This blog post describes the Social Web open source feed reader app and includes a link to the Amazon free-tier installation demo video.

Introduction

Social Web is a new open source rss feed aggregator that anyone can install at no cost on an Amazon free tier VPS server.

An optional mobile app is available for Apple devices, which costs 99 cents/month. The Android version of the mobile app will be available soon.

Users can share and follow topical lists ("Stacks") and host private group chats.

Installation

The easy turn-key Amazon web-based installer works with free-tier, or the app can be installed on most other Web hosting providers too. An ansible installation script is available.

Click on the video link below to watch the Amazon free-tier installation how-to video, it's about 8 and 1/2 minutes long.

Subscription Lists ("Stacks")

Stacks are collections of sources about a topic which are easy to make and share. Share a stack link and when a friend clicks they can follow your ever-changing list of topical feeds, which always remains hosted on your server. Here is an example of a Tech News stack hosted on hoverkitty.socialweb.cloud, but it could be any domain name.

Group Chat

Create a new group chat and invite your friends to upload photos and messages. The data will stay on your VPS, and your friends can subscribe from any feed reader app. They have options: chat from the Social Web mobile app, or use any feed reader, or use the free mobile-web 2-way feed reader that is hosted on www.socialweb.cloud.

The chat feature is built on rssCloud and websockets. Each instance of the app hosts its own rssCloud hub. When friends subscribe, their instance will be pinged when a new message is added to the group chat. Each participant in the group chat is a feed subscriber, and they can POST images and messages to their personalized feed URL to participate in the chat.