src/_posts/2021-02-16-coop-cloud.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title: The Cooperative Cloud
+description: Free software infrastructure without re-inventing the wheel
+image: coop-cloud.png
+category: coop, cloud, docker, swarm, free-software
+date: 2021-02-16
+---
+
+At Autonomic, we've been using [Cloudron] to quickly and easily deploy free
+software applications (Wordpress, Nextloud, Mediawiki, etc.) for our clients.
+If you haven't heard of Cloudron, here is the short summary of what it does: it
+provides infrastructure hosters like Autonomic with a simple to use web
+interface for deploying hundreds of free software applications in a few clicks
+of the mouse.
+
+Using a system like Cloudron has expanded our capacity to support more "on a
+shoestring" grassroots organising because it reduces our initial starting
+costs. This is the work that we feel is important to support even when there is
+little funding to pay for that work.
+
+However, as time has gone on, we've had a few moments when we questioned our
+reliance on Cloudron.
+
+- Parts the system officially [became proprietary] which was worrying but also
+  somewhat understandable from a funding perspective.
+
+- The work to package the available applications is done [entirely by
+  the Cloudron team itself] and doesn't re-use the existing rich ecosystem of
+  free software packaging work already going on. This seems unsustainable.
+
+- A growing fear of centralising a significant part of our offering on a
+  single business which may make decisions that could have a large impact on
+  our ability to provide services.
+
+As a result of these concerns, we tried to map out a few core principles of a
+project which might work a lot like Cloudron but give us more guarantees that
+we can depend on. We've started to call that the Cooperative Cloud.
+
+- The Coop Cloud should always be available under [copyleft licenses] to retain
+  the shared work as public property. This doesn't mean we can't pursue
+  commercial work but we can't rely on creating false scarcity to earn money.
+
+- The Coop Cloud doesn't re-invent the wheel. We aim is to work with existing
+  free software communities who are already packaging and publishing their
+  software (Nextcloud, Gitea, Mediawiki, Rocket.chat, the list goes on...). We
+  want to be involved in their community spaces and build bridges between
+  infrastructure, software development and end-users.
+
+- The Coop Cloud has democratic governance at the core of the project. We
+  want to work as much as possible with other cooperatives to build up good
+  decision making structures so we can all depend on this project.
+
+With those ideas in mind, we started to build something in the time we could
+spare. We worked on a simple packaging format using existing [open standards]
+to build the application catalogue. We wrote a command-line client which could
+read the catalogue and deploy those applications.
+
+We can safely say the cooperative cloud project is currently alpha quality
+software but it shows promise and signs of stability. We've already been
+testing a sort of "dual power" strategy with some existing clients and we've
+been seeing good results. We're happy to say that we're already partially
+running operations on the Cooperative Cloud.
+
+If you want to learn more about the project, please read our documentation
+where we explain the decisions we've made so far in more depth. What
+technologies we're using, how we fit into the existing ecosystem, ways to
+contribute, what applications are available and so on.
+
+> [cloud.autonomic.zone](https://cloud.autonomic.zone/)
+
+At this point, we'd like to invite other cooperatives to take a look at what
+we're working on and come and have a chat with us. We think a common platform
+for hosting free software infrastructure could make a big difference in terms
+of what we're able to offer as a movement.
+
+[cloudron]: https://cloudron.io/
+[became proprietary]: https://forum.cloudron.io/topic/2862/why-not-make-cloudron-fully-open-source-again
+[entirely by the cloudron team itself]: https://git.cloudron.io/cloudron
+[copyleft licenses]: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html
+[open standards]: https://compose-spec.io/