While X shuts down communities, Acorn offers for the first time an alternative that puts creators in control

A new project called Acorn has launched a way for organizations and creators to build their own online communities as an alternative to centralized social media platforms like Instagram, X, and Threads. It uses the same core technology that powers the decentralized social media app Bluesky, allowing communities to build their own homepages, create starter packs for new members, and customize feeds and moderation tools.

The Acorn platform hails from Blacksky, a company that is building its own decentralized social media toolset around the AT protocol. The AT protocol was developed by the Bluesky team and is used by it and other open social media applications, such as Flashes, Spark, Skylight, Surf, Streamplace, Leaflet, and more.

To date, Blacksky’s focus has been on building tools to provide a safer online space for members of the Black Twitter community to navigate to — an effort that has so far included creating Bluesky, building custom moderation services, creating its own implementation of the AT protocol, and other technical feats.

With Acorn, Blacksky is providing access to these same tools for other communities that want to build their own spaces on the open social web.

This could allow organizations and creators to create communities that they control, rather than ceding that control to tech giants, leaving them at the mercy of arcane algorithms and ever-changing policies. For example, X recently announced that it would shut down its Communities feature, leaving users scrambling to move their groups elsewhere.

At launch, Acorn includes a suite of tools to help communities onboard new members, customize their feeds, configure and run moderation services, and track community growth through analytics, among other things.

Similar to Bluesky, where users can create “starter packs” with a list of suggested followers for newcomers looking to grow their network, Acorn allows communities to create their own starter packs. They also offer reputation systems that help communities recognize and manage members, using things like custom badges and trophies, along with bot and troll monitoring tools.

Communities can also determine which moderation policies are most important to them, and then access dedicated tools to manage reporting flow and other actions, such as removing or blocking accounts, or removing posts.

Community creators can create their own feeds focused on topics of interest to their members, and they can create different tabs for items of interest, like announcements, events, or resources, for example.

As the community grows, built-in analytics help creators track member growth, feed activity, and engagement patterns, so they can understand the overall health of their community.

Communities can deploy Acorn tools on their own domain, and pricing is customized to their needs. Some communities want to use all the tools, which could also include running their own PDS (Personal Data Server), which is part of the AT infrastructure. Others may want to create a custom version of the Blacksky Community Client to meet their needs.

The average client rate is approximately $100-$150 per month, but in the long term, Acorn will move to a scaled SaaS (Software as a Service) model that will scale with the size of the community and the level of tools required.

Already, Acorn is used by the AT Latinsky and Medsky protocol-based communities, and by a filmmaker community called The Invite. It is in active discussions with other media companies and non-profit organizations. Those interested in using its software can join the waiting list on its website.

“The name Acorn was inspired by the resilient and adaptable community Octavia Butler wrote in ‘Parable of the Sower’ in 1993. Like the fictional Acorn community, Blacksky has survived through constant adaptation,” explains Rishi Balakrishnan, principal software engineer at Acorn. “We didn’t set out to build the full infrastructure package we have now – one that provides complete autonomy for Bluesky. Every step has been adaptable and based on the needs of the community. Acorn shares the knowledge and infrastructure we’ve gained from building alongside the Blacksky community so other communities can grow in the same way – allowing them to stay focused on their missions/people without needing technical expertise.”

Acorn’s suite of tools also arrives at a time when social media services are being more strictly regulated in global markets, with some banning the use of the services by minors. At the same time, many people have become distrustful of the platforms created by tech giants, which are ultimately focused on generating profits from their massive advertising businesses first, and serving end users second.

Additionally, a wave of automated bans across Facebook and Instagram wiped out some users’ social media accounts and Facebook groups, leaving them with no way to reach a human to appeal. While the affected users represent a small percentage of Meta’s overall user base of billions, these people are more likely to consider an alternative platform when they choose to return to social media, making them good leads for services like Acorn to target.