Independent platforms are small, user-funded social sites run by individuals or tiny teams rather than venture-backed companies. They are the alternatives that exist after deleting corporate social media: no advertising model, no algorithmic feed, usually genAI-free by policy. The honest caveat: small platforms can be short-lived and lightly moderated, so they ask for trust and often money.

Adapted from Five Interesting Indie Platforms You Might Not Have Heard Of on brennan.day.

• Special Fish: a brutally designed journal-like community built by a solo working artist in St. Johns, Oregon. User-funded (suggested $40/year, pay-what-you-can), 18+ only, explicit “could shut down at any point” terms. The Garden holds user pages, the bulletin posts open calls and events, and a Sunday-morning writing room runs collaboratively.
• Ctrl + Shift + 3: no likes, follows, or vanity counts. A single chronological Feed, invite-only groups (“Clicks”), flat comments, posts that can be text, timed polls, or a 40×40 pixel-art grid. Experimental Direct Connect offers ephemeral browser-to-browser WebRTC chat.
• web1.0 Hosting: free static hosting in Helsinki built for old computers and phones. Sites work HTTP-only, IP-only (no DNS needed), and through a WAP gateway for old mobiles. 100 MB free on w10.site and other domains, 500 MB for community members, plus a no-code builder (HamsterCMS), webmail, forum, and the z00m.ws search engine for old-web sites. Sites are mirrored onto Yggdrasil.
• Pillowfort: a fandom-oriented Tumblr alternative in open beta since 2017, founded by Julia Baritz. Independently and user-funded, no venture capital; join with a one-time $5 fee or the free waitlist. Explicit anti-AI policy, per-post visibility controls, threaded comments, mutual blocking.

Not platforms but worth listing: the tildeverse (see The Tildeverse), the 32-bit Cafe and Melonland forums, and IndieWeb Homebrew Website Club meetups.

• IndieWeb
• Deleting Corporate Social Media
• Being a Good Neighbour
• Directories & Blogrolls
• omg.lol
• Supporting Independent Creators
• The Tildeverse
• Gemini
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