I believe to try and balance much of the current mess, people should focus on grassroots activism and building alternative systems to combat the current social, ecological, and technological mess. With a strong emphasis on open processes (#4opens), fostering collective action, to challenge the #neoliberal status quo (#deathcult) through direct engagement, rebooting independent media, and…
Composting mess (truth)
NOTE: This might seam a little confused because it is, I am arguing for “balance” and “use” in truths, and arguing against dogmatic, blinded, worshipping of the #deathcult as a moral argument. None of this shit is rational, it’s a mess I am pointing to, and a shovel and composting is needed to build truth.…
A practical path to balance the current “governance” mess in #FOSS
To build consensus processes in #FOSS (Free and Open Source Software), we need to apply principles from radical activism, embracing messy democracy and affinity group organization: For example, in FOSS, we could implement a process where a proposal only moves forward if it gains a basic level of support (likes or votes), and participants have…
The Present and Future of US Politics: Foreign Policy
Speaker: Peter Feaver (Duke University)As the United States heads into a high-stakes presidential election, this seminar series explores the structural problems and political challenges behind the headlines. We examine why American politics is so polarised and ask: what is at stake in the 2024 elections? The seminars will open with a short presentation by an…
Location and Rebellion: Rethinking the Relationship between Revolution and State Capacity
Speaker: Mark Beissinger (Princeton) DRAFT First impression is that everyone is very shiny and affluent, young academics and future bureaucrats. Looking at how location affects revolution challenge and state repression. Safe but infective in rural areas, close to power in urban areas revaluations have more impact but are much more dangerous for the revolutionaries. State…
#KISS is a key, democracy
A core tension between alternative cultures and the mainstream: the mainstream demands that alternative cultures conform in order to be effective, while the alt paths intentionally resist this push, aiming to remain distinct and radical. This clash creates a deeper issue—#mainstreaming voices tend to block and reject the need for a bridge between these two…
The #deathcult we worship: Totalitarian Capitalism Consumes Everything
In the modern world, #neoliberalism penetrates every aspect of our lives. It commodifies not only goods and services but human relations, creativity, and increasingly the natural world. This historical #dathcult is designed to obscure its roots and operations, keeping people powerless and confused, while ensuring the prosperity of a greedy and nasty few. By stripping…
The Non-Profit Industrial Complex (#NPIC): A Double-Edged Sword in #FOSS and Activism
What we call #NGO’s in the hashtag story. The Non-Profit Industrial Complex (NPIC) entanglement of non-profits, big businesses, governments, and social activism can, leads to mess we need to compost. While nonprofits can fund crucial tech and activist work, their reliance on corporate-linked foundations dilutes this, to keep receiving money, the is STRONG presser to…
Communities Adopt #KISS Tools, Not Technologies
Communities don’t adopt digital technologies—they adopt #KISS tools. People don’t think about TCP/IP or HTTP when browsing the web, or SMTP when sending emails. Similarly, they don’t think about #ActivityPub when using the #Fediverse. They interact with intuitive tools that simplify these layers. One of the toughest challenges in grassroots #DIY tech is creating #FOSS…
A new home #boatingeurope
Recognizing the Failure of the Center
A crucial question, that speaks to the frustration many people feel toward the ongoing crises—political, environmental, social—that is not only the failure of the center but also the collapse of the system itself. The center, sees itself as a space of compromise and stability, but has been propped up for decades by a neoliberal ideology…
The tension, grassroots movements and #NGO paths
The is a tension between grassroots movements and #NGO paths on the #Fediverse and wider #openweb projects. From a #fluffy point of view the NGO path, while often well-intentioned, can lead to forms of imperialism where outside forces-through funding, structure, and top-down approaches—unwittingly impose their agendas on communities. These actors often don’t realize they are…