Do you think opensource + Fediverse will develop into some kind of political force/movement in the next years?
Do you think opensource + Fediverse will develop into some kind of political force/movement in the next years?
I thought about this already for a while and with Lemmy and Mastodon the opensource community has a place to really try itself out and coordinate. Then even things like open-source planning-systems (like at Amazon) and AIs are possible.
At least in Germany there is currently no really political movement that could be described as left-libertarian at least seriously. Maybe the Fediverse could be the root for something like that.
Or will the Fediverse will become more like the new landscape of the internet, which encompasses everything and in which every party will need to move and have a certain stance to somehow?
Free Software started as a political movement about the rights of computer users to learn, share, and improve the systems we use. Open Source was the business-friendly depoliticized version.
Right but I wouldn't say its seen as such in the general discourse of society (at least not yet). Maybe that could change more in the next years?
In the tech biz, this has already happened. You're living in the aftermath of it.
The Open Source movement created a strong shared infrastructure for the modern tech industry, all derived from Free Software components like Linux, gcc, and Python.
Linux caught on. It took over huge swaths of the tech world in the late '90s and early 2000s; displacing not only Windows servers but also SGI, Solaris, and most of the rest of proprietary Unix.
Companies learned how to build proprietary systems on top of a common open-source core; contributing certain elements back to that core while developing other components privately.
This is what almost all modern datacenters are built out of. Most servers providing most well-known Internet services are running Linux.
In consumer devices, it's what Android, Chromebook, and Steam Deck are built out of. The modern Mac is a cousin: the Darwin core inherits from BSD. Your wifi router probably runs a Linux or BSD kernel.
You've seen the jokes about "the year of Linux on the desktop". Thing is, Linux on the desktop has been an easily available option for decades. The joke is that most people don't choose that option; they choose proprietary systems because that's slightly easier at first ... and then they normalize enduring all sorts of bullshit from those systems' proprietors. (I mean, seriously! Windows XP didn't run ads on your desktop, but today's Windows does. Why? Because they know you'll put up with it.)
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On the main fediverse you can really see it -- the thing everyone has in common is a back-end protocol. That's about it. You get trans instances and terf instances and no, they won't be joining hands to sing kumbaya.
The World Wide Web is another example of this that's much older. How many people reading this agree with Stormfront? Probably not that many. And yet both you and them are sharing the use of a variety of TCP/IP, HTTP, and HTML protocols and platforms.
The term "open source" was created to distance itself from the moral and political aspects of the already established term "free software" (free as in freedom). There are coordinated efforts to promote user's software freedoms and the developers of copyleft, free software.
What? No, lol.
Haha as a guy who definitely believed open source was the political force gathering steam to replace George W Bush back in the day...no.
with Lemmy and Mastodon the opensource community has a place to really try itself out
Sorry, I have no idea what you're talking about.
Lol no.
Some people, communities or instances will. Others will not. That's kind of the nature of the fediverse, it's not homogenous but diverse.
Meme Commando
Reporting for duty
I mean private movement is a thing. Of course it could be turned into a political movement if we're vocal about it. As long as we keep the public inform about the movement's vision, I'm pretty optimistic about we'll gain public support
It is fundamentally political. Political means advocating for policy, and decentralization is our policy we advocate for. The question is will it actually amount to anything.
That's the whole point.. hackliberty.org!
Oh God I hope not. I'm oh-so-fucking-weary of everything being politicized.
You are currently engaged in politics.
Your decision to be scared of politics is a political decision.
As a human being living in any social structure, you will be subject to politics.
No, I think the majority of people are fine being sheep. The size of the open source alternatives will never reach a number that plays a significant role otherwise they already would have e destroyed it.
If you don't use open source you're a sheep? That seems like a sure fire way to make open source community look like a bunch of elitist cunts.
Generally you can assume anybody who uses terms like "sheeple" unironically, or equates human beings with livestock, is a cunt whose opinions can safely be ignored and whose existence can be excised from your digital life with blocks and other such tools.
Use of those tools is also good for your mental health.