The ActivityPub Plug-in Acid Test

Are all plug-ins made the same?

So @cogdogblog did a nice write-up over the hidden utility of WordPress’s free ActivityPub free plugin which effectively makes your WordPress site a standalone ActivityPub node of one’s own. Like your own instance of Mastodon where you can both 1.)Originate and 2.)Share postings using the ActivityPub protcols same as any other Federated social sharing site. That’s located here: https://cogdogblog.com/2026/01/free-bonuses-wordpress-activitypub-plugin/

The test example Alan (cogodog) used was a Christmas posting by Andy Rush. So here now I’m going to give it a shot myself cobbling together as much of the steps as Alan outline in his article. Let’s see if it Pubs:

https://mastodon.social/@andyrush/115777574463230300

That’s nothing more than a new paragraph block with the raw url pasted in. And something I’ve suspected all along (again without confirmation, I’ve asked but it was never clear) there’s 2 tiers of “free” ActivityPub plugin. There’s WordPress.com (free tier) which I have. And then there’s the WordPress.org (non-free hosted tier) which allows you the luxury of editing the look/feel CSS styles of your whole site to your hearts content. And allows you to install actual plug-ins (free or paid ones, that’s on you). The WordPress dot com, free tier doesn’t give you that. You do not get to edit the CSS-styles, look and feel, nor do you get the to add-in any plug-in you desire.

Hence, this is why I’m calling this the acid test. If Andy’s Christmas greeting is not majickally embedded. Then the free-tier WordPress.com site is not using the same ActivityPub plug-in, but a stripped down version that allows WordPress to push a link to your linked ActivityPub account on the instance where it resides (arguably a “nice” feature but nothing like the invention of fire).

So there’s free ActivityPub plug-in, and the stripped down, barely there Plug-in that is just posting a link to your blog into your ActivityPub account when you hit Publish, in order to share the link with your followers. Which is I’m positive all I have access to:

No joy,… sad. Andy’s URL is nothing more than a link. No majickal embed, no ActivityPub goodness. So just be sure you know what you HAVE. There’s ActivityPub (providing links to things) and then ActivityPub (where your blog becomes an ActivityPub instance with all the same capabilities as a full-up Mastoodon site). WordPress.com (free tier) is not that, even though it superficially makes it seem like ActivityPub capability is THERE, it’s just URL links out from your blog post, no oEmbeds or goodness.