Notices by Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net), page 13

Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Thursday, 29-Nov-2018 12:05:54 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

"the thing is, a lot of those people [kids on Arpanet in the 1970s] felt outcast by society—they were geeks; their families and their fellow students didn’t understand them; they had nobody. And we welcomed them into the community [at MIT AI lab] and invited them to learn and start to do some useful work. It was amazing for them not to be treated as trash."

-- Richard Stallman

In conversation Thursday, 29-Nov-2018 12:05:54 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Thursday, 29-Nov-2018 10:58:42 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

Other alternatives to Signal in the single server (unfederated) category are RocketChat and NextCloud Talk. The latter might federate in future versions.

In conversation Thursday, 29-Nov-2018 10:58:42 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Sunday, 25-Nov-2018 09:33:39 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

The tide seems to be turning against Facebook. What's interesting here isn't so much the story as who it's coming from (CNN).

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/22/opinions/facebook-is-the-nerd-turned-bully-ball-opinion-intl/index.html

The real story is that Facebook's attempts to become more of an explicitly political actor have been hitting the fan. Zuck's tour of the US, which everyone thought was the beginning of a presidential bid, was probably the start of his attempt to understand the political landscape. He realized that Facebook couldn't stay out of politics and was trying to get more of a handle on it, outside of his usual bubble.

If you have a few billion people in the walled garden and you're making content decisions about what they see then this is always going to have an inescapable political dimension. You can claim to be "apolitical" and just following some censorship decision tree, but at some point that becomes no longer credible.
In conversation Sunday, 25-Nov-2018 09:33:39 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  Facebook has gone from plucky nerd to class bully
  
  from CNN
  
  It's a long time since Facebook was a scrappy upstart. It is not a start-up, or a disruptor, any more: it is a huge corporation. It cannot ignore its enormous flaws.
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Sunday, 25-Nov-2018 08:00:42 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

Some things are just designed for abuse.

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/google-mozilla-working-on-letting-web-apps-edit-files-despite-warning-it-could-be-abused-in-terrible

The obvious application for saving files though would be things like keys for UIs like RiotWeb. Saving keys in the cache isn't a good idea.

If it was restricted to that type of use I'd be ok with adding the ability to access the filesystem. Anything much beyond that just becomes an attack vector.
In conversation Sunday, 25-Nov-2018 08:00:42 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  Google, Mozilla working on letting web apps edit files despite warning it could be 'abused in terrible ways'
  
  from TechRepublic
  
  The firms, known for their Chrome and Firefox web browsers, are heading a group that is devising a way for users to save changes they make using web apps.
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Thursday, 22-Nov-2018 16:53:50 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
- Bart Groeneveld
@BartG95 Not only are they not technically decentralized but they're also not economically decentralized. If you ignore the numbers and just look at who is getting real bread-on-the-table type value out of it then it's always a very tiny number of individuals, with all the other users just being accessories to the ponzi scheme.

But even that being the case, blockchainers have somehow managed to claim the word "decentralized" as their own. It think this is because the technology is just slightly beyond most people's cognitive event horizon.

In conversation Thursday, 22-Nov-2018 16:53:50 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Thursday, 22-Nov-2018 10:36:32 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

On the EFF stuff about pushing companies to stand with their users it's worth remembering that after web 2.0 the user was no longer the customer and so the business incentives changed massively. Encouraging companies to go against their customers and side with the users is always going to be a very hard sell.

So if you want to pressure companies in this way you'll have to pressure them to change their business models. Doing anything else will just be like deckchairs on the Titanic.

In conversation Thursday, 22-Nov-2018 10:36:32 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Tuesday, 20-Nov-2018 19:22:42 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

More loathsome stuff from Google to creep you out. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/11/google-patent-bedroom-privacy-smart-home/576022/
In conversation Tuesday, 20-Nov-2018 19:22:42 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  The Next Data Mine Is Your Bedroom
  
  from The Atlantic
  
  Google wants to scan your clothing and listen to you brush your teeth. Welcome home.
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Tuesday, 20-Nov-2018 07:20:33 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

"Nearly any time most of the world wants to exercise a basic right - speech, association, movement, voting - they rely on software to do it, and they can only do what the software allows. When we don't have control over that software, we simply aren't free beings"

-- John Sullivan

In conversation Tuesday, 20-Nov-2018 07:20:33 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 18:51:14 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

The report on the sustainability of open source, written by Nadia Eghbal in 2016, identifies the problem well enough but doesn't have much of a solution.

It's written from the venture capital perspective, so startup culture is uncritically endorsed and there are various other questionable assumptions about corporate involvement. In some places there are also references to the myth of the lone developer ("rockstar" type thinking).

The problem it describes is that the current economy depends heavily on software and that underneath the glossy startups the infrastructure comprises largely of Free Software developed and maintained by a relatively small community of "key contributors". The software economy is mostly free riding upon the digital infrastructure base, and there isn't much systematic thinking about how to keep the infrastructure level going in the longer term.

I'd describe this problem in terms of the failing social reproduction of developers. It might be easier than ever to learn python, but it can be hard to make ends meet while running a software project, even if it's vital to the free rider economy.

It gives the classic example of OpenSSL - something which runs on the majority of internet servers and yet which in 2014 at the time of heartbleed was maintained by just one developer in precarious circumstances and hardly funded.

In conversation Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 18:51:14 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 17:50:39 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

"Open source is a development methodology; free software is a social movement."

-- Richard Stallman

In conversation Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 17:50:39 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 17:13:20 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

"Today, everybody uses open source code, including Fortune 500 companies, government, major software companies and startups. Sharing, rather than building proprietary code, turned out to be cheaper, easier, and more efficient. This increased demand puts additional strain on those who maintain this infrastructure, yet because these communities are not highly visible, the rest of the world has been slow to notice. Most of us take opening a software application for granted, the way we take turning on the lights for granted. We don’t think about the human capital necessary to make that happen."

-- Nadia Eghbal

In conversation Sunday, 18-Nov-2018 17:13:20 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 18:26:46 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
- Annah
@maiyannah Due to automation over the last hundred years farming is a tiny fraction of the economy. Also in recent decades many farmers were screwed by the supermarkets.

If times were hard enough the UK probably could be agriculturally self-sufficient although it would take a large mobilization comparable to what happened in Cuba.

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 18:26:46 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 18:05:27 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
in reply to
- BjarniBjarniBjarni 🙊 🇮🇸 🍏
@HerraBRE Smart tagging

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 18:05:27 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 17:39:26 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
- The_Gibson {UTC -4}
@thegibson I saw some videos and it looks more like a gimmick than anything practical. I can imagine flexible screens being useful for cylindrical displays at exhibitions or for large curved monitors.

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 17:39:26 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 15:55:08 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
@fitheach @gemlog @vfrmedia @vilbi @dick_turpin

Most of the UK's trade is with other EU countries. If anything interferes with that then there could be big trouble, and Theresa May resigning would be the least of it.

Think peasants with pitchforks, or the 21st century equivalent.

If the UK, collectively, is short on groceries then neither the US nor Russia are going to want to solve that problem. If they were to play any part at all it would be something like US dumping of surplus corn.

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 15:55:08 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 15:09:37 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
- Elly, nasty enby :heart_pan:
@Elizafox Extremely online

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 15:09:37 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 14:41:29 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

The Beauty of Class https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v4AipH4gzw
In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 14:41:29 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  Zero Squared #177: The Beauty of Class
  
  By Zero Books from YouTube
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 14:12:04 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

Instant Messaging and the Signal Protocol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXv1boalsDI
In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 14:12:04 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  Instant Messaging and the Signal Protocol - Computerphile
  
  By Computerphile from YouTube
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 11:56:14 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅

UK austerity https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/nov/16/uk-austerity-has-inflicted-great-misery-on-citizens-un-says
In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 11:56:14 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink
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  UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says
  
  from the Guardian
  
  Poverty envoy says callous policies driven by political desire for social re-engineering
Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net)'s status on Friday, 16-Nov-2018 11:11:46 EST Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅
- Linux
@Linux Wasn't expecting that, but it does make some kind of sense. Supporting any complex software for ten years is going to be hard.

In conversation Friday, 16-Nov-2018 11:11:46 EST from soc.freedombone.net permalink

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Notices by Bob Mottram 🔧 ☕ ✅ (bob@soc.freedombone.net), page 13