European companies and communities already host decentralized alternatives like Mastodon, a federated network powered by the homegrown Mastodon software. These GDPR-compliant tools allow users to control data and interconnect across servers—a model echoing the EU’s federalist values. However, fragmentation, lack of user-friendly UI and underfunding limit their reach. A unified EU initiative could fund these projects while the alliance of European companies and communities could merge these projects into a public-private platform. It is in the best interest of the European Union to provide funding for European-owned social media platforms to ensure their development and European digital sovereignty.

It would be awesome if the EU started funding the Fediverse.