@tante I love free software and creative commons, but in this AI age there needs to be a way of protecting them from crawling and violating the reuse licenses. Otherwise #freesoftware is just #freelabor without #UBI
#FreeLabor
Anticipation.
Off to volunteer our help for a friend who owns the local bookstore. She needs some bookshelves and their contents moved.
You know you're old when you start taking aspirin in anticipation of the day you're about to have.
A very thoughtful post from Disroot [1] regarding the time we share.
> In the world we currently live in, the most common thing that all living beings have and share —time— has become a scarce, exchangeable, and marketable resource. We work, produce, consume, and rest within a system that measures, regulates, and captures that time, turning it into an economic unit. What was once a shared, vital flow is now managed like a commodity. And as everything seems to speed up, we find ourselves with less and less time of our own.
> We're surrounded by platforms that present themselves as spaces for connection, collaboration, or entertainment, but their real business is the time of the people who use them. They don't provide services: they extract attention, data, free labor, and creativity and turn it into profit. Every interaction, every click, every message generates economic value for someone else. In this unequal exchange, we as users don't just give information, we give hours of our lives. Meanwhile, those who manage these infrastructures have built a well-oiled system of time trafficking: a gigantic transfer of human energy to corporations that give back nothing but dependency and precariousness. In this context, self-hosted, self-managed, open, and community-driven projects don't just propose a different technological model but also a different relationship with time.
@elettrona@poliversity.it
#CodeOfConducts do not exist to protect the weakest from harm, but to protect space's leaders from blame (and responsibility).
Without a #CoC, a community and its leaders are explicitly accountable for how they handle conflicts on a per case basis. With a CoC, leaders can exploit weak minorities to push their own agenda through a mostly uniform and conformist community.
Iow, CoC are designed to force a US-workspace like behaviour on people contributing for free, so that they are easier to manage (and exploit) as #FreeLabor.
But when you point this out, those same leaders will mount a rage mob against you.
That's why say #FOSDEM becomes a testimonial of companies that support a #genocide, like #Google or #Microsoft, %ak*n_ their money and let their employees to talk. And also why I'll never attend to one.
#CodeOfConducts do not exist to protect the weakest from harm, but to protect space's leaders from blame (and responsibility).
Without a #CoC, a community and its leaders are explicitly accountable for how they handle conflicts on a per case basis. With a CoC, leaders can exploit weak minorities to push their own agenda through a mostly uniform and conformist community.
Iow, CoC are designed to force a US-workspace like behaviour on people contributing for free, so that they are easier to manage (and exploit) as #FreeLabor.
But when you point this out, those same leaders will mount a rage mob against you.
That's why say #FOSDEM becomes a testimonial of companies that support a #genocide, like #Google or #Microsoft, %ak*n_ their money and let their employees to talk. And also why I'll never attend to one.
@jkanev@fediscience.org
Quite naive interpretation of #FreeSoftware history (and mitization of #OpenSource).
Unfortunately #RMS grow up during #ColdWar, so he couldn't really find a dynamic balance between the two value who defined the #history of '900.
Open Source has always been a capitalist attempt to marginalize #hackers while exploiting their #freelabor.
Free Software was a bit different, but still reduced the class struggle that the hacking movement was acting to a single etical value, #freedom.
https://encrypted.tesio.it/2020/09/03/not_all_hackers_are_americans.html
@programming@newsmast.community
Quite naive interpretation of #FreeSoftware history (and mitization of #OpenSource).
Unfortunately #RMS grow up during #ColdWar, so he couldn't really find a dynamic balance between the two value who defined the #history of '900.
Open Source has always been a capitalist attempt to marginalize #hackers while exploiting their #freelabor.
Free Software was a bit different, but still reduced the class struggle that the hacking movement was acting to a single etical value, #freedom.
https://encrypted.tesio.it/2020/09/03/not_all_hackers_are_americans.html
@programming@newsmast.community
Still, #LLM are voiding the #GPL (and #AGPL) reciprocity.
That's why years ago I wrote the #HackingLicense https://encrypted.tesio.it/documents/HACK.txt
It was designed with automated corporate #exploitation of #FreeSoftware in mind: it's goal is to balance #freedom and #communion, and it share with those that accept it much more than permissions, while being a stromger #copyleft and an explicit shrink-wrap contract.
Unfortunately, it's not compatible with GPL, because GPL is much weaker.
The fundamental issue of Free Software, the one that let people create the #OpenSource narrative and permessive licenses to exploit programmer ideals and #freelabor, was that #RMS, as an American grown up during #ColdWar, was too fond of the freedom-vs-communism propaganda to understand how lack of rules means the rule of the rich.
The problem is not commercial use of free software but commercial exploitation of free labour, as @doctormo@floss.social correctly stated.
The Hacking License does not prohibit commercial use, but requires recipient to share their own #copyright with the users of any derivative or dependant work they create as a contractual binding.
It's modelled after the research of #ElinorOstrom about Commons governance and the #Hacker ethics based on the value of #curiosity.
That's why years ago I wrote the #HackingLicense https://encrypted.tesio.it/documents/HACK.txt
It was designed with automated corporate #exploitation of #FreeSoftware in mind: it's goal is to balance #freedom and #communion, and it share with those that accept it much more than permissions, while being a stromger #copyleft and an explicit shrink-wrap contract.
Unfortunately, it's not compatible with GPL, because GPL is much weaker.
The fundamental issue of Free Software, the one that let people create the #OpenSource narrative and permessive licenses to exploit programmer ideals and #freelabor, was that #RMS, as an American grown up during #ColdWar, was too fond of the freedom-vs-communism propaganda to understand how lack of rules means the rule of the rich.
The problem is not commercial use of free software but commercial exploitation of free labour, as @doctormo@floss.social correctly stated.
The Hacking License does not prohibit commercial use, but requires recipient to share their own #copyright with the users of any derivative or dependant work they create as a contractual binding.
It's modelled after the research of #ElinorOstrom about Commons governance and the #Hacker ethics based on the value of #curiosity.
The whole open source idea feels like a trick by companies to get free labor from idealistic programmers.
#opensource #foss #freesoftware #softwareengineering #programming #programmers #freelabor #unpaidwork #unpaidlabor #exploitation
AI isn’t a secret scheme—it’s an obvious scheme. Of course they want your corrections. You're the unpaid intern polishing the algorithm just to get a worse autocomplete. #AI #FreeLabor 💼🤖
@lynn@a.bloodyno.se
https://web.archive.org/web/20220119124901/https://thebaffler.com/salvos/the-meme-hustler
Open source was born to marginalize #hackers as a cultural and political movement while turing their values as #marketing tools.
So, to me, it's refreshing to see more open source developers that realize how they have been used and manipulated for years and starting to fight back.
@filippo@abyssdomain.expert
open source libraries aren't just free code you can gobble up without investment.well, to be fair, the term #OpenSource was invented exactly to turn #FreeSoftware into #FreeLabor for corporations:
https://web.archive.org/web/20220119124901/https://thebaffler.com/salvos/the-meme-hustler
Open source was born to marginalize #hackers as a cultural and political movement while turing their values as #marketing tools.
So, to me, it's refreshing to see more open source developers that realize how they have been used and manipulated for years and starting to fight back.
@filippo@abyssdomain.expert
CREATING ON YOUTUBE MEANS PAYING TO WORK
YouTube is like Uber. Uber asks you to own, in your garage, a black sedan with less than 100,000 km on it—one you’re not using—and claims you can start making money from it. “It doesn’t cost you anything,” Uber says, since the car is just sitting there anyway. But in reality, it’s the most financially vulnerable people who see it as an opportunity. They take out a loan to buy a car. And when that car hits 100,000 km and the loan isn’t paid off, they get a second one—and now they’re stuck with two loans. Uber “earns” you €5/hour, but the cost of maintaining your setup is €7.50/hour. The more you work, the more your tool degrades. You earn 25% more, but spend 25% more. The vehicle is repurposed for an economic model that only benefits Uber.
¯
_
YOUTUBE IS NO DIFFERENT
When you become a YouTuber, they make you believe that “anyone can stream with a smartphone.” That all you need is an idea, a bit of courage, and some basic gear. That you can compete with MrBeast—who spends a million per video—on a shoestring budget. That’s a lie.
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_
THE REAL COST OF A SETUP
I spent five years, from 2018 to 2023, saving up to buy a €5,000 PC solely for production. Because streaming isn’t just “playing a game.” Your PC becomes a 4K broadcasting server. You need two graphics cards—or even two separate machines:
- One to run the software or the game
- The other to encode, stream, and record
You also need:
- A second monitor (for video return and replay)
- A replay buffer (to capture instant replays)
- A Stream Deck for seamless transitions
- A Wave XLR for professional audio quality
- Audio interfaces, mixers, USB cameras, XLR microphones
All these high-end peripherals constantly tax your system. You need two USB hubs capable of handling 15 devices at once with no signal loss. A single weak link can ruin everything. And that’s not all. To stream a Nintendo Switch, you need a capture card—and you can’t rely on your streaming software’s preview because of input lag. You have to play directly on the other screen already in place.
¯
_
ONGOING TECHNICAL LEARNING
Streaming requires broad technical expertise:
- Lighting, audio, capture devices, networking
- Compression, codecs, editing, formatting
- Live direction, visual/audio transitions, real-time coordination
And you’re doing all this with zero support from YouTube.
¯
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STORAGE AND ENERGY COSTS
Your PC isn’t enough anymore. You’ll need a NAS—a network-attached storage system—cheaper than the cloud in the long run, but which demands:
- Two 20 TB drives (mirrored) → 40 TB
- A dedicated server, which adds another €1,000
It’s become a mini television studio. Which brings with it:
- Planned obsolescence
- Frequent breakdowns
- Hardware wear and tear
- Electricity costs of a 1,000-watt PC plus a 24/7 server
Altogether, the setup costs more than a car.
¯
_
AND YOUTUBE PAYS NOTHING
And yet, it’s YouTube that cashes in. It runs ads on your videos—even if you’re not monetized. It hijacks your gear, your energy, your skills. And if your content doesn’t “perform,” it simply ignores you. A PC, cameras, capture cards, hubs, microphones, lights—tens of thousands of euros invested just to exist. And the platform invests nothing in return. No visibility. No value sharing. Not even a word of encouragement.
¯
#InvisibleLabor #PlatformCapitalism #CreatorEconomy #DigitalPrecarity #FreeLabor #YouTubeProblems #Shadowban
Fun (?) fact: https://pdfimpose.it was launched (about) one year ago. Besides my wife and a coworker, the only people who reached out to me where three professional printers. It is flattering, but once again, it raises the issue of companies benefiting from free labor provided by free software maintainers…
My 18-Months Rule for Open-Source Contributions:
You make a good-faith contribution to an open-source project. There’s never a response. What do you do? On a rule I’ve established for my own open-source work, and the reasons behind it.
I guess it’s expectation sensitivity, but I HATE IT when someone I don’t know (or do know, but not well) asks to “meet up” or “grab a coffee.” [This tends to be #professional life] Usually there’s a “pick your brain” or something else vague in there. Why? What do you want? Are you asking me for #freelabor ? Or you want me to just send you business? Without any relationship. Gotcha. Just lay it out there. And if you’re inviting, pay. This is what you get for being #corporate adjacent.
Hijab Law Violator Sentenced to Unpaid Cleaning Work
#Iran #IranRevolution #MahsaAmini #WomanLifeFreedom #IRGCTerrorists #IRGCRapists
#FreeLabor #Slavery
https://iranwire.com/en/news/117713-hijab-law-violator-sentenced-to-unpaid-cleaning-work/
"The Reddit corpus of data is really valuable, but we don’t need to give all of that value to some of the largest companies in the world for free.”
-- Steve Huffman, #Reddit CEO
The corpus of data provided and moderated for free by their community.
Going on a #MissionTrip Does Not Make You a #GoodPerson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY0YyKtC92g
#christianity #missions #prothlesizing #usVsThem #religion #freeLabor #whiteMessiah #whiteSavior #racism #film
I'm continually surprised at the quality of southern slavery-apologist criticism of economic theories about free markets and labor. EG here's George Fitzhugh on Adam Smith:
"He saw only that prosperous and progressive portion of society whom liberty or free competition benefitted, and mistook its effects on them for its effects on the world."
There are a lot of books like this from the time that combine really incisive criticism of claims that free laborers were actually free with utterly psychopathic defenses of the most brutal form of slavery the world has ever known. Here's the source:
https://archive.org/details/sociologyforsout00fitz/mode/1up
#Slavery #ChattelSlavery #GeorgeFitzhugh #SociologyForTheSouth #AdamSmith #FreeLabor
The Internet Was Built on the Free Labor of Open Source Developers. Is That Sustainable?
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/43zak3/the-internet-was-built-on-the-free-labor-of-open-source-developers-is-that-sustainable
A look at the complicated business of funding open source software development.
#opensource #freesoftware #labor #freelabor #OpenSSL #HeartBleed
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/43zak3/the-internet-was-built-on-the-free-labor-of-open-source-developers-is-that-sustainable
A look at the complicated business of funding open source software development.
#opensource #freesoftware #labor #freelabor #OpenSSL #HeartBleed
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