What are Hubz?
Hubz are independent general-purpose websites that not only connect with their associated members and viewers, but also connect together to exchange personal communications and other information with each other.
This allows hub members on any hub to securely and privately share anything; with anybody, on any hub - anywhere; or share stuff publicly with anybody on the internet if desired.
Hubzilla is the server software which makes this possible. It is a sophisticated and unique combination of an open source content management system and a decentralised identity, communications, and permissions framework and protocol suite, built using common webserver technology (PHP/MySQL/Apache and popular variants). The end result is a level of systems integration, privacy control, and communications features that you wouldn't think are possible in either a content management system or a decentralised communications network. It also brings a new level of cooperation and privacy to the web and introduces the concept of personally owned "single sign-on" to web services across the entire internet.
Hubzilla hubz are
- decentralised
- inherently social
- optionally inter-networked with other hubz
- privacy-enabled (privacy exclusions work across the entire internet to any registered identity on any compatible hubz)
Possible website applications include
- decentralised social networking nodes
- personal cloud storage
- file dropboxes
- managing organisational communications and activities
- collaboration and community decision-making
- small business websites
- public and private media/file libraries
- blogs
- event promotion
- feed aggregation and republishing
- forums
- dating websites
- pretty much anything you can do on a traditional blog or community website, but that you could do better if you could easily connect it with other websites or privately share things across website boundaries.
Who Are We and What Are Our Principles?
The Hubzilla community is powered by passionate volunteers creating an open source commons of decentralised services which are highly integrated and can rival the feature set of centralised providers. We are open to sponsorship and donations to cover expenses and compensate for our time and energy, however the project core is basically non-profit and is not designed for the purpose of commercial gain or exploitation.
Some sites may include monetisation strategies such as subscriptions and freemium models where members pay for resources they consume beyond a basic level. The project community supports such monetisation initiatives (nobody should be forced to pay "out of pocket" to provide a service to others), but we maintain the commons to provide open and free access of the software to all.
The software is not designed for data collection of its members or providing advertising. We don't have a need or desire for these things and feel that software built around these goals is poorly designed and represents compromised principles and ethics.
As a project, we are inclusive of all beliefs and cultures and do what we are able to provide an environment that is free from hostility and harrassment. Whether or not we succeed in this endaevour requires constant vigilance and help from all members of the community, working together to build an inter-networking tool with amazing potential.
