As of 8th September 2025, it seems the main provider of groups on the Fediverse, Gup.pe, has been forced to close because they were running entirely on a single server with a single domain name. The domain name was unexpectedly taken from them due to a strange clause in the .pe domain which allows anyone to buy it 12 days before it expires.
Ahh brilliant… so some arsehole has decided to jump on gup.pe and buy it before it could be re-registered… consequently we've lost a.gup.pe, including the very informative auscovid group which covered #COVID19 information.
No idea where or if an alternate group will be set up. In the interim, I suggest people follow some accounts from that list directly.
Okay, some really bad news but also a suggestion for a way forward.
The Guppe groups domain name was sold by their registrar before they could renew it. This means all Guppe groups are broken, and their web addresses point to a spam blog 😞
However, there is another group provider called FediGroups, you can find out more on their site:
@FediTips The warning about the "legal" steeling of the #guppe domain is also very important for all people who gave regular donations to the site! I'm sure they don't want to throw money at this guy.
The last bit of usable Facebook got enshitified... They are now putting AI bots into neighborhood groups, trying to drum up engagement.
A great function for the Fediverse would be to have groups or neighborhood forums. You kind of can create that with hashtags, but it misses the moderation function. #mastodon#fediverse#groups
@FediTips If I reply to a post from someone who has restricted who can follow them, then who can see my reply?
Is it safe to say that if I create an account somewhere with follow requests restriction turned on and boost all @ mentions I get, then this account will act as a kind of private group on Mastodon?
About groups, is there still any work going on to implement native groups in Mastodon?
@MastodonEngineering#mastodev#activitypub#groups
You can interact with both of them from Mastodon etc. They're not exactly like FB Groups, but are definitely worth trying to see if they fit your needs.
One thing everyone should realize when they go on to those places is that these are not centrally managed by a corporation which also means that these cost money to run
That means that you will have to fork money for it you won't get it for quote unquote free or you pay for it with your data with your usage patterns
Hubzilla is really intriguing. What I have in mind is having an independent web-being, without dependence on an instance to host your data, but with the ability to connect with others.
A main use case I think of is the ability to join multiple closed separate communities with your own identity, like closed/secret groups in Facebook, which are a feature I really miss in Mastodon.
I don't agree, this actually a good opportunity for #pixelfed to support #groups so people who want their post to reach a larger audience can choose a magazine/community to post.
A good way to discover interesting accounts is to follow hashtags. When you follow a hashtag, posts with that tag will start appearing in your timeline even if you don't follow the post's author.
To follow a hashtag:
Search for a hashtag
Click on the specific hashtag you want from the suggestions
Click "Follow" button at the top
To manage your followed tags, go to your own profile page, click ⋯ and then "Followed hashtags".
When using #groups on #fediverse is there a way to address the followers of the group ONLY? That means, you toot something and no one else except followers of the group can see it or discover it. Is that possible?
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Decentralized Instagram alternative Pixelfed launches mobile apps ( techcrunch.com )