The internet didn't break. It was captured.
A handful of corporations now own the infrastructure that public life runs on. That's a political fact, not a technical one, and it can be different.
The digital coup
The platforms we organise, communicate and govern on are owned by a tiny number of companies whose interests are not aligned with ours. When the rails of public life are privately owned, those owners set the terms of public life. That's power without a mandate.
The authoritarian stack
Cloud, identity, payments, social reach, app distribution: each layer interlocks with the next, so control of one becomes leverage over all of them. The result is a stack that can surveil, deplatform and extract at will, with no democratic recourse.
Why the moment is now
The tools for federated, community-owned alternatives already exist and are production-ready. What's missing is patient, pooled investment to put them in the hands of the communities that need them. The window is open now.
Not charity, but investment
This isn't aid for the digitally poor. It's counter-investment in shared infrastructure that returns autonomy, resilience and democratic control to the people who use it. Members are co-owners, not donors.
Who is it for?
- Cooperatives building democratic alternatives
- Climate and social-justice movements organising at scale
- Workers and unions reclaiming their digital tools
- Marginalised communities most exposed to platform power