We are all witnessing amazing free services and social networks such as Google Search, Gmail, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook etc. For better or worse, these sites changed our lives and they are big part of our life. Important part is that they are free. Everyone with Internet access can create account and start using them. Except, as we all know, they aren't exactly free. In order for them to be profitable and probably sustainable (this can be discussed a lot) they need our data so their ad system can be efficient. Now, primary purpose of our data is ad accuracy. But in reality, we don't have a clue what they use our data for. Their terms of services are really shady (maybe even anti consumer) as you can watch in documentary Terms and Conditions May Apply on YouTube (ironically). We are giving personal, potentially very intimate information to commercial companies that are seeking profit. At the end of the day, they will do anything to survive and make profit and their weapon is our data but without any sort of transparency and proper regulation.
What do you think is it possible to create alternative services that would be open source and fully transparent regarding data? Business model could be based on donations, maybe even premium without ads plan? Also, all projects are open for pull requests so everyone could be part of the process. I don’t think ad model is the problem so I’m fine with it. Of course, this is a wild dream, and there should be a lot more planning to do than writing a post on Hashnode. But I’ll try to explain it in more detail below.
At first all projects are consisted only of core volunteers. I would say that making Google Search alternative is to big of a task for small group of core volunteers. So first steps should be email client and free email service like Gmail, and maybe social network similar to Facebook but only with core features. I have an impression that many Facebook users don’t appreciate many features that Facebook offers.
I’m not into business jargon so I don’t know what type of business entity that would be but let’s call it company from now on. But major idea is this: profits (if any) cannot be split to owners/founders/shareholders/whatever. Profits are invested into the company that is – salaries, bonuses (but only for all employees scenario), office, marketing, other open source projects etc. There shouldn’t be major salary difference between owners and developers.
Main requirement for every project is that it should rely on truly open source technologies. Ideally not made by “competitor” services (like Reactjs or Angularjs).
I think this is key for gaining users. Every project should be done under the same brand (that is, company). Projects are not only independent for themselves, they are part of bigger ecosystem of free services that should be truly free to everyone. They should all be done under the same mindset, shouting same slogan, displaying same logo, using same same color palette. Main goal is to have users who think “I trust them cause they are not driven by profit. I use them cause they offer simple stuff which can be used for a lot of things”.
So, what do you think? Is this Internet utopia? Am I too naive and unrealistic? I actually have more ideas for this but I already put too much time on writing this so I’m interested in your thoughts.
Marco Alka
Software Engineer, Technical Consultant & Mentor
Well, as for email, I would never entrust my mail to a FOSS mail provider, as security is complex and hard to do right and uptime can be quite critical. FOSS developers usually do neither have time, nor money, to spend on those. I would welcome a company going opensource, however! At the moment, I go with a FOSS client plus a commercial mail provider (I pay money directly). As for the social network, have you ever heard of Diaspora? It is a distributed social network.
I think, your ambitions are admirable, however there already are projects like that and you just have to google a bit to find them. Take a look at them, first, because it makes a lot more sense to contribute to existing projects, if they suite your needs.