If you think that means it doesn't affect you, I suspect you'll find that's not the case.

I'm starting to get the impression that certain factions of the fediverse have moved to Nostr. I don't just mean people moving their personal social media activity, but software devs, hosting services etc.

If that's you, what motivated your change of alignment? Also, do you have a foot in both camps, or are you all-in on Nostr?

There's a big difference between not *liking* the outcome and not *accepting* the outcome. The first is normal. The second risks a breakdown of the peaceful transfer of power between factions, which constitutional elections are designed to facilitate. Worst case scenarios include civil war and what happened to the USSR in 1991.

"You can sovereignly host your own PDS"

Yes.

"... and entirely control your identity on bluesky"

No. The PDS stores your data, but BlueSky maintains a central registry for IDs in their network. In theory, you could run your own ATProto ID registery. But from what I understand, it would be incompatible with BlueSky. It would be the equivalent of forking BitCoin to create your own blockchain. You can, but it doesn't allow you to transact over the BitCoin blockchain.

"The reason OpenSats feels different is the way that it is running. It's not any one defined piece of software."

Sorry to be pedantic but this isn't new either. FSF was originally set up as a legal umbrella for the GNU Project, which covers many pieces of software. Software in the Public Interest was set up to umbrella Debian, which also includes many software projects. Software Freedom Conservancy forked off FSF to do a similar thing. Apache was set up for the webserver, but now umbrellas dozens of other projects.

Running a 501c involves a lot of administrivia, so it's unusual to maintain one for a single software project. This is why platforms like OpenCollective and Liberapay were established. So that new projects could accept donations to cover expenses, without having to be formally adopted by a 501c.

Is paying to connect to random WiFi a thing where you live? I've never seen that in Aotearoa, or in China for that matter. Most people use mobile data (cell network) and WiFi is either password-protected or open and free to use.

A successful Exit to Community is a positive thing overall. But this does make me concerned about the future of the existing OpenCollective platform.

Reading between the lines, it seems like the classic 'dump insufficiently profitable service on non-profit'. Netscape Navigator being dumped into the Mozilla Foundation was the first example, but we've seen many since; Goggle Wave and OpenOffice being left on Apache's doorstep, Sandstorm.io moving to sandstorm.org, and so many others.

OTOH this seems like a genuine cell division, allowing different factions of the founding crew to pusrue different visions. So I'm cautiously optimistic about the future of both projects.

"this is the first time a 501c has been established to work on opensource software EVER!"

Non-USAmerican here. Can you explain what a 501c is, how it differs from the usual non-profit Foundation (FSF, SitPI ApacheF, LinuxF), and why that's exiting? ELI5

Clever as the engineering undoubtedly is, I'm not sure the goal is worthwhile.

I remember the 1990s when access to *dial-up* net access was metered by the MB or by the minute. It took a lot of work to replace that with all-you-can-eat broadband. Going back to metered access seems like regression to me, not progress.

Apple is already under pressure to do the same from DMA enforcement in the EU. With both US and EU regulators pushing to de-monopolise digital tech markets, we've got a good chance of seeing it continue to happen over the next 4-10 years.

This is one example of why it's very important that US citizens re-elect their current administration. Regardless of what they think about the spokesmodel they're running for President.

If the US executive is taken over by the GoP in its current form, it will start working with the digital monopolists. To block antitrust enforcement at home, and fight the EU on DMA enforcement. As well as other countries trying to reign in the unbridled power of the monopolists.

This could set us back a decade or two in the fight for a free and uncapturable internet.

"Venice, Florida is covered in water

Climate change, working as designed. Brought to you by the Koch Brothers, and everyone else who's been blowing smoke for decades about carbon emissions being harmless, to protect their fossil fuel oligopoly. A typical product of corporate shitfuckery, and the pursuit of short-term profit at the expense of all else.

Also

Private equity rips off its investors, too:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/08/sucker-at-the-table/#clucks-definance

So of us don't give a shit about BitCoin. We just came here to chew bubblegum and post memes 😁

+1 I'm biased towards Automattic, for sure, because everything I've seen them do has been to support Free Code ecosystems and social web communities. Like hiring the ActivityPub for WP developer fulltime to work on the plugin.

I've only skimmed the first half of the article you linked. But if even half of Matt's claims about what WP Engine are doing are true, It reminds me of the shitfuckery LibLime / PTFS tried with the Koha project, or Oracle with OpenOffice.

In which case, Automattic and the WP Foundation are well within their rights to use any means at their disposal to protect the WP ecosystem from this kind of corporate parasitism. Especially in its particularly pernicious private equity firm, see;

https://redgreenandblue.org/2023/01/07/cory-doctorow-antitrust-twilight-zone-thats-feeding-monopoly-explosion/

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/are-private-equity-firms-plundering-the-u-s-economy/

https://www.theverge.com/23758492/private-equity-brendan-ballou-plunder-finance-doj

Using JS is marginally acceptable. What grinds my gears is a) using it for things that can be done just as well with HTML/CSS, for much lower resource use, and b) using off-the-shelf JS libraries with a rabbit hole of nested dependencies, without making any attempt to audit them.

Lest we forget, it was also exposing the collateral murder of journalists, by US forces in the Middle East that made WikiLeaks famous. Julian Assange paid the price, in years of exile and legal intimidation that would have killed many (remember The Internet's Own Boy AaronSw, RIP). But instead it just unravelled his mind and drove him into the arms of anti-Americans (as it did to Kim DotCom).

If the demonization of journalists is the last refuge of crypto-fascists, then murdering them is surely crossing the rubicon into full blown fascism. As in the 1930s, the people of the world cannot afford to ignore the growth of fascism. In all its many forms.

Neither can we afford to blindly let the powerful tell us who the "real" fascists are, with their struggle sessions and their Two Minutes Hate. As Brian reminds us in The Life of Brian, we've all got to work it out for ourselves. Because as Mrs Cohen points out, anyone we might want to do it for us is not the Messiah, just a very naughty boy.

I don't believe in God.

I do, however believe in following written instructions from random people, to the letter, even if they've been dead for thousands of years. See above.

So despite being an atheist, I'd still make a fantastic old testament fundamentalist. Don't you think? 😏

"Communication protocols" seems an odd thing for the SEC to be regulating, until you realize that the standards for digital inter-bank transfers are "communication protocols".

Here's the other side of the story;

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/10/monopoly-begets-monopoly/#gary-gensler

Gensler has been doing some amazing work to restore transparency in institutional investment, and reign in the robber Barron's who've been making billions off unpoliced financial scams. While people who work fulltimel lose their homes, struggle to feed their families, and get bankrupted by medical debt.

Got a link to a confirmation that this exists? I can't find anything about this. Tried a couple of search engines.

What you working on? An MLS NIP?