HollieFound my way into a great #FediForum discussion on implementing the ability to create private groups, and it startled me how emphatically a few folks were puzzled why this would be desired. One person repeatedly characterized private groups as "hiding from the public square". It feels like issues of harassment (sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc.) are talked about with such urgency (at least in my circles?) - I can't be the only hearing that? The public square isn't safe for everyone.
Chewie@hollie
Even if you're not likely to be the target of harassment, I can see they could be useful, for example, groups of local friends planning things, or a "club" of some sort.
I certainly would find it useful.
Someone in a different session mentioned Hometown: https://github.com/hometown-fork/hometown that he used for a local punk scene.
It by default posts local, but you can still use it to read federated things on other servers.
If course, it means you'd all have to be on one server, but it's a start.
