I’ve noticed that most online spaces for witches and covens—like:
Mandragora Magika,
JaguarMoon Cyber Coven,
Inked Spirit Coven,
Missing Witches,
Lunar & Wild Coven,
Witchcraft Academy Coven (Patreon),
Reddit r/Wicca
Wiccan Whispers,
Various Discord/Facebook groups,
etc.
—are centralized or rely on closed platforms.
Even the more “community” oriented ones, such as WitchBook or PaganSquare, are siloed and not interoperable with each other.
Given the rise of the Fediverse and its ability to host decentralized, community-driven platforms (Mastodon for microblogging, Pleroma for lightweight social feeds, PixelFed for image sharing, Lemmy for Reddit, PeerTube for video, etc.), has anyone ever thought about potentially attempting a federated network specifically for witches, covens, and pagan practitioners?
Some possible use cases:
Federated coven “instances” where each group can moderate its own space but still connect with others
Resource sharing (spells, rituals, book clubs, event calendars) via ActivityPub
Privacy and inclusion features for marginalized practitioners
Integration with platforms like PixelFed for sharing altar photos, PeerTube for ritual videos, and Mastodon/Pleroma for discussions and announcements
Does anyone know of any ongoing projects like this, or have thoughts on how such a network could be structured?
What challenges do you foresee (moderation, privacy, drama, etc.), and what features would be most valuable to the witch/pagan community?
I’d love to try building or contributing to something like this, but unfortunately I lack the ability and energy.
Still, I think the idea is worth discussing.
It's rather the opposite: the federated models allows to choose which instances you want to connect with.
On centralized models, you can't escape, you are trapped with everyone else, Twitter being a good example.
No they allow admins to decide that. Users have no control. User activity is fully public and cannot be controlled for safety.
Instances usually vote for defederation https://sh.itjust.works/post/11308397