Free and Open Source Software @beehaw.org

2年前

Following this road is overwhelming

Buggy software, not so user friendly, things don't work, new things to learn..

Sometimes you just wanna do a simple thing and you cannot do it and that really undermines your self esteem.

You try to find little working solutions when big techs with armies of engeneers and programmers are working against you.

Aurora store stopping to work, apps getting blocked on lineage os or rooted phones, Reddit cleaning out all those amazing third party apps, Linux that wanna make you destroy your pc at times, Firefox remaining the only real alternative to chromium (only god knows for how long yet), google wanting to DRM everything, ig blocking my account because i was using barinsta (i cannot even delete it), Newpipe getting stuck after 1/4 of the video.

Sometimes you find half of your software stops working and you need to go and understand why, fixing or checking for alternatives..

Is it possible that we have from one side mass tracking and surveilance and from the other a (sometimes understandibly quite not organized) series of freely mainteined software.

Can't we just find a new way of monetize stuff without ads? So that we can build really nicely working software without all the shit that comes from the need of having to track the user? Are there real alternatives? We need to get organized and actually starting to build a better web and software, but i really think an economical incentive is still very much needed for it to be stable and usable by everyone.

Sorry this is more of a rant than a real post, sometimes everything really gets frustrating and you have to deal with much more serious shit in life that doesn't leave time for checking out why your Newpipe, your gps or home server doesn't work..

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It is overwhelming. Just take it slow. Dont ban yourself from non open source things. Maybe try adopting one open source thing at a time

It helps if you can treat it as a hobby. My partner's hobby is music, which is a perfectly sensible thing to do in one's spare time. I always feel a bit weird when people ask me what I do in my own spare time and my answer is basically fixing my shit, then pushing it just hard enough that it breaks again.
To your question, the unfortunate reality is that those of us who care about privacy and software freedom are a small minority. Why overhaul your business model to suit us when they can continue to milk every other consumer out there who frankly doesn't give a shit?
Phones are, of course, the worst of all for this. People do great work developing FOSS solutions but it is an uphill struggle and I worry that the hill is getting steeper.
- I always feel a bit weird when people ask me what I do in my own spare time and my answer is basically fixing my shit, then pushing it just hard enough that it breaks again.
  Relevant

On the other hand, fixing all those problems makes you a really effective problem solver. You learn which technologies are good and which are bad; you learn where to find reliable solutions to problems; and you begin to see where tutorial writers have a lack of knowledge (or were really lazy) and how to fix their problems. It forces you to create good habits and to follow best practices. And years down the line, you'll have some great, stable software that is the envy of your techie friends.
- now THIS is podracing! (How computing used to be in the 80s and 90s, before corpos and apps took over)

There is one good example of a good FOSS project with reliable funding and a thriving community, which is blender.
You know why blender is a success unlike other projects . Because it a very complicated piece of software that most of the community can't just fork or start another project. so for FOSS projects to thrive they need more convergence of developpers to the same project . rather than divergence of efforts into multiple of projects. I know that this is not how FOSS works. but the reality is that without an urge to devellop projects in rivalary with the commercial ones. the resulting quality will always be mediocre.
another problem is the lack of proper documentation, It it very hard and time consuming to get familiarised with complex project codes. many of them are lacking proper documentation to encouraged newer devs to join in. the reality is that this takes time away from coding into documentation, but its an important ressource to encourage growth and participtation.
- You make a good point with Blender being too complex of a beast to divert the effort into forks. I rely on Blender to put bread on the stable and this is only possible because of the funding & development stability.

There is no ethical way to monetize software because the unethical thing is capitalism itself.
- Also, all the arguments for market economies being useful and the typical supply/demand arguments completely break down for a product which is infinitely duplicatable for free
  
  Yes, hence the constant efforts to create and enforce artificial scarcity, from DRM to NFTs.
  And it's not just software. The same ideology leads to locked dumpsters full of food behind grocery stores and shoes and coats cut open before they're thrown away at the end of the season.

Another point of view is that OSS and Linux is absolutely amazing.
With a very limited set of exceptions, you can grab Ubuntu or Fedora or whatever, make a USB boot drive, and be in a GUI and shitposting on the internet in about 5 minutes.
Linux has grown tremendously from when I started using it, which was when you'd probably have to end up editing a config file for X11 to add the modeline so X knew the resolution and refresh rate of your monitor because there was no auto-configuration for anything more than like 640x480@60hz (and even that might not work).
And in just a few years we went from very very few games working with Wine, to damn near everything that doesn't need ring0 rootkits working almost perfectly.
So yeah, it's not perfect, but it's absolutely light years from where it was 5 or 10 or 20 years ago and maybe focusing on how great it actually is vs bemoaning the things that still need work will help keep you motivated.
That said, at the end of the day software is just a hammer: you use it to build something. If Linux doesn't work but MacOS does, or Windows, or whatever does then use what works. There's no point in using something that doesn't do what you want to the point that you're angry/stressed/tired of dealing with it, because life is way too short to spend all your time fighting broken software when all you wanted to do was draw a picture or play a game or watch a movie or whatever.

Can’t we just find a new way of monetize stuff without ads?
Yes it's called taxation and public funding.
Governments should prioritize floss projects when running their infrastructure and other projects. Our money is paying for these projects. We should have access to all the products of that labor.
Furthermore they should give out money for non-business cases like games and other stuff just like arts funding.
We have private corps stepping in to do this sort of thing with "google summer of code". But it would be better through some nominally democratic structure.
In all cases governments and their agents should be good floss community members. "Free like puppies"
- Mmm floss

I am pro-opensource when possible. I use linux on desktop and laptop, I use foss android apps where available, and am happy to keep that trend alive.
That said, I am not a foss purist. There are things in my life where you gotta do what you gotta do. I have google'd android(a pixel even), I make use of steam and other proprietary game stores, I of course bank using bank things. Sometimes I waste time looking for an alternative only to find I've wasted my pre-bed time and Ive stayed up late chasing my tail. It's just easier to live well.
One thing about FOSS ui is that as frustrating as it is to be forced into someone's esoteric workflow, it isnt always counter intuitive, just different from how the mainstream does it. There have been a few foss programs where once it clicks I kinda get where they were coming from(and of course many others where I feel the devs are intentionally out there spreading chaos)
- Can’t we just find a new way of monetize stuff without ads?
  Just typo squat an NPM module with a cryptocurrency miner.
  jk do not do this

Can’t we just find a new way of monetize stuff without ads?
Please let us know if you figure this out. There are at least a few talented, detail-oriented developers who dislike both ads corporate life.

Buggy software, not so user friendly, things don’t work, new things to learn…
Sometimes you just wanna do a simple thing and you cannot do it and that really undermines your self esteem.
You try to find little working solutions when big techs with armies of engeneers and programmers are working against you.
Sometimes you find half of your software stops working and you need to go and understand why, fixing or checking for alternatives…
All of those issues are also present in proprietary software. Not sure why you think free and open source software is unique in that regard.
In my experience, FOSS generally works better than the proprietary alternative. It tends to have fewer features, but the features it does have are designed to be useful to the user rather than to collect more money from the user, and tend to be much more thoroughly debugged. My favorite example of this right now is Thunderbird versus Microsoft Outlook; the latter has plenty of bells and whistles, but trying to use it is an utterly infuriating experience.
Also, FOSS alternatives tend to be sparse in topics that most programmers don't personally care about or don't have access to. For example, there are a great many FOSS text editors, because every programmer needs one, whereas FOSS business accounting software is not so common, because most programmers don't own businesses.
Aurora store stopping to work, apps getting blocked on lineage os or rooted phones, Reddit cleaning out all those amazing third party apps, Linux that wanna make you destroy your pc at times, Firefox remaining the only real alternative to chromium (only god knows for how long yet), google wanting to DRM everything, ig blocking my account because i was using barinsta (i cannot even delete it), Newpipe getting stuck after 1/4 of the video.
That's a problem with proprietary software (i.e. proprietary apps and websites), not free and open source software (i.e. your browser, operating system, and Reddit client).
When a business refuses to do business with me because I use FOSS, I take that as an insult, and take my business elsewhere if I can. I suggest you do the same.
Can’t we just find a new way of monetize stuff without ads?
Not as long as we practice capitalism, no. As long as investors demand that businesses grow faster than inflation, those businesses will look for ways to take more and more of your money, forever, until they finally collapse, and then the cycle of enshittification starts anew. What you want is stability and equality, but stability and equality are anathema to someone who wants to be richer than everyone else.

Sorry this is more of a rant than a real post
Rant my friend! Preach! I feel you on this.

I laughed a little because I'm not sure I ever grew out of the expectation of everything being a little broken. You are going to learn so much you could have done without.
On a more sober note I'm not sure adding a business model fixes the problem anymore.
If we paid for our anonymity like toll roads or subscriptions we box out people who can't afford it. Commodity level information isn't likely to be decreasing in value any time immediately.
If equitable access is also on the list, I don't see anything but regulation and taxes getting you there. Just look at the steam store prices outside the first world and you have an idea for how poorly it could go.

Like another user said, take as much as you can comfortable handle at one time, as FOSS cold-turkey can be exhausting.
It's a bit like trying to stop using Nestle or another multinational's shit, once you realize how many brands and sub-brands are owned by the big bad, it can make one feel pointless doing it (like just switching from one to another big bad). Replace one thing at a time to make it easier on yourself.
Think of it this way. If FOSS is a rebel movement in the eyes of a world oligopolized by Big Tech, you can't just expect to overturn the core in a day. You take it slow and let the open-source movement and your desire to try out promising FOSS software one at a time drive you to become a knowledgeable power user, rather than trying to force upon yourself a lifestyle you might not necessarily want at this moment.
- This is a great way to think about it... as much as I would love to completely drop the companies I hate like Microsoft or Google or Twitter, sometimes you have to use it for school/work/etc. (Good God I hate Teams.) Like food conglomerates it's just far too hard for the majority of people to live off the big tech grid.

I mean, those services do exist. You have that middle ground. Services like Proton exist. And you can use PixelFed instead of Instagram. The issue with trying to use a FOSS frontend to a proprietary backend... well, it's already a broken system at that point. And Linux lands on a spectrum of building your own car from scratch and dealing with those problems yourself all the way to someone else maintaining it but you're limited in scope to what it can technically do unless you go under the hood yourself, and that all depends on the distro.
Computers are technological wonders. Making everything simple and easy actually takes a ridiculous amount of work. So doing stuff yourself is absolutely going to be more difficult than paying for a mainstream turnkey solution where they offset the cost by selling your data or showing you ads. Anything that's proprietary and private will always cost a significant amount more.

- This is a reminder to be nice on Beehaw.

Follow the current, it's encouraging you to reassess what your actual needs are, and giving you an opportunity to simplify your digital life.

Nothing gets solved overnight. I realize that f-droid isn't the be all end all, but hey, be the change you want to see in the world. Maybe Aurora is a stop-gap, but maximize your use of f-droid alternatives and support the developers however you can. Be active in alternatives to the big-tech sites, like posting in beehaw communities.
Poaching something I posted on Reddit /r/selfhosted at the beginning of the year:
Back of the envelope math. Assuming 30,000 active users here on /r/selfhosted x $50/yr = $1.5M / 20 -> $75,000 per year. In other words, if /r/selfhosted gave $50 per person per year, "we" could contribute $1.5M to open source projects we use. Some projects probably wouldn't know what to do with resources and/or don't have the infrastructure in place to receive anything, so not a panacea. But for the well organized and developed projects?
It's sort of wild if you think about it. There are probably 10-12 very popular self-hosted applications with a very long tail, but 20-25 probably captures a very healthy cross section of use. Not every project or developer can accept monetary donations or use them effectively. But $75,000/year is median household income in the US.
There are almost certainly many more open source software and app users than there are self-hosted people - I'd imagine the self-host people are a subset. So what if we add open source software and mobile apps to the collective pool we could financially contribute to - again, $50/year/per able user - maybe the number of supportable applications goes up to 50 or 80.
Leading the thought experiment to a logical conclusion - if 80 open source projects received $75,000/year in donation income (at a minor cost to those able to pay and none to the vast majority), enough in most parts of the world to support a person and possibly a family, we would have more amazing, privacy respecting options. It doesn't necessarily solve everything, most people naturally free-ride, and organizing many small contributions at a massive scale isn't a solved problem itself. But, my point is that users collectively have way more power than we realize.

I have no problem monetizing with ads, I just have a problem with privacy invasive “targeted advertising” and the non consensual sale of personal data to 3rd parties and governments. I’ve yet to see a compelling argument why the ads I see need to be so specifically targeted as to warrant tracking my behavior on and between websites. As a consumer, there isn’t a distinguishable benefit to this arrangement and I don’t understand why my participation is expected.

Try to use a mix of both open source and proprietary software depending on the software. I use YouTube with a subscription, and I also use RSS feeds and foss and donate to the creator.

Just fyi, I found that aurora store often works a lot better if you log in with a google account. I know its not the best option for privacy but I kind of rely on some play store apps working and being updated and I still had a google account either way.
Also, do you have microg installed? Most google play apps work without much hassle for me on lineageOS microg
- Yeah i have microg but some of the apps don't work very well either

I just use linux until fstab inevitably breaks again and my system won't boot. And then I install Windows again until I am fed up with how bloated and slow it has become, and install linux again. And then the cycle continues.
- This sounds like a torture
- This is the only true way to use a PC.

Well, for android at least I understand that app used for paying (Google Wallet, Samsung Pay, Bank apps) are blocked in a root environment, you never know if the app could get compromised and your bank account emptied or whatever. For the remaining, yeah it's shitty...

So, regarding convenience, sadly my apps are mostly non-FOSS. These non-FOSS devs have the advantage that they can see the source code of their FOSS alternatives. They also have FAR more workforce. So, we'll probably never reach the point where general FOSS is superior to closed source software.
The area that's primarily FOSS to me is coding. With ChatGPT it's got damn easy to build daily productivity tools that meet one's specific needs.
Security is also generally better with FOSS, but, yeah, I admit that the UI is less convenient than the proprietary ones...
- Well, regarding apps I use, they typically have professional testers who find bugs and who are paid full-time to fix them. Interoperability and protocols are respected differently by different projects by FOSS and non-FOSS alike, and they aren't needed for many apps.
  Something suggests me we're not going to agree, though. I'd appreciate if you further counter my points, but I'm likely not going to agree with you in that case. So, don't waste your energy.

Good thing I'm a libertarian and we hate roads!

I feel you, but looking at it in perspective the foss world has come a long way and I hope it will get better and better. I try to carry on because I feel it is the right thing to do and I'm encouraged to actually do more with less, but I don't have any critical task to perform on foss stuff either.

So, regarding convenience, sadly my apps are mostly non-FOSS. These non-FOSS devs have the advantage that they can see the source code of their FOSS alternatives. They also have FAR more workforce. So, we'll probably never reach the point where general FOSS is superior to closed source software.
The area that's primarily FOSS to me is coding. With ChatGPT it's got damn easy to build daily productivity tools that meet one's specific needs.
Security is also generally better with FOSS, but, yeah, I admit that the UI is less convenient than the proprietary ones...

38 评论