I want to join the Fediverse. I don’t have a computer or anything to make something like a Lemmy instance, and I found that NodeBB will easily allow you to make a forum quickly, but I have to pay to do so. Should I just pay when I can or is there a free way to make a federated instance on a software?

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[–] CraigCabbage@sh.itjust.works 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (10 children)

Nah, but I could ask my Dad. He did last time i checked

[–] mat@zelk.space 5 points 6 months ago (9 children)

@CraigCabbage if you have maybe a 10years old computer you can install Linux through the bios to run mastodon or any fediverse software. you can also pick a sub domain name to have a free domain name. once you got both, you may need an extra storage but basically you will be able to own an instance for free

[–] CraigCabbage@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 months ago (8 children)

Thank you!! Dad has one but you can't access the web with it.

[–] mat@zelk.space 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

@CraigCabbage why can’t you? no wifi and no ethernet? how old the computer is ?

[–] CraigCabbage@sh.itjust.works 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

IDK, Dad and Grandpa say the computer is too old to access it and he thinks me buying an ethernet cable is useless 😭 The computer is probably 10-13 years old, I’m not sure

[–] mat@zelk.space 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

@CraigCabbage should be compatible with internet, or if you want you can also buy some old stuff through eBay, its also cheap

[–] CraigCabbage@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 months ago

Thanks so much!!

[–] CraigCabbage@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 months ago (3 children)

Is there any way to federate a ProBoards forum? I made one once and someone said I should federate it

[–] mat@zelk.space 2 points 6 months ago

@CraigCabbage maybe I don’t know proboards, but you can’t federate it with activitypub

[–] sevon@lemmy.kde.social 2 points 6 months ago

If you go with something that isn't lemmy/piefed/mbin, you should look into compatibility and project activity very carefully.

[–] abeorch@friendica.ginestes.es 1 points 3 weeks ago

@CraigCabbage @mat I had a look at this - - If this is ProBoards - proboards.com/free-forum-featu… - It looks that its a closed service - hosted by that company and either free (Where the audience is is the product sold to Google Advertising) or where someone can pay to host a forum (and remove the ads) - I couldn't see any federation capabilities

Maybe it would make sense for them to have a Discourse type plugin that allows you to follow posts from the forums in ActivityPub to attract visitors but I guess they are too small to be able to devote their own resources to developing this capability.

From my perspective, If I was going to run a forum - I'd avoid this type of service since you are basically locked in and no doubt at some point it will get enshitiified. I'd either get a Lemmy server, use an lemmy server and create a community on that (so you are properly part of the Fediverse) or run a Discourse Forum (With ActivityPub plugin ) - where you at least own the domain and can move / migrate it if ever want/need to.

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