You know Block – but you may not know that you know the company. After changing their name in December from Square, Inc. to Block, the company is made up of Square, Cash App, TIDAL, Spiral, and TBD54566975. We are excited to announce that Block joined the Linux Foundation as a Silver Member.
At their core, Block is a global technology company with a focus on financial services. They work to help diverse audiences—sellers, individuals, artists, fans, developers, and all the people in between—overcome barriers to access the economy. From enabling sellers to adapt to a new, contactless and omnichannel economy, to finding new ways for musicians to get paid and pursuing many crypto initiatives aimed at improving the Bitcoin ecosystem, they are innovating every day to help shape a more inclusive economy of the future.
Collaboration is a priority for them—they understand the value it brings to innovation as they pursue their purpose of economic empowerment. Consequently, they want to build and collaborate in the open, making their partnership with the Linux Foundation a natural fit. The Linux Foundation helps communities and corporate participants collaborate at scale on open source projects that are critical to organizations like Block.
Max Sills, a leader in open source partnerships and legal issues, and Counsel at Block, explains, “At Block, we believe everyone deserves to participate in the economy, and a critical portion of that work is pursuing a decentralized and permissionless future for financial services. The open source model is directly aligned with this mission. As we continue building our blockchain initiatives, we’re proud to join the Linux Foundation to drive access and empower people around the world.”
It may seem counterintuitive for a financial services company to want to develop in the open, but Block recognizes open and secure go together. They know that community is strength, and they understand strength comes from working together.
Jim Higgins is Block’s Chief Information Security Officer, “The open source model is a critical part of Block’s infrastructure, and building and operating in the open is a priority for us. The open source community is at a turning point, and we need to band together to iron out some of the snags to make software safe and accessible for everyone.”
The Linux Foundation empowers open source innovators. Jim Zemlin, Executive Director at the Linux Foundation said, “We know that innovation comes from everywhere and that the Open Source Community is addressing the challenges of industry and technology for the benefit of society. We are excited to have Block as a partner on this path.”
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