Why Most Fediverse Codebases Are Languishing

Do you ever stop and wonder, really wonder, why most of the codebases outside #Mastodon are languishing? It’s not a technical issue. It’s not “a lack of funding” (though that’s what they love to talk about). It’s not even about network effects, not really. It’s because they’re all following Mastodon’s lead, straight into the #NGO world.

This is a path paved in smiles and slow death. A warm bath of grant cycles, diversity reports, and performative panels. On this dead-end, the goal isn’t to grow, challenge, or change. The goal is to survive, to be tolerated, within existing institutional structures.

Let’s be honest: this is such an obviously pointless and self-defeating direction that it’s stunning more people aren’t calling it out. Why is it pointless? Because in the #NGO world, success isn’t the point. The hierarchy already has its chosen project. It has its darling. And surprise surprise – that’s Mastodon.

Everyone else is there to tick the diversity box. You’re the “alternatives” that prove there’s choice, even if there isn’t. You’re invited to speak, but not to decide. You’re encouraged to exist, but only if you don’t matter.

So these projects stall, not because they’re bad ideas, or bad code, or have no community.
But because they’ve internalized powerlessness, shaped by institutions that reward conformity and punish genuine independence.

Here’s the bitter truth: If you want your project to thrive, you have to stop only begging at the gates of the palace. You have to stop only trying to be included, you have to also build outside their logic. That’s what the #OGB (Open Governance Body) is about, not building consensus at the top, building trust at the roots.

That’s what the #OMN is about, a web of native projects, not another hierarchy with a different brand. We don’t need to only “be taken seriously” by NGOs. We really need to #KISS build governance that works without them. And what we don’t need is more performative panels, we need compost, shovels, and seeds. Let #Mastodon be the flagship, in the long term, it’s likely to drift into irrelevance, or rot into compromise. Let the rest of us get on with building the working path.

You don’t have to only attack problems, you can also build round them and leave them to decay, then shovel over the mess to compost, the problem we face now is that we need a shovel, a first step is to build that #OMN

Some strategies to mediate the #blocking mess in a way that stays true to the #4opens:

1. Compost the Conflict. Don’t try to avoid the mess – use it.

Acknowledge blocking as an emotional reaction to risk/fear/powerlessness.

Create safe compost heaps where disagreements can break down slowly (forums, slow chat, moderated conversations).

Let things rot before replanting — time is part of the process.

Tools:

Slow-fed moderation queues

Forkable discussion

Bridge-building protocols

2. Build Friction Where It Helps. Instead of forcing “smooth consensus,” engineer positive friction.

Let friction surface hidden assumptions early, but contain it constructively.

For example, structured disagreements (Yes/And).

Use #4opens to keep the process visible and trustworthy.

Tactic: “This disagreement stays open – until it breaks something or blooms something.”

3. Create Walkable Paths Around Blockers. If someone/some group blocks – don’t go through them, go around them.

Design with pluralism and forking paths as core strengths.

Accept divergence — allow others to fork rather than forcing them to bend.

Metaphor: Every open path has forks. We need more people walking, fewer people standing still yelling.

4. Bridge the ‘Trust Gap’ with Small, Lived Examples. Many people block because they don’t trust the process – they feel tricked, ignored, or co-opted.

Rebuild trust through visible, small-scale functioning examples — real communities doing real things with the #4opens.

Highlight stories where governance and code worked together.

Stay humble: don’t oversell the vision; show, don’t tell.

5. Normalize Changing Your Mind. Most blocking happens because people are afraid of losing face, status, or being co-opted.

Create spaces where changing your mind is not shameful — it’s rewarded.

Public “reconsideration threads,” “I changed my view” badges, etc.

Use organic intellectuals who model doubt and curiosity, not just certainty.

Reframe the debate using values: trust vs. fear, openness vs. control, native vs. extractive.

You don’t solve #blocking by trying to make everyone agree, you solve it by making space for disagreement to stay open and generative – not as a problem, but as part of the compost from which better paths grow.

Should we do something native in the Fediverse?

And what would that actually look like? Let’s be honest about what the #Fediverse is, despite all the code and standards talk, the heart of the Fediverse is anarchism – not in the chaos sense, but in the older meaning:

The letter A for anarkhia (‘without ruler’), circled by an O that stands for order or organization.

We have plenty of the A with decentralization, voluntary cooperation and resistance to imposed authority. But where’s the O? Of clear coordination, transparent process and federated trust and mediation?

Right now, we’re herding cats – each server, dev group, and community running off on their own, building tools and protocols, often without clear ways to connect, share governance, or defend against capture. This worked when we were small, it will not work now the big boys have arrived.

Warning from experience: The #EU outreach failure, we had a direct taste of this during the 2023–24 EU outreach process. It worked, but was quickly transitioned to the infrastructure of the #Fediverse without its soul. This isn’t theoretical, it is what happened to #FOSS transitioning to #opensource in the 2010s. This is what happens if we keep doing nothing? If we don’t act:

The foundation model is imposed — not built.

The fig leaf of “community governance” will be ignored.

A self-selecting oligarchy will form — friendly faces, perhaps, but still an eliteist power cleqe.

The Fediverse will be co-opted — just like we watched Google and Microsoft do to open source over the last 20 years.

Yes, #ActivityPub is “open” but openness alone doesn’t stop capture. Ask the #FSF, or look at meany #NGO paths in tech.

What would “native” governance look like? Built from our values, not imported from the institutions we’re resisting.

Soft Structure – Not no structure. The #OGB (Open Governance Body) project is one possible model: https://unite.openworlds.info/Open-Media-Network/openwebgovernancebody It’s based on the #4opens and rooted in the real history of grassroots organising, not rigid control, but visible, participatory trust-based structure.
Real federation of trust -Imagine something like “trust instances”, each instance or org can choose to endorse certain process and values (e.g., 4opens, PGA hallmarks), creating a visible network of aligned projects. Not a central body, but a web of consent, the #OMN is an example of this.
Self-accountability + Diversity of tactics. Everyone agrees to transparency and openness. Everyone chooses their own path. Nobody is forced, but the community can see what you’re doing. This is essential for resisting #NGO co-option without creating more gatekeeping elitists

Are Platform Co-ops the Answer? Maybe, but… proceed with caution. Many tech co-op projects I’ve seen:

Become ossified in bureaucratic process

Elevate process geeks over users and communities

Reproduce #NGO behaviours under a different name

We’ve seen this in the #techcoop movement, especially in the UK, where platform co-ops often start with radical aims and drift into “doing B2B consulting for ethical startups.” Fine, but not the revolution we worked for. The stakes are real, we’re not just talking about tech here, we’re talking about:

Climate collapse

Social fragmentation

The rise of digital authoritarianism

We need an #openweb that reflects our values, #fediverse governance that protects the commons, and to move from just the A to the full A inside the O – the anarchist circle of voluntary structure. Let’s not wait for another hijacking, we need to build something native to the Fediverse before it’s too late.

The signal-to-noise problem of our #geekproblem in the #fediverse and the wider #openweb. Let’s be clear: platforms like #Mastodon and the #Fediverse are native openweb projects. They embody the values of the #4opens — open data, open source, open process, and open standards.

The value here is not in hardening and securing these systems to the teeth. People who are pushing for hyper-“security” are missing the point entirely. This isn’t about “common sense” dev practice. It’s about use-case. Public media content should be open — and that’s what the Fediverse is good at. It’s media. It’s conversation. It’s public dialogue. That’s what #ActivityPub is designed for. For private communication, we already have mature and well-tested encrypted tools: #Matrix, #Briar, #Signal, etc. Use those for whistleblowing, direct action, or anything sensitive.

Trying to bolt high-security models onto public communication tools breaks the value of the #Fediverse – its simplicity, accessibility, and low barrier to entry. Right now, the #Fediverse is a functional part of the #OMN – it’s a mesh of many small pieces, loosely joined, low-barrier, easy to host, easy to adapt, easy to grow. This is a fragile ecosystem, not a fortress. By pushing unnecessary “security” requirements, this #geekproblem are:

Scaring away potential users and admins

Raising technical barriers

Spreading #FUD

And most dangerously — undermining real-world activists who rely on open visibility and reach, not secrecy.

The #geekproblem, pushing complexity, abstraction, and fear over usability and trust, has been blocking the alt-tech world for over 20 years, it’s happening again. Let’s not let them smother this moment, the open web works when it’s messy, simple, and human.

You can help here https://opencollective.com/open-media-network

Talking about the #geekproblem in #openweb funding

Let’s be honest: we have a real and ongoing #geekproblem in how funding is allocated in the alt-tech and #openweb space, and it’s holding us back. The current push for infrastructure is important, but it’s not enough.

Yes, backend infrastructure is vital. You can’t build sustainable alternatives to #dotcons without solid plumbing. Funding projects like mesh networks, free firmware, and decentralised protocols, as #NLnet and others often do, is necessary work. BUT… If no one uses the infrastructure, or if it simply gets absorbed back into corporate platforms, then we’re just building tools for the next round of tech enclosures. That’s the pattern we’ve been trapped in for 20+ years.

Take the example of #ActivityPub. It would have remained a marginal protocol if #Mastodon hadn’t wrapped it in good UX, approachable design, and a culture people actually wanted to be part of. It was this social work, not just the code, that made the #Fediverse grow. That success was accidental, not structural, and we’re now coasting off that one cultural leap forward while backend devs get all the attention and funding. Culture first, code second is the hard truth:

The Fediverse is a culture first, and a standard second.

Where is the real funding for building sustainable social tools, interfaces, and communities? Where is the funding for actual alternatives to #dotcons that real people can use? This is one of the things we mean by the #geekproblem, the over-prioritisation of backend infrastructure in a vacuum, without acknowledging the social, political, and cultural layers needed for real systemic change. What’s the Risk? It’s that we end up with:

Endless dev churn.

Great tech no one uses.

A cultural vacuum that’s quickly filled by bad actors or subsumed by corporate rebranding.

Sound familiar? So what do we do?

Balance the Funding. Yes to infrastructure, but also fund user-facing projects, UI/UX work, community engagement, moderation tooling, multilingual outreach, and federated editorial practices. In other words, fund culture-building.
Support “Soft” Projects That Matter. There’s very little funding for projects like #OMN, #indymediaback, or #openwebgovernancebody because they don’t look like “innovation.” But these are the organic, lived tools that connect radical tech to real social movements.
Fund social protocols, not just transport protocols.

#4opens, the #PGA hallmarks, and trust-based governance are protocols too, just not the kind that compile into binaries. They help mediate conflict, keep projects focused, and build human networks that last.

Funding only “safe” backend tech guarantees it will either be: Irrelevant, co-opted, or turned into the next closed platform. We have to fund risky, visible, social alternatives if we want a different outcome. None of this is new, I like meany people been banging this drum since the #indymedia days and writing about it for decades. On this path, the #geekproblem isn’t about individuals, it’s a systemic blind spot. Let’s please take the time to balance funding tech AND the culture to finally move toward more humanistic paths.

Rise and Fall of Grassroots #OpenWeb

The #fashionistas are coming https://yewtu.be/embed/u_Lxkt50xOg? It’s time to become more real before this inflow swamps our “native” reboot, if we let them they will consume it and shit it out as more mess. To mediate this shit storm, it’s time to act, please, feel free to repost these web posts, thanks.

To understand where the #Fediverse and the #OpenSocialWeb are heading, and how not to lose our way, we need to reflect on where we’ve come from. The history of grassroots #openweb activism offers both inspiration and hard lessons.

Foundations are built by real people, social movements start local, they begin with people on the margins – those directly affected by injustice – taking action with the tools they have. In the late ’90s and early 2000s, tech projects like #Indymedia were the blueprint: decentralized, radically open, and run by volunteers who trusted each other and worked horizontally. It worked, for a while.

Today, projects like #OMN (Open Media Network), #indymediaback, and #makeinghistory try to learn from that past. They aim to reboot media infrastructure and historical memory, powered by the #4opens: open data, open source, open standards, and open process. We need to remember that this kind of work doesn’t scale by magic, it grows from grounded trust and native infrastructure, not from #VC injections or #NGO grants.

The trap of #NGO thinking is one of the biggest reasons grassroots projects fail, co-optation. When grassroots groups chase funding, they start shifting agendas to fit the funder’s priorities. Slowly, the mission gets neutralized. Culture changes, risk-taking of change and challenge vanishes, the projects to often become empty shells wearing yesterday’s slogans.

This has happened time and again, from later #Indymedia nodes to #EU-funded tech projects that are now more about kickbox reports than what any “user” wonts or the needed basic radical change. We can’t afford to go down this path again in the current #openweb reboot, the Fediverse.

We need Spiky/Fluffy balance, mutual aid that’s not just charity, but infrastructure. That’s where the #Fediverse shines: not just as an alternative platform, but as a parallel public space for organizing, sharing, and then resisting. It has to support both spiky (radical, disruptive) and fluffy (care-focused, relational) approaches.

On these paths, memory matters, projects like #makeinghistory remind us: if we don’t remember our wins and losses, we’ll keep repeating the same mistakes. Documenting not just content but working practice, how decisions were made, what trust looked like, what failed and why – is crucial. History is not just a mirror; it’s compost.

No monoculture, today, #Mastodon is becoming the monoculture of the Fediverse. It’s not evil. But it is dominating to the point of distortion. It’s following NGO-friendly paths and watering down the radical possibilities the #openweb offers. That’s a problem. We need more balance, more useful codebases, more governance experiments. This space is meant to be a garden, not a plantation.

Security isn’t paranoia, it’s culture, security on the #openweb isn’t about creating another bureaucratic nightmare of permissions and logins. It’s about cultural practices, trust, openness, moderation by consent, and keeping things simple. Most of all, it’s about not building what you don’t need, complexity is the enemy of security.

Final thought, to build real alternatives, we need to stop chasing virality and start building resilience. Less hype, more humility. Less “engagement,” more entanglement. And always, a ruthless focus on not becoming the thing we were trying to replace. Let’s not feed the mess. Let’s compost it and grow something better.

The problem of too big, Mastodon

I would start to say, with care, that #Mastodon is now heading in the wrong direction. Not because it’s inherently bad, or malicious, or “captured” in some conspiratorial sense. But because it’s become too dominant, tipping the scales far away from the diversity and messiness that a healthy #Fediverse needs.

This isn’t about blame, it’s about balance. To keep the #openweb alive and meaningful, we need to nurture other codebases, other, paths, cultures, and radically different governance paths alongside Mastodon’s dormant trajectory. Let’s acknowledge where Mastodon succeeded: It has been a gateway into the Fediverse, by mimicking Twitter, it provided a familiar experience that let mainstream users, journalists, #NGOs, and even some governments dip their toes into decentralization. It helped break the suffocating monopoly of Twitter/X. This was useful, necessary even. We needed a bridge.

But now? That bridge is being pushed/mistaken for the destination. And worse, it’s reinforcing the patterns we were trying to escape. Instead of blossoming into a diverse ecosystem and experimental tools, the #Fediverse is shaped by Mastodon’s design limitations and its pushing institutional gravity. That’s the problem, it’s not just a project any more, it’s becoming a bottleneck.

With #NGO-centric thinking shaping many of the newer Fediverse-adjacent events (like #NGI forums or EU funding discussions) which are now populated by the same #NGO/#dotcons crowd and comfortable liberal institutions that avoid risk, fear grassroots control, and domesticate the web for funding reports.

So, Mastodon isn’t “bad” and it played its part well. But its institutional path is now out of alignment with the nature of the Fediverse: the #4opens, radical transparency, permissionless innovation, and native grassroots culture. This is a poisoned balance, not because Mastodon is wrong, but because its gravitational pull is now preventing new paths from taking root.

What’s the alternative? Push for federation that supports collectives, not just individuals. Rebuild spaces for group publishing (like #Indymediaback) and shared authorship, not just influencer-following. Keep pushing the #4opens: Open data, open standards, open governance, open code – not just a logo and a code of conduct. Remember that a monoculture is always a point of vulnerability. Diversity isn’t optional, it’s the core strength of the #openweb.

So yes, Mastodon is a problem on balance, even as it was a solution before. But still, we don’t need to burn the bridge – but we do need to compost the monoculture and grow a thicker forest around it. Because decentralization means divergence, not convergence to one project’s roadmap #KISS

Trying to Remember: A Personal Reflection on Activist Histories and Memory Holes

This is a story of power, plain and simple

Over the last few years, we’ve been watching a familiar story unfold, we’ve seen repeat itself in radical spaces, tech movements, and grassroots networks for decades. It starts in the grassroots with “progressive” #fashernistas (yes, them) pushing themselves into the front to speak for “us.” They talk the talk of decentralisation, care, community, and #FOSS ethics. They wear all the right hashtags: #opensocialmedia, #Fediverse, #commons, #techforgood. But when you look at how power is actually exercised behind the scenes, it’s something else entirely. This is a story of power, plain and simple. Not in the dramatic “revolutionary” sense. But in the subtle creep of careerism, institutional capture, and “safe” social capital games that flatten the radical and uplifts the “palatable”.

Let’s take a few examples from the #activertypub world, first with the #SocialHub stagnation, this open space was originally created by the grassroots crew to shape the standards of the decentralised web, It was originally a commons, protocol-building and governance exploration space. So, what happened? The people now “leading” came from lifestyle #fashionista activism and wannabe NGO circuits, who in the end were all trying to be embedded in the institutional funding environments, or visiting from the safe academic bubble. And thus they brought with them the dogmas of safe spaces, of “emotional consensus,” “hidden affinity group governance,” and “(ex)inclusive dialogue”… that JUST SO happened to exclude the radical and messy paths that are actually native to the #openweb, the bad mess they then made, ended up only pushing the dogma of the #geekprolem as it was the ONLY path they could imagine controlling in a way that would not threaten the thin connection to the institutions they were feeding from. This behaviour so often slips into forms of parasitism, which is not a good thing at all.

Then we have the current #Fediverse outreach infrastructure capture, where we’ve seen the same class of actors attach themselves to the most visible projects – like Mastodon, ActivityPub standards, and now “Fediverse governance.” They secure seats on boards. They host conferences with glossy branding and friendly logos. They use these controlled spaces to then push out “code of conduct” documents and “safe space” branding… while closing and excluding the very messy native infrastructure of discussion and direction that is both native and needed.

Examples? #Mastodon’s GitHub, issue tracking, and moderation are all tightly controlled by a small clique around the project founder. Community voices are kinda tolerated at best, discarded at worst. The project is moving onto the #NGO path, no bad thing in its self, but with its years of pushing its own branding as THE Fediverse, it becomes a bad thing. In this, there is a very real debt of damage they need to pay back – as a part of a functioning gift economy – saying sorry and admitting mistakes would be a good first step.

Then we have the example of the #FediForum events, pushing into the space blindly, with zero historical context or any actual knowledge, to represent the #activertypub ecosystem. The problem is they paywalled, which lead “naturally” to increasingly gate keeping with #NGO commercial interests being pushed to the front to represent “us”. When the radical and experienced grassroots voices obviously don’t get involved, as they simply refuse to step over the paywall. This is an ongoing mess, that we do need to compost and not only with #fashionista outrage but with real working paths, we used to do this, but we can’t any more – why?

Over the last few years we have had proposals for genuine horizontal governance, that could have been used to shift this mess making and to actually shifts power outward – but these were labelled “too messy,” “too political,” or “not the right time.” This is not accidental, it is liberalism functioning as control – with a smile. So… what can we do? Let’s be clear: This is a power issue. It’s not about bad intentions. It’s about how power is used, and then abused, even in the so-called “horizontal” paths.

The first thing we have to do is recognise the smell of #NGO-style liberalism that so easily hides itself in good intentions, grants, DEI language, and “process.” But it then ends up:

Disempowering community autonomy
Replacing radical potential with “professionalism”
Marginalising away activists and messy real-world projects
Recreating the same vertical hierarchies, just with better “open” branding

Composting this mess is needed to break the cycle:

Build and back native projects. The only way to push back against capture is to grow infrastructure from within our communities, like: #OMN (Open Media Network) #OGB (Open Governance Body). These must be trust-based, not credential-based. That means supporting those doing the work without demanding they translate it into pointless and most importantly powerless NGO-speak to be taken seriously.
Use the #4opens as a filter, this simple social retelling of #FOSS is designed precisely to push out the 95% of #techshit and focus energy on projects with: Open source Open data Open standards Open governance. Apply these consistently, and the parasite class will struggle to keep and find a foothold.
Push for messy, lived governance, stop waiting for perfect systems. We need to prototype imperfect, transparent, accountable governance now. It should be: Based on trust, not rules-lawyering Driven by use, not representation Grounded in solidarity, not status
Refuse the “leader class”, just because someone has a title, a grant, or a #dotcons following, doesn’t mean they speak for us. Call out the unaccountable influence. Politely or not. Let’s not let careerists write our futures.:

The Fediverse path could be the most important #openweb reboot of the commons of this decade. But it will only be that if we keep it rooted in social power, not polished #PR and #NGO mess. We don’t need new kings. We need more gardeners, to work together to compost the piles of #techshit and keep the space open and safe.

I think when our #fahernistas say to us “what have we done, please be nice to us, you’re not welcoming.” We need to reply: Am happy to be nice #KISS, just stop being a prat in this space please.

It’s really simple, please stop being (an often nasty) prat.

The Mess We Make (Again… and again)

We need to shape native paths, not recreate #fashionista ones with shinier branding

We’ve got a new bunch of #mainstreaming tech devs flooding into the #Fediverse. Some from burned-out Big Tech, some from the academic funding circuits, some just looking for the next shiny project after the #AI hype wore thin.

Now, this could be good. IF even a few of them started working on native, grassroots tech – tools built for and by the communities who actually use them, not just more #dotcons platform clones.

Right now, we’re at a turning point. The first wave of the Fediverse was all about copying the #dotcons:

#Mastodon as “ethical Twitter”

#PeerTube mimicking YouTube

#Mobilizon as a Facebook Events replacement

#Lemmy doing Reddit but federated

All of this was necessary, it helped people jump ship and start imagining life beyond the dotcons. But that wave is peaking, and the second step is overdue. That next step? It’s about original, grassroots infrastructure. A federated trust graph instead of reinventing karma points or like-buttons. Protocols for local-first publishing, like the #p2p side of the #OMN or radical #4opens-inspired news and tools for community trust flows, moderation and accountability, rooted in values, not corporate TOS and PR management. Infrastructure for interoperability and redundancy, so projects don’t die when a maintainer burns out or a server goes down

But here’s the risk, if the new #devs only copy the #dotcons AGAIN, it’s a fail. Worse still, if they get sucked into the #NGO vampire nests, the slow, bureaucratic funding black holes of the worst paths of #nlnet and #NGI, we’ll just see more “safe” projects that burn grant money building tools nobody uses.

Let’s be clear, these institutions do some small good, on basic infrastructure, but their #NGO sides are hoovering up resources by pushing for risk-free deliverables, and ignore the actual needs of grassroots groups. This funding is way too often shaped by #mainstreaming politics and careerism, not lived practice. We’ve seen it before, and we’re seeing it again.

What we need now are tools that grow from compost, not code sprints. Tools built from social use, not tech fashion. We need radical simplicity, transparency, and flexibility, tech that can’t be easily co-opted by the forces we’re trying to move beyond.

So if you’re a dev stepping into this space, welcome. But please don’t make another Mastodon, but with more “privacy” or #AI features. Instead, work with those who’ve been composting here for years. Build with the messy, weird, and beautiful people who need to shape new paths, not, boringly, recreate the old ones with shinier branding.

A guest post – The Mess of the Current #OpenWeb Path: A User’s Experience

Setting up a #Mastodon account to move away from supremacist platforms like #Twitter, #Threads, #Bluesky, and #LinkedIn felt like the right step. But almost immediately, I ran into one of the core failures of the so-called #openweb – drastic post length limits, artificial restrictions, and a general lack of usability. At first glance, Mastodon appears no different from the mainstream platforms it’s supposed to replace. With the post lengths, why are we still replicating big tech models?

But that’s only partially true. Some Mastodon instances do allow longer posts, and the broader #Fediverse is full of different options, many of which are free from the limits imposed by inherited #mainstreaming culture. The issue isn’t Mastodon itself, but how fragmented and confusing the experience still is. The #Geekproblem strikes again, a quick dive into the openweb landscape reveals the same story:

Messy, inconsistent user experiences
Endless debate over technical details while real users struggle
A lack of funding or structured support for meaningful improvements
This fragmentation preventing mass adoption

All the noise about “fixing” this is just noise. Yes, the #openweb path exists and works, but it’s underfunded, unsupported, and often overshadowed by corporate-backed alternatives. A familiar failure that is both frustrating and predictable, this is a view of these struggles from an outside perspective. We still have a chaotic landscape where even well-intentioned users find themselves frustrated and giving up. The open web won’t succeed just by existing, it needs to work. Right now, for too many people, it doesn’t.

The #4opens vs. liberal tokenism in #openweb tech

What software do activists need?

The core problem for the last 20 years has been that most activists were locked into #dotcons (corporate social media silos) because open alternatives were either too difficult to use, lack network effects, or fail to meet their practical needs. With the current reboot of the #openweb with the #fedivers based on #ActivityPub has already taken a step away from this mess.

Here’s what’s needed from a software development perspective to break out of this mess. Open & accessible publishing networks. Activists need easy ways to publish and share information outside corporate-controlled platforms. Right now, #Fediverse tools like #Mastodon and #PeerTube exist, but they are still largely copies of centralized platforms rather than native alternatives that work for grassroots media.

To take the second step in alt tech we need a native decentralized, trust-based publishing network (#OMN is the example I am working on) Bridging tools to syndicate content between #dotcons and open platforms. Better “unbranded” discovery tools for surfacing trusted grassroots content (think of a federated search engine that’s not controlled by Google)

Secure yet open communication, is already mostly in place. Activists do need to secure yet transparent communication tools that balance privacy with accessibility. Right now, many are stuck using encrypted corporate platforms like #WhatsApp and #Telegram, which create spy silos and exclude people who purposely don’t have the apps. Projects like #Signal and XMPP chat kinda work in this space, so this is not a strong tech focus, but is a social issue to work on.

The type of project we do need #indymediaback, #makeinghistory, #OGB and the base #OMN coding. There is a continuing need for resilient infrastructure, hosting and sysadmin alongside sustainable funding tools for activists’ websites, blogs, and tools often get taken down due to coordinated attacks and lack of resources. On the more dev side of this path, hybrid peer-to-peer hosting solutions (so sites can stay online even under attack) could be useful to bridge current client server tools.

There’s a roadmap, but the problem is developer focus and funding. If you’re serious about helping, check out the stalled dev work on https://unite.openworlds.info and see how it can be set in motion agen. If you’re a dev who wants to make a real impact, this is a good place to look.

The issue with #FOSS tech development, the failure of many #FOSS projects, is a failure to move from theory to practice. The issue is that developers work in isolation, disconnected from grassroots needs, and get lost in perfectionism rather than delivering functional prototypes.

The #geekproblem dominates, with coders prioritize control, abstract debates, and self-contained experiments over practical, usable tools for real-world communities. This is why projects stall: they are not built with activists in mind. Meanwhile, centralized platforms continue to consolidate power, because they offer simple, accessible, and functional solutions, despite their deep and nasty flaws.

To break this cycle, we need:

Practical iteration, build rough, working solutions rather than endless theorizing.
#4opens culture, embrace open process, standards, and real collaboration.
Bridging solutions, tech that activists can actually use, not just developer-driven experiments.
Funding models beyond #NGO traps, so projects remain independent and sustainable.

The fight for the #openweb is not only about resisting #dotcons but creating alternatives people can and will use. Can we move beyond abstraction and actually make history?

The #Open Path vs The #Closed Path – Why Simplicity Matters

The #mainstreaming success of #Bluesky means we have a crew who keep pushing the idea of creating a “native” #AP federated codebase/platform that captures its simplicity and ease of use. The problem they focus on is complexity vs. accessibility, the #open path is inherently more complex than the #closed path, and that’s a good thing in an open society. It allows for diversity, resilience, and decentralization. But in a closed society (which is what we’re working with), complexity hinders adoption. In this, the problem isn’t just technical, it’s social.

Bluesky thrives because it prioritizes usability (#closed). What these people keep brining up is what if we had a #AP federated equivalent that did the same? As a new entry point for the #Fediverse? The idea that keeps coming back, and sometimes pushed is the normal #dotcons path of imaging a platform designed for non-technical users, with #Bluesky-like simplicity in setup and everyday use, a sleek, intuitive interface that doesn’t overwhelm, built-in discovery features to easily find content and people. With seamless onboarding for users unfamiliar with federation

This “new” path wouldn’t replace #Mastodon, and the wider #Fediverse apps, it would complement them. Mastodon remains the power-user platform, while they think that the new space could serve as a gateway for mainstream adoption of the Fediverse.

Questions to consider: Is there a genuine need for such a platform, or is this just another #techcurn distraction? What key features from Bluesky (or other platforms) would be essential to replicate on this path? How do we simplify federation without sacrificing its core values? What social and technical challenges stand in the way of making this happen? Why do we not simply continue down the existing #openweb path of pushing cultural change.

What do you think? Is this a #techcurn distraction, or could it be the missing path for wider Fediverse outreach and adoption? What I think about this is discussed here http://hamishcampbell.com

#Fediverse #Bluesky #Mastodon #OpenWeb #4opens

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.

#openweb vs #closedweb is the battle for the Internet

The internet’s origins are tangled with the military-industrial complex, designed for resilience in the face of catastrophe. But the protocols themselves, once set loose, created a playground for anarchistic experimentation. The lack of centralized control allowed people to build without permission, and that openness birthed the wild, decentralized internet we briefly glimpsed.

It was an accident, but an accident we can repeat. The #dotcons crushed that brief era of freedom, but the same dynamics that let the early #openweb flourish still exist. The #4opens, the #Fediverse, #OMN — these are our tools to recreate the “mistake” deliberately this time.

What if we embrace the idea that technology can escape its creators? Maybe we can compost the current #techshit and let something even more resilient grow. What do you think? Should we lean into the idea of building “mistakes” on purpose?

It’s well past time to pick a side. For decades, the internet has been being enclosed. The one’s living decentralized network of commentary sites, blogs, forums has been corralled into a handful of paved prison yards controlled by the #dotcons. With most people’s attention and thus freedom being in the hands of a #nastyfew oligarchs. Every post, every ‘friend,’ every creative work is locked behind closed doors, and when push comes to shove as it is now, you will increasingly find that you don’t have the keys.

But the keys still exist, and it’s not so hard for you to pickup them up. There has been a #openweb digital jailbreak going on for the last 5 years, if you value your humanity you need to become a part of this blackout, put the key in the lock and turn it.

OK, yes, maybe a little strong, the #openweb isn’t a utopia, but it’s the closest thing we’ve got to freedom online. It’s built on the #4opens: Open Source: The code is public, hackable, and accountable. Open Data: Information flows freely, not hoarded for control. Open Standards: Interoperability beats lock-in monopolies. Open Process: Transparent governance, not shadowy boardrooms.

This #fediverse path is an escape hatch from the #closedweb. It’s not a product. It’s not something you can buy stock in. It’s a network of interconnected platforms like #Mastodon, #Lemmy, and #PeerTube to name a few, all running on the open protocol #activertypub. It’s messy. It’s human. And it’s yours if you take it.

It should be easy to see that the #closedweb is a digital prison, a mausoleum for human creativity, dressed up like a theme park. It’s run by billionaire-controlled #dotcons and polished by the illusion of safety sold by the #encryptionists. Who keep misshaping our paths. What did they offer? Control: Your identity, your data, your connections — all owned by them. Manipulation: Your timeline, your reach, your visibility — dictated by algorithmic gods. Exploitation: Every interaction, every word, every click — another drop in their profit bucket. We’ve eaten their lie that the internet had to be this way. That Meta, Google, and the hollow husk of Twitter are the price of admission to digital society. But simply, it was never true.

OK, I get your apathy, why does it matter? Because when we blur the lines, we lose the fight. People pour energy into platforms that wear the clothes of progress but are stitched with threads of control. We need to clearly label projects as #openweb or #closedweb, so people can choose where to dig in and build. The #4opens are our shovels, and the remnants of failed #web03 promises are good compost to start on. Let’s turn the decay of false hope into fertile ground for real digital commons.

The internet wasn’t built to be a machine for ad revenue. It was built to connect the paths for radical, collective steps we need in today’s mess.

Grab a spade. Let’s start digging. #OMN

This post is inspired by this #fluffy post to add to the #hashtagstory