Places & roles: how community works in locali¶

At a glance. A place (in English "community") is a named group with its own feed, calendar and membership — organised by municipality, club or topic. How you join is set by the join mode. Within a place there are clear roles — from Guest to Owner — that define exactly who may do what. Places have a simple lifecycle (active → archived → deleted), and moderation keeps things fair and up to date.

Screenshot: Place with feed, tabs and membership badge — assets/screenshots/community-overview.png

What is a place?¶

In locali there is no single, overwhelming timeline. Instead: places — each with its own feed, its own calendar and its own membership. A place can be a municipality, a district, a club or a topic. You are a member of several places at once and only see what is relevant to you.

Every place has an address (a "slug", e.g. /communities/bretten), a description and, optionally, a code of conduct that is shown before you join.

Place or organisation? A place is a group with a feed and membership where people get involved. An organisation is an actor (club, authority, business) with its own profile that feeds in content. → More about organisations

For everyone / members¶

Joining a place¶

How you become a member depends on the join mode set by the owners:

Mode	How it works
Open	Anyone can join directly — membership is active immediately.
Request	You send a join request; a moderator approves or declines it.
Invite	Joining only with a valid invitation code.
Managed	No self-join — owners or moderators add members specifically.

If a request is declined, you can try again after a short waiting period (7 days by default). You can leave a place again at any time.

What you can do as a member¶

Role	What you can do
Guest	Read the feed, see events — no posts of your own.
Member	Create posts, comment, react, report content, RSVP to events.
Moderator	Everything a member can + create events, pin posts / mark them as announcements, review reported content, handle join requests, ban or remove members.
Owner	Everything a moderator can + edit the place profile, appoint/remove moderators, curate routing, archive or delete the place. The highest role.

Which role new members receive when they join is set by the owners (default: Member).

Get involved¶

Every place has a Get involved area: request help, offer something or look for volunteers. These posts carry a category and a coloured badge and can be cleanly separated from editorial content in the feed. → Features & possibilities

For moderators & owners¶

Moderators and owners work in the place's management area (reached via the gear icon). It is organised into tabs — including Content, Settings, Moderation (landing point), Members and Routing (owners only).

Moderation: two tasks¶

Review reported content — Posts and comments reported by members land in the moderation queue. You confirm a report (violation, will be handled) or dismiss it (no violation).
Handle join requests — For "Request" places you approve or decline new requests; you can also ban, remove or reactivate members.

Two small badges on the tabs show you live when something is waiting: open join requests on the Members tab, open reports on the Moderation tab. The numbers update in real time — without reloading the page.

Screenshot: Moderation queue with confirm/dismiss — assets/screenshots/community-moderation-queue.png

The owner model¶

A place is never "ownerless": whoever creates a place automatically becomes its first owner. The owner model follows a few clear rules:

Owners are assigned by an operator (instance admin) — there is no verification code as there is for organisations.
A place can have up to three active owners — handy for stand-ins and handovers.
Only owners may curate a place's routing (which sources and topics land here) and archive or delete the place.

The lifecycle of a place¶

State	Meaning
Active	Fully usable, accepts members.
Archived	Temporarily suspended and read-only — reversible.
Deleted	Permanently removed. Reachable only from "Archived" (a deliberate two-step).

For admins & operators¶

As an instance admin you steer the bigger picture in the governance hub (→ Management).

Platform rights stay with you¶

Some settings are deliberately always the platform's responsibility — regardless of whether a place already has owners:

managing invitation codes (for "Invite" places),
changing the join mode and basic settings,
assigning or removing owners.

The stand-in rule¶

locali separates platform management from place stewardship. As soon as a place has an active owner, you as an admin stay out of day-to-day business: you do not moderate, you do not edit the profile — that is the job of the owners and moderators.

Only when a place has no active owner do you step in as a stand-in and can moderate and manage until someone takes on the responsibility again. This keeps self-governance the rule and intervention the exception.

How admins create places and maintain settings is described in Management → Places and the place settings.

Notifications¶

Important events — an approved join request, a new report in moderation, a role change — reach you as a notification in your inbox. New notifications arrive in real time. → Notifications

Frequently asked questions¶

Question	Answer
What is the difference between a moderator and an owner?	A moderator looks after content, events and members. An owner can also edit the profile, appoint moderators, curate routing and archive/delete the place.
Can a place have no owner?	On creation, the creator automatically becomes owner. If, exceptionally, an owner is missing, an instance admin steps in as a stand-in.
How many owners are possible?	Up to three active owners per place.
Can I leave a place again?	Yes, at any time. After a decline, a new request is possible after a short waiting period (default: 7 days).
Can a deleted place be restored?	No. Deletion is permanent and only possible from the archived (reversible) state.