Homeserver Decentralisation Working Group Report
Matrix was created with the idea of federation at the core, but nowadays there is matrix.org which contains a majority of the users of the wider matrix network, nullifying the benefits of it. This has since also started generating significant cost for The Matrix Foundation and lead to shutdown of some previously offered bridges. The Homeserver Decentralisation Working Group aims to improve the situation.
The co-chairs of the (by now hopefully formalized) Homeserver Decentralisation Working Group go on a little journey through the history of the WG, how it formed, what challenges it tries to master and what lies ahead.
After a little introduction, we're going to tell you
- about the events that lead to the creation of the Working Group,
- how the initial members met,
- what problems The Matrix Foundation was already facing,
- what goals we have,
- what challenges lie ahead of us,
- our produced documents, governance proposals, tooling and general milestones achieved
- offering a look into the future, on what we aim to do in the near future and what we hope the far future will look like.
This talk is intended for Matrix contributors, homeserver administrators, community organizers, client developers and anyone interested in the governance and long-term sustainability of the Matrix ecosystem but also bigger organizations, that want to learn about the real benefits of federation and consider opening up their instance.
In case you don't know about the Working Group, you can find all our information here or ask in our matrix room.
TBD
Nicolas is a passionate self-hoster and open source enthusiast with a strong focus in infrastructure. Having a background in software engineering he started his hosting adventures around the age of 16, running collaboration tools and php websites on a iMac with macOS server. Since then, his skillset grew a lot, adding containers, gitops, linux, CI/CD, and ochestration and he took on numerous volunteer engagements with the Swiss scout association, now being part of the national IT committee.
At Matrix Conf 2025 he decided it was time to contribute actively to open source and together with others startet the Homeserver Decentralisation WG.