I've no longer got a job, and I'm also kinda completely broke.

So if anyone has a few extra dollars they can donate to help me, that'd be very appreciated.

https://ko-fi.com/fooneturing

"Even Obsidian’s most dedicated users don’t expect it to take on Notion and other note-taking juggernauts. They see #Obsidian as having a different audience with different values."
What are the values? Freedom and control.
Freedom to use an org system I created, freedom from my data stored by someone else somewhere and freedom from being dependent on one company's decisions.

#PKM #notetaking #Notes

https://www.fastcompany.com/90960653/why-people-are-obsessed-with-obsidian-the-indie-darling-of-notetaking-apps

I do not envy the #Godot devs right now.

I used to be heavily invested in GNU #Octave, a free #Matlab replacement. That was a bit of a more ambitious goal, because Godot isn't trying to be exactly like Unity, but Octave is trying to be exactly like Matlab. The overall problem, however, is similar.

It's a difficult, mostly thankless task. Users don't care what it takes to make it look exactly like what it's supposed to be replacing. Photoshop users going to the GNU IMP, Matlab users going to Octave, Maya users going to Blender, Chrome users going to Firefox... they all want the same thing: basically the same software, but without the fees, restrictions, or anti-user misfeatures. It is extremely draining to continuously disappoint people who aren't getting exactly the same software but without paying for it.

A few users will offer donations, but never enough to rival the budget of the software they're fleeing from. Nowadays there's better infrastructure to collect from these benevolent donors and get a steady income than when I was working on Octave. This offers some hope.

All this to say: if you're migrating to better, less enshittified software, donate if you can. If you cannot, then at least try to be kind and considerate of the smaller, more grassroots organisation and individuals that are trying to give you a comparable experience with no strings attached. :)

I'd go a step further: if something has no commercial value, preventing people from using, sharing, modifying, or expressing it should be illegal.

Not just copyrighted things. Also any DRM protecting something no longer for sale or that doesn't receive updates or support.

Locked bootloader on a ten year old phone? Illegal. Locked down jtag pins and bootrom on an always-online device after the services are turned down? Illegal. Class action suits up the wazoo.

It should be illegal to withhold from the commons.