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So true. A lot of activism in my city happens on facebook, and it's simply terrible. Perhaps emails are a bit more difficult to use, but it is important skill

by kome 6y ago

So true. A lot of activism in my city happens on facebook, and it's simply terrible. Perhaps emails are a bit more difficult to use, but it is important skill to master, especially in context where you have to self organize and discuss. It's also very democratic, because opening an email account is faster. And in terms of "real" privacy, emails are better, just because they are decentralized.

sjmulder 6y ago
Re. activism, this is a talk on how Extinction Rebellion have set up their infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_O3zj3p52A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_O3zj3p52A (technical talk starts around 22:30) It isn't quite decentralised but fairly resilient. The more mature local chapters can replicate much of this if need be and in any case the use of technology is quite fluid.
- blfr 6y ago
  Extinction Rebellion enjoys either outright support or warm neutrality from most governments and corporations. Their resilience to censorship won't be really tested. This is not the situation youtube-dl will find itself in now.
  - fao_ 6y ago
    I mean Extinction Rebellion a racist middle class group, you can tell this by how they blatantly broke with over 200 years of protesting protocol and said to their members that they should get caught by the police, knowing full-well that black people would overwhelmingly be nabbed and have charges thrown against them, and lower-class people would not be able to afford good defense against said charges. I don't really know what else to call such a blatant disregard of the lives of those people. They have also been known to collaborate with cops, which as a protestor is the exact /last/ thing you should be doing -- since the state's motivation is simply to put down all protests regardless of their method of protesting. You can see this in the UK with the laws against even peaceful protests. And have shown a blatant disregard for taking advice by more experienced protest organizations, some of which have been around for almost a century. All of that being said, I don't think it's very possible to compare youtube-dl, which is a bundle of source and the surrounding contributors, to an on-the-ground protest movement. While there are similarities, there are also many disparities. For what it's worth, youtube-dl is in a much easier position. Their main website is still operating, and all they have to do is prod people that they know to silently take over, and have those people make an announcement. IANAL but someone that they trust but who is not primarily involved would be ideal. They don't have to hand over the keys to the website, just allow those people to make public notifications stating they are the primary replacement, and have them continue the project -- under perhaps a different name and branding. Like ffmpeg and avconv.
    - sjmulder 6y ago
      I do agree that employing arrests as a tactic is exclusive (although here people aren't left to themselves to cover legal fees), but it must also be said that this that XR has a wide range of roles and types actions to participate in that do not involve getting arrested. Those first two paragraphs strongly depend on the location, in particular the situation wrt. police. Many countries (certainly mine, the Netherlands) do respect the right to protest and employ the police to facilitate and protect these rather than to 'put down all protests'. When activists seek the limits of these protections, e.g. with blockades, I think it's right that they seek to find the way to be most effective, which can involve negotiating with authorities or choosing not to pick certian battles. Case in point, Amsterdam has employed 'bestuurlijke verplaatsing' (stuffing people in to buses rather than arresting), which is legally iffy but it's a) less work for authorities and b) much better than getting properly arrested. A status quo that allows more inclusive mass actions.
asciident 6y ago
I think this is what tech people don't get about non-techies using technology. Tech people talk about edge cases, about past stories where Facebook shut down a group or posts, theoretical guarantees about "real" privacy, and decentralized control being more idealistic. Real people don't need stuff to work perfectly, because they'll come up with a workaround by moving platforms or changing how they do things. Nothing works perfectly for them anyways. The platforms they use just need to work 95% of the time, and be good enough. Real people are aware that what they write can be read by others, and don't care about the difference between whether it's encrypted in transit, or on the server, or to their recipient. For real use, it's all about the content, not the platform.
fredthomsen 6y ago
Agree with this and this is why everytime I see people suggesting some project should be moved from being hosted on a mailing list to github, I roll my eyes

by kome 6y ago

sjmulder 6y ago

Re. activism, this is a talk on how Extinction Rebellion have set up their infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_O3zj3p52A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_O3zj3p52A (technical talk starts around 22:30) It isn't quite decentralised but fairly resilient. The more mature local chapters can replicate much of this if need be and in any case the use of technology is quite fluid.

blfr 6y ago
Extinction Rebellion enjoys either outright support or warm neutrality from most governments and corporations. Their resilience to censorship won't be really tested. This is not the situation youtube-dl will find itself in now.
- fao_ 6y ago
  I mean Extinction Rebellion a racist middle class group, you can tell this by how they blatantly broke with over 200 years of protesting protocol and said to their members that they should get caught by the police, knowing full-well that black people would overwhelmingly be nabbed and have charges thrown against them, and lower-class people would not be able to afford good defense against said charges. I don't really know what else to call such a blatant disregard of the lives of those people. They have also been known to collaborate with cops, which as a protestor is the exact /last/ thing you should be doing -- since the state's motivation is simply to put down all protests regardless of their method of protesting. You can see this in the UK with the laws against even peaceful protests. And have shown a blatant disregard for taking advice by more experienced protest organizations, some of which have been around for almost a century. All of that being said, I don't think it's very possible to compare youtube-dl, which is a bundle of source and the surrounding contributors, to an on-the-ground protest movement. While there are similarities, there are also many disparities. For what it's worth, youtube-dl is in a much easier position. Their main website is still operating, and all they have to do is prod people that they know to silently take over, and have those people make an announcement. IANAL but someone that they trust but who is not primarily involved would be ideal. They don't have to hand over the keys to the website, just allow those people to make public notifications stating they are the primary replacement, and have them continue the project -- under perhaps a different name and branding. Like ffmpeg and avconv.
  - sjmulder 6y ago
    I do agree that employing arrests as a tactic is exclusive (although here people aren't left to themselves to cover legal fees), but it must also be said that this that XR has a wide range of roles and types actions to participate in that do not involve getting arrested. Those first two paragraphs strongly depend on the location, in particular the situation wrt. police. Many countries (certainly mine, the Netherlands) do respect the right to protest and employ the police to facilitate and protect these rather than to 'put down all protests'. When activists seek the limits of these protections, e.g. with blockades, I think it's right that they seek to find the way to be most effective, which can involve negotiating with authorities or choosing not to pick certian battles. Case in point, Amsterdam has employed 'bestuurlijke verplaatsing' (stuffing people in to buses rather than arresting), which is legally iffy but it's a) less work for authorities and b) much better than getting properly arrested. A status quo that allows more inclusive mass actions.

asciident 6y ago

I think this is what tech people don't get about non-techies using technology. Tech people talk about edge cases, about past stories where Facebook shut down a group or posts, theoretical guarantees about "real" privacy, and decentralized control being more idealistic. Real people don't need stuff to work perfectly, because they'll come up with a workaround by moving platforms or changing how they do things. Nothing works perfectly for them anyways. The platforms they use just need to work 95% of the time, and be good enough. Real people are aware that what they write can be read by others, and don't care about the difference between whether it's encrypted in transit, or on the server, or to their recipient. For real use, it's all about the content, not the platform.

fredthomsen 6y ago

Agree with this and this is why everytime I see people suggesting some project should be moved from being hosted on a mailing list to github, I roll my eyes