Social networks are becoming more and more important for public bodies and institutions as well. They enable a direct communication with citizens and allow a timely publication of information relevant for the population.
In most cases, well-known commercial platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or TikTok are used. People who want to use the Internet in a self-determined and privacy-friendly way are excluded from this. Through prominent linking and the use of the commercial services, advertising is also indirectly made for the large corporations, which could encourage more citizens to use the
corresponding services.
However, alternatives such as Fediverse already exist today and are enjoying growing popularity, for example with many federal authorities in Germany. This is a network of different applications such as Mastodon, which communicate with each other via a common protocol. Users have the option of operating their own instance or joining existing instances.
This results in an independent and self-determined use and design of digital technologies and forms the cornerstone for our democracy in an increasingly digitalized society. Citizens are not forced to pass on their data to large corporations in order to be able to communicate with public institutions.
With the FediGov campaign, FSFE Switzerland and GNU/Linux.ch want to raise awareness of the issue and offer both citizens and public authorities direct opportunities for action. Interested parties can use a template to send a letter to public authorities to motivate them to also be represented in Fediverse. Public institutions are given assistance in dealing with decentralized social networks based on Free Software.
2. Create a new site named **fedigov** (or whatever name you like) according to the Hugo [Quick Start](https://gohugo.io/getting-started/quick-start/) guide.
* Try to convince leading national authorities to set up a Fediverse-Server for other authorities: [example from Germany](https://social.bund.de/explore)