The Internet Con - You've been assimilated. Resistance isn't futile

You're my first ever reply, thank you :) It's also a good opportunity to work out how Remark.As actually works! :)

Completely agree that we're not going to win by slowly coaxing people over to Linux and Mastodon, but I do try to leave some suggestions either for actions or further reading with each blog I write. I also think that even explaining to people that something like Mastodon or Linux exists can be useful. Some of our friends and relatives may not even know about these alternatives, or things like Bandcamp, or Signal, or whatever.

And in fairness, Doctorow himself concedes that individual action isn't going to be the solution, but on the other hand, my own philosophy is that we shouldn't waste what limited power we do have. For some that's going off X onto Mastodon. For others it's modding an iPod. I've recently put my first Linux distribution in 15 years on a laptop that otherwise would 'run out of' Windows 10, and it's now my main blogging machine and I expect to get a few more years of life out of it.

Who knows, maybe if the entire Danish state moves over to LibreOffice and makes a donation equivalent to 5% of their current MS Office licensing costs, we will suddenly have a viable MS Office alternative for everyone!

And yes, maybe the solarpunk vs. cyberpunk comparison is a bit trite. It's where my mind has been recently. But reading Doctorow's book, it does feel like the sort of socio-technological configuration he aims for is aligned with, or within the vision of, solarpunk.

And I really appreciate the comment and engagement :)

It is really all about rent-seeking. I read a good tweet the other day, where someone said that any utility we consumers get from commercial software/hardware is just an unintended side effect. The main goal is to secure our revenue in perpetuity through recurring subscriptions and mandatory updates.

While I do like open source and the Fediverse, I must say that the “solarpunk” aspect leaves a lot to be desired, especially in terms of actually being inviting for the average person. The average Fediverse instance, with some notable exceptions, like maybe metalhead.club, is way too intensely left-wing political for any “normie” to want anything to do with it.

Connected to this, I am not convinced that ghettoizing ourselves is the way to go. Linux on the desktop? Probably not going to happen at scale. GNU on the desktop? Not even for the most hardcore nerds. I would much rather be discussing hacking and modding commercial and copyrighted equipment. They don't care about our rights. Why should we care about theirs?

Don't like how streaming is fucking over the artists? Want eco-friendliness and repairability? Buy music on Bandcamp or on a CD, play it on a modded iPod with Rockbox. Want to show Sony where they can stick it? Put CFW on a PS4 and don't buy a PS5 until you can do the same. Want to support indie developers still? There are ways to give them money.

Rebelling against big tech won't happen if everyone's too scared to do anything but politely disagree on Mastodon.