Visibility

The access scope of a social object. Visibility determines which members can see a given conversation, community, event, presence record, or activity entry.

Values (social service):

• public — visible to any member within discovery reach
• community — visible to members of the linked community (conversations only)
• circle — visible to inner circle members (presence and activity only)
• private — visible only to named participants or the owner

Allowed values by object:

• conversation: public / community / private
• community: public / private
• event: public / private
• presence: public / circle / private
• activity: public / circle / private

Forbidden values:

• followers (removed in migration 004; replaced by circle)
• friends (never existed in this system)
• unlisted (not a supported scope)

Forbidden uses:

• Applying circle to conversations or communities (not supported)
• Applying community to events or presence (not supported)
• Using visibility interchangeably with permissions (visibility controls read access; permissions control write access)

Notes:

• The followers visibility value was removed in migration 004_authorization.sql. Any code or migration referencing followers as a visibility value is incorrect.
• Surface and find services have their own visibility concepts (public/private) that do not include circle or community. Those are social-specific.

Related:

• circle
• community
• discovery
• relationship (block affects visibility indirectly)