In my last issue, I asked you a simple question: should I make Commune open source? I got a lot of responses on Commune (yay!) and over on LinkedIn.
Honestly, the feedback blew my mind. I expected everyone to shout a resounding yes. That absolutely was not the case. I was surprised most of you recommended I avoid it. Incredible. That included a lot of people in my network who have spent years maintaining open source projects or building open source products. I definitely did not expect that.
I have been thoroughly reading your comments and recommendations. You all make rock-solid points. You warned me about the unnecessary complexities of an open source business model. Adding to that complexity, going open source right now would likely mean making Commune distributed. I would have to wire it up using a social protocol like ActivityPub (Mastodon) or Atproto (Bluesky), and that is definitely not a top priority right now.
You also pointed out the hostility in the open source world lately. A huge issue right now is the AI slop. People are using agents to make a ton of automated contributions to different repos, and it usually results in more spam than actual usefulness.
Why did I want to make it open-source?
Having time to reflect, I asked myself why I wanted to make it open source in the first place. What triggered that in me?
I think it comes down to the urge to make Commune grow as quickly as possible. We engineers have a terrible tendency to solve sales problems with code. If nobody wants to use our product, we think we just need to add one more feature and they will show up.
I was trying to solve a problem with the wrong tool just because I am super comfortable using open source. Instead, what I actually need to do is reach out. A lot. I need to message everyone I know and let them know about Commune. I need to ask for favors when needed. I have to reach out to totally unknown people too. I need to do the uncomfortable job.
I am incredibly proud of why I built Commune. I wanted to turn my newsletter into a real community and help you do the exact same thing. But I still had to prove to myself that it would actually work for my own case.
Well, it is working. I am super happy to see us all chatting and bouncing ideas around. Some of you are even talking directly to each other without me stepping in at all. That is true community! I just need to relax and keep beating the drum. We are barely one month in and the signs are huge.
That said, open sourcing Commune is not a totally crazy idea. Even if I shelve it for now, it is absolutely still on the roadmap. Perhaps I never do it. Maybe I do it in a few months. Who knows!
I am not going to lie. The existence of a libre alternative to Substack really lights my heart. But I have to try things differently this time.
