Network School acquires Farcaster from Neynar in protocol ownership shift
Regulation & Gov ·
Decentralized social network Farcaster has changed hands, with its main app set to adopt AI moderation and onchain voting while the underlying protocol stays open-source.
Network School has acquired Farcaster from Neynar, according to a report from The Block. The deal introduces what has been described as a new "social smart contract" model governing how users participate on the platform going forward.
Under the new structure, the Farcaster protocol itself remains open and accessible to developers and third-party clients, preserving the decentralized infrastructure that has defined the network. The change is concentrated in the main app, which will implement AI-driven moderation alongside a proof-of-human verification system, according to a post detailing the acquisition.
A central feature of the new model is onchain voting: users will be able to vote on whether individual members remain full participants in the community or are shifted to read-only status. This mechanism ties community standing directly to a verifiable, onchain process rather than leaving moderation decisions solely to centralized app administrators.
The acquisition is corroborated across multiple reports describing it simply as Network School taking over the decentralized social network, with Neynar named as the seller in the more detailed account. Reaction to the move has been mixed, reflecting differing views on reconciling AI-driven content moderation and onchain voting on user status with a network built around open protocol access.
What remains unclear is how the proof-of-human voting system will be implemented technically, what thresholds will trigger a shift to read-only status, and how the AI moderation layer will interact with developers building on the still-open protocol. Terms of the acquisition, including any financial details, have not been disclosed in the available reporting.