NousCon NYC was 🪽🪽🪽 https://x.com/i/article/2116498201557553152
NousCon NYC 2026: Why Open Source Will Win the Next Decade of Software
When I saw the announcement of the NousCon event in New York City, I applied immediately. I'm a big fan of the Hermes agent and agents in general and I wanted to meet other builders. I had no idea what to expect at the event but it was some of the best networking I've ever done.
I almost don't even want to call it networking as it sounds businesslike and what is happening with @NousResearch is business like, it is doing it in a way that makes the outside business world very very uncomfortable. I feel like I made some new friends there and everyone's use of agents and their backgrounds were as random as you could imagine.
For me personally, NousCon was validation of something I've been working on with my own company @statsdrone. That is a consideration for source-available and/or open source software.
Why companies struggle with open source software
Earlier this year, we accidentally built our own data analytics and visualization tool which we called @nousviz (not associated with Nous Research). Let me share a short story to show you what is really happening in the real world.
When we told our potential customers that our data viz tool and maybe our affiliate stats cool could be available as open source, they got very excited. They loved the idea of having full ownership of a product and most importantly, protection of their data.
The tech people on our team were actually very against this idea of making our software either open source or source available. Our tech team seemed to hate the idea saying if we give away the secret sauce, they'll stop being customers.
My counter arguments are asking them what open source software they use to build our own products and how much money those companies have made.
I didn't expect my own team to not support my stance and this is exactly what's happening in the real world.
My non tech business partner fully supports me but it was a little disappointing to not get any support from my own tech team.
Just imagine how many people work for a company and the owners don't want to hear it but you have the opposite of owners that have their own tech people feeling threatened with open source.
If my team struggles with it then the rest of the world must be in a similar position. Do you think a company like Salesforce is going to open source their CRM tools or do the same with @tableau? I don't think so but that is my exact pitch for Tableau users is that my software is open source and you can own your data and I can build your BI dashboards without ever seeing or touching your data.
The world is clearly stating what they want to day, they don't want to be held hostage with their tech.
Last week at a meetup in Montreal, a new friend said there is one tech giant data platform that they use and loathe that boasts "we don't have customers, we have prisoners". WTF!
Of course my next playbook will be connecting my software with agents.
Security and privacy
One of the common discussions that I got from the audience was security and privacy. Security is making some people uncomfortable and I think this is going to cause a drive towards more people wanting to fully own their tech stack. It is a full circle of going from owning software, to SaaS and now back to ownership.
I'd say there will be more investment from companies and people in improving their security skills.
The people
The people I made at the event were all fascinating. I met some people that were deep into tech and security and just as many that I'd describe as being non tech people that were doing amazing things.
Thanks to the whole Nous Research team for putting this together and accepting us to attend. @witcheer, @teknium, @calvinnwq was a pleasure to meet and thank you for the validation.
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