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luis_in_brief

@[email protected]

Programmer turned lawyer and community guy.

Current: Sonarsource, Creative Commons, OpenET, California HDF, 415/94110, dad.

Previously: Tidelift, Wikimedia, Mozilla, Open Source Initiative, GNOME, LegOS, Duke, 305/MIA, more.

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@samir@functional.computer avatar samir , to random

RE: https://mastodon.social/@ieeespectrum/116030177478995194

What is the point of converting this software?

Who’s gonna maintain it?

Unless you have interest from the maintainers, you have a bunch of code that no one uses and no one maintains. Good job, folks.

I see nothing on these sites that explain how they hope to drum up maintenance, or even engage the maintainers of the original code.

Once again, the critical part of FOSS is ignored. It’s the people.

luis_in_brief ,
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@samir much depends on how well it is maintained. Lots of old C/C++ is defacto unmaintained already (so a Rust port is not going to make things worse), and people eager to deal with the bullshit of C/C++ for funsies are not growing on trees.

Which isn't to say this specific proposal is necessarily a good one, but the assumption that existing codebases are healthy and maintainable also isn't necessarily true.

@luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

My kingdom for a that admits that our desire for continent-spanning food supply chains and globe-spanning goods supply chains is not just an artificial artifact of advertising and capitalism, but that we actually like and want stuff (and often need stuff! I like my MRI machine and future titanium hip!).

And then wrestles with what human community, sustainability, and craft look like in that context.

https://social.coop/@luis_in_brief/115696393392082892

luis_in_brief OP ,
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Eg I love love love Monk and Robot, about a “tea monk” (read: wandering psychotherapist, where every session is held over a pot of tea) in a post-robot world.

Given its style, I don’t think it would benefit from grappling with the supply chain (and horrible labor issues!) of tea. But there’s absolutely a Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas backstory somewhere in the Monk and Robot world for that tea supply chain. So I find it hard to unironically hope to be a neighborhood tea monk some day.

luis_in_brief OP ,
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(This wasn’t intentionally a post about European tech sovereignty but it is also a post about European tech sovereignty. A near-future… sovereignpunk? that talks seriously about the adjustments and challenges of an economy built on EU-centric tech would be fascinating.)

@luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

Skimming https://authoritarian-stack.info/ and wondering what an explicitly and actively anti-authoritarian/anti-tyrant, not just (civil?) libertarian, EFF would look like.

@Daojoan@mastodon.social avatar Daojoan , to random

“We don’t talk enough about” sir let me stop you there we talk enough about everything, all we do is talk on the internet 24 hours a day 7 days a week we don’t shut the fuck up enough

luis_in_brief ,
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@Daojoan going to take this as an excuse to say “No One Is Talking About This” by Patricia Lockwood is one of the best novels I’ve read in ages

@JessTheUnstill@infosec.exchange avatar JessTheUnstill , to random

[Thread, post or comment was deleted by the author]

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    luis_in_brief ,
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    @JessTheUnstill spicier take: one of the great failures (arguably the great failure ) of the free software movement is that everything you say is true

    @mattblaze@federate.social avatar mattblaze , to random

    31-41 Union Square West, NYC, 2024.

    All the pixels, but no farmer's market three days a week, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/53731622110/

    acades of five late 19th- and early 20th- century commercial and residential buildings on a city block, with a plaza in front.
    ALT
    luis_in_brief ,
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    @mattblaze we used to go down there a lot (my wife worked in a role related to the market) but had no idea about the Factory being there. TIL!

    @mcc@mastodon.social avatar mcc , to random

    At the start of this train ride I pulled out my laptop and started writing Rust and the lady next to me started knitting* a hat. Some hours later I wrote very little Rust because my laptop ran out of batteries and anyway the wifi on this train has been out the whole time, and the lady next to me has most of a cute-looking hat.

    • Darning? I'm always confused about the terminology here
    luis_in_brief ,
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    @mcc @Andres4NY the venn diagram of perl devotees c. 2000 and weird voting systems devotees is a circle, or at least looks like a circle to the perl and voting devotees because we can’t find our reading glasses

    @molly0xfff@hachyderm.io avatar molly0xfff , to random

    Newsletter: I spoke to experts across financial regulation, gambling, and election law about prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket. They claim to be trading platforms, they look like gambling sites, and the rules don’t fit.

    https://www.citationneeded.news/prediction-markets-oversight/

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @molly0xfff I couldn’t possibly record audio of my blog posts without needing to go back and rewrite the whole post, and then re-record, and then re-write and… ♻️

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @molly0xfff oh, interesting. Do you then just re-record the audio from the top, or…?

    @molly0xfff@hachyderm.io avatar molly0xfff , to random

    If you ever wondered why some Wikipedia articles are titled "murder of ____" and others "killing of ____":

    Flowchart showing how Wikipedia article titles are chosen in incidents where subjects die
    ALT
    luis_in_brief ,
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    @molly0xfff this is … very clinical. Where is it from?

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @molly0xfff that’s… near peak enwiki

    @aeva@mastodon.gamedev.place avatar aeva , to random

    i've been working on a list of the fundamental archetypes of video-games. literature is primarily concerned with men causing drama, so all works of literature can concisely be boiled down to a man opposing something. video-games on the other hand are primarily concerned with our instinctual desires for interaction, so our archetypes are fundamentally different.

    so far i've got:

    1. make a little doll

    2. make nest for doll

    3. protect doll

    4. fruit

    5. climb

    6. block puzzles

    7. follow deer

    luis_in_brief ,
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    luis_in_brief ,
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    @aeva @luis_in_brief bbiab, going to build a (globe-spanning empire) house for my doll

    @luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

    I have been asked to prepare a CV for the first time in forever (for a side project, not leaving Sonar!)

    It is giving me very middle-aged “I am not a number (of publications)!” feels. Any tips for doing this in a way that feels positive rather than reductive? Extremely out of the box ideas welcome.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    @tante @luis_in_brief It doesn’t even matter; frankly it would sort of be a relief if I don’t get this, as I’m not sure I have the time. I can’t even imagine if it were actually important to my career/future.

    @mattblaze@federate.social avatar mattblaze , to Photography

    "Bowl For Health", Treasure Island, San Francisco, CA, 2007.

    All the pixels, shoe rental not included, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/2123765265

    A simple industrial-type structure, seen from the corner. A row of broken windows on the top of one side. Doorway with awning and sign reading "Bowl for Health", adorned with bowling-themed icons, on right side.
    ALT
    luis_in_brief ,
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    @mattblaze Would have been a cool airport to land at.

    And then hellish to get to the city from, unless it had a BART stop…

    luis_in_brief ,
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    luis_in_brief ,
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    @mattblaze @msbellows @luis_in_brief Don’t know about “primarily” but there are lots of great stills, films, and art of seaplanes there at the time.

    This article has a fun picture with the bridge still under construction: https://www.thisdayinaviation.com/16-17-april-1935/

    @mcc@mastodon.social avatar mcc , to random

    The reason I don't use or consider using SourceHut is… well, look at it.

    https://git.sr.ht/~bacardi55/houston

    To me a site like GitHub/SourceHut/Codeberg has two functions, one is to actually host the VCS, but the other is to be a useful, inviting public presence for your project. People with little-to-no knowledge of source code should be able to get useful information out of your project landing page.

    But every Sourcehut page is bewildering to me at first glance, and I've contributed code to DVCSes!

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @mcc what if minimalism, turned to 11

    @luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

    This, from @recursecenter , is a really thoughtful survey of attitudes on AI in the field right now. As they say, read the whole thing, but a finding that resonates: “You should use AI-powered tools to complement or increase your agency, not replace it.“

    https://www.recurse.com/blog/191-developing-our-position-on-ai

    @louie@pdx.social avatar louie , to random

    hi my name is louie and it’s my opinion that text fields should always be super-duper extra frosted or completely opaque, no matter what

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @louie wait is that real

    luis_in_brief ,
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    @louie waaaaat

    @luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

    🤔

    A screenshot of a publisher’s website of a book titled “The Invention of Scarcity” by Deborah Valenze, showing pricing, availability, etc.. Circled in yellow are three things: the title of the book (“The Invention of Scarcity”), the word “ebook”, and (in the same row as the ebook) text saying that the ebook is “out of stock”.
    ALT
    @luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

    My TODO app has been redesigned

    tableflip.gif but I’m not sure if I’m the flipper or the flipped

    @molly0xfff@hachyderm.io avatar molly0xfff , to random

    scheduling conflicts for with my own panels will sadly keep me away from some talks that promise to be amusing, but i think i should be able to make it to the Andreessen Horowitz panel on “Little Tech”

    Little Tech: Owning the Future of American Innovation Mar 9, 2025 11:30am – 12:30pm CT Favorite Hilton Austin Downtown Favorite Salon J Policy VC / Investors Innovation The path to greatness starts in a garage. But as the biggest tech companies have grown, they’ve increasingly promoted policies designed to limit competition and consumer choice. We believe Little Tech is vital to our national interest and key to maintaining American economic, technological, and military dominance in the 21st century — and we need policies that support, not stifle, competition and innovation. Join us for a conversation about how policymakers can champion Little Tech, give startups a fair shot to compete, and unleash the next American tech revolution. The time to build is now.
    ALT
    luis_in_brief ,
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    @molly0xfff i just can’t even

    @luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar luis_in_brief , to random

    Talking CRA is simultaneously thrilling, because it takes software quality seriously, and terrifying, because the stakes are so high for open source. So I will sleep like a log the next few night.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Wrap up of the afternoon: I’m less freaked out than I was, for a variety of reasons that will take some getting into so won’t happen tonight.

    But boy also legislative consultation processes are just deeply unsuited to working with open source, even if entirely well-intentioned. Lots of literal Seeing Like A State problems here.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    (And then I slept 11 hours.)

    Back up for today’s EU Open Source Policy Summit.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    But before that some comments and additions to yesterday’s 🧵. What was said from the front of the room often got clarified later.

    I find it somewhat maddening that the approach seems to often be “legislate first, learn later” but at least learning is happening!

    eg: it sounds like there will be a lot more serious effort to include open source folks in the funding I mentioned here. There’s still a lot of opportunity cost to get involved, but may be some support:

    https://social.coop/@luis_in_brief/113917137680678877

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Similarly, it sounds like a lot of the frustration was heard (not just yesterday, but preceding yesterday) so there will be serious efforts to make this standardization process more accessible to open communities:

    https://social.coop/@luis_in_brief/113917218850774860

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    It was pointed out to me that Article 21 creates a channel for this to happen. https://social.coop/@luis_in_brief/113917163537396938

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    I joked yesterday that mentioning the Draghi report was trolling, but it’s just been brought up in passing by a panelist who is generally going much, much harder than Draghi’s report did. And gets rousing applause at the end of their rant.

    Morning starting very much on a note of open as a tool for European self-investment and self-control, which is great but in muuuuuch tension with yesterday’s regulatory bent.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    (Today’s event is much more for explaining open to policy-makers at the EU level; yesterday was a bit more internal to the open community. So tones will be different but some notes carry through both days.)

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Adriana Groh of @sovtechfund (fka Sovereign Tech Fund) mentions that we’ve tended to focus on open maintenance, but we should also be thinking about growth.

    I’ve certainly been guilty of that one!

    German speaker agrees that this should be a non-partisan interest, in part because new governments may “have new parties” which is one way to say “neo-nazis”.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Same German (from @OSBA ) talks about proprietary American software in terms very analogous to colonialism: sending money to America to build better software to extract more money.

    Talks about how the German government should be pushing back on this, but often doesn’t or even sides with Microsoft.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    It’d be really interesting to read a history of industrial policy in the EU, that’s an area I know very little about, and it’d be interesting to understand what does/doesn’t map to open.

    (EU followers: please recommend reading on this!)

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    @Amandine talks about the sorts of things that need to be done to make open competitive, particularly focused on the economic dynamics to support larger teams.

    She’s not wrong! But boy I wish we had other ways to compete than playing purely on their terms. If “open” means “enterprise-style software and enterprise-scale businesses, but with a different licensing scheme” I think we’re not likely to win in the long-term.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Tempted to step out briefly because (1) I need a coffee and (2) I might play the Draghi drinking game, where we’ve just had a second mention.

    But glad I didn’t because Cristina Caffara from @cepr_org says out loud what German dude implied earlier: “we are a colony”. She’s explicitly trying to shock, but she’s not wrong.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    She’s blaming the focus on regulation, among other things. Also says Commission has no urgency. Gets lots of spontaneous, interruptive applause when she says there should be buy-European rules—“patriotism is not bad”.

    Draghi mention #3, but not sure if it counts for a drink because she says it is just a copy and paste of the Lisbon 2000 report. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Specifically hits on the idea that Trump controlling EU infrastructure should be horrifying to Europeans. “Trump is not a blip.”

    She says eight worst words you can hear if you’re a founder: “I will introduce you to DG-CONNECT”.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Peter from @OSBA raises that “buy european” mandates can be in some tension with how open source is developed. (We’re certainly going to see that in the US, with “buy American” mandates being used to exclude globally-developed open.)

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    This panel is spicier than any I’ve been to in a long time. Not what I expect in stuffy Brussels. Kudos to @astornc for putting it together.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Now on to @mairin (or maybe @mairin , ETOOMANYHANDLES) who I haven’t seen in the flesh in roughly forever.

    While she’s spinning up (with some apropos questions about AI from a human perspective) here’s… a hat shop that I can’t believe none of the FOSDEM regulars have ever pointed out to me before.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    I will not be writing too much about Mo’s talk because my brain is a touch burned out on AI stuff, but it’s good. I assume she’ll post the slides at some point.

    In the meantime, if you need pictures for a live-toot thread to be really engaging, here’s one: https://mastodon.social/@CMFrancoise/113922135598961881

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Core Mo message: AI must enable citizen agency, which is of course going to need open and government support.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    Next panel is extremely high firepower: leaders of FINOS, Mozilla, Apache, Eclipse, Rust. It’s going to be a little more focused on explain-open-to-EU, so I probably won’t toot it extremely intensively.

    luis_in_brief OP ,
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    [Back to Mo’s talk on AI for a bit: I wonder to what extent in this context “citizen” resonates better, or at least differently, than “user”. It should resonate better, with implications not just of features but of rights and inherent dignity. But I’m not sure if it does.]