As X shuts down Communities, Acorn debuts an alternative that puts creators in control
As X shuts down Communities, Acorn debuts an alternative that puts creators in control
随着 X 关闭“社区”功能，Acorn 推出了一款让创作者掌握主动权的替代方案
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 underlying 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. 一个名为 Acorn 的新项目正式上线，旨在为组织和创作者提供一种构建自有在线社区的方式，作为 Instagram、X 和 Threads 等中心化社交媒体平台的替代方案。它采用了驱动去中心化社交应用 Bluesky 的底层技术，允许社区构建自己的主页、为新成员创建“入门包”（starter packs），并自定义信息流和审核工具。
Acorn’s platform hails from Blacksky, a company building its own decentralized social media toolkit around the AT Protocol. The AT protocol was developed by Bluesky’s team and is used by it and other open social apps, like Flashes, Spark, Skylight, Surf, Streamplace, Leaflet, and more. Acorn 平台由 Blacksky 公司开发，该公司正围绕 AT Protocol 构建自己的去中心化社交媒体工具包。AT Protocol 由 Bluesky 团队开发，目前被 Bluesky 以及 Flashes、Spark、Skylight、Surf、Streamplace、Leaflet 等其他开放社交应用所采用。
Image Credits: Acorn from Blacksky 图片来源：Blacksky 旗下的 Acorn
To date, Blacksky’s focus has been on building tools to provide a safer online space for members of the Black Twitter community to move to — an effort that has so far included forking 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 to other communities that want to build their own spaces on the open social web. 迄今为止，Blacksky 的重点一直是构建工具，为“黑人推特”（Black Twitter）社区的成员提供一个更安全的在线迁移空间。这一努力包括分叉 Bluesky、构建自定义审核服务、创建自己的 AT Protocol 实现以及其他技术成就。通过 Acorn，Blacksky 正在将这些工具提供给其他希望在开放社交网络上建立自有空间的社区。
This could allow organizations and creators to establish communities they control, rather than ceding that control to tech giants, leaving them at the mercy of inscrutable algorithms and ever-changing policies. For instance, X recently announced it was shutting down its own Communities feature, leaving users scrambling to move their groups elsewhere. 这使得组织和创作者能够建立由自己掌控的社区，而不必将控制权拱手让给科技巨头，从而避免受制于难以捉摸的算法和不断变化的政策。例如，X 最近宣布关闭其“社区”功能，导致用户不得不匆忙将群组迁移到其他地方。
At launch, Acorn includes a set 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. As on Bluesky, where users can create “Starter Packs” with a list of suggested follows for newcomers looking to grow their network, Acorn allows communities to create starter packs of their own. It also provides reputation systems that help communities recognize and manage members, using things like custom badges and awards, along with tools for policing bots and trolls. 在发布之初，Acorn 包含了一套工具，旨在帮助社区引导新成员、自定义信息流、配置和运行审核服务，并通过分析工具跟踪社区增长等。正如在 Bluesky 上用户可以创建包含推荐关注列表的“入门包”来帮助新人拓展人脉一样，Acorn 也允许社区创建自己的入门包。它还提供了声誉系统，通过自定义徽章和奖励来帮助社区识别和管理成员，并配备了打击机器人和网络喷子的工具。
Image Credits: Acorn from Blacksky 图片来源：Blacksky 旗下的 Acorn
Communities can also define the moderation policies that matter most to them, then access custom tools to manage the reporting flow and other actions, like taking down or banning accounts, or removing posts. 社区还可以定义对自己最重要的审核政策，然后使用自定义工具来管理举报流程和其他操作，例如封禁账号或删除帖子。
Image Credits: Acorn from Blacksky 图片来源：Blacksky 旗下的 Acorn
Community creators can build their own feeds focused on topics that matter to their members, and can create different tabs for important items, like announcements, events, or resources, for instance. 社区创作者可以构建专注于成员所关注话题的信息流，并为重要事项（如公告、活动或资源）创建不同的标签页。
Image Credits: Acorn from Blacksky 图片来源：Blacksky 旗下的 Acorn
As the community grows, built-in analytics help creators track member growth, feed activity, and engagement patterns, so they can understand their overall community health. 随着社区的发展，内置的分析功能可以帮助创作者跟踪成员增长、信息流活跃度和互动模式，从而了解社区的整体健康状况。
Image Credits: Acorn from Blacksky 图片来源：Blacksky 旗下的 Acorn
Communities can deploy Acorn’s tools on their own domain, and pricing is customized to their needs. Some communities want to use all the tools, which can even include running their own PDS (Personal Data Server), a part of the AT Protocol’s infrastructure. Others may want just a customized version of Blacksky’s community client build for their needs. The average customer price is roughly $100 to $150 per month, but longer-term, Acorn will move to a tiered SaaS (software-as-a-service) model that will scale with community size and the level of tooling required. 社区可以在自己的域名上部署 Acorn 的工具，定价则根据需求定制。一些社区希望使用所有工具，甚至包括运行自己的 PDS（个人数据服务器，AT Protocol 基础设施的一部分）。另一些社区可能只需要根据其需求定制的 Blacksky 社区客户端版本。平均客户价格约为每月 100 到 150 美元，但从长远来看，Acorn 将转向分层 SaaS（软件即服务）模式，该模式将根据社区规模和所需的工具水平进行扩展。
Already, Acorn is being used by the AT Protocol-based communities Latinsky and Medsky, and by a filmmaker community called The Invite. It’s in active discussions with other media companies and nonprofits. Those interested in using its software can join the waitlist from its website. 目前，Acorn 已被基于 AT Protocol 的社区 Latinsky 和 Medsky，以及一个名为 The Invite 的电影制作人社区所使用。它正在与其他媒体公司和非营利组织进行积极洽谈。有兴趣使用其软件的用户可以通过其网站加入候补名单。
“The name Acorn is inspired by the adaptable and resilient community Octavia Butler penned in ‘Parable of the Sower’ in 1993. Like the fictional Acorn community, Blacksky has survived through constant adaptation,” explains Acorn’s lead software engineer, Rishi Balakrishnan. “We didn’t plan to build out the full infrastructure stack we have now — a stack that provides complete independence of Bluesky. Each step was adaptive and based on community need. Acorn shares the knowledge and infrastructure we’ve gained from building alongside the Blacksky community so that other communities can grow in the same way — allowing them to keep focus on their missions/people without needing technical expertise.” “Acorn 这个名字的灵感来自于奥克塔维亚·巴特勒（Octavia Butler）在 1993 年的小说《撒种人的寓言》（Parable of the Sower）中描绘的那个适应力强且坚韧的社区。就像小说中的 Acorn 社区一样，Blacksky 通过不断的适应生存了下来，”Acorn 的首席软件工程师 Rishi Balakrishnan 解释道。“我们最初并没有计划构建现在拥有的这套完整基础设施——一套能完全独立于 Bluesky 的架构。每一步都是适应性的，且基于社区需求。Acorn 分享了我们在与 Blacksky 社区共同建设过程中获得的知识和基础设施，以便其他社区也能以同样的方式成长——让他们无需具备技术专长，就能专注于自己的使命和成员。”
Acorn’s toolkit has also arrived at a time when social media services are being more heavily regulated in global markets, where some have even banned the services from being used by minors. At the same time, many people have become distrustful of the platforms created by the tech giants, which ultimately focus on generating profits from their massive advertising businesses first, and serving the end users second. Acorn 工具包的推出正值全球市场对社交媒体服务的监管日益严格之际，一些地区甚至禁止未成年人使用这些服务。与此同时，许多人对科技巨头创建的平台产生了不信任感，因为这些平台最终往往优先考虑从庞大的广告业务中获利，而将服务终端用户放在次要位置。
In addition, a wave of automated bans across Facebook and Instagram has wiped out some users’ social media accounts and Facebook Groups, leaving them with no recourse and no way to reach a human for an appeal. While the impacted users are a small percentage of Meta’s overall user base of billions, these people are more likely to consider an alternative platform when and if they choose to return to social media, making them good potential customers for services like Acorn to target. 此外，Facebook 和 Instagram 上的一波自动封禁浪潮导致一些用户的社交媒体账号和 Facebook 群组被抹除，他们投诉无门，也无法联系到人工进行申诉。虽然受影响的用户仅占 Meta 数十亿总用户群的一小部分，但当这些人选择重返社交媒体时，他们更有可能考虑替代平台，这使得他们成为 Acorn 等服务瞄准的潜在优质客户。