WAFRN, the Federated Tumblr Alternative

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WAFRN, it sounds like waffles, but it's not, or is it? I'm not sure. I don't know what it stands for! But I'm not here to talk possible acronyms, or words I'm unfamiliar with. I just wanted to write about this Tumblr alternative that is ... uh, actually pretty cool?

Of course, we all know that Cohost jumped out of nowhere and started sucking up the people who missed both Geocities and Tumblr at the same time. I know, I speak as though Tumblr is currently gone, and for all intents and purposes, it may as well be.

Left is nothing but a hollow shell of its former glory. Banning any and all not safe for work material, which, if you've been on the internet for more than three days, you know is the lifeblood of the internet. And then, more recently, the CEO came under fire for losing his shit over a joke a trans woman posted about his car exploding in knives, or something?

I don't know, but he went on some kind of transphobic rant, and now Tumblr is dead-dead. Like, not cool at all.

So there was and currently is Cohost, but they're in this constant state of, "We might not have the money to exist for another week." And I don't know about anyone else, but I hate anxiety. I don't like the idea of putting my words, thoughts, and possibly creations into a server that might up and fart and explode in thirty seconds.

Enter: Wafrn.

Wafrn is basically the same as Cohost. It's setup just like Tumblr, except, like many things connected to ActivityPub (read about my instance while you're here), it's open source, and you can host your own copy of it, and also you can put the Pool Rooms as your profile background.

Log on, post some stuff, and join in on ruining the internet. And, if you like what you see, you can also support the project and put a little bit of your coin toward a better internet.

Posts work the same way they do on Tumblr/Cohost. You write a post, insert tags at the bottom, input media if you want, and then post! The way it works, is through the viewport while on Wafrn, it'll look like a more basic Tumblr, and then on the Mastodon side of things, posts just look like Mastodon posts. So, you can be like me, and have multiple fediverse identities, or an identity crisis! Whichever you prefer!

The community seems cool, and pretty tight-knit at the moment. But hey, that's ActivityPub for you (at the moment, since more corporate sides of the internet haven't yet opened the floodgates).

But why would you want multiple fediverse accounts across different servers?

It's simple. Why would you want an account on Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and Tiktok (circa 2020)? Because they all serve a different purpose, much like the way Mastodon, Pixelfed, Peertube, Lemmy, and Wafrn serve several different purposes.

The good thing about them all being connected together, is it saves you having to share whatever you're working on, over and over again, to multiple different profiles. Because it's already there.

And you can set up accounts to be serious, to shitpost, to screw around and be unhinged and weird. Whatever! Maybe you want to have another account on some other Mastodon instance where you pretend you're a paper delivery boy who just discovered the internet. That's kinda weird, but you do you, I guess.

The point is, I kind of let the point get away from me by over-explaining why it's fine to have numerous fediverse/activitypub connected accounts. But!

Yeah, you should check out Wafrn and join us. Bring your Supernatural fandoms.