Flock to Fedora is more than a conference – it’s where the Fedora community comes alive. As part of the In the CommitHistory campaign, we sat down with confirmed Flock 2026 speakers to hear their stories: what brought them to Fedora, what Flock means to them personally, and what they’re hoping for in Prague this June. This is one of those conversations.
In 2015, an 18-year-old student walked into his first Flock not knowing a single person. He was shy, a little overwhelmed, and had no idea what he was walking into. By the time he walked out, something had shifted. The community had been so genuinely welcoming, so warm and easy to fall into that he left not just curious about Fedora, but hungry to be part of it.
That student was Justin Wheeler. And Flock never really let him go.
What started as one conference became a thread running through his entire open source journey. First he became a Fedora Magazine author. Then editor-in-chief. And now, as Fedora Community Architect, he’s the one standing on stage at the opening and closing looking out at the very kind of room that once changed his life helping shape the event that shaped him.
He’ll be the first to admit it’s a lot. “It’s way more intense and hard work than I ever could have realized,” he says, with genuine respect for everyone who built Flock before him. But that experience of once being the nervous newcomer gives him something no job description could have: an instinct for why people show up and what makes it matter.
