Ghost, the open-source alternative to Substack's newsletter platform, is deciding whether it will become the latest app in the fediverse-the social network of interconnected servers that includes apps like Mastodon, Pixelfed, PeerTube, Flipboard and, more recently, Instagram Threads among others. According to a post from Ghost founder John O'Nolan, the company, structured as a nonprofit, is considering federating Ghost over ActivityPub, the social networking protocol that powers the fediverse.

O'Nolan said the most commonly requested feature over the past few years has been federating his software. "Looks like there are a lot of ways to do it. Curious how you would want it to work?" he asked in a post on Threads, syndicated to Mastodon via the latter's integration with ActivityPub.

It also asks users whether they have used any ActivityPub platforms like Mastodon or Threads, and how they would expect the functionality of ActivityPub in Ghost to work if it were to be added. It also asks how federation might personally benefit Ghost users. And, of course, it invites participants to optionally give an email address in case they want to be contacted for more input in the future, as well.

While the launch of a survey isn't necessarily a commitment to federating Ghost, it is another signal pointing to the broader reshaping of the web that's now underway.

Users of Twitter, now owned by the billionaire Elon Musk, have firsthand knowledge of what it means to put your trust in central platforms: With the sale, Twitter became a new kind of platform, X, under new ethics and longer-term priorities. (Musk plans X as an "everything" app for transaction, creator content, video, shopping, and more and takes a less hands-on role in content moderation.)

For those who don't like the direction Musk has taken, a portable social networking identity suddenly seems like an idea that's worth more. That is, if you don't like the way your Mastodon server (or other federated service) is run, you can pick up your profile and move it elsewhere, followers in tow.

With Ghost, though, the concept could be to federate the writers who use Ghost to write their content. Those posts, published to the web and to email subscribers to a newsletter, could also live in the fediverse, where others may read, like, and comment on the post from a preferred app. Those replies could also syndicate back to Ghost, where they will live as comments.

If Ghost had done this, then it would be an example in itself, much like WordPress's federation with ActivityPub once that service obtained an ActivityPub blog plug-in. Once activated, WordPress blogs can be followed from people on apps such as Mastodon and others on the fediverse and those replies can then come in as comments on their own sites.

Mastodon CTO Renaud Chaput contacted O'Nolan after seeing his post to help him get ActivityPub integrated, something O'Nolan would definitely have appreciated.

Ghost has gained attention in recent months as one of the chief rivals to Substack for reasons that have seen some people flee X: People can't agree on how platforms should be moderated. Substack has taken to the galloping free speech, as Musk does on X, but that's also led to the platform being used by pro-Nazi publications, as detailed by The Atlantic late last year.

And as a result, one of its more prominent writers, Casey Newton, formerly of The Verge, left Substack for Ghost.

"I'm not aware of any major U.S. consumer internet platform that does not explicitly ban praise for Nazi hate speech, much less one that welcomes them to set up shop and start selling subscriptions," Newton wrote at the time.

In addition to Newton, other known destinations among Ghost users include 404 Media, Buffer, Kickstarter, David Sirota's The Lever and Tangle, among many others.

It's installed over 3 million times today, which would represent a healthy addition to the wider fediverse and its roughly 13+ million total users, around 1.5 million of whom are active monthly. (This figure doesn't include Threads' 130+ million monthly active users as it's not yet fully integrated with ActivityPub.)