Well yes, but that’s true of Twitter or FB, too - and the post is about creating a small instance for your friends - as in, it pre-requires a network 
Discourse is excellent for this, whether it’s 5 people or thousands as it is here. There’s a vibrant plugin community if you want to keep your environment small and private, or pull in news links, or whatever, too.
I’m also a fan of both mastodon and diaspora, but to me that’s more the FB-vs-twitter divide - persistent posts versus mostly ephemeral conversations.
If your goal isn’t to create a large public community, your options are plentiful.
