With the news of Cohost’s closure and Tumblr’s continued mistreatment of its users, those looking for an alternative platform may want to consider Pillowfort. In this post I’ll go over some of Pillowfort’s policies, setup, and emphasis on community to help prospective users decide if it’s a good fit for them.
Pillowfort has an explicitly Anti-AI stance.
They’re strict about it, so the downside is you can’t post AI images to use as examples when discussing or making fun of the topic.
They allow NSFW.
NSFW content is very much welcomed there, but it is required to be marked as such.
This means you have the option to toggle NSFW content off so you can avoid it entirely if you want.
To read the specifics of what sfw and nsfw content is and is not allowed on Pillowfort, check out point 8 in their TOS.
There is no recommendation algorithm.
Your feed is self curated, which does take some getting used to if you haven’t been on a platform like that before.
You start out following no one and have to dive through tags and communities to find people posting about your interests.
They are user funded.
This does mean some users need to donate or subscribe to Pillowfort Premium in order to reach the site’s financial goals each month.
Unlike Tumblr, “Pillowfort does not now, nor will it in the future, sell (their) user information to third-parties.”
This means that unlike many social sites, you are NOT the product!
The benefit of this is they do not have to bow to shareholders! Site users and their experience is their priority.
There is a communities feature
Similar in concept to Reddit’s sub-reddits. It allows for individuals to create and reblog posts into topic specific groups.
It’s a good way to find people to follow and quickly fill up your feed, but it also means you don’t necessarily have to follow a user’s blog to see posts from them on topics you enjoy.
Staff is transparent about funding and finances.
They have a budget breakdown on their donations page so you know exactly where your money is going.
There’s also a donation counter updated daily so everyone can see how close we are to reaching our monthly goal.
Apart from January 2024, Pillowfort has reached or exceeded the donation goal every month, with excess from other months making up for the shortfall in January.
As of this post, Pillowfort is funded through January 2025.
It is accessed through your browser.
The mobile site has some bugs and isn’t as smooth as desktop, but it still works well. Currently I’m on mobile full time and my experience has been nearly the same as it was on desktop.
A progressive web app (PWA) is in the works and it’s very high on their priority list. It should be out sometime in late 2024 - early 2025.
Tags actually work!
Unlike Tumblr’s system, when you search a tag on Pillowfort the only posts that come up are ones containing that tag. It’s not looking at text in the body of the post to include in the search.
Tags are also easy to blacklist. When you don’t want to see a certain tag, blacklisting fully hides the content from you.
In addition to tagging, Pillowfort has post privacy settings. You can set posts to be viewable by logged-in users only, followers only, or mutuals only. As well as turn off reblogs and comments.
Blocking is effective.
When you block someone you will not see any of their posts, even if someone you follow reblogs their post. They can’t see anything from you either.
The most you see from them is the text “someone commented” in place of their comments on other people’s posts. It can be annoying to see, but the benefit is it allows you to see and interact with all the other comments in a thread even if someone you’ve blocked is involved.
The community is welcoming.
The community is small, but it is generally friendly. People are excited to see new users join and are very eager to answer questions and help out.
They often make guides for new users to answer FAQs and give helpful tips.
There’s also communities, like Pillowfort101, dedicated to answering questions about the site and helping people navigate.
It’s “quiet” in nice ways.
Instead of callout posts (which are explicitly prohibited), people tend to block, move on, and let Staff handle the rest. This kind of attitude amongst users makes for the most low stress social media experience I’ve ever had.
Because of its small size in comparison to Tumblr, not all tags are super active with endless scrolling.
HOWEVER-
This means that by joining and bringing your hobbies, passions, and fandoms along with you, you’re helping to build a community from the ground up!
Because of its small size, many people on Pillowfort are open to hearing about topics they otherwise wouldn’t have encountered, so don’t be shy about introducing your interests over there.
It lacks certain features.
Pillowfort does not have reblog replies. Instead, additions and conversations are done through threaded comments on a post. A benefit of this is it gives users more control over interactions with their post.
Side blogs aren’t a current feature, though it is a feature planned for the first half of 2025.
Pillowfort has DMs, but not asks. However, asks are also planned for the first half of 2025.
Arranging images in a post can be frustrating sometimes. The system is high on their priority list to update and improve though, especially before the PWA launch.
There’s not currently a good setup for alt-text. It is an option, but there’s a character limit and it’s difficult to find. The most effective form of alt-text is putting it directly into the body of a post.
There are not custom content warnings like on Cohost or Mastadon. That’s all done through relying on people to tag or to write a warning above a read-more.
Joining
There’s several options to join. There’s a waitlist, which is the easiest option and typically takes less than an hour to get through. There’s also invites, which is the quickest option. I have a couple dozen I can give out, but there’s also people in the Pillowfort tag on Tumblr giving them out from time to time. The last option is paying $5 to get an invite instantly.
In Conclusion
It’s a small site so it’s not nearly as active as big platforms like Tumblr or Twitter, but community is a major focus of the site. From my personal experience it feels more like a place to talk with people, and not just at people. You may have to be the one to initiate conversation, but if you go looking for conversation it’s not hard to find.
As more active users join and begin participating in the site, I believe it will flourish. Overall, there’s a lot of room for growth on Pillowfort, but I for one am happy to buckle up and come along for the ride and I hope to see more of ya’ll join too.
tagged by @librarycards to do a "steal something from my room" poll (fanku!)
steal something from my room (⌐■-■)
really cool big painting of three geese in blues and pinks and purples it prety
the large brass dolphin ornament that I dropped on my head once (ask me how)
the little wooden thylacine pin that I found at a thrift store
little thrifted ceramic collie trinket that has no feet
my sick as bugs bunny reading lamp
green cut glass perfume bottle with a chip out of the rim that is soso cool
chipped peter rabbit teacup with a tiny picture of mr bean in it just because
vintage calendar of puddings
single ceramic squirrel salt shaker with no matching pepper squirrel friend
two large badges that say please maintain social distancing
one of my many editions of books of the film pete's dragon 1977 (i'll kill u)
Voting ended onApr 16
edit: I forgot to add this before I published the post and now I can't edit the poll did I mention that the pudding calendar isn't a calendar with pictures of puddings, it is a calendar with a pudding recipe for every day of the year :o
tagging @purplepineapplepopsicles @ashes-and-bone @mutttooth @feaftlikeabeaft @jazzyraccoon @emocat4eva @log-girlie @joshuaballsett @malevolentcafe @eve-nightengale @misterveeare @petzah394again @amaranthine-paws @forklift-dysphoria-girl @carfuckerlynch @shkspr if y'all would like to, and anyone else who'd like to! and even if you aren't tagged and/or even if you don't wanna do a post of your own, steal one of my things! ✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧
hiiiii, i was tagged by @cavarage to post gifs from my 20 favorite movies without naming them. this is so fun! there's definitely no theme/order here, just things i have and will watch over and over again. thanks for tagging me! :)
I was tagged by @draco-illius-noctis! Thanks so much for the tag! 🩷
Describe yourself ONLY with pictures you have, you CANNOT search or download new pictures
Ok, this is a fun one!
I'm tagging anyone that pops into my head, so feel free to do it if you like and ignore this if it's not your thing!
@rosiethemage @nixiegenesis @goldenshadowofthesun @lezbfrenz @across-the-cypress-trees @katatsumuli @radioactive-earthshine @naamah-beherit
@eckspress tagged me and thus tasked me with posting four non-selfies from my camera roll
(SQXL was fun even if the train ride was a lot. Shouts to @phirantyk and @mistydayjudge for being amazing friends)
It's open for anyone to turn around and post/tag but umma bother @exhaustedpumpkin @vampyretaemin @honorarykilljoy @painfulgreed and @pickel182 specifically
