The false continuity

Everyone can see the mess we have made of society and ecology. So why can’t our normal #mainstreaming do anything about this. What we have now is context collapse and the false continuity of liberalism. Academic and policy discussions assume that the current liberal framework will somehow persist, that the road ahead is bumpy but ultimately paved. But climate science, geopolitics, and resource decline say otherwise. That the liberal “centre” cannot hold under these pressures. Equatorial regions, facing escalating #climatecollapse, are the canary in the coal mine, they are slipping into post-political spaces where governance becomes a matter of force and survival, not policy and debate. Think Mad Max, not Davos. And this future isn’t “far away” – it’s already visible in countries facing water wars, crop failures, and climate migration.

Politics is moving from fantasy to fracture. We need real discussion about the actual future political paths, not the illusion of stability. And those futures will likely be led, or torn apart, by two poles: The hard right, using fear, control, and militarized borders. The progressive left, if it can organize around collective care, resilience, and radical democracy. This tension will define the coming decades.

The Tragedy of the Commons is a poplar right wing story where context matters, Yes, Garrett Hardin’s “Tragedy of the Commons” is ideologically flawed. He was wrong in assuming people can’t manage shared resources. But, and this is crucial, he is right within the logic of capitalism. That’s the tragic part. In a system built on extraction and competition, the commons are often destroyed, not by individuals acting rationally, but by structures rewarding private accumulation and punishing restraint. So in the context of our current #mainstreaming society, the “tragedy” metaphor is useful, not as a universal truth, but as a diagnosis of system failure. Use it carefully. Use it critically. But use it.

One path out of this mess is not to react to #mainstreaming – redirect It – when we react to #mainstreaming with outrage or purity, we feed the spectacle. Instead, we should build and walk our own paths. An alternative path, rooted in care, diversity, and solidarity, slowly force the mainstream to shift, not because we begged it to, but because we created a viable, compelling, and active outside. Think Fediverse vs Twitter. Mastodon didn’t shout at Elon. It just existed, and now journalists and their #mainstreaming assumptions are paying attention.

This leads on to monsters, Fluff, and Spikes, a note on social repression. In any radical space, when you scratch the fluff, spikes come out. This is not a personal failure, it’s a universal human problem, repression, both internal and external. The goal is not to eliminate conflict, but to mediate it through shared values. Respect for diversity, and the desire to debate with respect, is not a weakness. It’s how we build bridges across difference. Radical change without respect just breeds new hierarchies. Real strength is soft-spiked, compassionate, but uncompromising.

Then the next step is “Use and abuse” is a good strategy for dealing with the #dotcons while they continue to dominate our digital and social infrastructure. Why? Because refusing to engage with these platforms outright is the equivalent of shouting into the void – or living in a cave. And caves, while romantic to a certain type of purist, are never effective social solutions.

The truth is this #dotcons are still where the #mainstreaming people live, and mainstream attention is power, even if borrowed. As radicals or progressives, using their platforms to push counter-narratives, while simultaneously undermining their legitimacy and building our own independent infrastructure, is both necessary and strategic. Think of it as exiting from within by using their reach to grow the seeds of your use alt-path.

KISS: Keep It Simple (and Strategic). We don’t need more complexity. We need clarity and cohesion. Use the tools at hand (yes, even the dirty ones). Build better ones. Mediate conflict. Focus on real outcomes. And remember: purity politics is a luxury. Survival and solidarity are not.

A few steps, to become real challenge and challenge, not just a #fashionista wanker (this is a metaphor for non-productive). phhwww… best not to become a prat about this.

The hard right path, the #nastyfew playing the Nazi card

Our current #dotcons are playing the heard-right card with out you asking https://www.bi.team/press-releases/social-media-algorithms-amplify-right-wing-content-against-young-users-preference-study-finds/ In the current and historic right-wing path, the #nastyfew are mess making to mix and confuse social shit – like the recurring claim that Nazism was a left-wing movement, or at least contains left-wing elements as a mess making provocative and “controversial” statement. Let’s take a few minutes to look at this mess pushing argument (and Its confusion)

Hard right talking points:

It’s still “an open question” whether Hitler’s ideology was left or right.
Nazis called themselves “National Socialists,” so perhaps there’s a left-wing lineage.
No one has “done the analysis properly,”.

This is then framed in #mainstreaming pseudoscientific terms, borrowing credibility from the idea of science while avoiding rigorous historical or cultural context. This falls into #geekproblem territory where surface logic replaces any deep knowledge.

We need to spend time and focus to dismantle claim’s like this by highlighting the following:

Ideologies grow from shared cultural soil
You can’t categorize ideologies “left” or “right” – without considering the cultural compost they grew in. #4opens thinking reminds us to look at the process, not just the output.
Shared features ≠ same ideology, fascism does share tools, aesthetics, and concerns with both socialism and conservatism, because it arises from the same history and uses elements from both. This doesn’t make it “left-wing” in any way.
Ideology is not a checklist, the hard right idea to remove context is dangerously naive. Ideology isn’t a shopping list of policies – it’s a lived, embodied, blurry-boundary system of meanings, symbols, and affect. That’s part of the reason #dotcons and #NGO attempts at governance are floundering -because they think in terms of checkboxes, not compost.
Misunderstanding of culture, when we collapse evolutionary psychology into cultural history, it becomes #techshit reductionism. An example is when we try to explain 20th-century genocide using universalist “human nature” arguments, rather than the unique horror of a cultural breakdown under specific hard right (and its left shadow) political conditions.

It helps to use the composting metaphor, problematic figures come from messy soil. It’s possible to be honest about the rot and acknowledge resilience, #nothingnew might be helpful?

The danger in the hard right populists is in confusing the crowd, with intellectual sleight of hand using familiar #mainstreaming phrases (“science,” “open question,” “no one’s done this properly”) and mixed ideological references that feel insightful at a glance. Then icing on the cake is the #fashionista playing of personal vulnerability that is used to deflects criticism.

This is the hard right

Underneath this is a kind of cultural manipulation – blurring lines in a way that disorients rather than enlightens, it’s not critical thinking. It is an example of right-wing capture of shared cultural stories through contrarianism disguised as open-mindedness.

This is what happens when you let narratives drift unmoored from social history. It’s why we need to focus on grounding projects in native cultural understanding – because when you lose that grounding, anyone can hijack the conversation with pseudo-insights. In short, this hard right shit is composting badly. It’s fundamentally mixing rotten banana peels and plastic bags and calling it soil. It might look rich, but it won’t grow anything good.

You need a shovel, you help find one here https://opencollective.com/open-media-network

What we need is useful compost layer’s for growing native projects

Compost, not illusions, is a first step – A radical look at “light green” tech – For a second step we need a useful compost layer for growing native projects, like the #OMN. What we currently have in most so-called “green technology” promoted through #mainstreaming and #fashionista narratives is not ecological in substance – it’s performative environmentalism, built on omission, distortion, and branding. To help make sense of this mess, let’s use the lenses of the #4opens, the #geekproblem, and the broader #openweb.

The mess is “green” as branding, not substance. Most of today’s #mainstreaming “green” tech, like, electric vehicles (EVs), solar panels, wind turbines – is “green” in aesthetics, not in impact. These are products sold as solutions, but they’re too often rooted in the same extractive, centralized, and opaque paths and systems that caused the problems in the first place. This is the heart of the lie we need to compost, as the needed social change cannot grow from toxic soil, no matter how glossy and plastic the flower appears. If we ignore the roots, we just keep geting more illusions.

Watch this critique: The True Cost of Green Tech (YouTube)

The #OMN critique is to move past the false solutions and the broken paths. Yes, light green solutions pushed by institutions and NGOs aren’t inherently bad technologies – but their production, distribution, and governance models are deeply flawed. They violate every principle of the #4opens:

Open data: No honest accounting of full lifecycle impacts.
Open source: Dominated by proprietary, locked-in systems.
Open process: Controlled by corporations and states, with no meaningful public input.
Open standards: Sacrificed for monopolistic vertical integration (e.g., Tesla).

The result is more #techshit – waste and violence hidden behind shiny #PR branding. Even our weak #NGOs point out the brutal costs: resource extraction (cobalt, lithium, rare earths), labour exploitation (child and Uyghur forced labour), and environmental dumping. These costs are buried beneath greenwashed PR aesthetics, making them palatable to consumers but invisible to our shared, and needed critique.

The #geekproblem, the “problem” in much geek culture, is tech as saviour, this is the belief that technology itself is inherently progressive. This takes us down the paths where proposed “fixes” like nuclear follow the same flawed paths: centralized, capital-intensive, top-down systems cloaked in the language of innovation. It’s new wrapping, same old crap.

This is not a path to climate justice. It’s a continuation of the #deathcult – digital colonialism powered by extraction, slavery, and silence. No genuine social or ecological transformation can grow from this poisoned foundation. Where the real cost of “green” tech is not just ignored, it’s deliberately silenced. This silence isn’t accidental; it’s structural. The narrative that we can “buy better things” and consume our way out of crisis is a pacifying lie. It sells comfort, not change.

True ecological technology must be social first. It should grow from transformation, not transaction. We need to compost the lies to grow real alternatives. We must compost the #mainstreaming myths-this is the role of #hashtag stories.

There are meany paths to take, the one I focus on is reclaiming small-scale, peer-produced infrastructure. Using the #4opens to demand transparency, accountability, and participation. Solar panels and EVs have a role, but only when embedded in a radically #degrowth paths: Open governance (#OGB), local, decentralized production (right to repair, community assembly), circular economy (reuse, repurpose, recycle), humanism as non-negotiable (no slavery, no offshoring of harm). It’s a simple, not to say old-fashioned idea of humanistic progress, maybe we can do this better this time, I hope.

Conclusion, please #KISS the illusions goodbye, build the compost heap. Now also, please remember, we are not against technology – we’re against the lies that accompany it. As long as we keep lying about the nature of change, we cannot begin the real work. We need fertile ground – a compost layer for native projects like the #OMN – to push openness and cultivate the genuine ecological thinking we need to grow. It’s way past time for people to lift their heads from worshipping the #deathcult and stop being prats about this.

We need to compost the spiky and the fluffy nasty

From hard walls to fluffy blocks – let’s compost the negative nastiness in our progressive spaces.

A reflection on toxic communication in radical spaces, and how to build something better.

In the 20th century, much of the nastiness came from the hard vertical left. Back then, control, ideology, and vanguardism created rigid hierarchies, enforced through forceful exclusion and dogma. In the 21st century, that same exclusion comes from the “fluffy” horizontal left, the #fashionista crew wrapped in progressive aesthetics. It’s still fear and control. It’s still the same mess. And it still needs composting.

Even in spaces that claim openness and justice, we see “common sense” pushing of gatekeeping, moral absolutism. From both ends, the old vertical hardliners and the new fluffy puritans, we’re still well stuck in cycles of not hearing each other. One of the hard problems of the current left/progressive paths is this intolerance and dogmatic nastiness dressed up in fluffy cloth. Historically, from the hard vertical left, but much more common today is from our “fluffy” #fashionista “progressive” crew and their pushing of postmodernist language games as #blocking.

It’s a real and persistent issue in left/progressive paths, we do all service by worshipping a #deathcult, so people are often “wrong” as this common sense worship is the normal, not the exception. It is a cycle where gatekeeping, moral absolutism, and social exclusion dominate on every side. But when this comes from the “fluffy” or “horizontal” side, it is even harder to talk about, as it’s too often masked as care or safety, but still ends up reinforcing fear and control.

Non-nasty communication would be rooted in trust, a touch of humility, and most importantly shared purpose, and could look like a presumption of good intent, default to assuming people are trying, even if they fail. Then we need to replace instant cancellation with curiosity, “What do you mean by that?” or “Can we unpack that together?” in more constipated language that works for some more academic people.

Yes we do need clear boundaries without exclusion, you can say “That’s not OK here” without blocking, shaming, or exiling. Encouraging dialogue before disengagement builds stronger communities than isolation does. Then in every step visible open process (#4opens Style).

In group process, clear decision-making, open archives, transparent moderation, and rotating responsibility make space for people to learn and grow instead of fear missteps. If this goes wrong, and it will, deep listening, slow speaking. Let things sit. Respond with reflection, not reflex. Allow pauses and silences; don’t rush to dominate with the “correct” take.

In the end, it’s best to see conflict as compost, not crisis. See disagreement as a chance to grow shared understanding, hold space for messy difference rather than rushing to resolution or punishment. A part of this is inviting language, use “we,” “let’s,” and questions more than commands or declarations. Say “I’m wondering if…” instead of “You’re wrong because…”

In short and sharp, what to do when people are “wrong”, treat people as comrades, not problems is a good first step. Communication should be generative, less about winning, more about creating together. #KISS we do need to compost this nasty mess, do you need a shovel #OMN

Then OK in the end you might end up hitting each other, but this should always be long down the process path, long down. Hope this helps 😉

#Techshit Hype – #NothingNew

The is nothing new to pointing out that our #fashionistas #mainstreaming crew push tech mess.

Remember when drone deliveries were going to revolutionize shopping? When every major news outlet unthinkably reported that we’d have autonomous quadcopters dropping off toothpaste and Amazon boxes on our doorsteps? Or when 3D TVs were the future of entertainment, pushed so aggressively that manufacturers stopped making non-3D models for a while? Where are they now? Rotting covered in dust in clearance bins or forgotten in garages.

Then there was the Internet of Things (#IoT) hype, your fridge was supposed to talk to your toaster, which would text your smart kettle to boil water before you even knew you wanted tea. Instead, we got insecure, surveillance-riddled devices spying on us for #dotcons corporate profit. And we need to not forget #blockchain, #NFTs, and the endless #Web3 hype? Each was pushed as a revolution, yet all followed the same pattern of hype, vulture capital gold rush, and then, inevitably, disillusionment. NFTs went from “the future of digital ownership” to being abandoned by even their most vocal promoters.

If we won’t a progressive world, why do we keep pushing this #techshit? Every time a new #mainstreaming tech fad appears, it follows a predictable, boring hype cycle. First, it’s marketed as the next big thing, a must-have, must-invest, must-embrace technology. Then, sceptics, like this site, are ridiculed as out-of-touch or anti-progress, at best or simply trolling at worst. But when the promised revolution never materializes, the same people, quietly move on, forgetting the past mistakes and priming ourselves for the next wave, this is a rinse and repeat cycle.

We need more people, to lift their heads, to say loudly, “Not this again, you were wrong last time”? So we have space to ask why do we let the wannabe #nastyfew feed us this mess, why do we let it slide, allowing the same marketing binds to #blind us over and over?

The answer? We have our heads down worshipping a #deathcult, and this is pushing #fashionista tech, a cycle of embracing new trends not because they work but because they fit the cultural moment – mixture of corporate propaganda, social pressure, and the desire to be seen as forward-thinking creates a path where critical thinking is drowned out by #FOMO (fear of missing out). It’s fear, simply fear.

How do compost this? A first step is, instead of dismissing #KISS critics, we embrace grounded scepticism as part of a healthy tech culture. The goal isn’t to reject all new technology, it’s work for real, meaningful progress rather than letting corporations sell us snake oil over and over. There’s a hashtag for this: #nothingnew, a reminder that most fashionable “revolutions” are recycled ideas repackaged for a new round of exploitation.

This is part of the native #openweb story, not just about technology, but about culture. We don’t need to keep mindlessly adopting every new fad. Instead, we should compost the hype, extract what’s useful, and discard the corporate waste. Yes, it’s messy, but that’s what being native to the #openweb means sometimes…

Composting the #TechShit

The value of the #Fediverse isn’t in the tech specs. It’s not in the #ActivityPub protocol or the code itself, those are tools. The value lies in the culture that birthed it. The #Fediverse is the living embodiment of the #openweb, not some #VC Silicon Valley plaything. But as money floods in #mainstreaming forces will unconsciously increasingly try to turn it into another hollow platform, on this we risk losing the very thing that makes it powerful, its strong decentralized, trust-based roots.

The looming battle is CONTROL vs. TRUST

We need to shout this loud and keep shouting it: if we don’t compost the inrushing #techshit, we will rot in it. So if you’re plotting a power grab, do us all a favour – DON’T. These grabs for control create more mess that others then have to clean up. #Powerpolitics is a wasteful distraction, and we have better things to do. The #Fediverse is built on trust and open collaboration, it is not the place for #fashionista influence peddling or backroom power games. If you want real change, try the #4opens, it’s the grounded native path.

Look at history, every commons that survives long enough faces an inflection point. Do we defend openness, or do we let it be devoured by the forces of control? Right now, we are at that moment.

CONTROL wants to bring in governance models borrowed from the corporate. #NGO world, top-down, centralized, policed from above.
TRUST builds governance through open, messy, and transparent processes, by learning from failures rather than silencing dissent.

It’s the serious question: are you on the side of CONTROL or TRUST?

Breaking the cycle of destruction, the #mainstreaming web is collapsing under its own dead weight. People are stepping back to the #openweb, but they are bringing their baggage with them. We need better tools to mediate this influx. If we don’t, we’ll repeat the same mistakes that led to the first enclosure of the internet commons 20 years ago.

The Fediverse is working, and that’s terrifying to the #dotcons and the #NGO class trying to domesticate it. It still needs to destroy billions of dollars worth of CONTROL while growing billions of people and communities based on collective happiness. That’s the balance we push and maintain: keeping it messy enough to stay real, but structured enough to survive.

And let’s be clear, if we don’t call out those in our own communities who push control agendas, we are complicit in their mess making. If we don’t resist the #NGO push to turn the Fediverse into another grant-funded, #VC playground, we are signing its death warrant. If we don’t challenge the rising mobs of faux-activists and #fashernistas who police culture over substance, we are handing them control.

The Poison is the cult of control, isn’t only corporate overlords, it’s also being fed by dead ideologies like postmodern nihilism. Too many people are weaponizing identity politics, turning everything into a performative purity contest. The cruelty of social capital hoarding is just as toxic as corporate greed, it’s the same authoritarian impulse, just wearing a different mask.

YOU can’t do social change without annoying people. We need to stop chasing distractions and focus on real accountability. Otherwise, we are just repeating the cycle that destroyed the early web. Let’s be blunt: if you think you can do radical change without stepping on toes, you’re play-acting. You’re the problem, not the solution. If this annoys you, good—that means it applies. We don’t have time for the normal path of #stupidindividualism, for personal empire-building, or endless #powerpolatics struggles. The #Fediverse is about cooperation over control, culture over corporations, and trust over fear. Let’s keep shouting this, least we forget.

The reality is messy. The future is uncertain. That’s OK. The answer isn’t sterile management, it’s composting the ground into something fertile. We aren’t shouting into the void. We are building something new from the mess of the old. Dive in, follow the flow, and be part of the solution, click a hashtag to join the conversation:

#OMN
#openweb
#activitypub
#stepaway
#4opens
#geekproblem
#fashernista
#dotcons
#failbook

Are you here to build, or are you here to control? Choose wisely please.

The Trump mess, Speech to Congress

This starts so Nazi. Then goes onto the use of force, but the heckler gently leaves, which hides this. They then move to protect the border… and then pushes the internal border to exclude people internally who they don’t want on the inside. Then the celebrating the braking of the old world order, and the dismantling of its structurers and norms. Then back to me, me, me, a recurring theam. They are removing the last 20 years of #fashionista paths, but only to go back to a mythical past, nothing progressive.

This is a powerful #KISS populist move, for a reactionary outcome. The words “common sense” comes into play, the mix of the language of left and right is filling the space.

OK, can’t watch much more of this mess making… what’s the plan beyond running round like headless birds #stupidindividualism

UPDATE, skipped through to end, he celebrates the genarside of the Native Americans and calls for more American imperialism. It ends with fight, fight, FIGHT, so it’s pretty clear what they plan to do. The liberals walk out glum and dispirited at the end.

In my thinking, this is a grimly familiar cycle, the stripping away of even the shallow veneer of progress to reassert control, all while dressing it in the language of “common sense” and “protection.” The mythical past they reach for is just a tool to consolidate power, feeding off fear and division.

The building of external and internal borders mirrors the #deathcult logic: anything outside the rigid, nostalgic framework becomes an enemy. The “use of force” becomes not just physical but ideological, policing thought and community through propaganda.

The real mess making is the mix of left and right language — it’s a classic strategy, flattening complexity into soundbites, so people feel like they’re part of something bigger, even as they’re herded into smaller and smaller enclosures.

The need for a plan is key. Without collective grounding, we fall into the trap of #stupidindividualism, spinning in place while reactionaries move as a bloc. The path forward is less about grand plans and more about steady, stubborn composting, rebuilding from the bottom up with every tool we’ve got, even as they try to burn the garden.

How can you see the #OMN or the #OGB fitting into composting this mess? What seeds do you have to scatter? Or is it time to sharpen the tools for some direct pushback?

The #Fediverse is native to anti-common-sense governance

My perspective is shaped by years of hands-on experience, weaving together grassroots activism, technology, governance, and the growing crisis of #climatechaos leading to social collapse. On this “native” Alt path, I highlight the failures of liberal #foundation models, which often start with good intentions but inevitably lead community-driven projects into the hands of corporate interests, diverting resources toward maintaining the status quo rather than driving real social change.

Take #OpenAI as an example: originally championing openness, it quickly shifted toward closed, profit-driven models once corporate interests took hold. This is a pattern of capture, often pushed by #fashionista agendas, where grassroots energy is co-opted and repurposed to reinforce existing power structures.

Why governance matters: Resisting centralization & co-option. To counter this, we need governance models that resist centralization and remain rooted in bottom-up, DIY approaches. This is where #OGB (Open Governance Body) and #DIY become tools of resistance and grassroots empowerment.

The #OGB path aligns with the ethos of the Fediverse, prioritizing non-elitism, democratic participation, and simplicity. By following #KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principles, we create governance that is accessible, adaptable, and grows organically—rather than being imposed from above.

The Fediverse is a template for the future, unlike corporate-controlled platforms like Facebook and Twitter, which impose governance designed to serve profit over social good, decentralized networks like the Fediverse provide space for experimentation with participatory, community-driven governance.

This opens up opportunities for anti-“common sense” tools, such as reputation networks, which build trust through human connections rather than encryption-based paranoia. Moving away from “trust nobody” models toward community-focused trust systems allows us to foster resilience rather than fear. The Fediverse, with its anarchistic roots, offers a sandbox for developing governance models that could influence the broader #openweb movement to challenge the #deathcult mentality

Social collapse, fueled by #climatechaos and the prioritization of short-term profits over long-term survival, defines the “deathcult” mindset. Examples include: Governments doubling down on fossil fuels despite overwhelming evidence of climate catastrophe. Corporate greenwashing, where unsustainable practices are deceptively marketed as solutions.

To challenge this, we need tools that emphasize simplicity and accessibility. The #OMN (Open Media Network) follows this principle, ensuring that its systems remain open and easy to use. The #4opens provide a foundation for transparency and trust, which are crucial in resisting co-option and capture. Practical Steps we can take:

Reputation-based trust systems → Prioritizing human connections over algorithms, strengthening real-world communities.
Human-readable governance → Avoiding jargon-heavy, overly technical solutions to keep participation inclusive.
Keeping it #KISS → Simplicity prevents alienation and ensures broader engagement in the movement.

The fight against the #deathcult is not just about technology, it’s about reclaiming governance, community, and resilience. Let’s build systems that work for us, not against us.

Signal vs Noise

The idea of “signal” amidst the “noise” in #mainstreaming agenda is both a necessary aspiration and a challenging philosophical undertaking. To better frame this outside our “common sense”, we need to connect it to practical action, which helps us to see it through the lens of #OMN and the metaphor of the shovel.

Signal represents news, agendas, and actions that prioritize public good, transparency, accountability, and social responsibility. It’s about stories that connect people, foster community resilience, and address systemic problems. Signal has a purpose beyond profit or personal gain, rooted in collective benefit and meaningful change.

Noise is the overwhelming chatter of sensationalism, clickbait, fear-mongering, and consumerist narratives that dominate the #mainstreaming agenda. It’s the distraction that keeps us from focusing on any real solutions, its fuelled by #deathcult ideologies of neoliberalism, #stupidindividualism, and private greed.

Building signal in a noisy world is about judgment for social good, signal requires active discernment. Instead of going with the flow, we need to pause and critically evaluate the impact of information. Does this serve the community? Does it align with principles of equity, justice, and sustainability?

Then one way to take action is through metaphors, the shovel and compost metaphor is perfect. The OMN is a tool – a shovel – to sift through the noise, dig into the messy realities, and create fertile ground for new, better narratives. The act of composting represents transforming waste (noise) into something fertile (signal).

Collaborative projects like OMN focus on creating decentralized, trust-based paths where communities can curate and amplify signal. By focusing on horizontal governance and community-first publishing, the OMN counteracts the corruption and privatization inherent in current vertical elitist paths.

The moral imperative, is simply that we’ve lived in a metaphorical sewer for over 40 years. The #deathcult’s grip on society has normalized being covered in “shit,” but what’s tragic is the embrace of this state through #stupidindividualism and #fashionista agendas. These aren’t just distractions, they actively undermine collective progress.

Capitalism grew from historical processes rooted in enclosure, extraction, and the exploitation of people and nature. Liberal politics stabilise rather than challenge this, while promoting forms of (stupid)individualism that fragment collective power, making it harder for people to organise together against entrenched control.

Instead of lamenting, we need to act. Grab the shovel, embrace the mess, and build compost heaps that nurture real alternatives. When private greed meets public need, corruption is inevitable. The shovel isn’t just a tool, it’s a commitment to refuse passivity and to turn decay into growth. Let’s build ecosystems of signal together. #OMN

The clear and urgent challenge, to step away from entrenched thinking

There are deep cultural and structural problem in our social world, here I try and concentrate on the #openweb and tech spaces, which are currently shaped by deeply entrenched hierarchical thinking (we can call this #feudalism) and the inability to embrace horizontal governance paths. This often manifests as the #geekproblem that represents a persistent resistance to the solutions necessary for the meaningful change we need, and defaults to patterns that reinforce the status quo (#deathcult worshipping).

Horizontal solutions have proven foundations, community-driven projects like #OGB (Open Governance Body) reflects this grounded understanding of what works. The last five years of work in the decentralized #Fediverse shows that horizontal technology can scale without succumbing to this mess of centralized, hierarchical control.

#Nothingnew is about combining what all ready works. The creative task is now is to integrate these proven social and technical approaches into cohesive systems like the #OMN (Open Media Network): A decentralized framework for building media networks based on trust, transparency, and shared governance. #OGB: A governance model for the #openweb, ensuring horizontal decision-making structures that resist co-option by hierarchical or neoliberal influences. #Indymediaback: Reviving radical, grassroots media projects that embody these principles, amplifying needed voices outside the #mainstreaming.

To get any do any of these project working we need to break through the #blocking cycle, when discussions about radical or progressive changes are met with unspoken #blocking, which has the result of a stagnant cycle of unresolved issues that eroded goodwill. This stagnation is a direct threat to the social commons. To break this cycle, we can use, and think inside the Fluff/Spiky debate to encourage broad, inclusive paths while not shying away from hard truths and unpopular calls for accountability. Reject #fashionista worship to push back against superficial trends that align with neoliberal and #mainstreaming values, which are ultimately harmful to the #openweb.

There is a language trap here, #liberalism, and by extension #neoliberalism dominate conversations, to start to mediate this we need a constant low level critical examination of this misalignment with the goals of the #openweb. Then we need calling out this uncomfortable balancing, uncomfortable but necessary, to recognize and challenge how these frameworks perpetuate the #deathcult. The question remains, will others step up to help make this happen? Are they ready to take on this challenge?

Replacing market signalling with #opendata signalling

We have a blinded dogma running our economic, social and environmental lives, The dominance of the free market, for the last 40 years personified by the #deathcult worship, has instilled in us a deep-rooted belief in the power of market-driven signals as a determinant of value and action. This belief system prioritizes capital and greed as the primary forces that drive progress and social development. However, as our world becomes increasingly digitized, it’s past time to rethink and replace these signals with something more sustainable and aligned with collective welfare: #opendata signalling based on the #4opens.

Market signalling, a core tenet of capitalism, operates on the assumption that prices, supply, and demand efficiently communicate the state of the economy. These signals guide decisions across industries, influencing everything from resource allocation to investment trends. While this system has propelled economic growth, it comes at a significant cost: environmental degradation, social inequality, and systemic exploitation of every type. In resent years, our worship of this “free market” led to an economy built on misery – a #miseryeconomy where people and communities pay to escape the hardships imposed by the very system they are part of. You see this everyday life.

The open vs. closed data dichotomy is currently largely invisible, so good to bring focus to this. When considering alternatives to market signalling, we need to explore the difference between open and closed data paths. The original #openweb was built on the #4opens principles – open source, open data, open standards, and open processes. These fostered transparency, collaboration, and equitable growth. However, the rise of the #dotcons over the past two decades introduced #closeddata silos that have stifled and blocked the native path. Closed data systems prioritize proprietary algorithms, user data and metadata hoarding, and opaque decision-making processes. This has been used to reinforcing capital-driven signals as the only path, the #closedweb is something we need to put energy into composting.

In the emerging #openweb ecosystem, there is a new model – one rooted in #opendata signalling. Unlike market signals driven for profit, opendata signalling operates on transparent and shared data inputs that inform decision-making across communities. This shift prioritizes communal benefits, sustainability, and builds trust. This path currently can only be glimpsed in the messy #fashionista driven #openweb reboot we are a part of. Consider the surge in decentralized networks such as #Mastodon, the broader #Fediverse, #BlueSky, and #Nostr. Over the past years, these have grown from a few hundred thousand users to tens of millions, highlighting an appetite for more community-driven paths. Open-source platforms like WordPress are integrating ActivityPub to support decentralization, extending open data practices to a quarter of the web. Even #dotcons corporations like #Facebook (with its #Threads initiative) are adapting to this movement, albeit with a corporate agenda.

What opendata signalling looks like? In a practical sense, #opendata signalling means that any institution or person running a Mastodon instance, for example, can access a significant portion of the Fediverse’s content as plain text in their database. This access allows communities to collaboratively analyse and act on data without any intermediaries distorting and monetizing it for control.

Imagine policymaking informed by real-time public discourse, free from the profit-driven filters. Local governments could tap into decentralized data to plan infrastructure, health initiatives, or educational reforms that reflect actual community needs. Environmental policies could be shaped by transparent data on ecological impact, rather than suppressed by industry lobbyists protecting closed capital interests.

Challenges and Considerations? Transitioning to opendata signalling isn’t without challenges. Regulation and policy will need to adapt to safeguard open data’s integrity. The fear of spam and manipulation, which critics often raise, must be addressed with intelligent design and federated community moderation. Yet, these challenges are surmountable compared to the unsustainable trajectory of a market that fails to act collectively for evern basic survivability.

Moving beyond worship, with our reverence for the “free market” as an ultimate arbiter has reached its logical and moral limit. By embracing opendata signalling and shifting away from closed, profit-driven paths, we create a foundation where collaboration, sustainability, and shared progress are at the forefront. This is not only a technological shift but a cultural one, As we continue this transition, let’s recognize that our digital choices will dictate whether we uphold the values of the #openweb or fall back into the restrictive practices of #closedweb. Let’s try to have a real conversation about this, please.

The path out of this mess is in part social tech, we need to build this path

The current path of distraction’s and #stupidindividualism push the cycle of pointless noise that is feeding into our inability to focus on real change. People are busy, swept up in these distractions, and pointless pursuits to be the change and challenge they need to be. It’s a cycle of complacency with a bad outcome. Agitation, anger, and disturbance are powerful motivators, but we need to focus into something meaningful, to avoid drowning in the noise, we need to focus on what’s actually going on. But, in this mess, how do we push people to grow up and focus without falling into the trap of more #blocking or just offering more distractions or ‘better bling’?

The answer is simple and #KISS, by recreating collectives. We’ve seen first hand how hyper individualism (#stupidindividualism) isolates people, leaving them powerless against larger systemic issues. Rebuilding real, engaged, and active communities is key. Movements like #OMN, #OGB, #indymediaback, and #4opens are examples of initiatives that become the change and challenge we need. These projects draw from undercurrents of ideas that we know work, combining them with the best of #openweb tech to grow from small seeds into real change.

But it’s also essential to dig at the roots of the mess: #pomo (#postmodernism) and the #deathcult (#neoliberalism), ideologies that have shaped the mess we’re in, cynicism and cutting off collective alternatives. If we don’t address these root issues, they will keep returning, and we’ll remain stuck in the same cycles of decay.

The #geekproblem is real, it’s the problem of domination and control born out of geek culture shaped by “common sense” paths. Look at the decline of the #dotcons like #failbook and Google, where #fashionista optimism gave way to corporate greed. Then look at early days of #openweb projects like #couchsurfing and #indymedia, we had healthy, thriving native cultures that weren’t obsessed with control. The key is to recognize what went wrong and build on a path that doesn’t repeat those mistakes.

What the #dotcons think the future is, from meta

The challenge is that many within geek culture can’t see the value of projects like #OMN, as it exists outside their narrow, “common sense” world-views. We need to help people see beyond the obvious, look for non-mainstream alternatives, and recognize that the solutions aren’t in the corporate web but in the decentralized, open spaces, commons, we create ourselves.

Now is the time to reboot our own media and to be wary of #fashionista agendas that hijack and dilute the change we need. The way forward is messy, organic, and rooted in collective action. What we can do:

Agitate and Disturb: Use media, art, and culture to push people out of their comfort zones and make them question the status quo. The hashtag story is a tool to do this.
Build Collectives: Recreate spaces where people can work together meaningfully, paths that empower communities to balance the current #stupidindividualism. The OMN are projects for this.
Focus on the Roots: Don’t only address symptoms, dig deep into the core ideologies that keep returning and haunting us, like #pomo and the #deathcult. This website is a tool for this
Reboot Media: We need to take back control of our media, using open technology to create alternatives that aren’t based on capitalist greed but on #KISS shared values. There is a native project for this indymediaback
Stay Wary of Distractions: Resist the temptation of ‘better bling.’ The solution is not to make the distractions shinier, but to focus on what matters.

The path out of this mess is in part social tech, which we need to build. It’s time to grow up, pay attention, and start building the world we actually want to live in. A shovel is need to compost the current mess #OMN. But I don’t have the focus to do this, we need a crew.

The key part of this is WHO decides, this is a political and democratic issue, not a tech “problem” we need to build with this strongly in mind.