It has been nearly three years since we started working on building a decentralized information network, and finally, the RSS3 Mainnet is coming.
From the Stone Ages with pigeons flying around carrying letters, information networks have been the driving force shaping the world's history, and currently its present and future.
Among all the attributes of the world's information networks, information freedom is the most important one. The amount of information that is free of flow determines the foundation and potential of humanity for understanding, imagining, and inventing the world.
However, information freedom has never be a field with significant material gain: the first martyr of information freedom, the Internet's own boy Aaron Swartz (also coauthor of RSS) didn't become the richest man in the world, but instead died fighting for it.
Very few understands the importance of information freedom because the lack of it suffocates humanity collectively instead of individually, and eliminates a potential better future that couldn't happen.
But still, there have to be people who push it forward. Otherwise, it only degrades.
Several days ago, my tweet for the Open Information Manifesto was retweeted by Aaron's mother - I assume she'd be happy seeing a new generation of builders are carrying the baton.
The past three years have been adventurous - we've dedicated ourselves into creating something genuinely innovative: there has never been anything similar to RSS3 before, leaving us very little reference to get started with.
The idea of RSS3, on the other hand, remained straightforward:
"A network, consists of numerous nodes, collectively covers every piece of Open Information on the Internet, and structures it accessible and valuable for everyone in need."
Simply put, it is the largest library within the Open Web where everything can be found. It is a hub of free information.
With that in mind, we've spent a significant amount of time researching on the best architecture to achieve it. That is why we came up with the dual sublayer design - as an information network, part of it needs to achieve a level of decentralization lower than a blockchain without compromising its nature, and the other part needs to secure ownership and value at an extremely low cost with high efficiency.
I'm extremely excited and proud to see the result.
On one hand, it is something new - very few projects in the field build actual innovative technologies. Also, it is something effective - it does index, structure, and disseminate Open Information of a large scope in ways that help applications and users. Being new is hard. Being new and effective is harder.
On the other hand, two years ago, when we first released the first RSS3 Roadmap, we expected to have it ready by the end of Q4 2023. Now it looks like we are only one or two months behind. This is also the reason why we haven’t released another “Roadmap” before the launch of Mainnet - we’ve simply been working on it. Of course, later on I got to see that most people cared more about the news itself rather than the actual progress - but I do know that everyone working on RSS3 cares about the latter.
15 years ago, the Guerilla Open Access Manifesto was released calling for information freedom. That was at a time when public information was free and open - whatever you posted on a website is accessible to everyone who had access to the Internet. Anyone can build a search engine or an RSS client differently. Innovation was thriving.
15 years later, Twitter (or X), Reddit, TikTok, Instagram, all these service providers handling our public information are strictly controlling it - no one can ever build another search engine from public information.
One of the things we learned along the way of building RSS3 was that by simply building a good piece of technology isn't enough to make the society better. To make it work, we need to have more people care about the cause and more builders join the fight.
We are starting an Open Information Movement - starting with the manifesto (https://openinformation.io/) and goes up to the Grant (https://openinformation.io/grant) and the House (https://openinformation.io/house).
Not unlike "Network State" or "Mars Exploration", "Information Freedom" is a social topic that needs more attention and contribution, and the RSS3 Foundation should be focusing on it with equal, if not more, resource than upgrading the technology alone. We need to do more.
A lot of tough decisions were made in the last years, and a lot of mistakes as well. But all in all, I'm happy that, though compromise occasionally, the foundation and core developers of RSS3 have maintained level of soul and integrity that make ourselves proud.
I can't say enough thank you to every contributor - those who keep on working till the next mornings, those who give up better pay to join the journey, those who help us out without asking for return, and those who keep staying in the community with all the ups and downs.
If RSS3 does manage to become the network handling a majority of information activities within the human society, I think it's because we care more. If not, what we build here will lay the foundation for something better.
We must build a future digital world where information empowers all, not just a select few.
Best,
Joshua