Roadmap for The Decade of Open-Source (2020 to 2030):
Let’s Fix the Broken Web, Together!
You made it; welcome to this fresh new decade!
Looking back at 30 years of the internet, we should be proud. Mankind’s achievements are enormous. We have perfectly organized everything in the world, mostly user-friendly at the same time. With Google we find information, we use Facebook and LinkedIn to organize the people in our lives, and we travel with platforms like Uber.
Without the vigorous leadership of giants like these, we would have been nowhere near today’s state.
At the same time, some people feel that the web as we know it is broken. Our devices are optimized to misuse the attention of our beloved ones. Others feel exploited by corporations or affected in our democracies. Recent research by IPSOS learns that people in Europe experience an increasing amount of distrust towards the internet.
However, this will not be a sad story. I’m hopeful and optimistic that 80-90% of all the problems we face with the internet, can be fixed in the coming 10 to 25 years. However, I do believe that the coming decade is a crucial one.
I work full-time with open-source software for over a decade (I co-founded my WordPress agency in 2006), actively contributing (WP GDPR, 1,3M+ downloads & Laraberg, bringing WordPress’ editor to Laravel). From that perspective, I thought it would be valuable to remix powerful insights and quotes of thought leaders in open-source; plotting a roadmap for the new decade.
As the opportunity we have fascinates me, I hereby declare this the Decade of Open-Source. #DecadeofOpenSource
Why should 2020-2030 be the Decade of Open Source?
- The web as we know it is broken (plagiarism, revisionism, click-baiting, exploitation, fake news, mass manipulation, democracy is at risk…), but …
- … at the same time, building blocks, big thinkers and best practices are in place to start decently fixing a lot of these problems in the coming 10 years.
“I believe Open Source to be the only way to build a pro-privacy, anti-monopoly, open web.” stated Dries Buytaert, founder of the Drupal CMS. And I couldn’t agree more.
Last June, I gave a presentation for 2,500 developers called “From WordPress to blockchain, the Future is 100% Open Source” at the world’s largest WordPress conference. This article, published at the dawn of the new decade (2020 to 2030), is a follow-up to this presentation.
Let’s Fix the Broken Web, Together.
Here’s how:
Continue reading “The Decade of Open-Source (2020-2030); Let’s Fix the Web, Together!”