Get involved
There is a place for you in the open layer
The community is the infrastructure — the code, the nodes, and the knowledge only exist because people show up. Four ways in, in the order that matters most.
Join the community first
The fastest way to be useful is to show up where the work is visible. The rooms are public, persistent, and full of the people who actually run this stuff — the knowledge of the whole ecosystem moves through them daily. Everything else on this page is a continuation of this step.
Run a node — become the infrastructure
The network's strength is that it is not hosted by one company — it is hosted by its users. Every machine a member runs is infrastructure the community owns: the more distributed the hardware, the harder it is for anyone to control the network. Open infrastructure only stays open if it is distributed.
Self-host your own instance
Run the full platform on your own hardware — a laptop, a workstation, a box in a closet. Every capability is built to run this way. Docs and the quick start are public.
Read the quick start →Contribute capacity
Join your machine to the distributed pool — every node makes the network less dependent on any single host, and less switchable-off by anyone.
Join the network →Contribute to the open source
The platform, the tools, and even this website are public repositories in the community's hands. Start with an issue labeled for newcomers, or bring your own fix.
Support the foundation
Contributions fund the training runs, the infrastructure, and the people who keep the open layer maintained. Details on giving are published transparently — see the transparency page for the record.
For sponsorship or major giving, reach out and the conversation starts there. Every contribution is recorded in the public record.
Contact the foundation