Not-yet-named #atproto Critical Infra Collective#

Concept Document v0.1.1 · October 2025

A collective of idependent builders creating critical infrastructure for AT Protocol. We work in the open, decide through contribution, and unite projects under shared values while keeping complete autonomy.

This collective is independent and has no affiliation with Bluesky PBC or any other company.

We looking for a cool name! If you have suggestions, drop them in the comments on the Bluesky post or Nooki thread. Looking for something short, memorable, and meaningful.

🛠️ What We're Building#

AT Protocol needs independent infrastructure built by people who care. Our collective brings together developers, researchers, and builders creating the essential pieces that make the protocol work.

We focus on critical infrastructure and tools:

Development Tools: SDKs, testing frameworks, debugging tools, and developer utilities
Infrastructure: Indexing services, search systems, PDS implementations, AppView services, relay implementations
Explorers & Browsers: Tools for exploring and understanding network data, like PDS and record explorers
Security: Research, auditing, and tools that keep the ecosystem safe
Protocol Research: Improvements to scalability, functionality, and experimentation
Documentation: Comprehensive guides, tutorials, and technical references
Community Support: Helping users and developers navigate the ecosystem
Ecosystem Metrics: Providing visibility into network health and growth
Community Tools: Open utilities and services that benefit everyone

Each project stays independent. The collective helps with administration, fundraising, legal work, infrastructure and marketing - stuff that pulls builders away from building.

⚡ How We Work#

Those who build, decide. Authority comes from doing the work, not titles. If you're building it, you decide. This keeps decisions close to the actual work.

Neutral ground. No bias toward companies, products, ideologies, or people. We don't care who you are or where you're from. Transparent criteria applied consistently. This makes the collective a trusted space for infrastructure that serves everyone.

Everything in the open. Our infrastructure, processes, decisions, and finances are public. Anyone can see how we operate and where money goes. Projects pick their own licenses, but the collective operates transparently.

Complete autonomy. Each project controls its technical direction, roadmap, and governance. We provide support, never direction. Your project is yours.

Service, not profit. We exist to strengthen the ecosystem, not accumulate power or money. Resources go to projects and infrastructure. We subtract rather than grow - resisting the organizational urge to expand and capture. When others create value, the ecosystem becomes more decentralized, which is what we want.

Long-term thinking and sustainability. Impact measured in decades, not quarters. We care about the community that exists today and the one that will exist tomorrow. Planting seeds for trees we won't see mature. This guides our decisions and how we sustain projects and contributors.

Stewardship of values. Decentralization, open access, transparency, and privacy guide what we build.

🎁 What the Collective Provides#

Shared Infrastructure#

Running open source is more than code. The collective helps with financial admin - accounting, grants, fiscal management. We coordinate fundraising, talk to donors and sponsors, apply for grants that individual projects can't chase alone.

Marketing happens through shared channels - blog, social media, docs hosting. Community infrastructure connects people through forums, chat (that aligns with our values), and events.

For Your Projects#

By joining the collective, you can focus on building while we handle the operational overhead. Sustained funding comes through pooled resources and grant opportunities that benefit all members. You maintain full technical independence while benefiting from shared administrative infrastructure.

Your work gains amplified reach through collective marketing efforts. And you connect with other builders working on complementary projects, creating opportunities for collaboration and knowledge sharing that might not happen otherwise.

For the Ecosystem#

The collective creates independent, neutral infrastructure everyone can rely on. Better tools through focused work on SDKs, frameworks, and docs. Protocol evolution through dedicated research pushing boundaries.

Long-term reliability from sustained development and maintenance. Diverse approaches - multiple independent implementations and perspectives that strengthen everything.

🏛️ Structure & Governance#

Membership#

The collective is individuals and their projects. Contributors bring their work under the umbrella while keeping control of technical direction. We look for projects addressing critical infrastructure, aligned with our principles, committed to working openly.

New members join through invitation from existing members. This maintains alignment while staying open to meaningful work.

Constitution & Decision Making#

We establish our foundation through a basic constitution declaring our core principles and operational rules. This is our shared agreement on working together.

Decisions happen where work happens. Contributors to projects have authority over those projects. Collective decisions - funding allocation, accepting members - happen transparently with documented outcomes. Major structural decisions involve everyone with voting mechanisms.

Like a teapot, sometimes usefulness is in where it's not. Constant growth isn't always necessary and might hurt the ecosystem. When possible, we remove ourselves from the equation so the ecosystem flourishes with infinite gardeners, not just us.

Funding#

We raise funds collectively through grants, donations, and sponsorships. Distribution follows transparent criteria prioritizing long-term sustainability. Multiple funding sources - foundations, companies, individual donors - keep us independent.

🚀 Get Involved#

Open invitation to contributors and projects working on AT Protocol infrastructure. If you're building something important and want to focus on technical work while sharing operational burden, let's connect.

Looking for founding members. This is the moment to shape what this becomes. The first few people define the culture, set the standards, establish the patterns everyone else follows. If you've been thinking "someone should build this" - this is your chance to be that someone.

What's in it for early members:

Shape the collective's constitution and governance from scratch
Define which projects get priority and how resources distribute
Build the support infrastructure you actually need, not what someone else decided
Be part of something that could sustain critical AT Protocol work for decades
Direct access to pooled funding as soon as we secure it

Right now it's just me and this document. The first 5-10 people who join will fundamentally define what this collective becomes.

Next Steps#

If at least 3 people/projects are seriously interested, we can immediately:

Create a Bluesky profile for the collective
Create Matrix/Signal workgroup for coordination
Set up git repo for collaborative work on this concept (Tangled? 😉)
Start writing the constitution together

Contact#

@tree.fail

Discussions#

This document is a living draft. Feedback and contributions welcome.