Bluesky Social, the new social network, takes a big leap forward in open source. On May 15, 2023, he opened the code base of his Bluesky Social application on GitHub. From the start, its owner, BlueSky Public Benefit LLC, a public benefit corporation, built a social network with an “open and decentralized” spirit.
Unlike Twitter, which seeks open source, Bluesky’s code client is for anyone who wants to work on improving the code or use it as the basis of their own social network.
Bluesky’s code, licensed under the MIT License, can be used now. And while it’s only been available for about 24 hours, it’s already been forked 88 times and earned over 1,300 GitHub stars.
So far, the open source development of Bluesky is going well.
Although this is specifically the code base for the Bluesky Social application, it is also a resource for AT Protocol programmers. This protocol supports a decentralized social network. It includes the ability to connect with anyone on a server that supports the AT protocol, control how users view the world through an open algorithm marketplace, and allow users to change host without losing their content, followers or identity.
The code itself is written in React Native. It is an open-source UI JavaScript software framework. It is mainly used to create apps that work on iOS and Android devices.
The lead developers would like to remind you that they “serve a large community of users. Our day to day job is to constantly ask ourselves what our top priority is”. If you submit well-written PRs [Pull Requests] that solve problems in a concise way, it’s a great contribution. Otherwise, while we’d love to welcome your ideas and input, we really don’t have the bandwidth. That’s what forking is for!”
So far, the open source development of Bluesky is going well. Paul Frazee, Product Developer and Protocol Engineer at Bluesky, said, “I want to congratulate everyone for the incredible commitment you have already shown to the application codebase. “You’ve all been extremely kind and helpful. You’ve honored my requests for types of contributions. And there’s already been several awesome PRs that have been merged. You all dominate.”
If you fork the code, although you have their blessing, it is important to be clear to your users that you are forking them. So be sure to:
- Change all branding in the repository and UI to clearly differentiate them from Bluesky.
- Change all support links (feedback, email, terms of service, etc.) to your own systems.
- Replace all analysis or error collection systems with your own so that we are not confused.
Regarding the use of Bluesky, although the number of its members is more than 100,000, you still have to either register on the waiting list of the network or receive an invitation from an existing member to access the network.
Source: “ZDNet.com”