Diaspora vs. Facebook - the main differences

The alleged Facebook killer diaspora keeps appearing in the news. We explain the differences and special features of the two social networks.

Differences between diaspora and Facebook: decentralized pods vs. Server Farm

The most important element of diaspora is the decentralized structure.
While Facebook operates the network with a few gigantic server farms, Diaspora runs on many small servers, so-called pods.
These pods are distributed all over the world and are operated by individual users or different organizations.
Accordingly, when creating your diaspora account, you choose which pod you want to register on.
You can make this dependent, for example, on the country in which the pod is located, how many or few users are registered on the pod, or whether you particularly trust the operator with your data.
You can even create your own new pod if you just want to leave your data to yourself.
Thanks to the appropriate technology, the pods can of course communicate with each other and thus make diaspora the network that it is.
In general, the diaspora software can be freely changed and supplemented. This gives users even more options to design the network according to their wishes.

Diaspora is operated by the users of the network itself, whereas Facebook is a stock-listed and profit-oriented company.
While this means a bit more work for diaspora users because they have to take care of the pods themselves, diaspora is ad-free and the user data is relatively secure.
On Facebook, on the other hand, your data are in the hands of the company and are used not least for various advertising and research purposes.
There are also numerous advertisements on Facebook. It even goes so far that you sometimes see paid posts in your feed.
Due to the structure of the diaspora, even with increasing size of the network, it is unlikely that there will ever be advertising.

An essential difference between diaspora and Facebook is of course the reach. With almost 900 million daily active users, Facebook is slowly but surely reaching the limits of what is currently possible.
Diaspora, on the other hand, generally has just under a million registered accounts.
Freedom of use is a core principle of diaspora. You are free to present yourself as you like. There is no real-name rule, such as Facebook enforced in the past.
There are hardly any limits to the topic. In general, this freedom also invites individuals whose content is removed very quickly in other networks.
Articles and topics can be reported, but due to the decentralized structure of diaspora, it is difficult to completely remove and prevent such content.
With Facebook, the focus is on the activity stream, which you can still filter automatically for top messages.
At Diaspora, you sort your contacts from the outset into so-called aspects and can manage what you share with whom.
Similar sorting functions are also available on Facebook, but they are less important and are therefore cumbersome to use.
Hashtags are now also available on Facebook, but they are a central element on diaspora. Here you will find numerous topics and like-minded people.

Next we explain the main differences between Ello and Facebook.