As precursor to my blog post announcement later today, here's my #SocialHub response to the topic on how to treat the #LinkedData based #ActivityPub open standard where messages can be expressed both as plain #JSON as well as in #JSONLD, leading to the most costly misconception that has dragged the #fediverse sideways from its original promise and power..
https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/practices-around-json-formatting-of-json-ld-messages/8628/24
Fediverse-we-have is at a major inflection point And so I did, and seeing all the discussion here for which I thank you all, I decided to put in way more effort than originally intended, and delving into much deeper subject matter. The article quotes @SorteKanin and mentions others in this thread, especially @silverpill as the pillar who upholds the FEP process today. I read the discussion with interest, but skipping the implementation details, to take a broader perspective. All of you are rig...
#fediverse is at an inflection point.
Either revival and course correction to the original #ActivityPub protocol power and promise. With the potential to #ReimagineSocial.
Or keep current track with fedi-we-have. Be content with a few great and reasonably popular app platforms. Surely some more to come. But with a messy wire protocol that stifles #innovation and isn't future-proof.
#AskFedi do you dare to dream?
This special thought provoker is based on personal reflection and 8 years of #commoning. Deliberately exposed to the inherent unsustainability of the #FOSS movement. Burning privilege by spending my savings.
Goal: 1st-hand experience to learn the #social dynamics that make a #commons tick.
I invite you to a #brainstorm & #ideation ride. To ponder how #fedi can organically evolve. Become unbeatable by #hypercapitalism.
https://coding.social/blog/grassroots-evolution
But in an age of #AI who still reads long handcrafted #blogs? Fill in the #poll.
| In the end I more or less read the whole article | |
| I read the article summary, skimmed for highlights | |
| I passed the problem section, read the tech ideas | |
| Meh, skip. Too technical. Too social fluffy. Other |
Back to promise and power of AP?
Sustainable #evolution, hmm, yes.
#Emergence, you say? Right, umm.. 🤷
#Fediverse-we-have vs. #ActivityPub, which is more powerful and #versatile ?
Lego Sets vs. Lego Blocks, which is more powerful and versatile?
View the video mentioned in the article about Emergent Complexity..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HqUYpGQIfs
Can you influence and steer emergence and evolution? Some people like me, with Social experience design think so. Another person is Richard D. Bartlett known from #Loomio who also is behind #Microsolidarity, which I was reminded of the other day. Have a look for yourself..
@laurenshof wrote fabulous reports analysing our #SocialWeb and sadly this included raging techno-ideological #ProtocolWars too. How can we turn that to #Progress?
So much friction and heat in the raging discussions #ActivityPub vs. #ATProto 😭
🔮 What is *much* more relevant in #Bluesky vs AP is WHY ❔ Bluesky + ATProto gets the bigger uptake, despite compromising on #moral and #ethical values and #principles we hold dear.
Knowing the answers to that is where #opportunity for strategic action comes from. And subsequently following what you may call #FocusedPragmatism instead of just 'wild-coding' the chaotic #fedi with countless independent, uncoordinated "Show, don't tells" of yet more code to shove onto the #BigBallOfMud that fediverse-we-have increasingly represents.
#ActivityPubAPI provides such Opportunity.
To revive on a *greenfield basis* doing #Protocol design and adopt lessons-learned from APv1 #Microbloggosphere vs. #Atmosphere.
For those who chimed in to join the #brainstorming and want to be nerdsniped potentially you may ponder that..
♟️ #Chess is a great example of an #EmergentSystem.
🌱 Recipe for #Emergence of chess #game
- [chess ingredients here]
And then to continue onwards and think how the relationship is between #FOSS individuals who give their all-in best-efforts for world improvement, make real sacrifices, and who gift their 2 cts with best-intentions, still are faced with uncomfortable questions.
To turn that into solution-orientation we must find a good recipe, and note down #recipe ingredients..
🌱 Recipe for Sustainable open social systems i.e. #SOSS
- [sustainable FOSS ingredients here]
Hint / rule: Max. ingredients is 10.
https://social.coop/@smallcircles/116316524763055082
@helge Recipe support on the #ActivityPub fediverse?
The fun of #SX is that you don't have to learn it, nor do you have to get it taught to you.
Like chess you should #experience it to gain #experience, and you do that by meeting other #people and #practice it. By #SocialExperience with your friends and peers in the chess world #SocialGraph. Weaving #SocialFabric where you can be playful, creative and do experiments, engage in #challenges. This keeps one intrinsically #motivated to stay into the #game. Learn more. Enter a virtuous ⭕ circle of rewarding #exercises.
And perhaps one day. Suddenly and unexpected, #opportunity finds you to play against #MagnusCarlsen. And WIN!
The important thing is: You need not have any *expectation* for that. And most people shouldn't, as it is boils down to 'hanging yourself up to a Vision' if you simply don't possess the 'chess genius gene'. Most people don't.
However you can still #Dream about beating Magnus one day to have fun at every level of your progression path to mastery.
Emergence. So fascinating, that. I came to some deep insight re: commons organization, a concept I call the Paradox of (commons based) Emergence. Hope to post a forum topic on it soon.
I told so often on the channels that I shouldn't explain so much about SX concepts. That it was a failure condition. And it is. It was also my method to reiterate to myself for testing and improving them against various statements. And to jog my bad memory.
#SX #ThoughtExperiment. #Emergence needs 2 ingredients: Simple building blocks and a set of rules. What if you were the first person to invent chess? For chess you can write them down in a heartbeat. Then though, this first designer / inventor of the game, who thinks it through..
Can they imagine at that time Magnus Carlson level complexity?
1/2
There exist no other chess players yet. Can they train with others? Will they understand the excitement of a deep philosophical session where the inventor got an inkling of Magnus Carlsen level genius? Probably not.
Today there are libraries full of chess books. But not then. Should the inventor write all that? He can't. The only way to 'spread' chess about, is for others to experience it with others: social experience. Learn by doing.
My mistake was that I was encouraging people into *doing*, but my continuous explanation seemed to ask "join me on something very complex and vague". That complex and vague being the reverse engineering of complex social dynamics that exist in the #commons, back to simple building blocks and rules. What an emergent designer does. But not at all what you need to know to participate in SX solutions. Everyone does their own thing.
The paradox: Concrete SX practice steers intangible emergent value creation, but what you see at a time is just your 2 cents.
#ParadoxOfEmergence. The Paradox of Emergence entails that the more intricate an #EmergentDesign gets, the more complex #WickedProblems it can potentially solve.
However, all the potential power remains dormant, ethereal and invisible, especially to people other than the designer. It can only be properly perceived and valued, either with deep attention and focus on the emergent dynamics of the design. Or by dilligent practice in the field.
A design may represent a beautiful emergent Golden Dragon of Problem Solving. Waiting in its lair under Wicked Problem mountain for when its time to breathe its Fires of Solution onto mankind. Ready to soar. Yet what most other people and even at times the designer themself perceive is merely a tiny mouse. Thus they are unwilling to add their 2 cents to a Potential they cannot grasp. Unable to see how their support adds to a sizable Dragon's Hoard that has already emerged, lending power to the dragon so it may be unleashed.
@smallcircles I want to read it, and it's on a topic of importance to me, but I recognize that I don't have the focus or time.
Also, I'm quickly running into information for which I lack referents, making it difficult to digest what the article is saying.
I think what I'd need (for whatever that may be worth) in order to be able to digest this properly is some backgrounders on the major pieces mentioned:
I'd probably have more to ask/say but I keep getting interrupted, which perhaps gives you some idea of why I'm not able to read the article properly right now... 
@woozle the article was described as "fairly long thinkpiece" by @Profpatsch which with 53 min. read time is an understatement of "fairly long" where it comes to typical online content.
Thank you for taking the time and ponder things! I think that is the most important. We are all so pragmatic and want to have quick results. And our society is asking to be hurried. Everything is urgent. All is in peril. But giving in to that urge is a trap, that makes us weaker as mankind to face our wickedest problems.
Besides "Hammock driven development" mentioned in the article, #Emergence is key. And emergence is WEIRD and fascinating. I just tooted about it in..
https://social.coop/@smallcircles/116384803540561801
--
I used #SolidProject just to contrast a totally opposite approach to how fedi evolves: Fully formal #OpenStandards driven, but with risk to evolve into a 'standards maze' without ecosystem support.
#Mastodon Foundation is a new development. Hopefully they care beyond the app.
I have been working on a "move slowly and build things" basis for some time now -- arguably to excess [insert rant here]
Unfortunately, as you noted, Life keeps going at its own breakneck pace regardless of whether I'm interested in breaking any necks 😅
I do appreciate a good deep-dive, though, and hopefully I'll have time to absorb more of it 
@Profpatsch
cc: @eryn
Thank you! I am delighted to hear that. An *intent* in itself is already valuable. And even more so, being *intentional* in what you do. Both of these have emergent properties. So you are *already* practicing #SX by sending this toot, it constitutes your 2 cents. And hence, truly, you may call yourself Social experience designer, if that were your dream job like it is mine. 😊
This is how weird and wonderful emergence is. At least that is my *expectation*. I am also merely practicing, ha ha :)
@woozle @smallcircles @Profpatsch @eryn "I have been working on a "move slowly and build things" basis for some time now..."
This is absolutely fine. Anybody who thinks a new order of independents is going to emerge in five years is delusional: first, we can all only do so much in a given time, and second we have to wait for each other to come up with successive evolutionary steps.
@khleedril @woozle @Profpatsch @eryn
💯 Totally! This is even part of core principles of #SX: Mindfulness.
A movement is timeless and can only progress by participants adding their 2 cts, which accrue over time. Or it pauses, waiting for input. The wicked solution is timeless in a similar way, waiting its lifecycle stage where it solves the wicked problem and sustainably satisfies all stakeholders' evolving needs.
Urgency is provided by individuals. However, if some group or movement has the attitude "Stop the talking, we MUST act NOW and with URGENCY" they have a humongous failure condition right there.
Instead there is prioritised, planned urgency and after breakdown into manageable chunks. It becomes simple then. You talk when you need to talk, and you act when you need to act.
It sounds like a platitude, and perhaps it is in how obvious it is. But if you don't act according to the wisdom of the platitude, perhaps it bears repeating it? Platitudes are a form of universal truths.
I just wish being patient didn't require so much patience ;-)
@woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
Aha, good one, I love it! Since I'm still in nerdsniped state on this whole emergence thing, let me try to come up with yet another platitude then... umm 🤔 ......
Aww, got it. Maybe its garbage, platitudal overload, but at least it sounds deep. 🤣
@saxnot @woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
You are right. It is flawed. Happens on the quick-toot modern timeline of our time :)
But this is also emergent design: experiment, test, improve in short cycles.
Another attempt at platitude then. Then it is up to others to counter-platitude me again :D
I see a pin-back button in the works.
May I?
@Algot @saxnot @woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
You mean a quote post? Sure, by all means :)
I have a button-making setup. I'd love to make a physical button.
@Algot @saxnot @woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
Oh, that is lovely. You can use it public domain CC0 as a quote by me, Arnold Schrijver, assuming that no one before me has formulated it already.
@Algot @saxnot @woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
I'm pondering now if I should make "SX platitude" a SX artifact. I likely will.
You see, there's a concept of "wisdom tiles" in SX, indicating universal truths that all (or most) people agree on, like "think, before you act". The tile I generated represents a Delft-blue "wisdom tile" and these things used to hang in the toilet in our grandparents house when we were young. You typically gifted them on birthdays of your Grandma. They are now kinda disappearing. It is old-fashioned.
The underlying innercircles simple life philosophy that underpins SX goes from the assumption that "simple solutions still exist". And that in terms of wisdom, knowledge, common sense, and life experience *everything* we need to solve the wicked solutions of our time, is already out there. It is the coordinated application in practice during prolonged times where we drop the ball.
Wisdom is relative, in the eye of the beholder. "Wisdom tile" best avoided.
@Algot @saxnot @woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
With CC0 there's no need for attribution, but if you want to honor me you may quote as:
-- "Urgent platitudes" quote by Arnold Schrijver, social coder.
I'd say it's also good to have a plan; outside of capitalism, it's easier for plans to include things like "spending time following up creative impulses until you feel like you're done".
When people are working together, some of them might even want to be available to help others with their impulsive projects -- and from that, new plans, new branches, or new solutions can emerge.
@woozle @khleedril @Profpatsch @eryn
Both, based on need I'd say. In SX its mindfulness principle again, and I can expand the sentence above with "plan, when you need to plan".
Plans are certainly needed at different granularity and scope, for different purpose, and likely having relationships to each other too.
Mindfulness is one thing, but Sustainability core principle is about finding the right balance of when to do what and when. You must plan to anticipate your Risks timely, for instance.
Finally there's Playfulness core principle, which is the most powerful, but also only truly comes into play (pun intended) when the other core principles are addressed to a minimal extent.
Here is the freedom to be creative, to experiment, to be flexible and versatile, to work at your own leisure, to just have fun, etc. This all relates to the Joyful creation SX formula, and the stimulation of intrinsic motivation to participate in the commons, find places where you fit, and foster cohesion.
@khleedril @woozle @Profpatsch
Oh wow, that is even more whopping! The Astro Starlight blog plugin must have optimism bias, or built in read-me encouragement balance correction. 😅
I was delighted to hear your feedback on the other posts, thank you! I will reply in due time on them.
@woozle @smallcircles
Length of time to read something “from start to finish” should not be the only “value measure” of an expressed written article as I typically don’t read an article only once to fully comprehend(build a personal mental model). Otherwise I will skim and speedread to create a “mental gist” summary.
I’ve read “once through” all of the article with Saturday morning coffee, otherwise I would have read what I could within an allocated timebox to make previous time commitments.
Well said. Esp. when things are HARD, like the wicked problems that ail our world, #ClimateChange for instance. Everyone should contribute their fair share, right? Give just their 2 cents?
#Emergence deals with radical #Simplicity. But simple ain't easy.
Wicked problems require wicked solutions. Numerous tiny #solution increments made all over the place by different people. It requires 'thinking at scale' for prolonged times, and 'doing' on the basis of that. In terms of planning for that 'Bigger Ideas' need time to mature and ripen, and this too involves many people. And is emergent and evolutionary in nature too! This great animation on "Where good ideas come from" calls this the 'Slow Hunch"..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NugRZGDbPFU
#SX's slow hunch took 11 years.
There's another great vid by Rich HIckey, creator of #Clojure, besides "Hammock Driven Development" mentioned in the article, titled "Simple made Easy" given at a #StrangeLoop conference..
@smallcircles That's a really strong article, solid all the way through. I'm glad you acknowledge the small web as a plausible alternative to the fediverse.
I'm strongly of the opinion myself that whenever humanity tries to design something it never ends well, but that organic creation is the only way forward (compare new towns to very old ones which have character and community), and also that protocols really need to be as simple as possible.
/cont
They should follow the UNIX philosophy of doing one thing well, and then the stack functions harmoniously to provide high-level functionality. Thus I think that ActivityPub is utter pants, including the whole W3C management of it.
I'll have more to say on my own blog in a couple of weeks, when I've worked some things out. I'll keep you posted, and look forward to reading other comments on your piece here :)
🫧 socialcoding..
Jan Vlug
Bechele
Woozle Hypertwin
Khleedril
saxnot
Algot
Beady Belle Fanchannel
Dawn Ahukanna