FireSide Fedi (Panel)

Presented by

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  Anthony Zone
  @ozoned@btfree.social @btfree_org
  https://anthonyzone.com/

  With over fifteen years of experience spanning the healthcare and finance industries, he has built a distinguished career in information technology. His seven-year tenure at Red Hat solidified his commitment to open-source solutions and collaborative development practices. Throughout his professional journey, he has consistently championed transparency, security, and user autonomy in digital infrastructure.

  In recent years, he founded BT Free (Big Tech Free), a public charity dedicated to advocating for decentralized and open platforms. The organization promotes alternatives to centralized tech ecosystems, with particular focus on the fediverse and community-driven technologies. He also operates tubefree.org, providing resources and support for those seeking privacy-respecting, non-corporate online experiences.

  His work reflects a belief that technology should serve individuals rather than extract value from them. Through BT Free, he continues to educate communities about the importance of open standards, data sovereignty, and sustainable digital independence. His advocacy bridges technical expertise with grassroots organizing, helping people transition away from proprietary platforms toward more equitable internet infrastructure.

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  Ben Pate
  @benpate@mastodon.social https://benpate.dev

  I am a builder, who believes in the original promise of the Internet - that free and open communication could democratize access to knowledge and power around the world. So my contribution to this fight is in building the tools to reclaim individual freedom and sovereignty from invasive tech. By making it easier for regular, non-technical people to join the open social web, we help move humanity forward - one human at a time.

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  Dan Supernault
  

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  Django Doucet
  @django@social.coop https://mediaformat.org

  Django is a Social Web Developer and Instructor of Digital Design at NAIT (Northern Alberta Institute of Technology). He has contributed to various ActivityPub projects over the years, notably WordPress-ActivityPub, and is currently developing a Progressive Web App to push forward the unrealized potential of the ActivityPub Client API.

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  Matt Baer
  @matt@writing.exchange https://write.as/matt/

  Matt is a software developer who's spent over a decade building for the social web, from closed apps to, over the last several years, the fediverse. He's the founder of Write.as, a minimalist, writer-friendly blogging platform launched in 2015. In 2018, Write.as joined the fediverse and went open source as WriteFreely, which now powers hundreds of independent writing communities and blogs around the world. He is also the admin of Writing Exchange, a Mastodon-based community for writers, as well as other online communities.

  In his free time, he helps organize NYC Photo Stroll, an in-person meetup for photographers around New York City, where he is based.

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  Vagrant Cascadian
  @vagrantc@floss.social https://www.aikidev.net

  Vagrant strives to make Reproducible Builds a best practices reality for everyone. Vagrant discovered free software late last millennium and has been contributing to free software since the beginning of this millennium. A long-time Debian Developer and contributor to Guix, tinkering with ARM and RISC-V systems, Vagrant contrasts spending too much time on computers with aikido, bicycle commuting and a DIY solar hobby.