Both Hubzilla and (streams), in practice the only Fediverse server apps that have a “public stream” and users other than the dev, can do a lot to keep content private.

But tell that to the Mastodon users who only know Mastodon and the Lemmy users who only know Lemmy, both of whom “know” that nothing in the Fediverse is private because nothing on Lemmy and effectively nothing on Mastodon is private.

My point is that not everything in the Fediverse is public. Unlike what Mastodon and Lemmy users keep claiming because that’s all they know.

If you decide to make it public. Or if you’re on something that doesn’t leave you any choice like Lemmy.

If you’re on Hubzilla or (streams), and you’ve grokked it enough to use it accordingly, then you can actually post content in private to only selected users.

There are two common fallacies. One, the Fediverse is inherently private because it isn’t corporate. Two, the Fediverse is inherently public because everything on Mastodon or Lemmy or whatever is the only Fediverse project you’re familiar with is public.