Track spotlight: The Next Socials! 📲 🤝
This track of the PublicSpaces Conference 2026 — developed in collaboration with @wearenew_public — explores a new generation of platforms within the open social web.
A selection of events within this track:
📚 Panel: Social Media, Journalism & Democracy
📈 Panel: Growth and Sustainability of the Open Social Web
🔍 Workshop: Everything in Moderation
🏆 Event: The Open Social Awards
Join us on June 4, 5 and 6: https://conference.publicspaces.net/en
RE: https://mastodon.social/@wearenew_public/116449239553462621
Reminder: Get your OSA application in!! Applications are due by 11:59pm PST on Friday May 1, 2026 🌐🌱✨
📢 Announcing the Open Social Awards🏆
Alongside @publicspaces and @waag, we aim to honor the work of independent builders around the world, creating innovative products for the open web!
More details below…
Technologist and podcaster @rabble calls Roundabout, our new local community app in closed beta, “the Good Place version of Nextdoor.”
In an revolution.social interview with Bluesky’s Jay Graber, they talk about how New_ Public is moving from research and critique towards building new flourishing digital public spaces.
Trei Brundrett, @blaine, and the rest of the team are currently working with local stewards to pilot Roundabout in communities around the country!
RE: https://mastodon.social/@wearenew_public/115729800203396909
We've been working hard over the past six months to ship Roundabout to our pilot communities. It's amazing to see them come to life, and I'm so excited to keep building & learning to support healthy online spaces for local communities. 💖
RE: https://mastodon.social/@wearenew_public/115645917115143165
Six months ago, I joined New_ Public to help build a new social platform for local communities. Today, I could't be more excited and proud to share what our amazing little team has cooked up, and is launching in closed beta this week.
This isn’t another toxic, chaotic space — Roundabout is designed to be useful, fun, and helpful and it isn’t motivated by stealing your data and selling you stuff.
Learn more at https://joinroundabout.com
I love @bonfire's slow and determined approach to building this important piece of the social web.
As we at New_ Public work towards our early Local lab launch, I'm really looking forward to participating in wider conversations about how communities can thrive in federated social environments. Bonfire's work is so inspiring towards that goal.
Congrats on the 1.0, y'all! 🎉❤️
RE: https://indieweb.social/@bonfire/115507615653471686
What @bonfire are working on is impressive and important and y'all should consider supporting their crowdfunder!
Bonfire was absolutely the top contender for my work building New_ Public's Local project (https://newpublic.org/local); in the end, I'm building mostly from scratch not because Bonfire isn't great, but because I wanted our team's 2+ years of research, planning, and design to lead the conversation, not the technology.
BUT we're in a unique spot. Most communities could use Bonfire.
PublicSpaces
New_ Public