Jack Dorsey Donates $10 Million to Nonprofit Focused on Open-Source Social Media

Jack Dorsey, the co-founder of Twitter and CEO of Block, is not only developing new social applications like Bitchat and Sun Day, but he has also invested $10 million to back groundbreaking open-source projects and tools that have the potential to transform the social media landscape.

These initiatives form part of an online collective called “and Other Stuff,” which was launched in May. The team includes Dorsey, Evan Henshaw-Plath (Twitter’s inaugural employee), Calle (the mind behind the e-cash platform Cashu), Alex Gleason (former chief engineer at Truth Social), and Jeff Gardner (the fourth employee at Intercom).

The group, which united through their efforts on Nostr, an open “apolitical” social networking protocol, has captured much of Dorsey’s focus since his exit from Twitter’s board and the sale of the platform to Elon Musk. Additionally, they are also investigating other technologies, such as ActivityPub, which powers decentralized applications like Mastodon and Cashu.

Recently, Dorsey has raised concerns about the direction of social media platforms, asserting that Twitter should have remained decentralized and that Bluesky appears to be falling into the same traps as Twitter.

As a result, the “and Other Stuff” team is dedicated to creating not a traditional company, but rather a “community of hackers,” as stated by Henshaw-Plath. Their goal is to build technologies that may lead to innovative consumer social applications and various experiments, including developer tools or libraries for others to forge their own applications.

One of their initiatives is a platform named Shakespeare, which facilitates app development similar to Lovable, specifically designed for crafting Nostr-based social applications with AI support.

The team has also created heynow, a voice note application based on Nostr; the Cashu wallet; the private messaging platform White Noise; and the Nostr-powered social community +chorus, alongside other applications launched by Dorsey.

Recent advancements in AI-driven coding have made such creative experimentation possible, as noted by Henshaw-Plath, akin to how technologies like Ruby on Rails, Django, and JSON facilitated the previous iteration of the web known as Web 2.0.

In conjunction with these projects, Henshaw-Plath recently spoke with Dorsey on the first episode of his podcast, revolution.social with @rabble. (Henshaw-Plath’s Twitter handle is @rabble.)

Though Dorsey resides in Costa Rica while Henshaw-Plath is located in New Zealand, they met at a hackathon in Switzerland for their conversation. The nearly hour-long episode features Dorsey reflecting on Twitter’s past and providing insights into where social media has faltered and possible solutions.

“It took me a long time to realize this…I didn’t fully articulate it until my return as CEO for the second time. But for a platform like [Twitter], being a company poses challenges because corporate incentives often clash with its aim to serve as a protocol,” Dorsey explains. He highlights that Twitter frequently faced restrictions from its advertisers—an issue that Musk now faces with Twitter, rebranded as X. Musk has even threatened legal actions against advertisers in light of boycotts driven by concerns about X’s moderation and Musk’s own controversial statements.

Dorsey acknowledges that catering to advertisers benefited Twitter’s business model and stock performance, but it proved damaging to the internet as a whole.

“They can easily withdraw their funds—your funds—and your revenue plummets,” Dorsey notes about the power advertisers possess. “If [Twitter] had been an open protocol, a truly open project, you could establish a business on it that would thrive sustainably.”

Dorsey ultimately supported a venture to create an open protocol within Twitter, which eventually evolved into Bluesky. However, he believes Bluesky faces the same structural hurdles as traditional social media platforms, as it, too, relies on venture capital funding like many startups. He observes that Bluesky has already been compelled to meet governmental demands and address moderation challenges.

“I think [Bluesky CEO] Jay [Graber] is exceptional. The team is outstanding,” Dorsey conveyed to Henshaw-Plath, “but I disagree with the structure… My aim is to direct energy towards something akin to Bitcoin—totally open and not privately owned at the protocol level. That’s my vision for Nostr as well,” he elaborates. “I prefer stepping away from the corporate model, even if it’s labeled as a public benefit corporation.”

In upcoming episodes, Henshaw-Plath plans to engage with various figures knowledgeable in the evolution of social media and technology, including journalists like Kara Swisher and Taylor Lorenz, former Twitter Trust & Safety head Yoel Roth, Substack co-founder Chris Best, Medium CEO Tony Stubblebine, Cory Doctorow (who introduced the term “enshittification” to illustrate the current state of the web), and respected misinformation researcher Renée DiResta.

Furthermore, the “and Other Stuff” team is drafting a social media “Bill of Rights,” as noted by Henshaw-Plath, outlining essential commitments that social platforms must uphold regarding privacy, security, interoperability, transparency, identity, self-governance, and portability.

They believe this initiative will assist platforms, including Bluesky and others, in maintaining accountability to their user base against external pressures.

Dorsey’s initial funding has positioned the nonprofit on a solid trajectory, and he has contributed to the development of some of its early iOS applications. Meanwhile, team members are working together to create Android versions, developer tools, and various exploratory social media projects.

Henshaw-Plath reveals that even more exciting projects are in the pipeline.

“We have thrilling developments that are still under wraps,” he hints.