Strypey @strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz

Under marked otherwise, all posts from this account are #CC #BYSA 4.0. Unless I send a DM, I want all my posts publicly visible, to any web browser, and any other user app or archival/ research system that speaks #ActivityPub (and ideally #Diaspora and #Zot too). I'm happy for them to be indexed by any search system and included in any relevant search. That's why I publish them on the web with Mastodon. When I want to have private discussion, I use DMs. One day the AP-verse will do this better.

"Our collective objective should be, to make the world work for 100% of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offence, or the disadvantage of anyone."
- Buckminster Fuller

I wonder if there are academic or institutional research groups out there intentionally pushing harmless but viral misinformation through various styles of network media? If we had a body of empirical evidence on which styles amplify misinfo and which succeed in reducing its spread, maybe we could design self-education systems with some confidence we know what works and what doesn't, rather than relying on heuristics and ideology.

https://misinfocon.com/infrastructure-against-misinformation-9d4c9dda0860

Making FarceBook and Goggle share revenue with the news media companies who employ journalists is like making paedophiles pay to hang around outside childcare centres. It's a finger-in-the-dyke response, which completely ignores the larger issues at play. Namely, the fact that a handful of giant corporations can control and direct the lion's share of most people's attention:

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/435055/google-threats-shouldn-t-make-nz-government-wary-expert

#NewsMedia

#TIL that Nigeria is projected to have a bigger population than the US by 2050, in which case it would be the third most populated country in the world. This according to Gwynne Dyer, author of 'Growing Pains: The Future of Democracy (and Work)'.

#Nigeria #GwynneDyer

According to what I've read on the Goggle help pages, the new storage limit enforcement policy formally kicks in June 2021. But the quota system has been in place for a while, and according to an article on #ZDnet it was the cause of the big outage last year:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/google-heres-what-caused-our-big-global-outage/

I doubt I'm the first person to mention this here, but it's finally happened; Goggle has imposed a storage quota of 15GB on gratis accounts. So one of the biggest advantages of using their services without paying - eternal, unlimited storage - is now toast. Could FarceBook be next? I wonder if this might be an opportunity for platform cooperatives to pitch modestly-priced services as a replacement for both?

#Goggle #FarceBook #storage #PlatformCooperatives

#OwnCast is an audio-video streaming server designed for live, one-to-many online broadcasts. It's free code available under an "MIT" license:
https://github.com/owncast/owncast

#video #streaming

I wonder how much it costs WINZ to keep people who call their 0800 number on hold for half an hour (not unusual)? I hope it's significantly less than setting up one of those systems that queues callers up for a callback when call volumes are high.

#WINZ #NZ

Anyone out there interested in taoist philosophy? I've been meaning to read Tao Te Ching ever since I read The Tao of Pooh more than 20 years ago. I intend to continue learning Chinese and one day I will read it in the original Chinese, maybe even Chinese characters. In the meantime, can anyone recommend an English translation?

#taoism #taoist #tao #TaoTeChing #translations

Me, I'm feeling quite hopeful about 2021. On a personal level, I'm looking forward to making the most of the relentless pruning 2020 gave my life, with a burst of vigorous, healthy personal growth.

On a community level, there are many of us who see how badly capitalists and their toadies are running the world, even if we don't use the same language to describe the problems. 2021 can be a year of reconnecting outside the corporate social media silos and doing better ourselves.

The message from a panicking neoliberal capitalist establishment seems to be along the lines of 'if you enjoyed 2020, you're going to love 2021!':
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/world-could-face-hunger-pandemic-in-2021-world-food-programme-head-warns/2ZNCOY3HOVZYF7O6KDTFYI27Z4/

The matrix devs at Element have been experimenting with getting into the federated social media game:
https://matrix.org/blog/2020/12/18/introducing-cerulean/#whats-with-the-decentralised-reputation-button

#matrix #Element #FederatedSocialMedia

#ShowerThoughts: Think for a moment about all the energy used by making metal and plastic cutlery, and all the carbon emissions involved. Imagine all that being replaced with reusable cutlery
made from fast-growing plant materials, like bamboo, hemp stalks, reeds, or harakeke (a hardy swamp grass native to Aotearoa, commonly called "flax"). Ideally made near the point of use and locking up more carbon in the material than is emitted in production and distribution.

"Following UNESCO 38th General Conference Resolution 'CONNECTing the Dots: Options for Future Action' , the Organization therefore stands for the approach of Internet Universality, which is based on the R.O.A.M principles of human-Rights, Openness, Accessibility and Multistakeholder participation. These principles are essential to ensure an open, transparent and inclusive Internet worldwide."
https://en.unesco.org/themes/freedom-expression-internet

#UNESCO

For anyone interested in the history of RiseUp.net, one of the oldest community-hosting collectives using and recommending exclusively free code software, here's a 2020 interview with some of the collective members:
https://pramen.io/en/2020/06/interview-with-riseup-tech-collective/

Note the comments on the role of Indymedia in their genesis and growth.

#RiseUp #CommunityHosting #FreeCode #Indymedia

"Recently declared a human right under the 2012 United Nations Human Rights Council resolution ‘The Promotion, Protection and Enjoyment of Human Rights on the Internet' (HRC 2012, Resolution A/HRC/20/L.13), online interactions are now afforded protection equal to offline, real world interaction."

- #VaughanAHolding, 2016, Interstate - Journal of International Affairs

http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/articles/1345/internet-freedom-rhetoric-versus-reality

#HumanRights #InternetFreedom #UN

Automattic has a pretty cool job going for work on integrating WordPress with matrix. They're looking for someone capable of working on multiple programming languages, especially PHP and JavaScript.

https://automattic.com/work-with-us/matrix-integrations-engineer/

#jobs #SituationsVacant #NowHiring
#Automattic #WordPress #matrix