Building a private community site, especially in the broader ‘rebel’ sector requires special care and expertise. Firstly, ALL software used is open source with the site running on dual, carefully configured VPS (Virtual Private Server) not a cheap ‘shared’ system most use.
We also avoid any ‘big tech’ hosting services from Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Zoom services and ‘cloud’ applications lazy developers rely upon. Similarly for upcoming chat and video/webinar applications, where we will use Jitsi or similar including Matrix add-ons. All super-secure, open source and running on our own private Linux OS servers.
During development we only use Linux OS PCs and servers, avoiding Windows and Apple machines and cloud applications for storage, services or videochat that could be used to track our development work or steal valuable client data. Open source VPNs are also used. We also educate clients on easy migration paths away from Windows, Apple and Google tools, for improved security, privacy and safer interactions. Promoting the widespread use of de-googled mobiles, replacing standard Android and iPhones is the final step.
The CLO website software is open source WordPress which we’ve utilised since 2007. Special measures are taken here to separate the new ‘social’ community from the rest of the CLO website and shop. We naturally avoid excessive plugins and especially buggy layout applications like Elementor that web designers love, sticking with safer/faster WordPress Gutenberg blocks instead and their recommendations.
We tested several standalone and WordPress community apps, finally settling on Fluent, being developers we’ve known for years for their webforms, booking and CRM tools. Each has proven robust, reliable and is open source, running on our own VPS host, not ‘the cloud’.
There are three layers of security to protect the site, users and site hacking. Cloudflare as the DNS, the host server security system and the WordPress application Wordfence.
In summary, our focus is on robust and reliable open-source solutions that prioritise user safety and community integrity.