after reading an analysis that identified the surveillance as a feature this eventually turned into this thought which i'd be interested in your opinion about regarding the central idea or the phrasing https://circumstances.run/@hipsterelectron/112483607166560877
@hipsterelectron I feel like several things are going on, and I don't understand all of them.
Beyond software, I've tried to think how to articulate a basic question of strategy, whether to try to organize people to reclaim a social institution and reshape it, or to try to create a new independent institution that we control directly.
The latter is often criticized as abandoning people who are coerced to use the existing institution, or as cruelly forcing people to use something inferior.
@hipsterelectron In other words, the creation of social alternatives gets framed as a rejection of solidarity, rather than as an expression of it, as many of the people who create them intend and as you describe.
@FoolishOwl @d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan Honestly, the frustrating thing about this is how many people upcycle computers using FLOSS. So many people don't notice or care that it's different! The argument is literally against the idea of even envisioning a real future.
@silverwizard was really surprised-and-glad to hear a few weeks ago that an online friend of mine who doesn't even program but has poor eyesight and not much money has been doing exactly this for a while (installing ubuntu and using it on old machines) and i really want to be able to represent people like them effectively even if i haven't done that myself
@silverwizard @hipsterelectron I feel like there's some sort of epistemic closure involved, as well as some sort of unexamined emotional attachment, something like nostalgia. Like all that advertising and marketing has a more profound effect than we realized.
I think there's this other issue where like If I use MacOS I'm using a messy bunch of shell scripts If I use Windows I'm using PowerShell and cmd. exe If I use Linux I'm using a bunch of the shell
if any of those break, I'm researching sysinternals and fixing it
If my mom uses any of those, she asks someone professional to fix it.
My mom has a small credit in the Pascal standard, she just doesn't like fixing shit, so she pays someone. My dad wrote a commerical unix from sratch, he also just pays someone to fix things
there's no need to be a Linux User *and* a person who fixes it
d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan
•d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan
•d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan
•FoolishOwl
•@hipsterelectron I feel like several things are going on, and I don't understand all of them.
Beyond software, I've tried to think how to articulate a basic question of strategy, whether to try to organize people to reclaim a social institution and reshape it, or to try to create a new independent institution that we control directly.
The latter is often criticized as abandoning people who are coerced to use the existing institution, or as cruelly forcing people to use something inferior.
silverwizard likes this.
FoolishOwl
•silverwizard likes this.
silverwizard
d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan
•silverwizard likes this.
FoolishOwl
•@silverwizard @hipsterelectron I feel like there's some sort of epistemic closure involved, as well as some sort of unexamined emotional attachment, something like nostalgia. Like all that advertising and marketing has a more profound effect than we realized.
(Well, maybe Guy Debord realized.)
silverwizard likes this.
silverwizard
@FoolishOwl @d@nny "disc@" mcClanahan yeah
I think there's this other issue where like
If I use MacOS I'm using a messy bunch of shell scripts
If I use Windows I'm using PowerShell and cmd. exe
If I use Linux I'm using a bunch of the shell
if any of those break, I'm researching sysinternals and fixing it
If my mom uses any of those, she asks someone professional to fix it.
My mom has a small credit in the Pascal standard, she just doesn't like fixing shit, so she pays someone. My dad wrote a commerical unix from sratch, he also just pays someone to fix things
there's no need to be a Linux User *and* a person who fixes it
we don't all need to use arch