Navigate the full conversation by topic and timestamp.

Intro (0:00)

00:00 - Welcome to Eclecticisms; introducing the publication's first recorded conversation

00:07 - Guest introduction: Rudy Fraser, Blacksky Algorithms, Berkman Klein Center

00:29 - Framing the podcast: people who exist at unconventional intersections

Part I: The Genesis Story (1:04)

01:18 - Community as the crux of Blacksky

01:43 - "I did it for me, and then everyone else just showed up"

02:01 - 2020, the George Floyd uprisings, and rediscovering community

02:28 - New York City as inherently communal — eight million people, one of the most expensive cities

03:27- Protests as an expression of shared rage and shared belonging

03:50 - Seeing community fridges for the first time

03:55 - Quitting his executive role after a company exit; having runway

04:06 - First startup ideas in enterprise IT — doing what he thought he was "supposed to"

04:44 - The pivot: "Win, lose, or draw, I'm happy with the journey"

Go deeper on anything mentioned.

Blacksky Official Site — Overview, mission, and services

Blacksky Documentation — Technical documentation and list of services

Blacksky on Open Collective — Transparent financials and donation page

Blacksky GitHub (rsky — Rust implementation) — Open source codebase

Rudy Fraser's Blog — includes "Blacksky: Expressing the Black Everyday in a New Digital Space"

AT Protocol Official Overview — The technical overview of how AT Protocol works

Federation Architecture — Bluesky Docs — Deep dive into PDSes, relays, app views

AT Protocol Community Wiki — Community-maintained wiki with reference docs on core architecture

Intercommunalism (1974) — Viewpoint Magazine — Huey Newton's original text

Huey P. Newton's Late Theorizations — Viewpoint Magazine — Context and analysis

Cypherpunk — Wikipedia — History and key figures of the movement

Key terms and references explained.

Web3 — A broad term for decentralized internet technologies built on cryptographic protocols, including blockchain, cryptocurrency, and peer-to-peer networks. Rudy came to AT Protocol through this world.

DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) — An organization governed by smart contracts and token-holder votes rather than traditional corporate hierarchy. Rudy describes Blacksky Cash as "the promise of what DAOs should have been, but for normal, everyday people."

Cypherpunk — A movement from the late 1980s/90s advocating for strong cryptography and privacy-enhancing technologies as tools for social change.

IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) — A peer-to-peer protocol for storing and sharing data in a distributed file system. IPFS (via Protocol Labs/Filecoin Foundation) has provided funding to Blacksky. ipfs.tech

LocalBitcoins — An early peer-to-peer Bitcoin marketplace where buyers and sellers could trade directly, often meeting in person or using bank transfers.

SAFE (Simple Agreement for Future Equity) — A startup financing instrument where investors provide capital in exchange for the right to future equity.

Network States — A concept (popularized by Balaji Srinivasan) of digitally-native communities that eventually acquire physical territory. Rudy references this as an example of getting "too ahead of the people."

Mutual Aid — A practice of voluntary, reciprocal support among community members. Distinct from charity (which implies a power imbalance), mutual aid is rooted in the idea that communities take care of their own. Rudy's organizing career started through mutual aid work in Brooklyn.

Susu (also sou-sou, tontine) — An informal rotating savings arrangement common in Caribbean, African, and other diasporic communities. Members contribute regularly to a shared pot, and each person takes a turn receiving the full amount. PaperTree ran a digital version of this.

Community Fridge — A publicly accessible refrigerator stocked by community members for anyone who needs food. They proliferated across NYC during the 2020 protests and became a symbol of mutual aid infrastructure. PaperTree was partly inspired by the concept of a "digital community fridge."

Fiscal Host / Fiscal Hosting — An arrangement where an established nonprofit allows unincorporated groups (like mutual aid collectives) to receive tax-deductible donations under its umbrella. Open Collective provides this service.

Intercommunalism — Huey Newton's late political theory: since the U.S. empire is so powerful that true national sovereignty is impossible, the path forward is uniting communities around the globe rather than building separate nations. Rudy traces a line from this to Blacksky's model.

Black Radical Tradition — A broad intellectual and political tradition encompassing thinkers and movements from abolition through the Black Panthers to contemporary organizing, emphasizing self-determination, community sovereignty, and building alternative systems.

Other interviews, articles, and links from Rudy & Blacksky.

AT Protocol: @rude1.blacksky.team

GitHub

Harvard Berkman Klein Center

LinkedIn

Tech Policy Press: "Building Middleware for Bluesky: A Conversation with Blacksky Founder Rudy Fraser"

Dot Social: "Architecting a New Era of Community, with Blacksky's Rudy Fraser"

DevTools.fm #125: "Rudy Fraser — BlackSky — Next Generation of Social Media"

There Are No Girls on the Internet (iHeart): "Can BlackSky Fix What Twitter Broke Using Bluesky Tech?"

Nodestar / Computer Says Maybe: "Building Blacksky w/ Rudy Fraser"

We Distribute — Decentered S1E6: "Beautiful Blacksky with Rudy Fraser"