Additional Funding from #startsmall

We are delighted to announce that OpenSats has received a generous donation of $10 million from Jack Dorsey's philanthropic initiative, #startsmall, which will be used to support the development of free and open-source software and projects focusing on bitcoin, nostr, and related technologies.

OpenSats' mission is to help build a sustainable ecosystem and provide consistent funding for free and open-source projects and protocols. We believe that free software and open protocols are necessary for a free and prosperous society. Without software that protects the individual user's rights and freedoms, and without digital infrastructure that is open to all, modern society risks slipping further into digital totalitarianism.

OpenSats will continue to be a 100% pass-through operation, meaning that all donated funds will be fully allocated to projects vetted by the OpenSats board of directors unless they are specifically provided for operational purposes. #startsmall's donation includes funding for OpenSats' operational budget, which will allow us to remain 100% pass-through, expand efforts, and streamline operations as a 501(c)(3) public charity going forward.

Half of the donation amount—$5m USD—will be dedicated to advancing the new and growing nostr ecosystem. We have set up a committee of nostr developers and tinkerers, including fiatjaf and NVK, who will help us to evaluate projects and protocol contributions. If you are working on nostr and looking for funding, please apply here: https://opensats.org/apply

As part of expanding these efforts, NVK and Gigi are joining the OpenSats board to help with our organizational and funding decisions. Gigi will be joining in a full-time capacity to lead our ongoing operations and strategy.

The structure of OpenSats remains unchanged: we want to create a sustainable, independent, and consistent ecosystem of funding for bitcoin, nostr, and other open-source projects. Having multiple open-source contributors on our board—tenured core devs among them—helps us to better understand what is needed to put effective long-term support structures into place.

We are excited to work with contributors, industry, and the wider free and open-source community to help ship the freedom tools that are so desperately needed. We can't wait to see what you are going to build.

In the words of Cypherpunk founder Eric Hughes:
"Let us proceed together apace. Onward."