A social instance image allows you to easily set up a fediverse server, which federates using the OStatus or ActivityPub protocol. You will need:

• An old laptop, capable of booting from USB
• A USB drive, preferably Sandisk and 16GB or larger
• An ethernet patch cable
• A domain name of your own
• A dynamic DNS account

The installation process is the same as usual, with the only difference being that on initial setup it will go straight to the domain setup details for your instance. In summary:

Substitute sdX with the device name for your USB drive.

sudo apt-get install xz-utils wget
wget https://freedombone.net/downloads/v31/freedombone-pleroma-amd64.img.xz
wget https://freedombone.net/downloads/v31/freedombone-pleroma-amd64.img.xz.sig
gpg --verify freedombone-pleroma-amd64.img.xz.sig
unxz freedombone-pleroma-amd64.img.xz
sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdX bs=32M count=8
sudo dd bs=32M if=freedombone-pleroma-amd64.img of=/dev/sdX conv=fdatasync,sync,noerror

Also note that if the laptop has a removable SSD drive it's possible to copy the image directly to that if you have enough equipment.

Plug the USB drive into the laptop and connect it to your internet router with the ethernet cable.

You may need to alter the BIOS settings to get this to work reliably.

Log into your internet router using a non-Tor browser (usually it's on an address like 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.1.254). Often port forwarding settings are together with firewall settings.

ssh fbone@freedombone.local -p 2222

Or alternatively you can log in directly on the laptop. The initial username is fbone and the password is freedombone. You should make sure you write down or copy the new password when it is shown.

Enter your user details, domain name and dynamic DNS settings.

Navigate to your domain and register a new user.

More details about setting up and using Pleroma can be found here.