In this two-part series, we explore what open-source social media is and whether it is the future of online connection. Can it fix social media? Or will it produce more of the same?

What Is Open Source?

So, disclaimer, this is very new for me, and I am no expert.

The premise of open-source software is that it makes the underlying code publicly available. Any person, if they know what they’re doing, can look at the code, share it, and even change it. But nobody owns it.

“Open Source” was coined in 1998 by Eric S. Raymond to describe this code.

Think BitCoin, Firefox, WordPress, Brave, Blender, Linux, and many others.

The big themes for advocates of open-source software are decentralization and transparency. No single person or company has total control or too much power.

It’s community-driven and emphasizes data privacy. Advertisers can’t mine our information or buy it. There aren’t any patents or propriety. No equity. Just a platform. Like an open-world video game where you can do what you want.

The Concept of Open-Source Social Media

Open source applied to social media is not much younger as an idea than open-source anything.

The social media experiment has shown the best and worst of the human race to all of us, immediately and viscerally. Because the constant stream of videos, statements, ideas, experiences, convictions, and emotions are so powerful, money was an early factor.

Social media quickly evolved from a novel idea into one of the biggest markets in history.

With money comes the consolidation of power. Who gets to say what. When. Why. How. Who is amplified and who is silenced. What stories, news, and influences are prioritized by the mysterious “algorithm” and what isn’t.

Side note: There’s an interesting movie to be made about an “algorithm” coming to life. Or maybe it already has?

Jack Dorsey, pictured above on the Revolution Social podcast, and Twitter’s co-founder, has been thinking about open-source social for a long time.

Recently, he’s expressed the idea that Twitter should never have been a company and that Bluesky is repeating the same mistakes Twitter made.

His team at “andOtherStuff” wants to build communities, not companies. Protocols and pillars that users can build businesses and groups on top of, without depending on a social media company for their success. Think of the impact the slightest platform or algorithmic change from Google or Meta has on nonprofits and businesses.

Dorsey said in a 2025 podcast, “[I]t’s hard for something like [Twitter] to be a company, because you have corporate incentives when it wants to be a protocol.”

Since gaining traction in the internet age, social media hasn’t found a clear way to not be beholden to governments, advertisers, and investors. After all, you need cash and government permission to support the infrastructure and expand.

Is open source the answer?

How Open-Source Communication is Evolving and Gaining Traction

Dorsey says, “I want to push the energy in a different direction, which is more like Bitcoin, which is completely open and not owned by anyone from a protocol layer.”

This is why he’s interested in things like the Fediverse, a network of social platforms that can communicate with each other while remaining independent.

In the podcast, he describes Bluesky, the spinoff of Twitter, as a for-profit company at the center of an open protocol. It’s a step up from the pure corporate mindset, but it still has to deal with market and political demands in order to provide paychecks to employees and returns to shareholders. This includes allowing more ads, changing algorithms even if the user experience worsens, or ramping up speech and content moderation.

Nostr is more like Bitcoin. There’s nothing at the center. Dorsey calls it “more tamperproof” because these open-source protocols don’t have “these single points of failure of organizational structure that control the protocol layer.” Nostr says its users control their data and communications without worry of censorship or data breach. It has an estimated 1,100,000 users.

Other platforms, like Signal, Matrix, Diaspora, and Mastodon have grown, too, with Mastodon reaching 9 million users.

Will it work? Will influencers still be influencers? Will we feel like we’re missing out since we’re not plugged into the larger community anymore? Will safer and calmer be as exciting to scroll through, or just boring?

It’s human nature to coalesce around personalities. We like entertainment and excitement. We say we hate all the drama and chaos. But we also kind of love it.

Click for part 2 exploring whether open-source social media is up to the challenge of improving our online experiences.

Do you use open source social platforms? Are they better or worse, or the same? Join the conversation! Shoot us an email at info@yellowlinedigital.com and follow us on LinkedIn.