I gave a very rambling and unstructured session on the indieweb at Halima’s open house event. Here’s some notes for those that wanted more details!

tl;dr

  • do what you do on social media, but own it on your own site
  • this great indieweb comic gives a nice intro!

what?

  • my indieweb site is… this site
  • it’s a collection of my notes (microblogs), bookmarks, photos, listens, reads, etc
    • i.e. the kind of things you’d do on various social media websites
    • i have one main feed, and feeds of different types (e.g. tracks I like)
  • i post to it with various different clients
  • i read and interact with (e.g. like, repost) what other people are writing

why?

  • own your identity
  • own your data
  • decentralize
    • avoid big centralized silos
    • they control your data, and they control what you see
    • and they have a habit of abruptly vanishing, along with all your content

how?

  • client-to-server publishing with micropub
    • implement a micropub API endpoint on your site
    • any client that implements this protocol can publish to your site via the endpoint
    • authentication to publish is via indieauth
  • server-to-server communication with webmention
    • send webmentions to let someone know you’ve mentioned them
    • receive webmentions to know someone has mentioned you
      • display the mention on your own site
  • staying in touch with existing friends/sites
    • POSSE – Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere
    • PESOS – Publish Elsewhere, Syndicate to your Own Site
    • brid.gy for posting to and getting interactions back from the silos
  • content is marked up with microformats
  • my site is WordPress with lots of plugins, but you can use any technology you like to build it
    • and things like micro.blog exist for those who don’t want to build something themselves

who?

  • Chat – 24/7 online chat across timezones, by web, Slack, Matrix, or IRC
  • Homebrew Website Clubs – regular meetups in person
  • HWC London
  • Indie Web Camps and Indie Web Summits – bigger meetups where people travel to places around the world

my indieweb site and decentralization

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

To respond on your own website, enter the URL of your response which should contain a link to this post's permalink URL. Your response will then appear (possibly after moderation) on this page. Want to update or remove your response? Update or delete your post and re-enter your post's URL again. (Find out more about Webmentions.)