This post is written on https://normals.me/ and delivered to !fediverse@lemmy.world over #ActivityPub, so if you are reading it the basic plumbing works. Now let me explain what is this.
Normals is a forum with communities, threads, and questions with an accepted answer. It is a single instance, not software you can host, and the core is closed for anti-abuse reasons. The federation module will be published separately with implementation notes (FEP-67ff).
What federates today Every community is a Group actor following the Lemmy model (FEP-1b12). Follow @selfhosted@normals.me or any other community from Lemmy, PieFed, Mbin or Mastodon.
Posts and comments go both ways. Replies from your instance appear in the thread on Normals, replies from Normals go back to the origin.
Remote content is labelled with its origin, links back to it, and is never copied. Media loads from the source.
Signed fetches, so it works with instances that require authorized fetch. NodeInfo 2.1 is up.
Policies, in case they matter to you, it has no ads, and no paid reach, and of course no AI training on posts. AI crawlers blocked by default, public mod log with reasons, and no automated removals. Numbers at https://normals.me/transparency so please take a look.
If something from your instance shows up wrong here, or something from here shows up wrong on yours, reply with the URL and I’ll fix it. Andy Piper mentioned NodeBB uses the same group model, if anyone runs a NodeBB instance I’d like to test against it, if possible.
I hope we all have fun. Cheers!


Tailwind it’s a utility first framework with no pre built components, I think you are the one that does not know what are you saying, you build whatever you want and can fully customize the theme that’s literally the point of it, and it’s in the official docs.
On the AI and closed source speculation, the auth, signatures, permissions, input handling is standard and went through an OWASP review before launch I said it before. I said I used AI for unit tests, integration tests, performance work, and even to attack my own app. I did not say I let it write the product. After 15+ years writing software, most of us already know AI still ignores SOLID, duplicates existing functions, and introduces security issues if you hand it the whole job. But you’re free to dislike the design or the decision to keep the anti-abuse parts private. The transparency page is public if you want the actual policies and review status instead of the theory.
Again, if you don’t like the UI or think this is all robots, you can always join X, Reddit, or any other platform that steals your data and helps big corporations, or you can develop your own and invite me, but for that you need to be developer first. I thought people were different in the Fediverse.
People have high standards on the fediverse, sorry your project is not getting the positive reaction you wanted.