People, community, the long struggle between the #openweb and #dotcons

This is a mess that has been clear to see for 20 years, but people keep falling into the same traps instead of stepping off the cycle of control. We had something, we lost it, and we are still refusing to face why.

Let’s use #Failbook as a practical example of a monster that devours our dreams, fifteen years ago, the writing was already on the wall, #failbook and the #dotcons would eat everything. It wasn’t some grand conspiracy, just basic power and control dynamics. People knew this. They saw the cage being built around them, yet walked in willingly. Why? Because in the small picture, it was “easier” to stay inside than to step outside. They thought they were users, but they were being used. Every attempt to “fix” #failbook, the endless ethical tech debates, the “kinder, fairer” alternatives, the #NGO-funded projects promising “a better social network”, misses the core issue: You don’t fix a monster. You stop feeding it and walk away.

This is where the religious metaphor fits, people don’t want atheism (the #openweb), they just want a nicer god (ethical #dotcons). They still kneel before centralized power, just hoping for a softer whip. We need to stop worshipping the digital feudal lords and start building something else entirely. One path is to reboot the original #openweb

To do this we need some social history: The #openweb was murdered, and no one faced the consequences, we need a truth and reconciliation process for what happened to the #openweb. Why? Because people refuse to learn from history, and that means they keep making the same mistakes. Look at the waves of migration from open to closed over the last two decades:

The rise of blogs and open publishing (2000s) → The pull into social media walled gardens (2010s)
The rise of the federated web (2000s, early 2010s) → The collapse into corporate-owned silos (late 2010s, 2020s)
The rebirth of the Fediverse (Mastodon, PeerTube, Lemmy, etc.) → Now being co-opted by NGOs and #mainstreaming interests

Each time, the excuse is different, but the result is the same, we hand over power, they take control, we lose everything. Until we face the fact that we let this happen, that we were complicit, this cycle won’t stop. Every time we fail to call it what it is, the blood-letting/stains keep coming back.

The problem with #NGO and Co-op models, people love to push the same “solutions” that failed before. Pushing a voluntary project into a hard “not-for-profit” structure kills it, this happened again and again. Look at #indymedia. It worked because it was messy, decentralized, built from the ground up. Run by volunteers, not controlled by a central authority. Rooted in the activist base, not an #NGO-funded agenda. Then came the push to “formalize” it, and what happened?

Funding fights, bureaucracy, infighting.
Projects being hijacked or forced into rigid structures.
Most of the co-op/NGO media projects collapsed.

There is nothing wrong with people building not-for-profit media, but stop forcing voluntary activism into structures that will kill it. The old mistakes aren’t new solutions. They are just mistakes waiting to happen again.

The #OMN and the need for diversity of strategies, the #OMN is built on a simple idea, diversity of strategies is strength. We need:

Commercial models where they work.
Not-for-profit structures where they make sense.
Voluntary activism as the foundation.

Then the basic #4opens of them linking to each other. What we don’t need is people using their own narrow worldview as a #BLOCK on other approaches in the guise of “helping”. This happens all the time, with the #NGO crowd that wants everything formalized, structured, and professionalized, they see grassroots messiness as a problem. The geeks want everything to be purely about the tech, ignoring the social and political realities. The politicos want everything to align with their ideology, even when that means excluding actual working solutions. These proxy fights kill the meany projects before they even start.

The solution is not ideological purity, it’s pragmatic diversity. If we want to break the cycle, we need to stop repeating the same mistakes, stop blocking each other, link and start building with what we have #KISS

One path to this, that needs support https://opencollective.com/open-media-network

The light in this is the #Fediverse, otherwise the last decade in tech has been a complete dead end. We’ve watched the same old mistakes play out, layering more “solutions” onto the #geekproblem without ever questioning the foundation. Instead of building trust, we’ve been sold “security” wrapped in fear, reinforcing the same toxic cycles that keep us locked in place.

The #OMN projects build from the #Fediverse and #openweb reboot to break from this. They are about real empowerment, shifting power by growing trust rather than control. If we keep repeating the same mistakes, we’re just feeding the #deathcult, accelerating the collapse. The #fashernista and #encryptionist obsessions, instead of opening paths to change, have become blind alleyways leading to catastrophe. We need to step back, reassess, and build differently, before the coming decades bring suffering on a scale we’ve barely begun to grasp.

Bridging the Divide: Using Imperfect Tech for Real Paths

I have an #ActivityPub account on a #fashernista anarchist server and another on a liberal #mainstreaming instance. I deliberately boost posts between them, not as an act of personal amplification but as a small, intentional intervention to bypass the “common sense” blocking that happens on both sides.

This isn’t about ME< ME< ME. It’s about building bridges in the messy, imperfect flows of social tech. People often don’t see how tightly they’re locked into ideological bubbles, where the “obvious” truths of their side become invisible walls. By bridging content between these spaces, the goal is to reintroduce doubt, curiosity, and a flicker of understanding that wouldn’t otherwise cross the divide.

It’s a #KISS path to bridge-building. Not perfect, but practical. The tech might be flawed, and people might misinterpret the intent, but that’s part of the struggle. The point is to gently challenge the cycle of people only hearing what reinforces their paths, to remind them that the story is always bigger, more complex, and worth exploring.

If this sounds confusing, or if your first reaction is suspicion or dismissal, maybe that’s the signal to pause. The site linked here, hamishcampbell.com, dives deeper into these ideas. It’s not about personal validation; it’s about understanding the compost we’re standing in and figuring out how to grow something real together.

#KISS

UPDATE: if you have a “rat thought” and wont to pick this #4opens post up and hit me with it, note none of the posts convene the conduct of either instance, this is not about getting round unfull #blocks it is about getting round the unthought through result of some behaves. So please put that stick down and share the post, thanks.

Anarchism, the mess we make

In this area of activism, the uncomfortable truth is that the biggest obstacle is way too often the anarchists themselves. I have spent years stepping into and outa anarchist spaces, and it’s clear that anarchists struggle to embody the autonomy they talk about. The #fashernista cultures discourage people from stepping beyond the established narrow paths, dress, behaver and language, reinforcing a cycle of self-isolation and easy to see failure. It becomes a lifestyle, anarchism, in practice, can to often look less like a rebellion and more like a subculture adapted to coexist with the paths it claims to oppose.

When real revolutionary moments arise, familiar rhetoric, feels safer than the unpredictable leap into real stateless freedom. Faced with the potential for anarchy, many anarchists cling to “anarchism” instead, sabotaging movements like the #OMN and older #openweb out of fear of losing their place within the struggle. Even without formal organizations, anarchist recreate hierarchy, influential figures shaping discourse while subtly suppressing critiques that could disrupt their status. This hidden power structure, where decisions are made without accountability, is still the normal paths anarchism claims to reject.

The core of anarchist thought, the rejection of imposed authority and the belief in voluntary cooperation, still holds radical potential. The problem isn’t with the ideas; it’s with the way they’re enacted. The state, with its machinery of control, has created the conditions that make itself seem necessary. Anarchy won’t come from rigid adherence to this ideological brand but from people who shed the weight of anarchism as a subculture and start living anarchically, forging relationships based on mutual aid and direct action, without waiting for permission from the past.

If anarchists could step away from the trap of anarchism, the state wouldn’t stand a chance. It’s time to stop venerating failure and start cultivating the seeds of real, messy, lived anarchy.

The #OMN social tech projects are an example of this step.

Inspired by https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/bob-black-anarchism-and-other-impediments-to-anarchy

Radical movements are too often their own worst enemies

The #fashernistas poisoned the well of alt-media

This has been going on for more than ten years, I have been at the heart of this movement, at many of the steps, I meet defeatism and negativity. It’s frustrating, especially now, when the mainstream is visibly stepping away from the #dotcons and looking for a place to land. We should be building that landing space, but instead, we’re tangled in the wreckage of failed ideas and cynical inertia.

Yes, stupid fashionable ideas have failed again and again, but that doesn’t mean the basics no longer work. The #openweb grew from simple, powerful principles: decentralization, collaboration, and a belief that media should be in the hands of the people, not locked behind corporate walls. It worked then, and it can work now.

The #blocking wall, the #dotcons built to dam this flow, just might be crumbling, but I don’t think people realize just how much defeatist noise we had and still have to break through:

“Old tech. Nobody uses torrents anymore.”
“That’s been tried — it failed.”
“This is better, nobody’s interested in that.”
“You should be using XYZ instead. I have a better idea...”

It’s an endless cycle of negativity, driven by a #geekproblem that values novelty over function, and a #fashernista culture that chases trends rather than tending to the messy, necessary work of composting old ideas to grow something real. The #openweb tools still work, If we use them. The core tools of the #openweb are still powerful:

#RSS feeds for simple, open distribution.
#Torrents for decentralized, resilient file sharing.
#Fedivers networks like #Peertube, #Mastodon, and #Wordpress for publishing and connection.
Mesh networks and local-first tech to break dependence on centralized infrastructure.

None of these are new, that’s the point, they work. The failure wasn’t in the tech, it was in our inability to hold space against the relentless creep of the #deathcult. Reclaiming the compost heap is a first step, we need to stop chasing the next shiny thing and start digging through the muck. The #OMN, #indymediaback, and #4opens are all rooted in the idea that we can rebuild from what we already know works, not by reinventing the wheel but by getting our hands dirty and composting the failures into fertile ground for the future.

The defeatism is loud, but it’s not unbeatable. We’ve been here before. We know the way out.

Decentralize.
Publish.
Connect.
Trust the process.

We (re)build the #openweb one small, stubborn step at a time.

Deep breath. Take a step.

The Said Business School is a temple of the #deathcult

One thing to keep in mind is that these people largely think they are good people, doing the best they can in the world as it is. And will become upset and very #spiky defensive when pointing at them on their knees prostrate worshipping. Like they said in the seminar, “I don’t know what to do about this”. I don’t think most of us do.

The Clarendon Lectures 2025 – Designing the Future: Multidisciplinary perspectives on designing better futures

Systems thinking challenges traditional approaches to management research and practice. In this second Clarendon event, Tima Bansal engages in conversation with academics in #Oxford who are integrating research and practice with the ambition to co-create futures rather than simply analysing solutions.

An outsider, polemical look at this event: Most university panels have a #NGO-thinking academic for process box-ticking. This is the representation of the fluffy side of #mainstreaming social change. This lettuce person is at best a #fluffy careerist and at worst a #NGO parasite. If there is any content at all, it’s box-ticking to create the illusion of consent and goodwill.

Then the meat of the business school is the worship of the #deathcult — people climbing the gravestones of hierarchy in the shiny, crumbling mausoleums. Even then, it’s mostly careerist. This one is talking about embedding in more fluffy NGO groups to build their story. It’s all about community and relationships. She lets go of the ego she pushed first, to step back to embed. No idea what the outcome of her work is — it’s all process. She ends with a call for nature and holism, the world her work destroys.

The currency is theory; on this, the business school is completely bankrupt from an academic point of view — not to get into the subject of morals, let alone basic human survival. She says they push their content out into science journalism, as these people are not able to judge the value of abstract academic work.

The next is an accounting bureaucrat, who does mention the green limits. He touches on the real and talks about the language in documents of bureaucratic regulation. He says it’s a mess and doesn’t know what to do. Trusting what companies say is not going to be enough. You need to change the economic relationships, and changing this is very difficult — and it’s currently simply not working.

The summing-up person is excited with an issue? Not sure what — no idea what she is actually saying. She is back to not talking about anything. She touches on statues and embarrassment. Finally, she asks an interesting question: who is the ordinance, us or somebody else? We have no idea who?

She says we need strong institutions, as individual companies are not going to do it — they capture the levers of power and pull them to keep the mess, and money, flowing. She has no answer to this. She does mention moving past “markets” in passing for a moment.

Boundaries come up — the answer is fluff, then more substance, accounting has hard boundaries, but useful change comes from stepping outside this. Systems thinking — no answer.

These people are lost and are training up the next lost generation. It’s interesting to see that they have some understanding of this, but it’s looking like they will do nothing to change it.

Wine and nibbles were OK.

Talked to many of them after the event. A few said they were undercover academic “radicals” infiltrating the business colleges — which was maybe a tiny bit true, or not. The students I talked to were blank and staying in academia.

The “consultants” were interested and animated; they found it a little shockingly invigorating to have a counter-culture conversation.

To sum up, mostly hopeless. I am always surprised the place doesn’t stink of rotting zombies, a metaphor, maybe? They need some real content… they really need some real content, but you get the strong feeling that they are not even going to change until the Thames is flowing up under the nearby railway bridge. Even then, there will be calls for more sandbags while talking more about careers — all they know — but underneath this, they have the fear that these careers will likely not exist.

This is it. What to do?

It’s a bleak cycle: academics pump out theory to feed the chatting classes, who in turn guide the #fashernista, spinning ever more refined justifications for the status quo. The echo chamber reverberates with hollow soundbites while the world burns. What we end up with is a layer of intellectual manure, with no one doing the work to turn it into compost.

With projects like the #OMN social tech could be the spade that digs through this mess, breaking down the dead ideas and aerating the soil for something new to grow. But instead, we use #dotcons tech to pile up more waste. Every app, platform, and algorithm is designed to reinforce the system, not break it. The closed loops of influence, profit, and prestige just churn on.

If we want to prod this beast, one way I am working on is to embrace the disruptive potential of the #openweb. What if we built platforms that exposed the rot? Imagine public academic review systems where research couldn’t hide behind paywalls, or tools that tracked the influence of corporate funding on “objective” scholarship. There are some seeds for this, what if we grow them #4opens

Or more direct action, maybe we just crash the garden party. What if we hijacked their panels, flooded their Q&As with real questions, or set up rogue alt-conferences right outside their events? The goal isn’t destruction for destruction’s sake — it’s breaking the illusion of inevitability.

What do you think? How do we spark that shift in behaviour, that even they, softly, say we need to do.

#Oxford

UPDATE: If this #fluffy path is #blocked then people will turn #spiky as we are already seeing happening https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/24973861.oxford-university-palestine-action-group-admits-vandalising-building/ and https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/mar/08/a-new-phase-why-climate-activists-are-turning-to-sabotage-instead-of-protest we need a real debate in the university about how change comes about #KISS

The rise of #neofascism and the need for a #openweb response

With each passing day, we’re witnessing the acceleration of the global far-right resurgence, a modern incarnation of #fascism, adapted to our time. This neofascism wears the mask of democracy, claiming legitimacy through hollow elections, while quietly dismantling political freedoms. It thrives on the wreckage of #neoliberalism and the crises it has unleashed, feeding on fear, resentment, and social breakdown.

The growing number of neofascist regimes may lack the overt paramilitary displays of the past, but their violence is no less real. It simmers beneath the surface, ready to erupt when needed. And unlike the old fascism’s obsession with state control, this new version embraces the worst of #neoliberalism, surrendering public welfare to private greed, while doubling down on nationalism, racism, and hostility to any form of collective liberation.

With escalating #climatechaos and systemic collapse, this is not just a political threat but an existential one. These forces are accelerating our collective destruction, blocking meaningful environmental action, and fuelling division at precisely the moment we need solidarity.

So where is the path out of this mess? By composting the crisis and reclaiming the #openweb. The answer isn’t found in bunkers or prepper fantasies, survival in the face of collapse requires cooperation, not isolation. And it certainly won’t come from the #dotcons or the #NGO complex, which are too entangled with the systems they claim to resist.

We need to build a grassroots counterforce, grounded in the principles of the #4opens, to cultivate digital and physical spaces of resistance. The #openweb offers us a framework for doing this, a messy, imperfect garden where we can plant alternatives and nurture them with care. But it only grows if people use it. We need joined-up thinking, not the fractured, piecemeal approach of the #fashernista crowd. We need people to commit to using and building tools outside the corporate silos, even when it’s inconvenient. Because every click, every post, every conversation shapes the landscape we inhabit.

Muscular Liberalism by #AI – Trump vs Zelensky by @nimayndoleaux

Don’t ask, just do it, please don’t wait for permission or perfect conditions. Pick up a shovel and start composting the current mess. Rebuild local networks, create spaces for collective storytelling, and amplify voices that push back against #neofascist narratives. Use tools like the #OMN to link these efforts together into a larger ecosystem of resistance.

The neofascist wave may be rising, but history shows us that these forces can be stopped, not by isolated individuals, but by collective movements. The seeds of the future are already in our hands. The question is whether we have the courage to plant them.

#4opens #OMN #DIY #ClimateResistance #NoPasaran

Composting the Mess to Make Room to Plant

In the swirling chaos of the digital landscape, it’s easy to feel lost. The #Fediverse, should be a beacon of hope for a decentralized, community-driven internet, but as always is facing an onslaught of push back and pressures from every direction. The #dotcons loom large, #NGO agendas quietly co-opt grassroots energy, and the #encryptionists lash out with SPAM money to drown out critique. It’s messy, but mess is where compost comes from, and compost is where new life grows.

Pick up a shovel, start composting, it’s time to stop waiting for permission. Don’t ask, just do it, start composting the wreckage of the current paths. Plant seeds of your own lived life and nurture the social gardens with your care. Build spaces where people connect, share, and create outside the control of the #dotcons corporate platforms and the clumsy grasp of the old traditional top down institutions.

So, where is the positive in this mess? I’d look to the healthy fragments of the #openweb path that still exists. Projects that embody the #4opens offer the seeds of something better. But these projects won’t survive on hope alone. They need care, attention, and participation. Use them or lose them. If we don’t actively engage, they’ll wither, and the digital paths will continue its slide into centralized control and the new #mainstreaming creeping authoritarianism.

The #ecryptionists, clinging to their fantasies of rugged individualism, would have you believe that the solution lies in isolation, in bunkers, in hoards of digital currency, in cutting ties with the social fabric. But survival, whether against digital authoritarianism or the unfolding #climatecatastrophe, will come from cooperation and collective resilience, not isolation. Even in the face of disaster, thriving requires community.

Beyond the ingroup, we can’t rebuild the #openweb if we only talk to ourselves. The term “Fediverse” is a great example of this, it makes sense to those inside the space but means little to those outside it. #Openweb is a better, more intuitive term. It’s positive, clear, and easy to contrast against the negative: the #closedweb of the #dotcons. Mastodon is a #4opens project of the openweb; Facebook is a closedweb project. Simple, direct, and powerful framing that cuts through the noise.

With the hard shift to the right, we’re standing on a knife’s edge. #Climatechange, economic instability, and accelerating automation are pushing us toward a future of disruption. But disruption doesn’t have to mean collapse, it can mean transformation. The work we do now to build and maintain #openweb projects lays the foundation for the communities that weather the coming storms.

The Fediverse, for all its narrow flaws, shows that alternatives are possible. The challenge now is to grow beyond this first step. To dig deeper, plant wider, and build an ecosystem that can sustain itself long term. We need to constantly think outside the ingroup, to bridge divides, and to invite people in. It’s hard work. But so is everything worth doing. And if we get it right, we just might cultivate a future where common humanity, not capital, shapes the digital world.

Grab a shovel. Let’s get to work.

#OMN #4opens #DIY #Openweb #Reboot

Rediscovering the Open Web: Why We Need Joined-Up Thinking with #4opens

The internet wasn’t always like this. Before the rise of #dotcons, we had a flourishing landscape of community-driven sites and platforms, built on openness, collaboration, and trust. Yet today, much of what we do online is controlled by #dotcons, closed, profit-driven systems designed to capture and commodify every interaction. It doesn’t have to be this way — but to break free, we need to think and act differently.

The #4opens offer a practical path back to the #openweb. They guide us towards building space that is open in source, data, process, and standards. This isn’t just tech jargon; it’s about creating online spaces that work for people rather than exploiting them.

The trap of piecemeal solutions, too often, attempts to rebuild the #openweb get stuck in the #fashernista trap: chasing trendy but fragmented fixes that fail to address the root problems. A federated app here, a new protocol there, while each piece might be valuable, without joined-up thinking, they scatter energy and slow momentum. We need to step back, see the bigger picture, and work together to build a truly interconnected path.

We don’t need permission to start. The tools, ideas, and history are already here. Current platforms like Mastodon and initiatives like the #OMN (Open Media Network) show what’s possible. But it takes more than just using the tools, it takes sharing the vision. If you’re reading this, consider it a nudge: start conversations, share resources, and bring people onto the path. Dig into the posts at hamishcampbell.com for more background, and share the posts widely. Every shared link, every discussion, and every new node in the network helps.

Basic activism in the digital age is about reclaiming the internet to refuse to accept the current mess as inevitable and to actively choose better paths. By advocating for the #4opens, supporting decentralized platforms, and consciously stepping away from the #dotcons, we become a small part of the solution. The future web can be cooperative, empowering, and deeply human, but only if we build it that way. So grab a metaphorical shovel, help compost the tech junk, and start planting the seeds of something better.

The #openweb is waiting.

The challenge for #OMN & #openweb

There are a lot of mental health issues that are pushed over us in what remains of our open alt spaces, we need ways to mediate the damage, to help the people who spread this mess. The path of the #mainstreaming is corrosive to the alt cultures it feeds on. The cycle is always the same:

Radical ideas emerge → They are raw, open, and challenging.
Mainstreaming co-opts them → Dilutes them into something marketable.
They become performative → Used as branding by the #fashernista left, while the right weaponises the left’s discarded tools (like direct action).
The original movement is discredited → The real alternatives get buried under a mess of victimhood narratives, NGO bureaucracy, and “respectable” gatekeeping.

Composting this mess, one way is radical openness, but in a way that is intentional rather than naïve:

#4opens as a grounding principle → The more we expose the internal workings of a movement, the harder it is for power politics and NGO rot to take hold.
Affinity-based organising → Trust-based, decentralised, and responsive, avoiding the traps of rigid structures that get hijacked.
Resisting the urge to close → Every time a movement feels under attack, there’s a knee-jerk reaction to centralise and control. That’s how we lose.
Recognising how #dotcons manipulate OPEN/CLOSED → They’ve mastered open for them, closed for us, and turned it into a system of social control.

To take these step we need to admit we live in a gatekeepered world, yes the old media gatekeepers are gone, but what we have now is worse. The illusion of openness in the #dotcons masks a totalitarian model of control that makes traditional media censorship look almost quaint. Until we acknowledge that, every alt project will keep getting swallowed or broken from within.

The challenge for #OMN & #openweb is that we need to rebuild media and organising from a place of resilience, not just reaction. The #geekproblem, the #NGO mess, and the left’s failure to defend its own tools have left us in a weak position, but there’s still compost to grow something from. So, who’s ready to get their hands dirty?

Let’s try a #spiky view of #fluconf

Am sure these are all “nice people”, but they are also the parasite class https://fluconf.online/program/ events like this are as much problem as solution – likely more so in the current mess. Nice as a facade, hiding small-minded, petty, nasty, invisible rot of the commons as a community.

What a mess we keep making. Yeah, it’s the same old cycle—polite, well-meaning polishing the surface while the rot spreads underneath. These kinds of events present themselves as solutions, but they’re a part of the problem, consolidating small influence, reinforcing the same tired invisible hierarchies, and sidelining anything truly change and challenge that we need.

They build in closed, insular circles, focusing on their own comfort and tiny carriers rather than the actual struggle happening outside their “curated spaces”. It’s all managed dissent—safely disrespectable, and ultimately toothless. They won’t rock the leaky boat because they are the leaky boat, floating uncomfortably along the wreckage of our tech paths

The invisible rot is the worst part. It’s not just individuals being “bad” people; it’s how structures of control creep in through do-bureaucracy, funding dependencies, and #fashernista gatekeeping. What starts as an open, messy movement shrinks, institutionalised, and turned into #techchurn at best or a cog in the #NGO machine at worst.

Meanwhile, real alternatives, we need, the commons, the #openweb, grassroots movements are not here, the cycle repeats. That’s a #spiky view what would a #fluffy view look like, we need more composting #fluconf

A #fluffy view, is more that the problem is less “them” than “us”, we are not creating the spaces that they could be better people though. So we fucked up here, what are “we” going to do about this mess making?

The difference between struggle and #fashernista ethics. The latter is comfortable. The former matters.

Power in tech isn’t neutral, and our issue over the last 20 years is that we have allowed the #dotcons to hoarded and weaponised it. The answer to our failer isn’t to retreat or seek more “ethical” enclosures, it’s to reclaim our power through radical, commons-based networks like #indymediaback and the #OMN.

This argument is #nothingnew, we don’t need endless reinvention, we need continuity. The #openweb isn’t about mimicking #dotcons; it’s about breaking their privatisation model and returning power to collective hands. Hashtags, metadata, and federated networks help on this path, but the real strength is social, not just technical.

Examples of this: #Indymediaback isn’t just a project, it’s a continuation of a proven model that worked before the #dotcons stole the narrative. It was a social technological project embedded in radical movements, used real-world trust systems, and functioned outside of state/corporate control. Rebuilding it isn’t nostalgia; it’s a practical step toward rebalancing power.

We need ongoing arguments about power, opting out or running to “better” #dotcons just dodges the issue. Power is always there. The question is who holds it, and for what purpose? Right now, the #dotcons wield it for social control, profit, and policing. The #openweb flips that, if we build it as a “native” path.

The fight isn’t about making people “feel good” about tech choices, it’s about removing power from enclosures and putting it back into the commons. That’s the difference between real struggle and #fashernista ethics. The latter is comfortable. The former matters.

Paranoia is one of the biggest blockers in alt-tech and radical spaces. It breeds mistrust, isolation, and internal sabotage, making collective action impossible. While some caution is necessary, too much just feeds into stasis and control, mirroring the systems activists are trying to break away from.

The #4opens is a direct antidote to this. Transparency counters paranoia, when decisions, processes, and networks are open, there’s less space for suspicion to fester. Trust isn’t built by secrecy but by consistent, open, and accountable action.

The irony is that a lot of these paranoid actors think they’re resisting control, but by shutting everything down, they’re just self-sabotaging. The solution isn’t more walls—it’s more flows. The #4opens provides the framework to move past the paranoia blockade and rebuild trust in practice, not just theory.

The victimhood narrative is often a trap, weaponised by the right and co-opted by the #fashernista left to shut down alternatives. It can be used as a tool of control, not liberation. Composting the mess, in part, by refuse to play their game, victimhood, is in part real and in part is used to create moral authority without real action. If we engage on those terms, we just get dragged into performative battles.

Expose the power dynamics, by asking who benefits from this? In the negative sense, it’s often gatekeepers who want to control the narrative. NGOs do it for funding, #dotcons for engagement, and #mainstreaming activists for status. A path out of this is reclaiming direct action, which sadly meany in the left abandoned, and the right picked up. We need to take it back, not through reactionary purity politics, but by actually doing the work outside their controlled spaces. A healing path is shifting from identity to process, the current model is all about who is speaking, not what is being built. That’s a dead end. We need #4opens process-driven organising, not personality cults or gatekept “safe spaces.” Make failure visible, one of the biggest weapons against alt movements is pointing out their failures, while #mainstreaming projects hide their rot. If we embrace messy openness, we take that power away.

Breaking the cycle:

The right weaponises grievance → to mobilise.
The liberal left weaponises grievance → to control and suppress real challenge.
The alt-left needs to weaponise transparency → to break gatekeeping and rebuild trust.

So the question is: how do we make “openness” an effective tool in this? The #4opens is a step.

Public Social Media: The Choice is Clear

As the #fashernista and #geekproblem “debate” over social media platforms intensifies, the choice between truly public, decentralised networks and corporate-controlled #dotcons has never been clearer. Let’s look at a simple example:

Mastodon is owned by no one and everyone (community-driven). Its structure is public non-profit. Number of distributed nodes are in the thousands (fully decentralised). Post length: 500 characters and more. Can edit? Yes. Mastodon represents the native #openweb. It’s built on decentralised principles, where people and communities own and control their spaces. There’s no central authority dictating rules or exploiting for profit.
Bluesky is owned by Venture Capitalists, Its structure is corporate for-profit. Number of “distributed” nodes: One (centralised in practice) Post length: 300 characters Can edit? No. Bluesky, despite its claims of decentralisation, is owned and operated as a for-profit venture. Its structure centralises power and prioritises profit over people’s control, offering a polished but limited alternative to #mainstreaming paths.

The choice between #Mastodon and #Bluesky reflects a broader conflict between decentralisation and #dotcons corporate control. It should, but often is not easy to see that networks like the #fedivers are native to the #openweb where Bluesky is an interloper, though they are both #4opens.

Projects like the #OMN, #4opens, and the #Fediverse itself, offering freedom, community ownership, and transparency. Bluesky, on the other hand, represents the same closed, profit-driven ethos of the #dotcons, repackaged in a new “shiny” wrapper.

When you choose a network, you’re not just choosing where to post, you’re choosing what kind of internet you want to build. The open, public internet is still within reach. The choice is clear.

Seed from a toot and image from @FediTips

The pushing of doomed projects

We need real and sharp critique’s of the current state of #mainstreaming in the #openweb and tech-for-good spaces. The challenge is of cutting down obviously pointless projects from 99% to 90% which is a both realistic and necessary path. How can we achieve this shift, focusing on impactful subjects, better implementation, and strategic approaches in coding development.

The developing of alternatives to corporate platforms is a first step we have taken in the #Fediverse, with most of the #mainstreaming projects simply replicate corporate models while branding themselves as “ethical” or “decentralised.” The next step is to create genuine alternatives, by focusing on “native”tools for community governance, people-first design. Then it’s key to mediate the many #NGO tech projects that keep reinventing the wheel instead of tools for the change and challenge we actually need and use.

We need to rethink funding paths for #openweb projects, as the current funding ecosystem mostly drives pointless or doomed #geekproblem and #fashernista projects. Many of these projects are designed to chase grant money, not solve problems. To mediate this, we need to push for more cooperative grassroots funding pools.

A persistent issue is the disconnect between what developers think people need and what people actually need. Shifting away from the current paths can be done by testing ideas in real-world environments before scaling them, ensuring they’re practical and usable. Stop chasing the startup-style obsession with scaling at all costs. Building federated systems designed to thrive in small, resilient communities. Encourage slow, thoughtful growth that prioritises depth of engagement over breadth of reach. Simplifying over-engineered solutions and avoiding adding complexity for its own sake; the simpler the tool, the more likely it is to succeed.

How do we achieve the 9% Difference? Getting from 99% pointless projects to 90% will require, stronger public scrutiny to slow the pushing of doomed tech projects. This path needs to focus on realistic, grounded ideas, focus on doing, not talking by encourage people to start small and prove themselves through action, not the normal empty big #NGO promises.

By focusing, we can make a tangible difference in the #openweb space and reduce the noise of pointless #techchurn that waste time, focus and resources. It’s not about erasing failure altogether, that’s impossible. It’s about creating a culture where thoughtful, practical grassroots work has the space to thrive and grow #KISS