When a post is made, its sent a group’s inbox, and then the group sends it to the inbox of every user subscribed to it. If I send you a direct message, my server sends it to your inbox.
If you go to a post in your browser, it shows it in the web interface, but if you set whats called a header (some small bits on information sent to a server when you request a page) saying that you’re a server, it gives you a machine readable representation of it.
For example, your comment here looks like this:
{"@context":["https://join-lemmy.org/context.json","https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams"],"type":"Note","id":"https://lemmy.world/comment/17178560","attributedTo":"https://lemmy.world/u/Docker","to":["https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#Public"],"cc":["https://lemmy.world/c/nostupidquestions","https://startrek.website/u/FriendOfDeSoto"],"content":"<p>In this regard, can a singular website function like a unique instance of the fediverse ?</p>\n","inReplyTo":"https://startrek.website/comment/16837450","mediaType":"text/html","source":{"content":"In this regard, can a singular website function like a unique instance of the fediverse ?","mediaType":"text/markdown"},"published":"2025-05-21T09:55:42.214962Z","tag":[{"href":"https://startrek.website/u/FriendOfDeSoto","name":"@[email protected]","type":"Mention"}],"distinguished":false,"audience":"https://lemmy.world/c/nostupidquestions","attachment":[]}
So, you could make a post or page of a website like one of these, and then manually send it to everyone’s inbox, but you won’t be able to handle incoming messages.
Instances are websites. Federation just means that they can automatically communicate directly between multiple intakes, and share information without requiring user interaction.
All this happens via APIs. Any website that implements ActivityPub APIs properly can federate with other sites as part of the fediverse.
In this regard, can a singular website function like a unique instance of the fediverse ?
To explain federation (I am terrible at explaining things),
Every user/group on an instance has an inbox and an outbox, for example, yours is https://lemmy.world/u/[email protected]/inbox and [email protected]’s is https://lemmy.world/c/nostupidquestions/inbox .
When a post is made, its sent a group’s inbox, and then the group sends it to the inbox of every user subscribed to it. If I send you a direct message, my server sends it to your inbox.
If you go to a post in your browser, it shows it in the web interface, but if you set whats called a header (some small bits on information sent to a server when you request a page) saying that you’re a server, it gives you a machine readable representation of it.
For example, your comment here looks like this:
{ "@context": [ "https://join-lemmy.org/context.json", "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams" ], "type": "Note", "id": "https://lemmy.world/comment/17178560", "attributedTo": "https://lemmy.world/u/Docker", "to": [ "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#Public" ], "cc": [ "https://lemmy.world/c/nostupidquestions", "https://startrek.website/u/FriendOfDeSoto" ], "content": "<p>In this regard, can a singular website function like a unique instance of the fediverse ?</p>\n", "inReplyTo": "https://startrek.website/comment/16837450", "mediaType": "text/html", "source": { "content": "In this regard, can a singular website function like a unique instance of the fediverse ?", "mediaType": "text/markdown" }, "published": "2025-05-21T09:55:42.214962Z", "tag": [ { "href": "https://startrek.website/u/FriendOfDeSoto", "name": "@[email protected]", "type": "Mention" } ], "distinguished": false, "audience": "https://lemmy.world/c/nostupidquestions", "attachment": [] }So, you could make a post or page of a website like one of these, and then manually send it to everyone’s inbox, but you won’t be able to handle incoming messages.
Instances are websites. Federation just means that they can automatically communicate directly between multiple intakes, and share information without requiring user interaction.
All this happens via APIs. Any website that implements ActivityPub APIs properly can federate with other sites as part of the fediverse.
Yes, WordPress and Ghost websites are able to share their posts via ActivityPub, so people can follow them through Mastodon-like Fedi apps.