mike_hales @mike_hales@social.coop

Ever wonder who keeps the SC lights on? Who updates SC software? Who responds when something goes wrong and our beloved instance goes dark?

Well for the past year it's been two dedicated volunteers (@mayel @vmatekole ) but it's time we make it a team effort.

#socialcoop Tech Admin Ops Team needs you.

Nominations are now open for (2) Coordinator, (2) Critical Infrastructure Maintenance Developer, and (1-10) Project Developer positions.

https://www.loomio.org/d/e49bvwiA/place-to-dicuss-the-formation-of-the-tech-admin-ops-team-proposal-

RT @kulturalmarx@twitter.com
toddler: when i grow up i want to be a princess

conservative (dumb): sorry kid boys can’t be princesses

liberal (also dumb): you can be anything you want!

me: [leaning in really close] let me teach you something about monarchy you reactionary little shit

@bhaugen @mike_hales @mako Dividing the cell is - for me - the critical piece to learn. And I think that this is very hard to do well, probably even when it is designed in from the outset.

@mike_hales we went through this a couple times already, and the strongest feeling among those involve was that, if and when we'll expand, it will be towards implementing other federated tools (peertube, matrix chat etc...). Also, I prepared a specific questionnaire to be used for when we'll get the ball rolling on this matter to better understand what are the most relevant tools for our user base.

An intriguing comparison of #DuckDuckGo ad #StartPage, including #UX, #privacy, #ownership, #hosting, and more.
http://securityspread.com/2016/10/24/duckduckgo-startpage-2016-update/

@bhaugen @mike_hales And it is a criticism of sorts. For a FLOSS project, or indeed any sort of project, meritocracy is a very sensible and obvious place to start, but it's not sustainable. As the project matures, more voices need to be heard, and governance needs to broadened and become inclusive - hence a democratic cooperative approach fits well. But project owners rarely have the knowledge or interest to to pursue this option.

@mike_hales @mako Cooperatives are a social hack. We create structures to fulfill our aspirations and to protect them from the lesser aspects of human nature. Our success at this is mixed, but we keep learning & keep trying.

An idea: a solidarity economy footprint chart (commons chart, p2p chart, platform coop chart...) showing where in your life you do and don't use cooperatives, commons, sharing, etc. and where you don't. (Food, Energy, Banking, Music, Education, Clothing, Sex?, Sports, Buying, Work, Travel, Housing...) ideally with an easy-to-use form & cool graphics with links to solidarity economy resources.

Level Two: your intercooperation footprint...

Inspired by @tbeckett post

https://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx

@mike_hales Because FLOSS world is a meritocracy and not a democracy?

@mike_hales More to the point, I also think it's better than if we all had use some cooperatively run GMail alternative.

Being able to choose between many federated coop-GMails feels much more flexible & resilient to me.

@mike_hales In terms of managing protocols, you're right that's turtles all the way down.

But I also think there's real autonomy to be gained from pushing things onto a lower turtle. ;)

Creating, changing, adding to the SMTP (email) protocol standard involves politics. And it has been coopted in clear ways. But the fact that it's a federated protocol by design means that we're MUCH better than alternative where everybody had to use GMail to send messages to each other.

@mike_hales We should remember that although the consequences rarely involve being sold to Microsoft cooperative organizations also become oligarchic—e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy.

Peer production & Internet-based cooperativism is hardly immune: https://mako.cc/academic/shaw_hill-laboratories_of_oligarchy-DRAFT.pdf

@mike_hales I'm saying that there are two distinct ways of solving the problem of infrastructure run by organizations with little structural reason to act in the interests of their users: (1) Build new tech to decentralize tasks so there is less/no need for shared infrastructure. (2) Manage infrastructure cooperatively & democratically (and develop new/better ways to do this!).

Both approaches have limits and I think the best results involve pursuing both in parallel.

coop≠libre but coop⊂libre

@mike_hales Cooperative management of shared infrastructure is path to "libre." A more libertarian approach is decentralization and federation around fixed (or cooperatively managed?) protocols which deemphasize the need for shared infrastructure in some way.

If we believe that effective cooperatives will be limited in scale or scope, a combination of the two may be necessary. This is more or less what we have here at social.coop which is part of a larger federated network.

@mike_hales

Don't think of economic as only about money. The root of the word is about managing the household.

You can now watch my #LibrePlanet keynote (edited w/ slides) about how firms and markets have coopted the free culture and free software movement's most powerful weapon (mass collaboration) and where that leaves us. https://mako.cc/copyrighteous/libreplanet-2018-keynote