Person
ActivityStreams §4.1"type": "Person"
Person represents a human user. It is the most common actor type in the Fediverse. Used by Mastodon user accounts, Pixelfed user profiles, and PeerTube channel owners. A Person actor has an inbox, outbox, followers, and following collection. Discovery via WebFinger: @username@domain resolves to the Person actor URL.
Details
The Person actor type represents an individual human user. It is the default actor type for social media accounts across all major Fediverse platforms.
Key characteristics: - Has an inbox (receives activities), outbox (publishes activities), followers, and following collections - Identified by a permanent HTTPS URL (the actor id) - Discovered via WebFinger: /.well-known/webfinger?resource=acct:user@host - Has a publicKey for HTTP Signature verification - preferredUsername is the @handle (without the domain)
Mastodon Person actors include additional extension fields: - @context includes Mastodon extension vocabulary - url: the human-readable profile page URL (distinct from id) - icon: avatar image object - image: header/banner image object - manuallyApprovesFollowers: boolean (locked accounts) - discoverable: whether to appear in directory
Profile metadata: Mastodon exposes profile fields via the PropertyValue extension type in the attachment array of the actor document.
Required Fields
| @context | "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams" (plus any extension contexts) |
| type | "Person" |
| id | Permanent HTTPS URL for this actor (never changes) |
| inbox | HTTPS URL of inbox endpoint (where others POST activities) |
| outbox | HTTPS URL of outbox OrderedCollection |
Common Optional Fields
| preferredUsername | The @handle without domain. Used in WebFinger lookups. |
| name | Display name |
| summary | Bio/description HTML |
| url | Human-readable profile page URL |
| followers | URL of followers OrderedCollection |
| following | URL of following OrderedCollection |
| publicKey | RSA public key for HTTP Signature verification |
| icon | Avatar image (Image object) |
Examples
{
"@context": "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams",
"type": "Person",
"id": "https://mastodon.social/users/alice",
"inbox": "https://mastodon.social/users/alice/inbox",
"outbox": "https://mastodon.social/users/alice/outbox",
"preferredUsername": "alice",
"name": "Alice Example",
"summary": "<p>Software engineer. Fediverse enthusiast.</p>",
"url": "https://mastodon.social/@alice"
}# GET /.well-known/webfinger?resource=acct:[email protected] { "subject": "acct:[email protected]", "links": [{ "rel": "self", "type": "application/activity+json", "href": "https://mastodon.social/users/alice" }] }