Erlend Sogge Heggen

1.3K Followers
694 Following
3.9K Posts

Bullish on kindness. 

Founder of Spicy Lobster studios and Weird.
https://weird.one

Formerly VP of Community / Product Lead at Discourse.

#opensource #gamedev #fediverse

Homehttps://erlend.sh
GitHubhttps://github.com/erlend-sh
Open Source Explainedhttps://blog.erlend.sh/open-source-explained
Web of the Peoplehttps://blog.erlend.sh/web-of-the-people

@liaizon @cypherhippie what’s the best place to track your work with DIDs in the fediverse?

In the atproto world there’s an emerging extension of PLC that has a lot of promise as a far more decentralized identity ledger: https://discourse.atprotocol.community/t/didplcbft-a-decentralized-approach-to-did-plc/571?u=erlend.sh

Didplcbft - a decentralized approach to did:plc

I was encouraged to open a discussion about my didplcbft project here. I figure it is indeed a bit better than trying to discuss this 300 characters at a time on a mostly one-on-one basis 😆 didplcbft is an experimental PLC implementation. It is built on top of CometBFT: uses BFT consensus to decentralize the hosting and maintenance of did:plc credentials. I would recommend that you read the README that is on the project in Tangled so I don’t have to repeat myself too much here. didp...

ATProtocol Community
And now @cypherhippie has a lightning talk about bringing #DIDs to the fediverse
Emissary along with @Bonfire and @swf are working on #MLS based e2ee messaging over #ActivityPub supported by Sovereign Tech Fund

It's done. I can't believe it's finally done. I've been working on this in mostly secret for so long, and I'm so excited to share it with y'all!

https://taggart-tech.com/ringspace/

https://ringspace.net

Introducing Ringspace: A Proposal for the Human Web

For months, I've been working on a project to demonstrate how we can preserve humanity on the web. It's finally ready for testing.

@bonfire backing!

Very happy to hear compatibility with the threadiverse is a goal. On that note, I hope you’ll consider pioneering the ability for groups to follow other groups:

https://blog.erlend.sh/group-convergence

Group Convergence

Groups as both a formal ActivityPub spec and general concept deeply invigorate me. I previously wrote about group-to-group following (FEP...

Open Indie

Good news everyone! We hit our first milestone: maintenance is 100% funded. Thank you all ❤️

Next up: unlock the stretch goal to co‑design federated groups: community‑owned spaces to organise across the fediverse, with no server or platform lock‑in.

Read about why this matters and how it can empower communities: https://bonfirenetworks.org/posts/why-community-matters-groups-as-the-next-step-for-the-fediverse/

Support the campaign: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/bonfire/community?refcode=tBIbwXI4dU25KvW4HBM0hQ

#Fediverse #FederatedGroups #CommunitySpaces #ActivityPub

Why Community Matters: Groups as the Next Step for the Fediverse

Federated groups in Bonfire will be spaces where communities gather to organise, care, and coordinate across the fediverse. They'll live next to your personal feed, but each group having a specific purpose: a study circle, a lab team, an activist collective, a local mutual aid crew, a project team. Inside you’ll find posts, conversations, calendars, shared resources, and more. Crucially, groups will be portable and interoperable.

Roughly this time tomorrow I’ll be chatting with the folks at Sensemaking Scenius about all things Open Source, something I’ve dedicated >20 years of my life to and have *opinions* about.

I reckon it’s high time we made OSS an innately anti-fascist movement that doesn’t pander to oligarchs and autocrats. Let’s talk about it!

https://luma.com/z9ivf64k

#opensource #antifa #democracy

Making Sense of Open-Source: Ideals, Reality, and What's on the Horizon · Zoom · Luma

Have you been wondering about the future of open-source? Do you find yourself caught between idealistic visions of collaborative commons and the messy reality…

I was inspired by this excellent article: https://blog.muni.town/open-source-power/

To write a short bit arguing that if software workers want to change the path we're on, we need to figure out how to build stable, powerful communities of ownership: https://notes.billmill.org/blog/2025/11/Licensing_will_not_save_us.html

Open Source Power

We have to talk about open source licensing.

Muni Blog

So here's a little bombshell for y'all: over the past two months I was interviewing for a role on Bluesky's trust & safety team, whilst I didn't end up getting the role, I had a lot of people from the ActivityPub community encouraging me to apply to it.

I didn't say anything publicly at the time, and perhaps never would have — it didn't happen after all, and I couldn't afford for people to get mad and cancel their donations in support of my work on Trust & Safety in the Fediverse and especially Mastodon. I've already had some cancellations occur seemingly in direct reaction to me diversifying and doing more work with AT Protocol.

I applied because my work on the Fediverse has been fundamentally unsustainable for the entire year, and because it was a role I could learn & grow in. There's a lot that can be said for an opportunity to work on something larger than I've worked on previously.

This year I've barely scraped by, unable to afford things that would allow me to live a better life & be more productive. I've been struggling with health issues stemming from a likely MCAS diagnosis, where food randomly sends me into coughing fits so bad I vomit at times. It's also amplified by stress, and my goodness I've had a lot of that this year.

Even if I had gotten the job, I would've continued in my role as co-lead (and founder) of the ActivityPub Trust & Safety taskforce, which has been a thankless job, and one I'm constantly pushed for time on. I did find myself at one point asking @darius
If I should step down, because I know my health can sometimes make things difficult (I can't always make meetings because some days I can barely leave my bed due to stomach cramps and nausea.

Next, let's have a look at current funding & some wins.

@indigo hope you’ll get something published! Judging by the unexpectedly positive reception of this article, I think the open software crowd is ready to talk more critically about our movement (or the absence of it) now, so it can mature into something more holistically pro-social.