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John Abbe (aka Slow)
@slowenough@mastodon.social
mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06Lover of #life, #community, #accountability, #commons, #nonviolence, #anarchy, #abolition, #wiki, #conversation, co-intelligence, #WholeSystems #Design, various people & groups, and 🍪. He/they. Parts of my ❤️ can still be found in #NewEngland, #BayArea, & #SriLanka, & now 20 yrs NW of Normal in #Eugene, #KalapuyaCounty (#LaneCounty), #Oregon. #PNW #Earth Sol System, Milky Way, Local Group, Virgo Supercluster, Laniakea Supercluster, Pisces Cetus Supercluster Complex #fedi23 #NoBots #WaterIsLife
444 Followers
662 Following
50 Posts
Joined October 28, 2022
label:
contentious
The US federal government has wasted a ton of money trying to violate our first amendment rights here in Eugene, which I'm sure is multiplied across many other parts of the country. Here, private actors managed to fight back and win, no thanks to our city government which rolled over for it. Much thanks to @CLDC@mastodon.social for taking this on, and winning! https://solidaritynews.org/2026/07/01/government-must-start-taking-down-federal-building-fence-tonight-judges-say/ #Eugene
The acceleration of more and more bots hitting websites more and more often has made life miserable for sysadmins everywhere, and boosted the businesses who offer defenses against such exploitation of people's digital goodwill.
Big companies will ultimately use this as an excuse to stop offering public access to anything outside of their app (or maybe signed-in web page), if it is allowed to continue. A sort of Internet Kessler syndrome, if you will. #AI #Internet #web
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@evan@cosocial.ca Done w this question. Fully set it down when I realized AI is 'just' the latest religious war among coders. (Perhaps second only to tabs-vs-spaces.)
Now I'm consciously trying to participate in AI conversations (if I participate at all) in ways that break the "Is AI good or bad?" framing, rather than reifying the fight.
Firefox did this in code: big button to turn AI off, little buttons to turn on LLM-powered features, starting w on-device translation which ~everyone understands & wants.
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@gruber@mastodon.social @perardi@mastodon.social At this rate, we'll need a dicktionary.
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@ajroach42@retro.social @ifixcoinops@retro.social More people than ever are actively looking to "degoogle" by which they mean alternatives to all the megacorps, not just Google.
So the current interest may be about getting *away* from what people don't want. That's a huge opportunity to offer tools they can use, and talk up the safe, optimistic worlds we'd like to see, and in some places already DO see.
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@screwturn "People who actually are leaders are typically stressed, exhausted, and miserable, and find out that their actual power is very narrow and always comes at a steep price."
In autocratic systems, yes.
In healthy, leaderful groups, leaders care for themselves, better or at least know where they aren't & are working on it it 🤣. They get leadership includes being real about capacity (including their own), and try to adjust what they say and what they do so they match.
And lead together.
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@aaronkurz@mastodon.online @wdormann@infosec.exchange Already happening. That's why Apple is suddenly out of Mac Minis and Mac Studios. Forward-thinking PC developers will be ready to pivot to that market when the current server boom busts. (You can be sure Apple is ramping up supply chains for relevant hardware in a massive way right now.)
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@SaanichGuy@mstdn.ca @gerrymcgovern@mastodon.green That sort of thing, ecological crimes that 'pierce' the corporate veil, is called ecocide. More and more legislators have started taking it seriously. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecocide
In Brazil: https://ecojurisprudence.org/initiatives/brazil-ecocide-law-2023/
Curious what England's Greens will do if they continue to gain influence there. And how this could intersect with expanding #transformativejustice
#ecocide #ecology #environment #law #legislation #crime #justice #nature #life #habitat #water
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@lauren@mastodon.laurenweinstein.org @jtk@infosec.exchange @Ralph@hear-me.social I randomly read the latest issue just a few days ago and saw your name on a post.
❤️🩹 💔 ❤️
The best time to end the genocide would have been decades ago. The second-best time would be now, today.
Every day, Israel has the opportunity to change course. Every day, the US, the Arab oligarchies, and Iran, could each/all shift gears take up in earnest opportunities they are missing to move in more fruitful directions. There are civil actors working hard for this, I'll try to post about them more. https://www.nbcnews.com/world/gaza/shooting-gaza-un-report-israel-targeting-children-rcna351890 #Palestine #Israel #Gaza #WestBank #EastJerusalem #USA #imperialism
Apple won't say tata to Tata over this, but it is for sure a Big Deal. The info revealed will aid their competitors. And their suppliers in negotiating better deals.
For those of us who care about society, and good computer design, it's an open question what kind of political economy might yield the benefits of integrated hardware & software design, without handing too much power to one company. Centralized power, even under vaguely benevelont oligarchs, is precarious. https://daringfireball.net/linked/2026/06/29/tata-electronics-breach
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@omar@mastodon.bsd.cafe @RedFacedUakari@mastodon.social @jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io @cairobraga@gts.cairobraga.com Yes, local IT co-ops are unlikely to happen in isolation, and more likely to happen in the context of general rising of local community, mutual aid, and other neighborhood-scale organizing. City Repair in Portland, Oregon has worked on this sort of thing a bit, I'm sure there are many others.
People are getting rather organized in many places right now to defend others in their communities, so, many opportunities for community-building!
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@RedFacedUakari@mastodon.social @jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io @cairobraga@gts.cairobraga.com There are definitely a bunch of co-op incubators out there, for example: https://belovedcommunityincubator.org/
I don't know of any neighborhood tech co-ops, but people's interest in switching away from big tech providers is pretty high right now, so I believe there is hope at least for many small tech co-ops to succeed even if they couldn't yet make a living doing tech infrastructure & support for literally just their neighborhood. #cooperatives
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@jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io @cairobraga@gts.cairobraga.com Apple has run out of most Mac Studio and Mini models because there are so many people who understand this, and do not wish to be subservient to the cloud any longer. Silver lining: Another crack at a world where every household as a decent server and every neighborhood has a small tech geeks co-op to steward them.
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@markmccaughrean@mastodon.social I got fascinated withspiracles recently, and it strikes me that this behavior re temperature and water takes advantage of some of the same geometry & math that make spiracles work for air/oxygen.
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@ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org @Viss@mastodon.social I read comp.risks back in the '90s, and still go back and check it periodically. Never worked in the field but read comp.risks long enough to experience the trajectory: getting a bit caught up on the latest security tech issues, seeing that most security isn't the tech stuff, then sticking around for the entertainment value.
After that the news stories about it generally made sense.
And returns to reading about security over the years are speed runs through the same arc again.
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@JakeOrlowitz@mastodon.social The next 'event' for me will be Meehan's response after reading what I & others wrote. She's "committed to thoughtful engagement over the long term."
Others' responses such as Miller's, accentuate that most staff were as in the dark about this as the community. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WMF_Community_Tech_team_has_been_disbanded,_engineers_laid_off#Wishlist_going_forward_(11_June_WMF_update)
Even if there is no union busting, even if the wishlist continues in an okay way, I'm reading a general lack of care &/or understanding about, and investment in, the Wikipedia community.
Thx again.
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@JakeOrlowitz@mastodon.social Thank you for this.
You're doing great work. Any chance of getting some of these, or additional writing of yours, into outlets with more reach?
What's your sense of what the rest of us can do to help? I wrote here the other day in response to Meehan's May 24 note: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:BMeehan-WMF#Unionization
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@sidd_harth0_5h4h @futurebird Meanwhile, the ants are like, "Thank you for your service."
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@datenwolf@chaos.social @cczona@hachyderm.io @pojntfx@mastodon.social Taiwan handled COVID-19 very well, perhaps we could learn from their experience? https://www.wired.com/story/how-taiwans-unlikely-digital-minister-hacked-the-pandemic/ (Also see Tang's new book, Finding Light Through the Cracks https://www.co-intelligence.institute/book-audrey )
Obviously, TSMC and therefore many others in Taiwan have a stake in the AI boom, but by all accounts the big AI investors are frustrated TSMC won't ramp up production even faster. In other words, TSMC is already not pursuing the bubble full speed.
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@sandwich@mastodon.world We're gonna need another Freedom Summer, I hear. (Thx for posting about that.)
I see you, doing things to make life more wonderful for yourself &/or other people.
Thanks for doing that. #LifeReminder
Last night DHS/ICE & Eugene's police came out in big numbers downtown while workers set up to build a fence around ICE's federal building.
At least 2 workers quit. They had been contracted without being told they'd be building a fence to protect ICE. Good-hearted locals even got one who needed it a place to crash and more.
Cops' eagerness to escalate with critics on the scene increased tensions, & lead to multiple detentions and at least one arrest. https://lookouteugene-springfield.com/story/justice/2026/04/29/eugene-police-arrest-one-at-federal-building-protest-as-fence-construction-begins/ #abolishICE #ICE
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@amydiehl I hear about an all woman group and I'm liable to assume some qualities (agenda, compassion…), as a good thing!
Anyway, it's great for individuals & organizations to up awareness & mitigate our own assumptions. Also socially, we could use more (non-trite) stories where someone has that fear, and part of what they fear does happen, but not all and the outcome is so great the path makes sense.
More than one woman at a time is a big hump. It's where a lot of media fail the Bechdel test.
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@adamshostack Sounds great have your OpenClaw call my OpenClaw and they can do lunch (recharge?) and make a deal.
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@dfroidmont @ZLabe Looks like one point may have tipped back in 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dka4mcVQ4mA
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@dhobern@scicomm.xyz @tobbsn@post.lurk.org Ceci n'est pas un toot.
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@Bobblegagger @benroyce @Haste It's past time for an Andor-level, modern adaptation of Zelazny's My Name is Legion.
"Just before the system goes live, the hero expresses concerns about the possible misuse of such power to his superior, who gives him a chance to destroy his personal data before it is entered into the system. In taking this step, the hero becomes non-existent as far as the system is concerned." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Name_Is_Legion_(short_story_collection)
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@CrimethInc Very timely! CLDC just published this handy guide to help clarify the various abolition movements. https://cldc.org/know-your-abolition/
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@Daseinsappeal @grickle @maslos Among other kinds of salamanders… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PMu3HOO3Ag
This Giant "Salamander" Isn't a Salamander at All!
RE: @OpenSexism@mastodon.world
Even things that are quite terrible, such as AI, can be ruined even further by patriarchy.
(One has to wonder as well if the dominant AIs, all trained with vast quantites of patriarchal content, simply do a worse job when working on a woman's resume?)
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@decurtins @ErikUden @Gargron One Apertus focus is being multilingual, it may do a better job with Rumantsch. https://www.swiss-ai.org/apertus
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@omar@mastodon.bsd.cafe @jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io @cairobraga@gts.cairobraga.com Oh yeah I wasn't suggesting everyone get a Mac, just pointing to it as an indication of a rapid increase in the number of people who are buying hardware so that they can run models locally.
That suggests it is a good time for new PC makers to get into the market!
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@soph@grrl.me Re theft, I'm just at the beginning of learning about models developed with a care to the inputs, like this one: "Compliant Apertus is trained while respecting opt-out consent of data owners (even retrospectivey), and avoiding memorization of training data" https://huggingface.co/swiss-ai/Apertus-8B-Instruct-2509
Re higher new kinds of development, this helped me accept a future with both development as we've known it, and the newer kinds of development AIs (LLMS + these new 'harnesses') enable. https://www.caimito.net/en/blog/2025/12/07/the-recurring-dream-of-replacing-developers.html
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@cutesobri @alienghic @ZLabe They are making a ton of choices, and some of them make different choices. Like MacKenzie Scott.
I think I get what you're saying though, maybe? There's all kinds of systemic pressures on anyone who has gathered power, that make it less likely that they will make wise choices. So, often, it's less about convincing them to change, or replacing them with wiser people, than it is about shifting systems, for example such that there are no such concentrations of power?
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@beep@follow.ethanmarcotte.com @phire@phire.place This is why dependency cooldowns. https://blog.yossarian.net/2025/11/21/We-should-all-be-using-dependency-cooldowns
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@AnarchistArt "In this mini-documentary on the Asianometry Youtube channel, the history of the zaibatsu – the huge industrial conglomerates owned by a small number of family clans in Japan from the late 19th century well into the mid-20th century – and their growth, leading to their eventual demise and break-up, is examined." https://undersoutherneyes.edpinsent.com/what-eating-the-rich-did-for-japan/
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@soph@grrl.me "Conversational approaches to coding could be beneficial."
Haven't coded in forever, but it was instant & ongoing my awe at how central it is to any reasonably complex project, to talk and talk with people about what they actually want, because we are so often unable to specify what we want. First getting clear how to start, and then accepting it keeps changing.
It's wild to watch some coders love LLMs so much, and others hate it so much. Maybe the most religious programmers' war, ever.
The official local Pride march was canceled by its organizers, but an independent march got organized almost immediately. The community had been through a lot with the police this year and did not want to work as closely with them as they had in recent years.
One of several issues: Bodycam footage outing the deeply misogynistic & racist attitudes of a seven-year veteran. Many calls for Chief Skinner to resign, but the city does not seem to be listening. https://lookouteugene-springfield.com/story/arts-culture/2026/06/27/at-pride-replacement-rally-and-march-queer-activists-call-for-eugene-police-chiefs-resignation/ #pride #Eugene
The final season of Strange New Worlds is apparently going to do a puppet episode.
The series has had fun with episode idea bingo, drawing on Star Trek history and TV in general. They did the musical, the undercover-as-another species bit (not written well), the crossover, the Federation courtroom. Hopefully they pull off the puppets, Angel's was fun.
I continue to enjoy most of the SNW actors, and sounds like this will be the finale of the era? But the reasons to care have largely evaporated.
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@SecureOwl@infosec.exchange Strong When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth vibes. https://craphound.com/overclocked/Cory_Doctorow_-_Overclocked_-_When_Sysadmins_Ruled_the_Earth.html
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@cutesobri @alienghic @ZLabe And instead live a system bringing together everything we know (and keep learning) about interdependence - our dependencies on, and support of, not only each other but the rest of life!
Collective celebration & mourning. In-person and distributed collaboration, connection, rhythms, flow, the power of weak links, rough consensus & running code, appropriate technology, clarity & honesty, empathy, subsidiarity, transparency & accountability, sortiition & mini-publics…
May Day has been a big deal elsewhere.
This May 1 (Friday), for a growing number us in the United States of America, normal day-to-day business stops and we come together to remember a tragedy — the Haymarket Massacre. We celebrate and make visible the power of the labor movement, all of the people's movements the massacre helped inspire.
Here are a few of the events happening on May Day in cities & towns around Oregon: https://www.daywithoutanimmigrantor.com/events #MayDay #events #Oregon #Eugene #SpringfieldOR
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@sandwich@mastodon.world 💯 %.
I literally just started an account on that other service for a very particular reason. But this is the only quasi- social media platform that seems to have a future, atthe moment. There's all this blather about it being theoretically possible for Bluesky to evolve into something that is not centered around one institution, but that institution is apparently working hard to keep itself at the center. https://trezy.com/blog/the-marshmallow-test
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@HannahClover@mastodon.social @JakeOrlowitz@mastodon.social I just saw this, about upcoming June 27 & 28 cafés. I'm already promoting other things this month, easy enough to add these to my existing efforts, especially where they align. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:BMeehan-WMF#June_2026_Wikimedia_Caf%C3%A9_meetups_regarding_the_English_Wikipedia_Editor_Reflections_project #Wikipedia #Mediawiki #WMF
Why Haven't We Seen a Photograph of the Whole Earth Yet?
'It was so enjoyable, conducting street-clown seminars on space and civilization, that I kept returning to Cal. Then I branched out to Stanford. And then to Columbia, Harvard, MIT. “Who the hell’s that?” asked an MIT dean, watching hordes of his students buying my buttons. “That’s my brother,” said my brother Pete, an MIT instructor.' https://longnow.org/ideas/why-havent-we-seen-a-photograph-of-the-whole-earth-yet/
We got the photo, Brand. Nice, but it didn't save the world, yet at least.
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@omar@mastodon.bsd.cafe @jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io @cairobraga@gts.cairobraga.com I'm American, and I very very much support humanity having more redundancy in our computing supply chains. :-)