It’s Not 2006 Anymore; The Useful, Vernacular Institution; What Is Free Our Feeds, Anyway?

Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, and Enduring Polarization

The social media ecosystem appears to be in flux. Twitter’s rebranding to X has come to symbolize a broader reorganization of online publics – political reshuffling, user attrition, and uncertainty over the role of legacy platforms. Simultaneously, the shift from text-based, networked feeds toward algorithmically curated, short-form video has accelerated, with TikTok setting the pace for the wider ecosystem [18, 14, 16]. At the same time, everyday communication increasingly migrates from large, open networks to semi-private spaces such as group chats and messaging apps. Commentators describe a digital public sphere in transition: smaller, more fragmented, less dominated by traditional social networking sites, and rise of more broadcast-oriented forms of media – with some even suggesting that we are seeing the beginning of the end of the social media era.

The Astrosky Ecosystem: An independent online platform for science communication and social networking

While almost everything that astronomers study occurs in the vacuum of space, astronomy itself does not `happen in a vacuum'. Interactions between scientists, as well as outreach to members of the public, improve extensively from access to good communication tools. Social media has become a key tool for communication in astronomy, being widely used by individuals and organizations alike for networking, outreach, and more. However, traditional social media is reliant on benevolent corporations providing a free service without compromising on quality, and the recent takeover and decline of Twitter has shown how vulnerable these platforms can be. In this proceeding, we present The Astrosky Ecosystem, which is an initiative to develop open-source tools and integrations for social media, principally the Bluesky social network. We explain how our project enables the astronomy community to operate its own social media infrastructure, independent of for-profit corporations. We also discuss some of the project's technical aspects, including its use of the AT Protocol for social networking, before concluding with ideas for the future.

Improving social media for democratic discourse

Social media have expanded opportunities for communication and political participation, but today's dominant platforms are optimized primarily for engagement and advertising revenue, contributing...

ATmosphere technology to support organizing and activism

I’m working on a post about anti-surveillance organizing and activism on decentralized social networks, and one of the points I’m going to make is that the ATmosphere offers a lot of Innovative and very useful functionality for organizers that doesn’t exist on centralized social networks today, and complements decentralized implementations of classic social network activism tools like blogs, newsletters, microblogging, live-streaming, etc. Here’s some of the examples I have so far … custom f...

ATmosphere technology to support organizing and activism

I’m working on a post about anti-surveillance organizing and activism on decentralized social networks, and one of the points I’m going to make is that the ATmosphere offers a lot of Innovative and very useful functionality for organizers that doesn’t exist on centralized social networks today, and complements decentralized implementations of classic social network activism tools like blogs, newsletters, microblogging, live-streaming, etc. Here’s some of the examples I have so far … custom f...

Social Media Is Now Parasocial Media

When practitioners used the term “social media” to describe the internet tools that emerged in the mid-aughts, they were giving a name to the kinds of platforms and protocols that allowed people to socialize with friends and communities of interest by using digital technologies. Twenty years later, users of social media are far more likely to scroll than post – and the content that they consume is often strategically produced and algorithmically curated. In this essay, I argue that the very essence of social media has changed. To more effectively interrogate what we are witnessing, we need to stop presuming that these tools are “social media” and begin recognizing that they are now “parasocial media.” Doing so raises new questions about digitally mediated sociality, not to mention the politics and governance of these platforms.

FediForum | Growing the Open Social Web:<br>An Online Un-Workshop

Since the Twitter takeover by Elon Musk over three years ago, the Open Social Web has been adopted by an enthusiastic community. People world-wide are building and using open social platforms and open social protocols to better interact with others online.

Seeing the Politics of Decentralized Social Media Protocols

Calls to decentralize feed-based social media have been driven by concerns about the concentrated power of centralized platforms and their societal impact. In response, numerous decentralized social media protocols have emerged, each interpreting “decentralization” in a different way. We analyze four such protocols (ActivityPub, AT Protocol, Nostr, and Farcaster) drawing on protocol documentation, media coverage, direct usage, and semi-structured interviews with protocol developers and experts to situate each protocol within its socio-technical goals. To support this analysis, we develop a grounded lexicon that facilitates the description and comparison of analogous components across each protocol. With it, we show how each protocol distributes control over key components differently, shaping who holds power over critical aspects such as user identity, curation, and infrastructural ownership. By examining protocols as socio-technical artifacts, we show how they prioritize different values and make distinct trade-offs, providing CSCW researchers with a lens to more effectively evaluate and design future decentralized social media systems.

Traditional Social Media as a Prison - What’s Happening on My Feed?

Social media apps have become a vehicle for community building, world news, and political campaigns. As app owners have enmeshed themselves more with the state, the carceral logics that haunt marginalized communities offline, became a part of their digital realities online.

FediForum | Growing the Open Social Web un-workshop, 2026/03/02

Traditional Social Media as a Prison · What’s Happening on My Feed?

Social media apps have become a vehicle for community building, world news, and political campaigns. As app owners have enmeshed themselves more with the state, the carceral logics that haunt marginalized communities offline, became a part of their digital realities online.

Leaflet — social publishing on the Atmosphere

A simple and powerful platform for social publishing — blogs, newsletters, and more!

Leaflet — social publishing on the Atmosphere

A simple and powerful platform for social publishing — blogs, newsletters, and more!

Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020-2024: Decline,...

Using nationally representative data from the 2020 and 2024 American National Election Studies (ANES), this paper traces how the U.S. social media landscape has shifted across platforms,...