The story: power, truth, and walking the fun path

Our powerlessness feeds our desire to hate. This is not a personal failing – it’s a social design flaw. A path built on alienation and distraction will always funnel frustration into polarisation. That’s why the controversy-driven algorithms of the #dotcons (corporate social media platforms) are not just annoying, but actively harmful. They feed on our despair, and we, often unknowingly, feed on the drama they serve back to us.

It’s a closed loop of spectacle and spite, profitable to the #nastyfew but corrosive to us, the meany. An extractive business model built on social breakdown. And yet, many of us know this. So why do we stay? Because stepping away from this mess is hard. It takes more than wishful thinking. It takes movement. Not only that, but it takes organising. It takes the kind of networked activism and lived alternatives the Open Media Network (#OMN) has been building and trying to seed for the last ten years

Let us not overlook vital things, because of the bulk of trifles confronting us.

Truth isn’t declared, it’s built. #Postmodernism taught us that truth is slippery. That’s fine, but in the hands of #mainstreaming culture, that slipperiness has become a tool of endless distraction and decay. People say things like they are true because they feel true. They build tech platforms because they believe in them. They sell movements as brands because it looks like change. But let’s be honest: wishing something into truth does not make it true.

What makes things true is collective struggle, shared purpose, and concrete acts of solidarity. A load of social work, grounded activism, and careful trust-building make something true. This is the hard path, but it’s also the only one worth walking, and when we do it together with joy it’s the happy path.

Pettiness separates; breadth unites. Let us be broad and big.

The #geekproblem, again, is too often a part of this mess. Writing code is seen as a kind of truth declaration. “Look, it runs! So it must be real!” But a thing that compiles is not the same as a thing that lives. Tech without community is a corpse. For anything to matter, you need people. And to keep people, you need some rough-and-ready PR. You need actual engagement. You need trust, time, and probably a bit of music and food too. We can’t engineer our way out of this crisis. We have to organise our way out.

The #Lifecult vs. the #Deathcult. What we’re up against isn’t just bad ideas, it’s a worship of stability, spectacle, and control, the illusion of movement through aesthetic alone, no real challenge to the dominant system. It feels warm. It promises safety. But it leaves no room for difference, contradiction, or rebellion, this is inside both “cult”.

It requires less mental effort to condemn than to think

This is why we don’t need worship, we need practical action. Change and challenge are not side effects of our projects – they are the sharp point. We don’t do this work to be liked, we do it because there is no other way to make things true. And if we do this together, it becomes fun and meaningful – we create social “truth”.

Working with the #Eurocrats (and other impossible people). Let’s talk about the institutions. The #EU. Local governments. #NGOs. Big tech “allies.” They are hopelessly incompetent when it comes to grassroots tech and progressive social change. But here’s the thing, they will not go away on their own. If we don’t push, the right-wing will step in and push harder. That’s mess is already happening.

Revolution is but thought carried into action.

So we take the harder path, we show up, try to guide. We keep the door open even when it slams in our face. And yes, it’s exhausting. We’ve tried to work with #mainstreaming people. Many are unbelievably vile, and worst of all, they have no idea they’re behaving badly. They don’t see their role in the decay. They don’t see the crisis, because the spectacle of control makes everything look fine.

But we see it, and we are not powerless, refusing the mess is about rebuilding the commons. Yes, the current #mainstreaming is a mess. A deep, systemic, soul-grinding mess. But we should not put up with it. That’s what #OMN is for. That’s what projects like #indymediaback, #OGB (Open Governance Body), and the broader #openweb movement are trying to hold space for.

We don’t need more hype. We need slow, messy, grounded work:

  • Listen more than we preach.
  • Read each other’s code, politics, and history before rewriting.
  • Talk about our failures honestly.
  • Grow media and networks that are native to community, not layered on top like #dotcons digital colonialism.
  • Build up our own cultures of care and collaboration in the #openweb to replace the dying ones.

This is fun, not a strategy of purity or perfection, it’s a strategy of survival, and even joy.
Ideas? Responses? This is not a closed story, it’s a beginning. If you’re reading this and feeling the weight of it, good. That’s where we start from. But let’s not stop there. Come build, talk, and argue. Come plant seeds, come help make the mess into compost.

All the quotes are from Emma Goldman

Invisible agenda on the #openweb

A. #NGIforum21 #NGI #EU It’s not “usability” its “control” – the #dotcons are built for control the #eurocrates need, the #openweb tools which work fine is for people to people.

The #openweb tools do not have the control that the #Eurocrats need to move onto our tools and be a part of our community. This is going to lead to a “invisible” fight, as they are increasingly funding development we face a crisis in the #fediverse A Sheldon crises talking the language of our crew.

Q. Yes, we should keep things people-to-people and avoid getting involved with large hierarchical organizations who will try to appear friendly but will move the development into a more centralized mode which they can then influence and have control over.

What the EU people want I think is a Silicon Valley in the EU. A digital portfolio from which they can project influence internationally and a vehicle for venture capital and new digital markets. If you read their blurb this is what they say, and I don’t have any reason to disbelieve them.

Obviously something like the fediverse doesn’t really fit with the cunning EU plan (fits like a fish riding a bicycle) and so at some point there will be an ideological parting of lovers (perhaps it has already happened, I am not following the NGI conversations).

A. The #mainstreaming funding of the #fedivers is already completely dominated by the #EU all the big projects are funded by #NGI

This is more #fuckup than conspiracy though am shore conspiracy is growing as people see the levers of power and control which comes with money agenda.

It’s an “invisible” hot war, standing aside is not an option.

Q. Maybe there should be a plan for whenever the EU launches some venture capital fediverse product. I expect it would be like what Trump is doing, but under some EU branded “incubator” and maybe with centralized moderation.

Something like that would create a tug-of-love between the revenue of projects and a centralizing agenda. I’ve been around the bloc enough times to know it’s bound to happen. These things are so formulaic.

A. I think that’s jumping ahead of were we are for the next year or two. Most of the People at #NGI pushing this agenda simple do not see the damage they do. Only a tiny number are actively “evil” currently.

We have a opening http://hamishcampbell.com the last few posts are a way to step away from this “crisis”.

Q. It’s like you can see the truck driving towards the cliff edge.

“If you go in that direction, you’ll fall off the edge”.

The driver says “Nah mate, it’s different this time”.

And you watch the truck as it reaches the precipice, and then falls off.

A. yep but need to look in the back of tuck as it’s filled with much of the #fedivers infrastructure that’s going to go over the cliff.

Actavisam is to sit down in front of the truck and refuse to move, while talking to the “press” about the issues #fluffy

Or pour sugar into the truck fual tank in the night #spiky

Standing and watching while shrugging shoulders is kinda #mainstreaming 🙂