I've been writing software for about 40 years and open source software for about 30. My first open source software was a web contact script called TecFORM that I ended up making open source because the company that had contracted me to build it didn't pay me for my work, so rather than starting legal actions, I just made the software open source, and it was the first of many open source projects I've created over the years.
About a year ago I decided to move my active git projects to codeberg. As a big believer in open source, and a bit copyright and content licence nerd, the Microsoft/github's take on IP and copyright was just getting too far removed from the spirit of open source software that I felt I needed to move my active code somewhere else. I kept my historic code on github, because after all, I have and need a day job to pay my bills, and in the regular nine to five world, your github account is basically half your resume, and alternative hosters like codeberg aren't really part of the recruitment reality in tech.
What open source software is for software, code that no one can control, not even the owner, that is what decentralized blockchain technology is for infrastructure. HIVE, the platform that I'm posting this on, is a great example. A decentralized proof of stake blogging and social content platform without a big capricious commercial company pulling the strings, selling our data to the highest bidders. The creation story of HIVE actually shows us just how close decentralized blockchain technology is to the spirit of open source software.
My main personal open source projects for the last few years, and one professional one, have all been blockchain and Web 3.0 related. Professionally I wrote the @aioflureedb python library for the FlureeDB blockchain based graph database. In my spare time, I've been working on multiple projects for the InnuenDo Stack:
- CoinZdense: A C++ library (previously Python) for post-quantum hash-based signatures and least authority subkey management aiming at Web 3.0 chains like HIVE
- AioW3: A multi-chain rewrite of aiohivebot written in Python, a framework for writing multi-connected immediate fail-over web 3.0 bots.
- Merg-E: A least authority Web 3.0 domain specific programming language with AioW3-like framework as a main part of the runtime.
The goal of these projects, and of other InnuenDo stack projects is the creation of a cross Web-3 chain quantum resistant least authority infrastructure that allows people to safely be part of or expand on a grassroots distributed blockchain infrastructure that follows the spirit of open source. Because that is what blockchain is in its essence, the same liberation from corporate overreach for infrastructure that open source gave us for code.
When I moved my code from github to codeberg, I did so because of the exact same corporate overreach that github brought to its users by just harvesting the shit out of their users with AI.
Codeberg vs the Open source spirit
But then came the shock. Codeberg turned out not to be the safe place for the spirit of open source after all. They published on their site that for some reason cryptocurrency projects are no longer allowed. But the actual policy was even worse:
Cryptocurrency "related"! Basically all of my projects right now seem to apparently be "hurting the reputation" of codeberg.
So how did this happen? Apparently there was a community vote, and enough clueless kids who either don't understand the spirit of open source or were persuaded by semi-political ill informed narratives voted for this monstrous policy to make it pass with a huge majority.
Looking at the preceding discussions, there seem to have been some bad faith arguments made about POW (many alternatives exists now, and making these arguments in 2026 can only be seen as made in bad faith), and the same is true for the ICO-scam and grifter arguments. How can you argue against decentralization technology when all of the historic scams being referred to already had massive centralization red-flags?
306 out of 494 voted that the very technology that captures the very spirit of open source the most is the technology that is hurting the reputation of a platform that people like me turn to because of the corporate overreach of companies like Microsoft/github.
How Codeberg destroyed its reputation by trying to protect it.
So basically Codeberg is trying to protect its reputation by basically destroying it. The reputation that codeberg had was that of a safe haven from corporate overreach. The exact same type of safe haven that Web-3.0 crypto currency projects like FlureeDB and HIVE, and open source projects like Merg-E, aiow3 and CoinZdense are trying to create too.
With this vote, and with this policy, Codeberg is doing exactly what it is trying to prevent, but worse. It is not just harming the CodeBerg reputation. No, this stand goes much deeper than that. In taking a stance against the very spirit of open source, it is siding with the big corporate actors protection from which was a huge portion of the Codeberg reputation of. This isn't just harming the reputation of Codeberg, this policy is destroying the very core of Codeberg's reputation.
This is not what I would expect from an organization that states:
The main objective of Codeberg e. V. (as defined in our bylaws) is to
promote the development, collection, distribution, and conservation of free
and open content.
We aim to support equality of opportunities to access and share knowledge,
and to spread awareness about the relevance of FLOSS to society.
Nor is this the kind of policies we would expect from a community driven open source initiuative. But I think it shows exactly the problem with all centralized infrastructure: No option to fork. Open source and distributed systems aren't a simple 'tough luck, accept it' democracy, it leaves room to fork. So no matter how good a community driven effort may be, centralization makes even democratic comunities capricious.
And the result, exact the level of overreach and gatekeeping we have come to expect from the large companies that have been oposing open source.
The ban is extremely broad, there is zero nuance, zero options for appeal. And decentralized blockchain technology that embodies the very spitit of open source is grouped together with violence and nazi symbols. For an organization claiming to be about open source, that is some totalitarian way to govern.
Alternatives?
So with github gone and now codeberg gone, what place is left that is still true to the spirit of open source? Maybe we should start building a distributed Web-3.0 project hosting infrastructure? We probably should if we want open source to actually have a place safe from corporate overreach. CodeBerg seemed like such a place for a while until it showed the inherent issue with centralized policies with no options to fork. CodeBerg is no longer the champion of open source, its community chose to join the dark side, side with corporate overreach against the distributed technology that embodies the spirit of open source the most. A distributed blockchain based version control system may be a big project, looking at the git source and looking at Web 3.0 platforms like HIVE show us that there is already massive technological overlap. Full protocol compatibility would probably not be the way to go, but embedding the full logic of git into a Web 3.0 platform and creating a version controll client on top of that that uses the Web 3.0 primitives of the existing platform seems like something that should be doable to an actual usable level with maybe a 5 or 6 man team over a period of about a year to 18 months. I'm not saying we should do it (yet), but if we are lacking real alternatives, maybe it's the only way forward?
