rewrite this title OSFest 2026 opens community voting on themes – Hypergrid Business

OSFest 2026 will run October 12 through 26 across the hypergrid, organizer Lisa Laxton told Hypergrid Business, and the community is now voting on the festival’s theme through a custom ranked-choice platform she built for the occasion. Voting closes on May 31.

The community submitted 18 theme suggestions this year, Laxton told Hypergrid Business. Rather than picking one with a simple poll, organizers are using a ranked consensus voting system that produces a composite ranking from all participants’ choices.

The voting page is public, and anyone can rank the suggestions, Laxton said. Results will help organizers settle on one or more themes for the festival.

Built for the global hypergrid crowd

Last year’s OSFest drew avatars from more than 150 grids, and Laxton said the new voting tool was designed with that international, accessibility-minded audience in mind.

The tool supports 16 languages and auto-detects the browser’s preferred language, Laxton said in her email. It also includes an AI-assisted election helper that takes voice or text input in the selected language.

“The palette and font used is dyslexia and neurodiverse friendly,” Laxton said. The page is screen-reader compatible, and users can engage by mouse, keyboard, or voice from any device because the site is built as a Progressive Web App.

OSFest 2025 welcomed events from any grid that could provide a stream URL, with simulcasts handled through the hypergrid broadcaster system from 0HubRadio.com.

This year follows the same open pattern.

“Anyone can participate in the voting and host events on any grid this year,” Laxton said. The OSFest calendar will go live after the election while the OSFest grid is being updated to support physically based rendering.

Organizers used a community vote to pick the theme for OSFest 2024 as well, though that round was conducted via Discord emoji reactions and email.

Hypergrid Business editor and publisher Maria Korolov is a science fiction novelist. During the day, Maria Korolov is an award-winning freelance technology journalist who covers artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and enterprise virtual reality. See her Amazon author page here and follow her on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn, and check out her latest videos on the Maria Korolov YouTube channel. Email her at [email protected]. Her first virtual world novella, Krim Times, made the Amazon best-seller list in its category. Her second novella, The Lost King of Krim, is out now. She is also the publisher of MetaStellar, a new online magazine of speculative fiction.

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