Forks aren’t just a technical event. We can look at them as philosophical ruptures, and the open source world isn’t the first to face this. Crypto communities have lived and breathed this reality for over a decade, often in the most chaotic, transparent, and high-stakes ways possible.
Now, as Valkey rises to become the de facto open source Redis, what if we can take a few lessons from the blockchains, especially now that Redis has made its latest licensing pivot?
1. Builders follow relevance, not righteousness
Crypto lesson: Ethereum Classic stayed true to decentralization after the DAO hack, but Ethereum (with more pragmatic and adaptable governance) kept growing and innovating.
Redis Inc. changed its license to protect monetization, then introduced a tri-license model (RSALv2, SSPL, and AGPLv3) to appeal to different user groups. It’s a move meant to regain favor, but the real question for builders isn’t just about licensing. It’s about where the action is. Who’s shipping? What are the tools? What real problems are we trying to solve?
Valkey gained attention because it stood for openness and freedom, but it will only keep it if it also becomes the platform where things happen. That means delivering real functionality, supporting new use cases, and attracting developers who want to build, not just philosophize. Because in the long run, builders don’t follow ideology, they follow energy.
2. Ecosystem > Innovation
Litecoin wasn’t radically better than Bitcoin. But it was stable, easy to use, and well-supported. That’s what kept it alive.
Valkey faces the same dynamic, but now with a bonus: Redis’s tri-license adds just enough legal fog that many enterprise buyers will default to Valkey simply because it’s easier to understand. Simplicity is a feature.
If adoption is difficult, if modules don’t exist, or if ops teams can’t monitor it, people will stick with Redis out of inertia. But Valkey’s growing ecosystem needs to keep removing that friction fast: tooling, operators, observability, and integrations that “just work”, so Valkey is stable, easy to use, and well-supported.
3. Messaging must stay ruthlessly simple
Bitcoin SV failed not because of tech but because no one could explain why it existed. Clarity wins adoption.
Valkey’s positioning stays powerful here: “Redis. Truly open. Foundation-governed.”
Redis Inc. now needs to explain how RSAL, SSPL, and AGPL coexist – and to whom they apply. Valkey doesn’t need to enter that debate. The simpler the message, the stronger the adoption curve.
4. Forking was easy. Leading is harder.
Ethereum Classic stuck to principle but lost relevance as Ethereum shipped relentlessly, from smart contracts to Layer 2s.
Valkey can’t simply exist as “the fork” forever. Redis Inc. continues pushing forward with Redis Flex (disk-based storage), AI-powered caching, vector search, and cloud-native services.
If Valkey wants to stay relevant, it needs more than open governance – it needs open innovation. That means moving fast, experimenting publicly, and meeting enterprise expectations head-on. Modularity, AI integration, multi-cloud support – these can’t be long-term ideas. They need to be now.
5. Community remains the only real moat
Every successful crypto fork had a thriving, participating community. The forks that died had only mailing lists.
Valkey’s future depends on:
- Regular public releases and maintainers who are accessible
- Contributor voices being heard and valued
- Enterprise adopters feeling safe putting it into production
- Vendors (Percona, cloud platforms, MSPs) actively building services and tooling around it
Redis’s licensing shifts don’t change this. If anything, they make Valkey’s community credibility even more valuable.
Final thought: This is a movement, not just a module
Redis Inc. changed the game by changing the rules. Valkey responded, not just with a fork, but with a bet on community trust and neutral governance.
Redis’s new tri-license didn’t simplify the landscape; it made the value of true open governance even clearer. For many organizations, simplicity, transparency, and freedom aren’t just legal preferences but risk-management decisions.
Now the world is watching: Can open win again?
Crypto already showed us how forks either become movements or footnotes.
Want to go deeper?
Check out our report Key-Value Stores: Adoption Trends Through a Valkey Lens to explore how this shift is playing out in real-world adoption, feature sets, and developer momentum.
About the Author
Andrey GlazkovAndrey Glazkov is a Product Manager at Percona, where he leads product strategy across Support, Professional Services, and Managed Services. While his primary focus is on these service pillars, he also spearheads initiatives in emerging technologies, notably Valkey (the open-source fork of Redis). Andrey has been instrumental in developing Percona’s enterprise-grade support for Valkey, aligning it with the company’s commitment to open-source excellence. He also played a key role in launching Percona’s EOL support for MySQL 5.7 EOL. Prior to Percona, Andrey drove LLM-powered product initiatives at PwC. He holds an MBA with a focus on Data Analytics from Arizona State University. Andrey combines technical fluency with go-to-market strategy to drive product innovation and customer success. He lives in Alexandria, VA.
