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I'm part of the April 2024 Core employees Google decided to part ways with. I'm taking this opportunity to take stock, embrace my purpose and chart a new path in these uncertain times.
To say that we're at a crossroads is an understatement. Cherished ecosystems are threatened. The Web itself has an uncertain future as it's moved from a global library of knowledge to an app/ads delivery channel. Open Source faces funding pressure and uncertainty about viable business models. Knowledge itself has become fluid and commodified as it's fed to global AI models. Even the once resilient systems that power society are at risk from demagogues and ill-conceived technological mediation.
Yet, amidst this upheaval I see opportunity. I have a chance to embrace this uncertain future and add another technological impact to my life story.
While I'm exploring impactful possibilities within Google until June 24th I'm confident my skills can make a positive impact in many places. The world needs solutions and I'm determined to contribute to a better future!
If this resonates reach out and let's see what's possible!
@lindner this resonates with me.
Met with similar anxieties, frustrations, and impediments, I've concluded the place to start is in building communities for the purpose of mutual support, and building a better world.
Past that it gets complicated, but I think that kindness is always a good place to start.
I'm working on joining an electrical apprenticeship, with the goal of building a better world through implementing home and community scale renewable energy infrastructure.
@katanova as tech-scale erodes and mediates human connection doing work locally is needed more than ever!
Mutual aid and things that don't scale will save humanity.
@lindner
Community-building scales, but not in the way that tech industries normally think of "scaling"
Tech seeks to "scale" by capturing attention and "market-share" and then exploiting it.
Communities grow and "scale" when their members learn how to lead their own communities.
I imagine community growth and scaling kind of like mitosis cell division.
In a healthy operating community unconstrained by centralized authority, community division is natural and even desirable. [Cont]
@lindner
People kind of lose their minds in communities larger than around 150, and in my experience, small-scale well-coordinated collaboration and cooperation work best at a max of around 8 people, *maybe* 15 if the group is very like-minded or well-synchronized
Centralized authority structures (centered around control rather than healthy growth and development) hold groups of people together far past the point of healthy community cohesion.
This is bad for us as individuals and communities.
@katanova indeed! I think there needs to be better vocabulary around cancerous tech scaling and organic, long-term, healthy, sustainable scaling.
I'm a big fan of the Viable Systems Model which shows how different small units can interact with each other and their environment. I'm hoping to take that and other things and use technology to make that process easier and enhance our inherent abilities.
@lindner sounds like you're on a path of working to build a better world
I've found that the top-down "find problems to solve and put the solutions out into the world for people to adopt" can sometimes sidestep the root issues, even while the symptoms of problems are addressed.
In my experience, developing connections and relationships with communities, asking them what they need, and helping address those needs can be a better long-term mode of solution-building.
[Cont]
@lindner
This mode of cooperation can enable more meaningful and equitable cooperation between the community and the people building the solutions.
This can also enable those communities to, in the long term, understand and maintain their own infrastructure and resources, which can truncate the cycle of tech dependence (and exploitation) that our world is built around.