#geekproblem — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #geekproblem, aggregated by home.social.
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Composting the mess of digital security in activism – We need to talk about this, offline
The online tools we "common sense" rely on for organising and campaigning are genuinely dangerous, and I find that paralysing. This isn't paranoia, it's a practical reality that urgently needs addressing. Until we do, offline working groups are one of the few reliable ways to unblock the mess. Where we actually are now... Disappearing, encrypted chat outside the #dotcons is one of the few spaces that feels even marginally safe. But even then, safety depends entirely on who's in the room, […] -
Composting the mess of digital security in activism – We need to talk about this, offline
The online tools we "common sense" rely on for organising and campaigning are genuinely dangerous, and I find that paralysing. This isn't paranoia, it's a practical reality that urgently needs addressing. Until we do, offline working groups are one of the few reliable ways to unblock the mess. Where we actually are now... Disappearing, encrypted chat outside the #dotcons is one of the few spaces that feels even marginally safe. But even then, safety depends entirely on who's in the room, […] -
Composting the mess of digital security in activism – We need to talk about this, offline
The online tools we "common sense" rely on for organising and campaigning are genuinely dangerous, and I find that paralysing. This isn't paranoia, it's a practical reality that urgently needs addressing. Until we do, offline working groups are one of the few reliable ways to unblock the mess. Where we actually are now... Disappearing, encrypted chat outside the #dotcons is one of the few spaces that feels even marginally safe. But even then, safety depends entirely on who's in the room, […] -
It’s time to stop pretending the current model will somehow fix itself, it won’t. The #GeekProblem is why open development is stuck in a dead end https://hamishcampbell.com/the-geekproblem-why-open-development-is-stuck-in-a-dead-end/
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The #encryptionist detour
Let’s look back to before the #Fediverse, to be honest about the last two decades of #openweb failure, for a long time we got pulled off the path. Not only by enemies, but by a mix of fear, fashion, and half-understood technical “solutions” that felt right to fearful people at the time. The rise of the dogmatic, blinded #encryptionist mindset came out of real conditions of mass surveillance revelations (Snowden era), common sense #neoliberal distrust of states and corporations and the […] -
The #encryptionist detour
Let’s look back to before the #Fediverse, to be honest about the last two decades of #openweb failure, for a long time we got pulled off the path. Not only by enemies, but by a mix of fear, fashion, and half-understood technical “solutions” that felt right to fearful people at the time. The rise of the dogmatic, blinded #encryptionist mindset came out of real conditions of mass surveillance revelations (Snowden era), common sense #neoliberal distrust of states and corporations and the […] -
The #encryptionist detour
Let’s be honest about the last two decades of #openweb failure, for a long time we got pulled off the path. Not only by enemies, but by a mix of fear, fashion, and half-understood technical “solutions” that felt right to fearful people at the time. The rise of the dogmatic, blinded #encryptionist mindset came out of real conditions of mass surveillance revelations (Snowden era), common sense #neoliberal distrust of states and corporations and the real harms of our worship of the (same […] -
The #encryptionist detour
Let’s look back to before the #Fediverse, to be honest about the last two decades of #openweb failure, for a long time we got pulled off the path. Not only by enemies, but by a mix of fear, fashion, and half-understood technical “solutions” that felt right to fearful people at the time. The rise of the dogmatic, blinded #encryptionist mindset came out of real conditions of mass surveillance revelations (Snowden era), common sense #neoliberal distrust of states and corporations and the […] -
The #encryptionist detour
Let’s look back to before the #Fediverse, to be honest about the last two decades of #openweb failure, for a long time we got pulled off the path. Not only by enemies, but by a mix of fear, fashion, and half-understood technical “solutions” that felt right to fearful people at the time. The rise of the dogmatic, blinded #encryptionist mindset came out of real conditions of mass surveillance revelations (Snowden era), common sense #neoliberal distrust of states and corporations and the […] -
What’s needed now is clear call for change. We don’t need more drawn-out, overcomplicated “common sense” solutions-we need grounded, ethical interventions. The #geekproblem exposes the limits of tech culture when it fails to balance technical skill with social responsibility. The path forward is to rekindle the spirit of the #openweb while actively composting the “shit heap” of the #dotcons. The goal is simple: build tools that serve people, not profit. #KISS
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What’s needed now is clear call for change. We don’t need more drawn-out, overcomplicated “common sense” solutions-we need grounded, ethical interventions. The #geekproblem exposes the limits of tech culture when it fails to balance technical skill with social responsibility. The path forward is to rekindle the spirit of the #openweb while actively composting the “shit heap” of the #dotcons. The goal is simple: build tools that serve people, not profit. #KISS
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For a take on the #geekproblem, we need to understand the challenges and cultural dynamics shaping tech development. A good starting point is standards. Everything in tech is built on layers of “open industrial standards”- they’re what create value, interoperability, and continuity. Ignoring these foundations to build isolated systems is like building sandcastles: fragile, temporary, and easily washed away.
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Actually solving things, and why this matters for #OMN
Activism has a reputation problem, in default #mainstreaming storytelling it’s painted as chaos, absence, or naive idealism. But if you look at what activists at best actually do, a different picture emerges: a long tradition of people working out, in practice, how to solve real problems together without relying on distant authority. And that’s the bit most people quietly skip. In most social/political movements, the hard questions - how we organise, decide, share resources, resolve […]https://hamishcampbell.com/actually-solving-things-and-why-this-matters-for-omn/
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Actually solving things, and why this matters for #OMN
Activism has a reputation problem, in default #mainstreaming storytelling it’s painted as chaos, absence, or naive idealism. But if you look at what activists at best actually do, a different picture emerges: a long tradition of people working out, in practice, how to solve real problems together without relying on distant authority. And that’s the bit most people quietly skip. In most social/political movements, the hard questions - how we organise, decide, share resources, resolve […]https://hamishcampbell.com/actually-solving-things-and-why-this-matters-for-omn/
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Actually solving things, and why this matters for #OMN
Activism has a reputation problem, in default #mainstreaming storytelling it’s painted as chaos, absence, or naive idealism. But if you look at what activists at best actually do, a different picture emerges: a long tradition of people working out, in practice, how to solve real problems together without relying on distant authority. And that’s the bit most people quietly skip. In most social/political movements, the hard questions - how we organise, decide, share resources, resolve […]https://hamishcampbell.com/actually-solving-things-and-why-this-matters-for-omn/
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Actually solving things, and why this matters for #OMN
Activism has a reputation problem, in default #mainstreaming storytelling it’s painted as chaos, absence, or naive idealism. But if you look at what activists at best actually do, a different picture emerges: a long tradition of people working out, in practice, how to solve real problems together without relying on distant authority. And that’s the bit most blinded people quietly skip. In most social/political movements, the hard questions - how we organise, decide, share resources, […]https://hamishcampbell.com/actually-solving-things-and-why-this-matters-for-omn/
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Actually solving things, and why this matters for #OMN
Activism has a reputation problem, in default #mainstreaming storytelling it’s painted as chaos, absence, or naive idealism. But if you look at what activists at best actually do, a different picture emerges: a long tradition of people working out, in practice, how to solve real problems together without relying on distant authority. And that’s the bit most people quietly skip. In most social/political movements, the hard questions - how we organise, decide, share resources, resolve […]https://hamishcampbell.com/actually-solving-things-and-why-this-matters-for-omn/
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#OMN Grounding (the roots as a story)
#techchurn is the endless cycle of adopting new platforms, tools, and technologies - not because they solve any real problems, but because novelty is mistaken for progress. It burns community trust, institutional memory, and activist energy, while leaving the underlying #nastyfew power structures untouched.https://hamishcampbell.com/?s=techchurn The #OMN uses #stupidindividualism to describe the culturally manufactured habit of prioritising personal gain and self-interest over collective […]https://hamishcampbell.com/omn-grounding-the-roots-as-a-story/
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#OMN Grounding (the roots as a story)
#techchurn is the endless cycle of adopting new platforms, tools, and technologies - not because they solve any real problems, but because novelty is mistaken for progress. It burns community trust, institutional memory, and activist energy, while leaving the underlying #nastyfew power structures untouched.https://hamishcampbell.com/?s=techchurn The #OMN uses #stupidindividualism to describe the culturally manufactured habit of prioritising personal gain and self-interest over collective […]https://hamishcampbell.com/omn-grounding-the-roots-as-a-story/
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#OMN Grounding (the roots as a story)
#techchurn is the endless cycle of adopting new platforms, tools, and technologies - not because they solve any real problems, but because novelty is mistaken for progress. It burns community trust, institutional memory, and activist energy, while leaving the underlying #nastyfew power structures untouched.https://hamishcampbell.com/?s=techchurn The #OMN uses #stupidindividualism to describe the culturally manufactured habit of prioritising personal gain and self-interest over collective […]https://hamishcampbell.com/omn-grounding-the-roots-as-a-story/
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In the #OMN hashtag story, #UX (User Experience) isn't about making interfaces prettier or more intuitive - it's a political question about who technology is actually built for, where bad #UX is a symptom of the #geekproblem and the #dotcons optimising for engagement and control rather than real human need.
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In the #OMN hashtag story, #UX (User Experience) isn't about making interfaces prettier or more intuitive - it's a political question about who technology is actually built for, where bad #UX is a symptom of the #geekproblem and the #dotcons optimising for engagement and control rather than real human need.
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In the #OMN path, #KISS ("Keep It Simple, Stupid") isn't just a design principle - it's a political stance against the tendency of the #geekproblem to deliberately or unconsciously build complexity as a form of control, insisting instead that technology serving genuine human needs should be transparent, accessible, and understandable to the people who use it, not just the people who build it.
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The #geekproblem is the tendency of people with technical expertise to unconsciously replace trust and human judgment with control and code - narrowing who gets to shape technology and embedding their own limited values and power structures into systems that affect everyone.
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#encryptionist refers to technologists and developers who prioritise cryptographic security and technical control as an end in itself - replacing human trust and open social relationships with code-enforced systems, embodying the #geekproblem tendency to solve political and social problems with technical fixes rather than addressing any underlying social dynamics.
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A fresh look at the mess we need to compost
DRAFT, needs bit more work. Our example of: Tactical Tech is a Berlin-based nonprofit that’s been around since the early 2000s, working on tech, activism, media, and education. Their core thing is: building digital literacy + critical thinking tools producing toolkits, exhibitions, and guides (like The Glass Room, Data Detox Kit) working with civil society orgs, journalists, activists, educators focusing on how tech shapes power, politics, and society They’re not grassroots […]https://hamishcampbell.com/a-fresh-look-at-the-mess-we-need-to-compost/
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The hashtag story is messy, that’s the Point
One of the constant pressures we face in #OMN and wider #openweb spaces is the urge to “tidy things up.” People arrive, see a messy landscape of hashtags - #geekproblem, #deathcult, #dotcons - and their first instinct is to fix it, define it, standardise it, make it neat and legible. That instinct feels sensible, but is also the #geekproblem. The hashtag ecology we’ve been growing over the last decade is designed to be messy. Not as a failure, but as a feature. These tags are not rigid […]https://hamishcampbell.com/the-hashtag-story-is-messy-thats-the-point/
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The hashtag story is messy, that’s the Point
One of the constant pressures we face in #OMN and wider #openweb spaces is the urge to “tidy things up.” People arrive, see a messy landscape of hashtags - #geekproblem, #deathcult, #dotcons - and their first instinct is to fix it, define it, standardise it, make it neat and legible. That instinct feels sensible, but is also the #geekproblem. The hashtag ecology we’ve been growing over the last decade is designed to be messy. Not as a failure, but as a feature. These tags are not rigid […]https://hamishcampbell.com/the-hashtag-story-is-messy-thats-the-point/
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The #dotcons, #mainstreaming, and Build to Walk Away
Three years ago I was trying to explain something simple in language liberals might actually hear. They talk about “platform capitalism.” Fine. But I’ve been calling it the #dotcons for 20 years - because that’s what it is - a con. The last 30 years of tech hasn’t just drifted into this mess. It’s been shaped, step by step, enclosure by enclosure, into systems designed to extract value from us. What we now call the internet is, in large part, a machine built to manipulate, […]https://hamishcampbell.com/the-dotcons-mainstreaming-and-build-and-walk-away/
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Talking about the #geekproblem in #openweb funding https://hamishcampbell.com/talking-about-the-geekproblem-in-openweb-funding/ None of this is new, I like meany people been banging this drum since the #indymedia days and writing about it for decades.
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The #geekproblem might kill meany of us, mediating it matters https://hamishcampbell.com/the-geekproblem-might-kill-meany-of-us/ Don’t be this mess, please.
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Do you remember when technology felt like a way forward?
Do you remember when tech felt like a way forward? That moment’s gone on the mainstream #closedweb path. What we’ve got now is something else entirely. Tools like Palantir and Project Maven aren’t about truth or insight. They’re excuse generators. Power does what it wants, then points to “the data” as cover. That’s the product. And the people building this? Still cosplaying as the good guys, well-paid servants of the #nastyfew, wrapped in the fading myth of being “freedom […]https://hamishcampbell.com/do-you-remember-when-technology-felt-like-a-way-forward/
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Do you remember when technology felt like a way forward?
Do you remember when tech felt like a way forward? That moment’s gone on the mainstream #closedweb path. What we’ve got now is something else entirely. Tools like Palantir and Project Maven aren’t about truth or insight. They’re excuse generators. Power does what it wants, then points to “the data” as cover. That’s the product. And the people building this? Still cosplaying as the good guys, well-paid servants of the #nastyfew, wrapped in the fading myth of being “freedom […]https://hamishcampbell.com/do-you-remember-when-technology-felt-like-a-way-forward/
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Do you remember when technology felt like a way forward?
Do you remember when tech felt like a way forward? That moment’s gone on the mainstream #closedweb path. What we’ve got now is something else entirely. Tools like Palantir and Project Maven aren’t about truth or insight. They’re excuse generators. Power does what it wants, then points to “the data” as cover. That’s the product. And the people building this? Still cosplaying as the good guys, well-paid servants of the #nastyfew, wrapped in the fading myth of being “freedom […]https://hamishcampbell.com/do-you-remember-when-technology-felt-like-a-way-forward/
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Do you remember when technology felt like a way forward?
Do you remember when tech felt like a way forward? That moment’s gone on the mainstream #closedweb path. What we’ve got now is something else entirely. Tools like Palantir and Project Maven aren’t about truth or insight. They’re excuse generators. Power does what it wants, then points to “the data” as cover. That’s the product. And the people building this? Still cosplaying as the good guys, well-paid servants of the #nastyfew, wrapped in the fading myth of being “freedom […]https://hamishcampbell.com/do-you-remember-when-technology-felt-like-a-way-forward/
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Do you remember when technology felt like a way forward?
Do you remember when tech felt like a way forward? That moment’s gone on the mainstream #closedweb path. What we’ve got now is something else entirely. Tools like Palantir and Project Maven aren’t about truth or insight. They’re excuse generators. Power does what it wants, then points to “the data” as cover. That’s the product. And the people building this? Still cosplaying as the good guys, well-paid servants of the #nastyfew, wrapped in the fading myth of being “freedom […]https://hamishcampbell.com/do-you-remember-when-technology-felt-like-a-way-forward/
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Gates vs Bridges: the obscure politics of the #geekproblem https://hamishcampbell.com/gates-vs-bridges-the-obscure-politics-of-the-geekproblem/ We’re all carrying some of this mess, it’s fine – it’s compost.
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Gates vs Bridges: the obscure politics of the #geekproblem
In the #geekproblem mindset, crossing a protocol flow is a gateway were in #openweb terms, it’s a bridge. That difference is not technical - it’s social - the difference between CONTROL and TRUST. A gate is something you lock, permission, authentication, enforcement were a bridge is something you cross, connection, flow, relationship. In the physical world, we don’t put gates on bridges as a default, but in software, we keep rebuilding them, and then wondering why things fragment. RSS […]https://hamishcampbell.com/gates-vs-bridges-the-obscure-politics-of-the-geekproblem/
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In the #geekproblem mindset, crossing a protocol flow is a gateway. In #OMN, it’s a bridge.
That’s the difference between CONTROL and TRUST. A gate is locked. A bridge lets things flow. In the real world, we don’t put gates on bridges.
Strange how that basic truth gets lost in code metaphors.
#RSS is a bridge.
Closed APIs are gates. -
Let’s try and simplify the #OMN
The #OMN Framework: The Five Functions (#5F) The #OMN is simple flows, not platforms, it’s a way of thinking about media as flows of objects moving through a network. People shape the flow, you can find a more technical view to read after here. A human-scale, federated media infrastructure built on #FOSS practices and the #4opens: open data open source open process open standards It doesn’t start with features, apps, or ideology, it starts with flows. Imagine the network as: pipes […] -
The Digital Commons: The Ground We Already Stand On
At #NOAW event I talked a lot about the digital commons so thought it might be useful to write a post grounding this. The digital commons are not a future vision, it’s something we already have. At its simplest, the digital commons are the widely used #4opens digital resources of software, knowledge, data, and culture created collectively, governed by communities, and made available for public (re)use. This is the native path of the #openweb it's been around for a long time, it might be […]https://hamishcampbell.com/the-digital-commons-the-ground-we-already-stand-on/
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A Note on “Security” for the #FOSS Crew
We need to have a clearer, more grounded conversation about “security” and what it actually means in the context of the #openweb. There is a long history of thinking in #FOSS spaces that security is something we can solve purely technically: better encryption, better protocols, better architectures. But in everyday life and practice, people need to work from a much simpler starting point - We do not trust client–server security. We only meaningfully trust what can be verified through […]https://hamishcampbell.com/a-note-on-security-to-the-foss-crew/
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A Note on “Security” for the #FOSS Crew
We need to have a clearer, more grounded conversation about “security” and what it actually means in the context of the #openweb. There is a long history of thinking in #FOSS spaces that security is something we can solve purely technically: better encryption, better protocols, better architectures. But in everyday life and practice, people need to work from a much simpler starting point - We do not trust client–server security. We only meaningfully trust what can be verified through […]https://hamishcampbell.com/a-note-on-security-to-the-foss-crew/
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A Note on “Security” for the #FOSS Crew
We need to have a clearer, more grounded conversation about “security” and what it actually means in the context of the #openweb. There is a long history of thinking in #FOSS spaces that security is something we can solve purely technically: better encryption, better protocols, better architectures. But in everyday life and practice, people need to work from a much simpler starting point - We do not trust client–server security. We only meaningfully trust what can be verified through […]https://hamishcampbell.com/a-note-on-security-to-the-foss-crew/
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The Tech “Empiricism” Problem
A recent essay on deadSimpleTech makes a point the #openweb community should hear: the biggest problem in technology is not only the tools, it’s also the culture behind them. For years the tech world has operated under a form of narrow “tech empiricism”: the belief that if something produces results quickly, then it must be working well. In this mindset, success is measured by novelty, speed of production, and the ability to create something new. The heroes of this culture are […] -
The #dotcons assume you want to be a techbro
One of the quiet assumptions built into almost every #dotcons platform is that the user secretly wants to become a #techbro. Not literally, of course, but culturally. You are expected to optimise yourself by building your “personal brand” to track your metrics. Engage with algorithmic growth loops by understand platforms, feeds, APIs, monetisation tools, creator dashboards. You’re supposed to treat communication as a kind of performance engineering problem. Most people never asked for […]https://hamishcampbell.com/the-dotcons-assume-you-want-to-be-a-techbro/
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OMN: Broken Institutions, and the Need to Rebuild the Commons
For progressive and radical people, one of the central political questions of our time is simple to ask but hard to answer - Why is it so difficult to rebuild the institutions that were destroyed in our #deathcult worship of the 1980s and 1990s? And more importantly why does the impossibility of rebuilding them make it so hard to change the needed balance of power in society? These question matters for working on the future of the society and most importantly the grassroots part of this: […]https://hamishcampbell.com/omn-broken-institutions-and-the-need-to-rebuild-the-commons/
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OMN: Broken Institutions, and the Need to Rebuild the Commons
For progressive and radical people, one of the central political questions of our time is simple to ask but hard to answer - Why is it so difficult to rebuild the institutions that were destroyed in our #deathcult worship of the 1980s and 1990s? And more importantly why does the impossibility of rebuilding them make it so hard to change the needed balance of power in society? These question matters for working on the future of the society and most importantly the grassroots part of this: […]https://hamishcampbell.com/omn-broken-institutions-and-the-need-to-rebuild-the-commons/
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A note to #FOSS funders
I’ve been working at the heart of this space for more than 30 years, funded and unfunded. In that time I’ve seen hundreds of alternative tech projects start with energy and good intentions. Most of them wither on the vine, a very small number flower. After watching this cycle repeat for decades, one thing has become clear: the projects that survive and grow almost always follow a simple pattern. I call this the #4opens. Other people describe similar ideas as open source development, open […] -
A note to #FOSS funders
I’ve been working at the heart of this space for more than 30 years, funded and unfunded. In that time I’ve seen hundreds of alternative tech projects start with energy and good intentions. Most of them wither on the vine, a very small number flower. After watching this cycle repeat for decades, one thing has become clear: the projects that survive and grow almost always follow a simple pattern. I call this the #4opens. Other people describe similar ideas as open source development, open […]