Introducing Acorn: Community Infrastructure That Grows With You

> Octavia Butler published Parable of the Sower in 1993, but it is set in a version of America in 2024 with a dangerous demagogue at the helm of the country and community all but broken down. She was prophetic. The protagonist, Lauren Olamina, develops Earthseed – a philosophy that worships change as the only true constant force in the world. The adherents of Earthseed worship by paying deep attention to the world around them, understanding the way that it changes, and learning to shape that change itself. This vision and the constant acts of care Lauren displays builds a community capable of adapting to the hostile world around them. She calls that community Acorn. > > Our platform is named Acorn as an homage to this vision. Like the fictional Acorn community, Blacksky has survived through constant adaptation. We didn’t plan to build out the full infrastructure stack we have now – a stack that provides complete independence of Bluesky. Each step was adaptive. We built feeds, because Black users on Bluesky needed a way to find each other. We created a mute list, because Blacksky users deserved a way to easily know which accounts to avoid. We deployed a labeler, because the community needed a way to define its own policies and proactively filter out posts and accounts. We hosted a PDS, because our community members wanted to host their data with a service that they knew would protect them. We built an appview, because the community needed a view of the network that reflected our relationships and values. As the community grew, its needs changed and our infrastructure grew to fit those needs. Community need guided every step.