The community is hard at work on something new. Regular visitors to Opensource.com may have noticed that things have been uncharacteristically quiet across the publication lately. That silence, however, is not a sign of winding down, but rather the prelude to a significant shift. There is a brand-new project actively in the works behind the scenes. While specific details regarding the exact nature, scope, and launch mechanics of this upcoming venture remain closely guarded for the moment, there is already plenty to discuss regarding the philosophy, history, and human connections that are driving this next chapter. And what better way to start exploring a massive collaborative evolution than by looking at the entire internet itself?
The Internet, and Top-Level Domains
To understand where the Opensource.com community is heading and why this transition matters, it helps to revisit the foundational architecture of the internet. Most people know that the internet is a vast network. By definition, a network is simply a group of connections working in tandem. In fact, the very word "internet" is a portmanteau born by combining "interconnected" and "network." At its core, the internet is quite literally a network of interconnected networks.
When the system was first conceptualized and built, it originally consisted of just two primary networks: the military network and the academic network. These closed environments served specialized researchers and defense personnel, operating under strict protocols and limited access parameters. However, once the internet began to catch on and gain widespread popularity far outside those initial, tightly controlled groups, it quickly became apparent that different designations were desperately needed.
As the digital landscape expanded to accommodate commercial enterprises, charitable organizations, universities, and various levels of governmental departments, a method of classification had to be established. These crucial designations became known as top-level domains, universally abbreviated as TLDs. Today, internet users can choose from a staggering array of TLD extensions, reflecting every imaginable niche, geography, and industry.
Yet, for a long time during the formative years of the web, there were only a handful of these foundational markers available. Those original top-level domains remain remarkably popular and culturally embedded in our daily web browsing habits to this day. Most internet users instinctively recognize that when they navigate to a web address ending in a .com extension, they are visiting a commercial site meant for business. Conversely, when they type in a .org address, they understand they are visiting the digital doorstep of a non-profit organization dedicated to a cause rather than a profit margin.
Open Source Is a Network
This division between commercial and non-profit spaces brings into sharp relief the nature of open source itself. Open source can be many things, spanning a remarkably wide spectrum of human activity and industry. It can be strictly commercial, driving enterprise software solutions and cloud infrastructure. It can be non-profit, fueling public-interest software and digital rights advocacy. It can be academic, supporting peer-reviewed research and educational tooling. It can even be entirely cultural, shaping the way communities share art, writing, and collaborative knowledge.
No matter what specific form it takes, however, open source is always fundamentally a network. Sometimes, that network manifests as a physical infrastructure of computers, servers, and repositories distributed across the globe. More importantly, however, open source is a network of people.
Whether those people are gathering in massive convention centers for a multi-day international conference, grabbing a casual drink at a local pub meetup, or collaborating asynchronously in an online chat room, open source remains at its core a vibrant community of human beings. Technology provides the medium, but people provide the momentum, the creativity, and the dedication.
For the past twelve years, the website Opensource.com has enjoyed the steady backing and financial support of a commercial entity. That corporate sponsorship provided the runway for more than a decade of publishing stories, tutorials, essays, and news about the collaborative technology movement. But the people—that is you, the readers, the contributors, the advocates, and the maintainers who make up the actual heartbeat of the Opensource.com community—are not commercial entities. The community is made up of human beings.
The impending shift aims to realign the platform with that fundamental human reality. In just one month, Opensource.com is going to resolve that long-standing structural bug. Stay tuned for the full announcement as the community steps into its next chapter.
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