Some questions answered on fediverse “governance”

An important word that needs some thought is “permissionless”

The body is made up of three different, balanced groups:

  1. Stakeholders – the people who do the work, who run/mod the fediverse
  2. Users – the people who use the tools/services, who use the fediverse
  3. The Affiliate Stakeholders – the people who commit time to support the work of the fediverse

This is a very broken web we live in so let’s clarify issues. The names can change, they are placeholders

Anybody can become a stakeholder, in the case of the fediverse this is setting up and running an active instance – could use mastohost for the less technical to do this or a home hosted instance on a old laptop.

If’s simple if a user wont to become a stakeholder setup and mod an instance.

Users are self-explanatory, they buy in but don’t have time or focuses or inclination to run a part of the fedivers.

The Affiliate Stakeholders are a little more complex and are thus treated differently, it’s up to the body itself to decide if the play a active and useful role.

Nothing in this is top down, nothing is this elitist, nothing in this is discriminatory, nothing in this is undemocratic. Its #KISS and looks safe to the “normal world” while at the same time being native to the fediverse and its roots.

All the coding is #4opens and based on #activertypub

We need a grant to make this happen who is helping to write the grant app.

Undated text Online governance – openwebgovernancebody – Gitea: Open Media Network

The geekproblem – humanity’s and science

Coding projects that come from the humanity’s general fail as they are not technically coherent and build out from abstract ideas without real relevance to lived humanity, they are too disconnected to become relevant to communertys of use.

Coding from science tend to fail because they are inhuman, and are built for mashions. They serve abstract ideas based on numbers and thus can reach only tiny numbers of people and can build no outreach social groups of use being irrelevant to “real/normal” people.

Coding from life has a better chance of success BUT only if balanced with a science based discipline and some academic rigour of  soiled social thinking

Let’s look at examples:

Knight News challenge was captured by academics and thus has produced a slew of irrelevant projects – the money and focus was poured down the drain.

Diaspora was a pure geekproblem project so found few humans to use it, the resources were poured down the drain.

Mastodon came from a computer scientist but is a human project based on an existing need/use with competent technical agender. It worked and outreached to normal-ish people. Mastodon for filled an existing human need. Thus has real social change/challenge action and potential – we should/need to learn from this.

What has worked for the fedivers to overcome the geekproblem is the copying of existing #dotcons as #openweb tools. This copying has mediated the gap between the humanities and the sciences by taking existing (bad) human technological relationships and building copy’s in the (good) openweb. In clear contrast peoples attempt to build both #geekproblem and academic #NGO tools has (obviously) failed in the fedivers.

We need to build out from this good/bad relationship and nurture the good and push down the bad – while avoiding the pointless ghettos of both geekproblem and academic dogma being pushed by captured funding agenders.

It’s an interesting challenge to have movement on/in. Current foundation funding agenders have been captured by academics on one side and the geekproblem on the other. Capital (#dotcons) funding agenders are dominating and pushing for aristocratic anti-humanistic outcomes and theological neo-liberal group think.

We need to step out of these #mainstreaming flows to push up the good and push down the bad. We are working to do this at the #OMN we’re trying to bring our lived experience (this is always were the value is) to rethink and re-emergence solutions to the old 4 estates thinking:

* The clergy – while being structurally irrelevant are still are at the core of the social condition – belief.

* The nobility – are a dangerous force for social destruction by control and play a bad role at every level, our #dotcons leaders are the new “nobility”.

* And the commoners – are all of us, we need to see this more, our best/worst governance is democratic – we need to embed this is all our social technology.

* The media – is the tools of social control and the path to social liberation we need to chose where we put our power and our intervention in media.

At the OMN we are practical working on the last two – while fighting for humanism is the first and fighting trench warfare agenst the second. In the end it’s a simple path made complex by the forces we are fighting agenst.

The answer is always #KISS the power is always human, the tools #4opens

#nothingnew  an old story we are still working through https://theconversation.com/humanities-and-science-collaboration-isnt-well-understood-but-letting-off-steam-is-not-the-answer-92146 today, it’s a good stage to have this conversation in/about #openweb technology.

outreaching ActivityPub to the EU – draft

This was an interesting process playing a role to do the document – outreaching ActivityPub to the EU https://pad.public.cat/p/ngi0-ec-activitypub-liaison-presentation-2021-04-19#/13

Good to get an outcome from this:

  1. #activertypub as a cross-platform standard for #dotcons who operate in EU
  2. funding to further this – we would need democratic structures in the #fedivers style to make this real rather than a Eurocratic/power politics dead-end structures.
  3. Is the path with a good outcome – I have been involved in a number of groups/projects that have received Eurocratic money and the outcome has always been sub optional not to say a compleat disaster. I have seen no/little thinking to mediate this outcome.

So on balance good to do this BUT we do need not to go down unrealistic paths.

Am trying to shift the focus so that the story is more “interesting” and “representative” ActivityPub in the EU sense is a movement as much as a standard – standards by themselves have little/no value. If the story comes from the standard it is easy to ignore, and it will be ignored. A movement, with a bit of jingoism (the ActivityPub speck is maybe largely a European thing?) is an easer story to tell/hear.

Good points, the #fedivers while having a good community, as individuals we do tend to act like cats.

Prepping the presentation is going to be a “herding cats” so best to concentrate on #KISS and focus on the ordnance – what do they need to hear.

The second day we can reveal the all to human delight (and worry this brings)

 

Like the focus on European as this is true – the #Fediverse mirrors the federated European dream and clearly moves away the US tech imperialism (soft power) of the #dotcons something that is a #EU agender.

My thoughts/feelings are pragmatic on a good outcome.

We have a clash of languages and assumptions for example “surveillance capitalism” and the “social dilemma” both come from inside business and Silicon Valley thinking – so they are not good examples to use for an ActivtityPub presentation which itself is COUNTER Silicon Valley thinking and has its own way of expressing these issues. Just use natural descriptive language instead of quoting the terms.

I don’t have an issue with web01 and web02 yes they are not correct, but they do communicate.

 

The first question is why – It’s a good fit both strategically, in challenging the big US tech corporations dominance and tactically, in it being simple to implement and open to innovation as it is outside of anyone group control and agendas.

But we are unready as a community if a big institution like the EU takes up ActivityPub you can see this in what happened to RSS when it was taken up by the NYT.

#activertypub like #RSS and the #www came out of grassroots movements, they bring world views with them its WHY THEY WORK. Yes the world view are in part incompatible with #mainstreaming, so the is a strong burocratic desire to hide these world views and then push them out of view/existence.

Why work with big vertical organizations like the EU – The bridges, allow our careerists and wona get statues crew a way to cross over to the mainstream to feed. By doing this they strengthen the bridge by adding mainstream value to the bridges.

Then the refuges from the mainstream shitpile have an easy path to get to alternatives gardens when the stink becomes too much to live with.

The bridge shifts out “problems” and “brings” in resources, expirence and skills to build real alternatives.

We need bridges to the mainstream to build alternatives.

Though the process will likely not go well. When dealing with power politics/vertical orgs in the end the grassroots is ALWAYS shafted – it’s the normal outcome they can’t help this behaver. So we need to keep the bridges in place no matter how bad there behaver is, keep calm and carry on – their behaver is shit to shovel for compost to plant seeds to grow a better world.

Am thinking we need more structears “from chaos comes order” rather than “order over chaos” its trust or control.

In the internal process. It’s interesting that people coming into non #mainstreaming projects and spaces then push “common sense” #mainstreaming ways of working and outcomes can’t see that they are creating a problem.

You then inevitably get Clouds of smoke to cover up the mess. When it clears everyone is covered in soot. it’s not a good look for anyone.

We need ideas on how to mediate this without going down the #mainstreaming paths.

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/webinar-with-the-european-commission-and-ap-community/1507/179

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/meeting-notes-for-prep-call-ec-webinar-19-april/1567

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/outreaching-activitypub-to-the-eu-are-we-ready/1589/11

 

This is a way of stepping away from the post-truth would

When truth-telling is simply penalized, it’s a clear sign we’re navigating a post-modern, obfuscating mess. Instead of addressing issues openly, society hides and punishes those who expose inconvenient views, letting problems rot and fester. It’s a reminder that transparency is essential for creating a healthier culture. When truth is composted rather than suppressed, it breaks down unhealthy systems and makes way for healthy growth and accountability.

  Please look at the underlying agenda BEFORE pushing “new” ideas, please.

  • Conservatism/right wing is based on fear and the resulting desire for control.
  • Progressive/left wing is based on cooperation and trust, with the resulting desire for freedom.

Yes, this is muddled by right wing agenda to push their lies. Don’t be a #fashernista on this subject, please.

#Ideology matters, is a useful tool, to judge the shit #fashernistas spew. “It is how reactionary politics works, by appealing to sense of injustice and then, instead of focusing anger on the rightful target (capitalism etc) they create a movement to serve their own class interests, in this case far right libertarianism.”

This is a #KISS way of stepping away from the post-truth would.

We need working home hosting.

Think we currently have a pile of shit for home hosting tech. Might have to break my #nothingnew pledge as the is literally nothing normal people can use/do. Plan/idea/focus?

Nothing is useable – have tried them all. Good to start from where we are we need to stop going round in circles and start to look at why we HAVE FAILED and if the is a path to failing less badly. Or better how to build something that is not fail.

The is endless circulating in our #geekproblem communities – the subject matters, but we do nothing but circal failer. Good to start from where we are.

We are here… we need social tech that works for normal people…

Update

Maybe build a #KISS set of lightweight apps that use tor as the backend communications standard and talk to the tor browser as web apps so you don’t need the app to dip in, but the apps do the work of lifting p2p hosting. Feasible?

UPDATE (from a chat room on home web hosting)

A. calling everyone’s project a pile shit and not apologising even when some of those project devs sit in this room is not ok

Q. But obviously it’s all well shitty otherwise we would not be in the stinking mess we are with everyone (well 99.99% if you nitpick) on the #dotcons if that is not a pile of shit then we kinda need to start calling a rose a rose and a pile of shit a pile of shit… we are not sniffing roses in this chat i can say this as have been here in the chat for a while and here in the alt tech world for a very long time.

Maybe “wishing” shit way is no replacement for working sewers? We need working p2p tech that normal people can use. So lets compost the shit so we can smell the roses 🙂

‎A.  🙄 request for moderation plz thanks bye

UPDATE (from a chat room on home web hosting)

‎A. i concur with *** that the language is neither helpful nor respectful towards people trying to make things. So please mind it.

Q. Fair anufe, though shit in moderation makes good compost and compost is needed for beading seedlings and seedlings grow into everything that feeds life… and https://homebrewserver.club is about grassroots DIY life… some shit in moderation is needed for this cycle 🙂

Let’s water some seeds that “normal” people can grow.

The “cloud” is just a big corporate run data centre that can and will burn down

You do realize that all our data is HORRIBLY centralized and thus could vanish at any moment, come the revolution/evolution/ #climatechaos tsunamis.

O
ur end plan in the #OMN is that all the content is redundantly stored in the network in a #KISS way, so traditional backup is less important -when it goes wrong, and it will sometimes as we are home hosting. Just boot up a new instance and put your hashtags and user info in and all your content will be sucked back in a #lossy good enough way. This makes home hosting work well enough to scale outward to build a #openweb

What is the #OMN project for

The #OMN is about building #KISS bootem up trust based media networks for publishing and soughing content with enriched metadata flows. In the end you have a “stupidly simple semantic web of media object “cauldrons” and flows build up from a local level. What you/we do with this is up to the users/producers… this is held to radical politics by #PGA

Initial projects are media #indymediaback and archiving #makeinghistory with the resistances’ exhibition. There are likely lots of other things you can build as its just pipes and flows – the internet as a “open/trust” database of humane objects/people.

How this fits into traditional or Alt economics is not rarely up to us – but bounded by #4opens and #PGA so up for “connections” based on opendata flows – #RSS or #activertypub are good starts.

 

hashtag storys #4opens

Q. While I agree with everything you wrote in that post, I don’t get how that illustrates the geekproblem. Is the #geekproblem the same as the #encryptionists?

A. The #geekproblem is illustrated here http://hamishcampbell.com/index.php/2021/03/06/over-the-last-10-years-we-have-been-told-a-lie/

Q. In one post you wrote that the geek problem is replacing trust with control. That immediately communicated clearly to me.

A. The #geekproblem is a general issue of misunderstanding of “total control” and what it is to be human. The #encryptionists are an example of this, that have been dominate for the last 10 years, the solution to everything is “privacy” “lock down” isolated individualism, me only me “no such thing as society only individuals and their family’s”.

The hashtags have different meanings if you look at them from different directions – but always #KISS and radical at base. Metaphors, soft knowledge. The are no hard definitions – but add them together and they tell a story of “control”. The opening is that YOU have the opertinertly… maybe its a bit Qanion, first time I thought about that one 🙂

Q. I assume open data, which is good in some contexts but shades into surveillance in others.
Open processes? Which again I like in most of the contexts I work in,
What else?

A. The is a few pages http://hamishcampbell.com/index.php/projects/4opens its a radical “social” definition of the open-source/free-software process. #4opens can be used to judge any tech/social project. It’s needed to lift the lid on what #dotcons and #NGO say and what they actually do, always different. If people make judgments it’s likely to put to one side 95% of the current tech crap and concentrate on real #openweb projects that get lost in the churning of #fahernista and #geekproblem agenders.

With #opendata currently we have a control issue. All the #dotcons data is open to corporations who pay and government agencies who spy, it’s just closed to us. What is the role of data in society is a complex issue that we do almost nothing to talk about in any real sense.

Social (data) ideas to think about:

What is a “free-market”

A. Ain’t no such thing and never has been nor will be

What is a command economy.

A. Any capitalist supply chain.

What are humane relationships.
A. longer conversation…

Q. But this is such a thing as a “free-market” in inverted commers 🙂 it’s the data we have on the things we “value” which we exchange for “data” that is created and guarded by our “states” with lots of guns and bombs.
A command economy is what the soviets tried and failed and china is trying to recreate with a state “manoalay” on data and metadata.
The “humane data” is the interesting one for #4opens and #OMN which are planting seeds for.

The #hashtags tell a storie

Dot for profit for few con for the rest – took over the #openweb during the #dotcom era.

#stupidindividualism is our internal poison that we breed from the #deathcult

#failbook will/has failed us as individuals and as a society.

#openweb is a good view of what we had and what we won’t.

#4opens is a path out of the #geekproblem

The #geekproblem is a humane failure of trust and its replacement with control.

The #hashtags add up to tell a story and thus build a way out of this mess.

The #deathcult is the last 40 years of neo-liberalism.

Need to work in shovels, shit and compost to the story. Hashtags a tool for #openweb organizing ideas/stories/community’s. The is obviously a balance with self-expression. At the moment this “balance” is pure #deathcult being pushed by our shared #stupidindividualism

We have a #shoval, common storied #hashtags we have piles of #techshit to shovel for #compost to build up fertile soil for planting flower and vegetables to nourish our soles and actions.

Why talk in “soft” metaphors?

The issues are soft as are the explanations/metaphors. You can’t have a hard explanation of the social world without building it up from an ideological foundation. As most people are in denial of the possibility of different world views/ideologies this makes “hard” conversations a largely pointless way of communicating. People asking for them have not taken the first step so talking their hand to help them will soon lead you down a different/ideology path. As the project is about #KISS and focus this is something we have limited time/focus for.

 
If you can glimpse the world from different views/ideologies than the soft/metaphor will talk to you and the attraction for hard will be less strong. These people have a hope of building a different/ideology world/process so can help in real ways.
 
As we need to focus, it’s not an issue to talk to the first and more important to consolidate around the second… question is finding people that have not been “broken” by #mainstreaming agenders.

 

Over complexity is fixed by trust and #KISS

Q. Still trying to fix permissions issue for peertube ‎why is there always some piddly little issue (that will likely eventually have an easy fix)

A. Over complexity is fixed by trust and #KISS the problems we face now are complexity built on top of complexity. This is largely pushed by ‘security’ which is a direct result of the failure of ‘trust’. To mediate this we need to balance this, it’s the core process of the #OMN and were the social value grows.

Our instincts are #deathcult we build tools to serve “the is no such thing as society only individuals and their families” everything to do with social tech pushes this. These “piddling little issues” are the need for TOTAL control that comes from this world view. Thinking about it, it’s a theology as ideology tend to be.

Trust or fear is left/right or open/closed or life/death. Today everything is the second… tomorrow if we are to live we need to balance the first/second.

Are you depressed with the world – A VERY positive world view for you

(For the complex crew, hold the shit and mud throwing as this post is not speaking to you)

You might be wondering and feeling depressed from all my posts talking about YOUR responsibility for creating the current mess. And yes I do point my finger at YOU as you clearly are responsible, you empowered the current social and political shit heap we live in. Why is this a positive statement you might be wondering, in a negative depressed sought of way. The ansear is clear and positive you had the power to create this mess, thus you have the power to clear up this mess, a better world is up to YOU.

The example I always use is the growth to globle domination of the #dotcons such as #failbook and its siblings, YOU feed this domination by posting cat pics and memes, all the “user generated” platforms have nothing and no value without YOU feeding this value to them. YOU gave them control of the media that shaped Trump and Brexit.

Its important to separate course and affect, the effect is Trump and Brexit, the course is complex and on the level am talking about here goes back 40 years, though has seeds deeper.

Worth the time to watch a few times as this is the history of the mess we are in and how our current technological/social shitheap was built to shape this agender.

Liberalism, fascism and the neo-liberal #deathcult share a NEGATIVE view of the human condition, of human nature. Socialism, communism and anarchism share a POSITIVE view of human condition/nature. Of course there are meany who throw mud and shit onto this simple view/divide but its useful to clear this mess off to look at the human scale #KISS ideas that these complex views are based on.

My thinking in this post is that YOU get to choose the POSITIVE or the NEGATIVE and are empowered to do this, in my example above, by stepping away from the #dotcons and back onto the #openweb the main thing you have to do is choose and stick to that choice, keep it #KISS, and clean the shit and mud off the simple things in life, compost, grow flowers in the digital realm as well as in the soil that shapes us all.

POSTITNOTE: And yes, for the complex crew, I am feeding #stupidindividualism to itself, eat and grow, plant and sow, build and prosper, be happy, keep it simple.

We need more crew to make this rollout work

If you would like to help with moving away from this current world/media mess please create an account: https://unite.openworlds.info this is the organizing space, yes this is to complex and needs to be made simpler and more #KISS but for now it’s what we have and works fine. Have a read through the issues and wikis on each #openweb project.
Then we need constant (polite) feedback on this thread to make the current site more useable for normal people https://unite.openworlds.info/indymedia/epicyon/issues/17
We have a public chat room here where you can get to know the crew and talk about the projects. Yes we know its complex, but agen it does work – here is a “easy” link for android phones https://conversations.im/j/indymediaback@conference.chat.openworlds.info or you will have to be geeky/ask for help and work it out from here: indymediaback@conference.chat.openworlds.info for other platforms.
Sorry about this it’s the #geekproblem that we are working to mediate and with your participation we CAN build useable tools.
If you feel you cannot help with tech/user side then you can support the core project with money here https://opencollective.com or if you don’t have money (we all understand) turn up and make tea at your local protest camp to talk about the #indymediaback #OMN project.
Let’s take a step way from this mess, pickup shovels #OMN and compost this shit pile https://unite.openworlds.info/indymedia/indymedia-reboot/issues/15