What Bonfire Is

Bonfire is a FLOSS and modular social web framework that allows communities to build their own Social Media platforms. It is self-hostable—run on your own server, not a rented closed platform. Generic docs: docs.bonfirenetworks.org (deploy, hosting). It is fully federated via ActivityPub, connecting it to Mastodon, PeerTube, Pixelfed, and the wider Fediverse. More: bonfirenetworks.org.

Federation and Independence

Bonfire is designed for decentralized, community-owned social spaces. It avoids centralized control, advertising, and opaque algorithms. Key points:

• Connects to the Fediverse via ActivityPub
• Self-hosted instances (examples: bonfire.hacktivism.ch, bonfire.social.coop, bonfire.cafe)
• Each community controls its own rules, moderation, and features
• No ads, no surveillance, no engagement-driven algorithms

Modular Architecture

Bonfire is built from extensions that can be enabled, disabled, or customized. This makes it a flexible social-media construction kit. Examples of extension areas:

• Microblogging
• Groups and forums
• Open-science collaboration
• Project coordination
• Cooperative-economy tools

More:
bonfirenetworks.org/extensions

Bonfire Flavours

Bonfire provides pre-configured setups called Flavours, each optimized for a different use case:

• Ember: minimal base
• Social: classic social-network features
• Community: groups, topics, forums
• Open Science: research collaboration
• Coordination: project and task management
• Cooperation: resource sharing and collective tools

Overview:
bonfirenetworks.org/apps

Social Media Features (Bonfire Social)

Feeds and Posts

• Chronological feed
• Custom feeds with filters
• Replies, quotes, shares
  bonfirenetworks.org/app/social

Profiles and Identities

• Multiple profiles per user
• Customizable profile fields
  bonfirenetworks.org/app/social

Privacy and Control

• Circles (contact groups)
• Boundaries (fine-grained permissions)
• Detailed moderation roles
  bonfirenetworks.org/privacy

Communication

• Direct messages
• Private groups
• Threaded discussions
  bonfirenetworks.org/community

Customization

• Themes
• PWA support for faster loading and limited offline use
• Custom emojis
  bonfirenetworks.org/features

Data Management / Portability

• Full migration between instances
• Includes posts, follows, circles, bookmarks
  docs.bonfirenetworks.org/data-manage.html

Bonfire is designed as a direct counter-model to the harms of centralized social media. Where proprietary platforms optimize for engagement and ad revenue, Bonfire offers chronological feeds, community-defined moderation, and fine-grained privacy boundaries (Circles, Boundaries) without opaque ranking algorithms.

The modular architecture lets each community choose which social features to enable and which risks to prioritize, whether that means open microblogging, closed groups, or research collaboration. Full data portability, including posts, follows, and bookmarks, addresses platform lock-in: communities can leave an instance that becomes toxic or commercially compromised without abandoning years of shared history.