Be FOR something, not against everything https://hamishcampbell.com/be-for-something-not-just-against-everything/ This isn’t only tech philosophy, it’s a practical shovel to compost the #techshit we’ve, suffocating buried under.
We fucked up… and that matters because we still have agency
Let’s start with the uncomfortable truth: we fucked up the last 20 years of #openweb tech. Not “they” fucked it up. Not only #BigTech, not only venture capital, not only governments and surveillance states. We did, especially those of us who were closest to the tools, the protocols, the decisions - the geeks, developers, architects, and maintainers who shaped how this stuff actually worked in practice.
That matters, because it means we still have direct power over what happens next. […]
Be FOR something, not against everything https://hamishcampbell.com/be-for-something-not-just-against-everything/ This isn’t only tech philosophy, it’s a practical shovel to compost the #techshit we’ve, suffocating buried under.
We’re working to create the soil for tomorrow’s social movements. Want to help us shovel the #techshit and start planting? The Open Media Network: More Than Just a Tech Project https://hamishcampbell.com/the-open-media-network-more-than-just-a-tech-project/
A project like the #OMN does need to happen — and it’s harder than it should be.
We have already done this work.
#Undercurrents, #Indymedia, #Ruffcuts, #VisionOnTV weren’t theory projects - they were action media, built in lived struggle, with real risks, real trust, and real consequences.
#OMN isn’t a new idea, it’s a recomposition under worse conditions: more capture, more fear, more professionalisation, more #techshit in the way.
So the question isn’t “what’s the idea?”
It’s “how do we reboot a culture of action when trust has been eroded and replaced with fear driven safety theater?”
A project like the #OMN does need to happen — and it’s harder than it should be.
We have already done this work.
#Undercurrents, #Indymedia, #Ruffcuts, #VisionOnTV weren’t theory projects - they were action media, built in lived struggle, with real risks, real trust, and real consequences.
#OMN isn’t a new idea, it’s a recomposition under worse conditions: more capture, more fear, more professionalisation, more #techshit in the way.
So the question isn’t “what’s the idea?”
It’s “how do we reboot a culture of action when trust has been eroded and replaced with fear driven safety theater?”
We’re working to create the soil for tomorrow’s social movements. Want to help us shovel the #techshit and start planting? The Open Media Network: More Than Just a Tech Project https://hamishcampbell.com/the-open-media-network-more-than-just-a-tech-project/
Belief in technical decentralisation
This space has a long history. The #fediverse grew out of the “cats” of libertarianism and, to a lesser extent, anarchism - notably without the (O). That lineage mattered. It shaped the instincts of the space: suspicion of central authority, an emphasis on autonomy, and a belief that technical decentralisation could substitute for social and political process.
I wrote this a few years ago.
Today the landscape has shifted. This #openweb space is increasingly layered with #NGO capture and […]
We fucked up… and that matters because we still have agency
Let’s start with the uncomfortable truth: we fucked up the last 20 years of #openweb tech. Not “they” fucked it up. Not only #BigTech, not only venture capital, not only governments and surveillance states. We did, especially those of us who were closest to the tools, the protocols, the decisions - the geeks, developers, architects, and maintainers who shaped how this stuff actually worked in practice.
That matters, because it means we still have direct power over what happens next. […]
Belief in technical decentralisation
This space has a long history. The #fediverse grew out of the “cats” of libertarianism and, to a lesser extent, anarchism - notably without the (O). That lineage mattered. It shaped the instincts of the space: suspicion of central authority, an emphasis on autonomy, and a belief that technical decentralisation could substitute for social and political process.
I wrote this a few years ago.
Today the landscape has shifted. This #openweb space is increasingly layered with #NGO capture and […]
There is such a thing as society -and the #openweb depends on it
There is such a thing as society. The entire #openweb is built on that assumption 🙂Deny it, and everything collapses into noise, power grabs, and enclosure. That denial, dressed up today as “post-truth” - is killing us.
Our current media ecology is broken. So called #AI and Google are no longer a useful way to find information about most things that actually matter. This isn’t accidental; it’s a structural #dotcons problem. Extraction, advertising, and algorithmic manipulation […]
There is such a thing as society -and the #openweb depends on it
There is such a thing as society. The entire #openweb is built on that assumption 🙂Deny it, and everything collapses into noise, power grabs, and enclosure. That denial, dressed up today as “post-truth” - is killing us.
Our current media ecology is broken. So called #AI and Google are no longer a useful way to find information about most things that actually matter. This isn’t accidental; it’s a structural #dotcons problem. Extraction, advertising, and algorithmic manipulation […]
Building, what comes next?
#mainstreaming people are wilfully blind and alt people tend to be pessimistic, it's a problem. Historically, real social change doesn’t arrive by waiting for collapse. It arrives because people are active, they build alternatives in advance, strong enough to bridge the mess when existing systems fail and lose legitimacy. This isn’t theory. It’s how change has always happened.
If you are interested in a better outcome, we need to remember, build first, collapse later is the lesson that […]
Building, what comes next?
#mainstreaming people are wilfully blind and alt people tend to be pessimistic, it's a problem. Historically, real social change doesn’t arrive by waiting for collapse. It arrives because people are active, they build alternatives in advance, strong enough to bridge the mess when existing systems fail and lose legitimacy. This isn’t theory. It’s how change has always happened.
If you are interested in a better outcome, we need to remember, build first, collapse later is the lesson that […]
We are not suffering from a shortage of “great leaders”
What we are suffering from a shortage of collective pathways. The crisis we are walking into isn’t caused by a lack of charisma or vision at the top. It’s caused by the cultural trap we’ve built around individual solutions to systemic problems. #stupidindividualism - the obsession with personal leaders, personal brands, personal genius - is going to kill millions and displace billions over the next 20 years. Not because individuals are inherently harmful, but because individualism is […]
We need to reboot "news" on the #openweb to tackle the challenges of our collective #stupidindividualism and the #techshit it pushes in the #Fediverse. Thinking about news on the #fediverse https://hamishcampbell.com/thinking-about-news-on-the-fediverse/
Manifesto for the Hashtag Commons
Outreach for the #OMN path, for the past year, the hashtag story has taken shape, not as branding, not as marketing, but as a shared language for navigating the mess we’re in. Each tag is compost: lived experience, memory of struggle, lessons from broken movements, glimpses of collective futures. Together they form a map of where we have been and the ground we are trying to rebuild.
This story is now done enough to act as a tool: a framework that connects all the projects, all the […]
Manifesto for the Hashtag Commons
Outreach for the #OMN path, for the past year, the hashtag story has taken shape, not as branding, not as marketing, but as a shared language for navigating the mess we’re in. Each tag is compost: lived experience, memory of struggle, lessons from broken movements, glimpses of collective futures. Together they form a map of where we have been and the ground we are trying to rebuild.
This story is now done enough to act as a tool: a framework that connects all the projects, all the […]
We are not suffering from a shortage of “great leaders”
What we are suffering from a shortage of collective pathways. The crisis we are walking into isn’t caused by a lack of charisma or vision at the top. It’s caused by the cultural trap we’ve built around individual solutions to systemic problems. #stupidindividualism - the obsession with personal leaders, personal brands, personal genius - is going to kill millions and displace billions over the next 20 years. Not because individuals are inherently harmful, but because individualism is […]
The internet itself isn’t the problem
Let’s be clear: the internet itself isn’t the problem. We knew how to build decentralised, humane, empowering networks long before the #dotcons turned everything into a behavioural extraction machine. The original internet - messy, permissionless, #4opens by default - can’t addict you. It doesn’t care. It doesn’t optimise. It just connects.
What addicts you are, the enclosure layers built on top of the internet. The sticky walls. The velvet handcuffs. The slick, dopamine-juiced […]
