A. It sounds like you’ve got a detailed plan — good luck in your work!
Q. As I outline in my posts, our work isn’t going anywhere because the grassroots have been hollowed out. My focus now is to build bridges to the #mainstreaming in an effort to make compost to refill the grassroots soil. What I argue for, in a practical sense, is that we’ve already spent 20 years working in alternative paths, and this approach likely still works.
We have a rare opportunity with the current bridging of the #openweb back to mainstream through #ActivityPub. This moment is crucial, and it would be a disaster to squander it, especially in an era defined by #climatechaos and the global hard shift to the right. Please keep this in mind when organizing events for the #SocialWebFoundation (#SWF). The bridges we build now shape the future.
Q. If our worlds keep getting smaller, we risk losing the very alternatives that could save us. Do you think some of them understood what I just said?
A. Absolutely they do. They just don’t give a rat’s patootie. They ran the numbers. A human extinction event is unlikely. Forecasts indicate that the remaining resources will support them and their progeny at their existing levels of luxury in perpetuity. The rest of us can just go take a flying leap at a rolling doughnut.
I don’t have the focus or energy any more to push these projects into being so the next step is to abstract them into the ideas and flows then put them out there for the next generation, I am happy to mentor, have an expedition boat to convert #boatingeurope thinking about writing a book to sum up the content of this site, and the 40 years of history, process, and development that has shaped it.
One of the biggest tensions in the fight to build an alternative, sustainable future is the relationship between mainstream resources and grassroots projects. The reality is STARK: grassroots movements need resources to survive and thrive, yet the very act of receiving funding, if they can access it at all, drags them into the suffocating grip of #mainstreaming culture, where the radical edges that make them valuable are dulled and destroyed. So, how can conscious mainstream actors support grassroots movements without killing the radical energy that creates the value in the first place.
The answer lies in sharing resources in non-mainstreaming ways, a difficult leap for many, but an essential one. The only people who can truly be useful in sustaining #openweb paths are those willing to break free from the entrenched habits of top-down control, endless bureaucracy, and the need to polish everything into marketable, bite-sized pieces.
What does non-mainstreaming support look like?
Unconditional Funding: Grassroots projects need funding without strings attached. Too often, funding comes with requirements that reshape the project itself, turning radical experimentation into pointless palatable, measurable outputs. True support means trusting grassroots communities to know what they need and allowing them to allocate resources nimbly. #TRUST#opencollective
Trust-Based Relationships: A “native” healthier approach is to build long-term relationships with grassroots groups, listening to their needs and responding in an organic, flexible way. #TRUST#OMN
Decentralized Decision-Making: Bottom-up governance models. Funding should flow to collectives, not charismatic individuals or figureheads building careers #KISS#OGB
Infrastructure, Not Ownership: A path that might work, rather than buying influence, mainstream actors can provide infrastructure, hosting, bandwidth, servers, physical spaces, without attempting to control the projects using them. Think of it as building bridges, not fences. #Fediverse instances
Amplify, Don’t Absorb: Mainstream platforms and institutions need to amplify grassroots voices without assimilating them. This means using their reach to highlight native radical projects but stepping back to let those projects speak for themselves. No need to repackage the message, people can handle raw, messy reality. #indymediaback
Why this bridge building matters, the current mainstream is crumbling under the weight of its contradictions. As #climatechaos accelerates, as #neoliberalism fails to deliver anything but more suffering, people will look for alternatives. But if those alternatives are already swallowed and sanitized by the current mainstream, hope dims. Grassroots movements are the seedbeds of real change, they hold the living knowledge of how to build differently.
Keeping the bridge in place isn’t an act of charity; it’s a #KISS survival strategy. The future will grow from the compost of the old world, and those willing to step off the conveyor belt of #mainstreaming and into the rich, chaotic soil of grassroots experimentation will be the ones who help plant the seeds.
This is a key point that often gets misunderstood. #Mainstreaming isn’t inherently good or bad—it depends on who is influencing whom.
Good #mainstreaming = Bringing #openweb values into the mainstream (transparency, decentralization, cooperation).
Bad #mainstreaming = The mainstream (corporate control, surveillance capitalism, hierarchy) infusing itself into the #openweb and reshaping it in its own image.
In the current context, mainstreaming is mostly bad because it tends to dilute radical alternatives into market-friendly compromises. The #deathcult (neoliberalism) doesn’t absorb things in good faith—it co-opts and neutralizes them.
That’s why we need mediation, pushback, and a clear understanding of context when talking about #mainstreaming. Sometimes it’s the right move, but right now, the priority is defending and growing the roots of the #openweb before our # #fashionistas can sell it off as a brand.
One of the best things about the Fediverse is that real people and community’s get to choose what kind of digital paths they want to take. Don’t want #Meta snooping around? Join or host an instance that blocks them out. Prefer not to have people search your content? Lock it down in your settings. Want to mediate the strong #blinded flow of “normies”? Close the doors via your instance settings. It’s a “nativist” system that offers a radical degree of agency compared to the #dotcons.
But what happens when people start demanding that their version of the #Fediverse become the default for everyone else? That’s where things get tricky, and where we risk losing the most valuable aspect of this messy, decentralized network: the bridges between worlds. The danger of closed loops, it’s understandable that people want their corners of the #Fediverse to feel safe, sustainable, coherent, and aligned with shared values.
The problem is that when we focus on tools so that every group can retreat into its own echo chamber, we recreate the failures of the wider #dotcons web: fragmented bubbles where ideas stagnate, and meaningful conversations can’t happen. This is what I mean when I talked about #mainstreaming echo chambers, the tendency for people to isolate themselves in what feels comfortable, which ultimately makes everything smaller.
The irony is that this impulse to close off is, in a way, the same as the desire to keep the Fediverse open. Both are reactions to the failures of centralized tech platforms. People who want to mediate #mainstreaming influences are trying to nurture the fragile seedlings of the grassroots culture they’ve built, while those advocating for broader adoption hope to prevent the network from collapsing into irrelevance. Both impulses come from wanting the Fediverse to survive, they just express that desire in too often opposite #blocking ways.
The failed bridge of #FediverseHouse is a normal path. This tension came to a head with projects like #FediverseHouse and #Fediforum, which aimed to be a gathering space but ultimately failed to build lasting bridges. It wasn’t because people didn’t care, it was because there wasn’t enough understanding of how to hold that tension between the grassroots and the mainstream without one swallowing the other. The projects lack the simplicity of #KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) and got tangled in the same old dynamics of control and fragmentation.
Keeping the bridge in place has a lot to do which sharing resources, in non #mainstreaming ways, yes, we understand, this is a hard leap for meany people but only people who can make this step can acturly be useful in the end to the “native” #openweb paths. The solution isn’t to pick a side, but to intentionally hold the bridge. In a smaller, view, that might look like running accounts across multiple instances and boosting content between different ideological spaces to keep ideas flowing. It might mean advocating for #4opens values even in mainstream-leaning spaces, or gently nudging the more isolated pockets of the Fediverse to stay curious about what lies outside their walls.
The Fediverse doesn’t need to be one thing, that’s its strength. But if we let the bridges decay, we lose the possibility of cross-pollination, of radical ideas seeping into #mainstreaming consciousness, or of everyday people stumbling into a space that makes them question the status quo. Instead of fighting, as we so often do, to make one version of the #Fediverse dominant, maybe the real work is in keeping the network alive, messy, imperfect, but always connected. Because it’s in those connections that real alternatives grow.
In this area of activism, the uncomfortable truth is that the biggest obstacle is way too often the anarchists themselves. I have spent years stepping into and outa anarchist spaces, and it’s clear that anarchists struggle to embody the autonomy they talk about. The #fashernista cultures discourage people from stepping beyond the established narrow paths, dress, behaver and language, reinforcing a cycle of self-isolation and easy to see failure. It becomes a lifestyle, anarchism, in practice, can to often look less like a rebellion and more like a subculture adapted to coexist with the paths it claims to oppose.
When real revolutionary moments arise, familiar rhetoric, feels safer than the unpredictable leap into real stateless freedom. Faced with the potential for anarchy, many anarchists cling to “anarchism” instead, sabotaging movements like the #OMN and older #openweb out of fear of losing their place within the struggle. Even without formal organizations, anarchist recreate hierarchy, influential figures shaping discourse while subtly suppressing critiques that could disrupt their status. This hidden power structure, where decisions are made without accountability, is still the normal paths anarchism claims to reject.
The core of anarchist thought, the rejection of imposed authority and the belief in voluntary cooperation, still holds radical potential. The problem isn’t with the ideas; it’s with the way they’re enacted. The state, with its machinery of control, has created the conditions that make itself seem necessary. Anarchy won’t come from rigid adherence to this ideological brand but from people who shed the weight of anarchism as a subculture and start living anarchically, forging relationships based on mutual aid and direct action, without waiting for permission from the past.
If anarchists could step away from the trap of anarchism, the state wouldn’t stand a chance. It’s time to stop venerating failure and start cultivating the seeds of real, messy, lived anarchy.
The #OMN social tech projects are an example of this step.
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.
One thing to keep in mind is that these people largely think they are good people, doing the best they can in the world as it is. And will become upset and very #spiky defensive when pointing at them on their knees prostrate worshipping. Like they said in the seminar, “I don’t know what to do about this”. I don’t think most of us do.
The Clarendon Lectures 2025 – Designing the Future: Multidisciplinary perspectives on designing better futures
Systems thinking challenges traditional approaches to management research and practice. In this second Clarendon event, Tima Bansal engages in conversation with academics in #Oxford who are integrating research and practice with the ambition to co-create futures rather than simply analysing solutions.
An outsider, polemical look at this event: Most university panels have a #NGO-thinking academic for process box-ticking. This is the representation of the fluffy side of #mainstreaming social change. This lettuce person is at best a #fluffy careerist and at worst a #NGO parasite. If there is any content at all, it’s box-ticking to create the illusion of consent and goodwill.
Then the meat of the business school is the worship of the #deathcult — people climbing the gravestones of hierarchy in the shiny, crumbling mausoleums. Even then, it’s mostly careerist. This one is talking about embedding in more fluffy NGO groups to build their story. It’s all about community and relationships. She lets go of the ego she pushed first, to step back to embed. No idea what the outcome of her work is — it’s all process. She ends with a call for nature and holism, the world her work destroys.
The currency is theory; on this, the business school is completely bankrupt from an academic point of view — not to get into the subject of morals, let alone basic human survival. She says they push their content out into science journalism, as these people are not able to judge the value of abstract academic work.
The next is an accounting bureaucrat, who does mention the green limits. He touches on the real and talks about the language in documents of bureaucratic regulation. He says it’s a mess and doesn’t know what to do. Trusting what companies say is not going to be enough. You need to change the economic relationships, and changing this is very difficult — and it’s currently simply not working.
The summing-up person is excited with an issue? Not sure what — no idea what she is actually saying. She is back to not talking about anything. She touches on statues and embarrassment. Finally, she asks an interesting question: who is the ordinance, us or somebody else? We have no idea who?
She says we need strong institutions, as individual companies are not going to do it — they capture the levers of power and pull them to keep the mess, and money, flowing. She has no answer to this. She does mention moving past “markets” in passing for a moment.
Boundaries come up — the answer is fluff, then more substance, accounting has hard boundaries, but useful change comes from stepping outside this. Systems thinking — no answer.
These people are lost and are training up the next lost generation. It’s interesting to see that they have some understanding of this, but it’s looking like they will do nothing to change it.
Wine and nibbles were OK.
Talked to many of them after the event. A few said they were undercover academic “radicals” infiltrating the business colleges — which was maybe a tiny bit true, or not. The students I talked to were blank and staying in academia.
The “consultants” were interested and animated; they found it a little shockingly invigorating to have a counter-culture conversation.
To sum up, mostly hopeless. I am always surprised the place doesn’t stink of rotting zombies, a metaphor, maybe? They need some real content… they really need some real content, but you get the strong feeling that they are not even going to change until the Thames is flowing up under the nearby railway bridge. Even then, there will be calls for more sandbags while talking more about careers — all they know — but underneath this, they have the fear that these careers will likely not exist.
This is it. What to do?
It’s a bleak cycle: academics pump out theory to feed the chatting classes, who in turn guide the #fashernista, spinning ever more refined justifications for the status quo. The echo chamber reverberates with hollow soundbites while the world burns. What we end up with is a layer of intellectual manure, with no one doing the work to turn it into compost.
With projects like the #OMN social tech could be the spade that digs through this mess, breaking down the dead ideas and aerating the soil for something new to grow. But instead, we use #dotcons tech to pile up more waste. Every app, platform, and algorithm is designed to reinforce the system, not break it. The closed loops of influence, profit, and prestige just churn on.
If we want to prod this beast, one way I am working on is to embrace the disruptive potential of the #openweb. What if we built platforms that exposed the rot? Imagine public academic review systems where research couldn’t hide behind paywalls, or tools that tracked the influence of corporate funding on “objective” scholarship. There are some seeds for this, what if we grow them #4opens
Or more direct action, maybe we just crash the garden party. What if we hijacked their panels, flooded their Q&As with real questions, or set up rogue alt-conferences right outside their events? The goal isn’t destruction for destruction’s sake — it’s breaking the illusion of inevitability.
What do you think? How do we spark that shift in behaviour, that even they, softly, say we need to do.
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.
The last decade has seen a rapid shift toward #mainstreaming, where the boundaries between #open and #closed have been intentionally blurred, is also mirrored in our alt paths. This #geekproblem confusion serves the interests of the #dotcons and the #deathcult, not the people. The language of the #hashtagstory sharpens this divide and give people the tools to see the reality of the paths they’re walking and engaging with.
The #openweb, is built on the principles of the #4opens: open source, open data, open standards, and open processes. It centres human-to-human connections, growing at best community, collaboration, and collective empowerment. By prioritizes social trust, transparency, and grassroots governance. And thrives in messy, organic, and decentralized environments.
The #closedweb is dominated by control. It is pushed by both the #dotcons and their shadow puppets, the #encryptionists, who sell privacy as a product while reinforcing isolation and distrust. Encourages #stupidindividualism and consumerism over community and collective action. Markets itself as progressive but reinforces the same centralized power structures.
Why marking the difference matters, when we blur the lines, we lose sight of the path we need to walk. People unknowingly feed the systems that oppress them, believing they are supporting alternatives. By #KISS labelling projects, platforms, and ideas as either #openweb or #closedweb, we create dialogue to empower people to make informed choices and shift their energy toward real change.
The #4opens acts as the shovel to dig through the #techshit, turning failed projects and false promises into compost for the next wave of more truly open technology. Please start using these #hashtags intentionally. Call things what they are. If a project claims to be open but hides its development, call it #closedweb. If a platform fosters community and embraces messy, social processes, celebrate it as part of the #openweb.
Change is happening. The centre isn’t holding, the choice is left or right. The #openweb is the radical, collective path in this choice.
The influx of #mainstreaming brings many different, often non-native, focuses into our spaces. Most of these will be better handled as external resources. Let’s keep the core simple: #KISS and #4opens. Money is a dangerous subject for #openweb projects. It’s the root of corruption and co-option, so it’s best to keep financial aspects as external applications and simply link to them. Words are wind, look at the ground. We live in a closed world, and we should not add to this mess.
There is no security in CLOSED systems — security comes from OPEN and social processes.
There is no security in individualism — true security lies in community.
There is no security in “trustless” models — real security emerges from social trust.
Over the last 10 years, we’ve been fed meany lies. This is especially clear in tech. Look at #opensource: can you find any lasting value in CLOSED within that? Over the last 20 years, we’ve seen an ongoing battle between OPEN and CLOSED, but the last decade has been dominated by the #dotcons and their shadow puppet, the #encryptionists. Both are CLOSED, both wear the cloth of OPEN, and both recite the right words. But words are wind — look at the ground. #4opens is the reality check.
I’ll be truly optimistic when closed paths of #encryptionist apps cross standards with the #open of #activertypub apps, bridging the human nature and “feeling” that fuels this gap. But right now, there’s a strong, unspoken push not to address these issues.
Nearly everything I do today revolves around #4opens, addressing the unspoken issues head-on. I’ve been doing this full-time for more than 30 years, and I’ve watched hundreds of alt-tech projects wither on the vine, with only a handful of flowering. Reflecting on this, I’ve developed a #KISS universally reliable way of judging which projects might flourish and which will collapse: the #4opens framework. Others might call it open-source development or radical transparency, but it’s all the same core path #nothingnew
To move this forward, we need to address the core problems:
The #geekproblem — a teenage mix of arrogance and ignorance that spreads like wildfire.
The #dotcons — a relentless push of greed over human need.
These are fundamental issues, and it’s good, necessary, to have strong opinions on them. Because not having an opinion? That’s a path straight back to the #deathcult. We don’t need more of that. What we need is compost, patience, and the courage to keep pushing for openness and social solidarity, no matter how messy it gets.
Let’s grow something real.
There’s an unspoken #geekproblem lurking at the heart of the #openweb, and it’s past time we bring it into the light. If we frame #p2p as #human2human, scaling becomes a virtue, an organic process of communities growing, evolving, and finding balance through social trust. But if we view #p2p as #data2data, scaling becomes a purely technical challenge, one that strips the human element away.
The first path embraces the messy beauty of human connections. Scaling isn’t a failure, it’s a reminder that growth needs care, cooperation, and thoughtful design. The second path, the data-centric approach, treats humans as nodes, reducing complex social interactions to packets of information to optimize and control.
Here’s the issue: the latter view is the one pushed by the #dotcons. The systems we’ve grown up with, the platforms we’ve relied on, all reinforce this anti-human perspective. And whether we like it or not, we’ve internalized some of this thinking, even within our #openweb projects. That’s the uncomfortable truth.
The question is: do we actually want to solve this? Because the solution isn’t technical, it’s social. It means rejecting the idea that tech should replace or dominate human processes. It means making space for friction, for inefficiency, for the unpredictability of people working together.
Talk to a geek today. Start the conversation. Ask how they see #p2p — as people connecting, or as machines exchanging data? Their answer might tell you a lot about where their compass is pointing, and whether we can navigate back toward a web that is human.
Let’s compost the #geekproblem, nourish the soil, and grow something better.
Are our geeks feeding the #deathcult? Twenty years ago, the #openweb was all about open. Our bowing down to the #dotcons has left everyone pushing for closed. For death.
We need to make some compost, this path in technology is social, rooted in the recognition that technology, at its core, is a tool created and used by humans to address social needs and challenges. While technological advancements on this path can bring about benefits and progress, they also have the capacity to perpetuate existing inequalities, exacerbate social divides, and undermine democratic paths.
To decide on what is compostable, the #4opens framework provides a useful lens through which to evaluate and assess technology projects. By emphasizing openness, transparency, collaboration, and decentralization, the set of principles prioritize social utility and collective benefit over corporate profit and only individual gain.
For our #geekproblem we need to talk about why the social dimension of technology is crucial for empowerment. Technology has the power to empower people and communities by providing access to information, resources, and opportunities. By focusing on the social utility of technology, we ensure that it is designed and deployed in ways that promote inclusivity, participation, and empowerment.
Equity and Justice are needed for this balance, in a world pushing systemic inequalities, technology can either reinforce existing power structures or serve as a tool for challenging and transforming them. By centreing social considerations in tech development, we work towards more equitable paths.
Community building using technology has the power to foster connections, collaboration, and community-building on a global scale. By using social utility, we harness the power of technology to strengthen social bonds, dialogue, and mobilize collective action around shared #KISS goals and values. In summary, the social dimension of technology determines how technology is designed, deployed, and used for social needs and challenges.
Let’s stop feeding the #deathcult. We need compost to grow something better, please.
The problem with #closedweb paths on the internet isn’t just “greedy” Big Tech, it’s the inevitable outcome of #capitalism itself. Under capitalism, companies endlessly grow or die, squeezing profits from every possible source. This means tricking users into handing over their data, treating them with contempt, and ultimately dehumanizing them.
Criticizing the #dotcons and pointing to #FOSS copies as a solution is a simple first step. But only doing this is like blaming #BP for abandoning green goals while ignoring the paths that reward environmental destruction. Big Tech’s, the #dotcons, behaviour is a symptom of the #deathcult, a dead economic system where profit trumps people. Copies of the #dotcons no matter how well meaning carry some of this DNA into the #openweb reboot.
The web started as an open ecosystem, a collection of independent applications and communities connected by common protocols and stories. The walls went up in the name of profit and convenience, and now it’s time to tear them down. For the #OMN and the #4opens to thrive, we need to break this cycle. Let’s build tools that make self-hosting accessible to everyone, reconnect people to the value of the commons, and dismantle the tech oligarchies piece by piece. At the moment this is way too hard to do and the change to make this possible is being #blocked by the #geekproblm.
To move past this blocking we need to recognise that the scaffolding is tech, but the building is people, mythos, and tradition. Let’s get back to work with our shovels and compost the mess. ✊
This post is about controlling the narrative, not letting the #nastyfew dictate the terms of engagement. Too often, we let them set the agenda, reacting to their every word instead of actively building the alternatives we need.
Their power isn’t just in what they do, it’s in how much space they take up in our minds and movements. We amplify their mess making when we obsess over their rhetoric rather than dismantling their actions. This is why we need composting, not fixating.
The #Fashionistas in Activism problem is real, when people latch onto whatever gets them attention instead of doing the hard, messy work of creating change. Chasing buzzwords, getting caught in endless reaction cycles, this is what keeps us stuck. We need to be the ones setting the agenda, not just replying to theirs.
Focus. Build. Compost the mess. That’s how we win.
In activism, the term “#fashionistas” captures individuals and groups, especially within #NGOs and advocacy organizations, who latch onto trendy causes or ideologies, not out of any commitment, but more to appear relevant and to align with the latest social currents. This is corrosive to meaningful change, reducing activism to performative gestures rather than a sustained struggle for justice.
Superficial engagement, when they rush to adopt the language of trending movements (like #BLM, #MeToo, or #ClimateJustice) without committing to their radical roots. For example, after George Floyd’s murder, many corporations and NGOs posted black squares on #Instaspam as a symbolic gesture. But what followed? Few made concrete policy changes or redistributed resources to Black-led grassroots organizations. It was activism as aesthetics, empty gestures rather than systemic action that was called for.
Lack of authenticity, when organizations prioritize optics over substance, which breed distrust. Consider the influx of NGOs claiming to champion digital rights but quietly partnering with Big Tech for funding. The grassroots developers working on genuinely decentralized platforms are left unsupported, while the NGO pointless/parasite class absorbs attention and resources, all while pushing and reinforcing the #deathcult paths they claim to oppose.
Mainstreaming, activism, loses its teeth when it’s tailored for palatability. Take the way climate #NGOs soften their language to avoid alienating corporate funders, pushing “net zero” narratives instead of demanding degrowth and direct action. By sanitizing radical demands, they reinforce the status quo rather than confronting the power structures driving #climatechaos.
Misaligned priorities, chasing trends, means resources get funnelled away from sustained struggles. For example, the fleeting attention on #Palestine waxes and wanes with media cycles, while groups doing year-round solidarity work scrape by with minimal support. #Fashionistas flock to hashtags when they’re hot, then move on, abandoning communities who still face oppression once the spotlight fades.
Reactive rather than proactive, when #fashionistas are caught chasing the next big thing rather than strategizing long-term solutions. Think of the explosion of interest in #openweb media during political unrest, a real issue, yes, but one that reveals the broader failure to build #4opens, community-run digital infrastructure proactively. The #OMN project exists precisely to address this, but it’s hard to gain traction when attention constantly flits to the crisis of the moment.
Rectonery, the most toxic aspect of fashionista activism is its tendency to reinforce the systems it claims to oppose. When #NGOs adopt radical language but stay within #mainstreaming paradigms, they create an illusion of progress. For instance, diversity initiatives in tech are often superficial, leading to token hires rather than dismantling structural racism or addressing the #geekproblem that keeps tech culture hostile to outsiders.
How do we compost the #fashionistas mess? The answer lies in prioritizing authenticity, long-term commitment, and meaningful engagement. This means, centring grassroots voices by funding and amplify people working on the ground, not just polished, and mostly pointless #NGO campaigns.
Rejecting mainstreaming, by being willing to alienate power on radical paths. This path needs us to building infrastructure, like #OMN and #indymediaback to grow autonomous spaces outside corporate control. Historical awareness, matters, to remember our past struggles, rights and freedoms were won by collective action, not #PR campaigns.
What, we don’t need, is more buzzword-chasing #nonprofits. We need shovels, compost, and a commitment to grow something real from the ruins of the #deathcult. It’s not glamorous, but it’s the only path to lasting change. Let’s start digging.
In the bigger picture. The best revenge against the #nastyfew is simple: don’t talk about them at all. What fuels them is attention — the endless cycle of fixating on their every move. Unless it’s absolutely necessary, keep the focus on the ideas and the collective struggles, not the individuals causing the mess.
Talk about the systems, the structures, in the US the republicans, not the disruptive few seeking to derail the conversation.
Ignoring the #nastyfew is the most powerful revenge you can take. Stay grounded, stay collective, and keep it #KISS.
