmew Sure, a mastodon instance can work as a standalone instance that does not federate.
And while that may serve some use cases. For there is no fun in that.
For me, what made me laugh with this post is that it a good "funny comment" to users that confuse the "Fediverse" with Mastodon, when the fediverse is more diverse than that: https://fediverse.party/
And the fediverse is not even ActivityPub alone, there is osatus and zot, and more
