Stewardship of the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP), a public-interest infrastructure protocol available as a public utility, is central to Project Liberty Institute’s mission.
Over the past year, the DSNP Advisory Council and its Governance Working Group chaired by our advisor, Wendy Seltzer, and led by Research & Policy Manager, Sarah Nicole, have been developing DSNP governance, producing foundational documents that structure the development of the protocol and its relation to the ecosystem. It was time to put those ideas into practice.
Since DSNP is about helping people reclaim control of their digital lives, fostering voice, choice, and stake in a better digital ecosystem, its governance should reflect and support those principles.
At RightsCon Taiwan, the DSNP community took a major step forward. As an official RightsCon Satellite event, Project Liberty Institute hosted the first DSNP community meeting, drawing a full room of over 40 participants.
Participants included representatives from Aapti Institute, CIGI, Creative Commons, Integrity Institute, Metagov, Mozilla Foundation, Open Data Charter, Wikimedia Foundation, independent developers, tech experts, and France’s Digital Ambassador. Beyond helping more people connect with Project Liberty’s work, we aim to foster interconnection among the supporters of the decentralized social web.
The session was co-facilitated by Wendy Seltzer, DSNP advisor & chair of the DSNP Governance Working Group, Audrey Tang, DSNP advisor & Project Liberty Senior Fellow, and Sarah Nicole, Research & Policy Manager.
Under the Chatham House Rule, discussions spanned a wide range of challenges and opportunities for building sustainable, decentralized governance. Participants explored technical solutions and the human dynamics that shape effective governance models, drawing examples from their extensive experience in community organizing and decentralization. They were enthusiastic about DSNP’s role as a dependable, censorship-resistant fallback for social feeds. DSNP is not seeking to compete with or overtake other decentralized efforts. Instead, DSNP aims to complement them with a “credible exit” option, affording user choice and pushing platforms to prioritize users.
Participants were enthusiastic about DSNP’s role as a dependable, censorship-resistant fallback for social feeds. DSNP is not seeking to compete with or overtake other decentralized efforts. Instead, DSNP aims to complement them with a “credible exit” option, affording user choice and pushing platforms to prioritize users.
Key insights included:
- Community-led success often comes from a clear sense of immediate purpose (e.g., crisis response, defending communal resources, offering an alternative to exploitative platforms).
- Sustainability hinges on the transfer of governance knowledge, robust documentation, rotating leadership, and inclusive ways of onboarding.
- Incentives must balance intrinsic motivations (friendship, personal growth, shared values) with the careful application of extrinsic rewards (stipends, grants, vouchers).
- Ephemerality is Natural: Some decentralized projects serve their moment. Knowing when to let them fade—or how to hand them off—avoids burnout and resentment.
- Incremental steps help people to see their path from the starting point to a bigger contribution.
- Bridging Communities is a further step: Weaving small-scale successes into broader networks sharing knowledge, resources, and protocols.
These insights underscore that sustainable decentralization goes beyond the initial spark of community empowerment. It depends on the structures and cultural norms that allow new people to join, contribute meaningfully, and eventually take the reins themselves.
Following RightsCon, Project Liberty Institute, and DSNP are committed to further engaging our community by inviting participants to DSNP governance working meetings. The DSNP Draft Governance Framework and the Mission & Principles will be refined with the feedback received during the session, and we look forward to sharing a roadmap of Progressive Decentralization.
The momentum behind DSNP is growing, and there is increasing interest in shaping the future of an open, community-driven social web. Sarah Nicole also joined the panel “How we Build the Social Web” along with Mallory Knodel from Social Web Foundation, Andy Piper from Mastodon, and Palak Sheth from Threads. It was another opportunity to share how DSNP acts as a bridge between different platforms and protocols to build a social web that gives users voice, choice, and stake in their digital lives.
If you want to be part of this journey, now is the time to get involved: [email protected].