megrania
@megrania@discuss.tchncs.de
- Comment on The Fediverse and Content Creation: Monetization 2 weeks ago:
I doesn’t “need” to be imported, the question is just, where do we see the future of federated (non-)platforms ? Do we want them to be “small and cozy” with a small and fairly narrow selection of content or do we want a non-corporate alternative that can compete in richness and variety of interesting content of all niches?
A lot of folks only seem to see the crappy part of youtube and other platforms, and don’t see the richness of content that exist. There’s still so much interesting stuff to be found. I don’t think there has ever been another archive of, say, documentation about arts, crafts, history, food, than YT, even it its current enshittified form. If that’s an ocean of content, the Fediverse isn’t even a major river (at least that’s my impression).
If you don’t mind that, great. But I do, I’d love a non-corporate version to exist that can compete in terms of richness of content.
And monetary incentive is part of the puzzle, as it incentivizes people to spend time on it, which in terms generates a bigger audience, which in turn has a higher potential to support a wider range of content niches. Plain and simple.
- Comment on The Fediverse and Content Creation: Monetization 2 weeks ago:
I don’t agree, really … that’d limit the Fediverse to hobbyists.
It’s completely legitimate to look for income & exposure as a creator, whether you’re making music, visual art, or document your process making physical objects. Corporate platforms, as crappy as they might be, provide a path to that, and in many ways created viable path for creators to do what they like full-time. Not saying that it’s perfect or easy. But the Fediverse is currently no alternative at all …
Currently, restricting yourself to the Fediverse as an artist unfortunately means that you’re taking quite a hit in terms of exposure you can get. As long as that’s the case, and people even defend it, then we really can’t complain that the Fediverse isn’t attractive for a larger amount of people, and centralized platforms will always have the bigger draw.
I try to avoid corporate platforms as much as I can, but as a consumer I often feel starved of content. I haven’t found any interesting woodworking channels on PeerTube, or guitar repair channels, or whatever else I enjoy watching to wind down.
And as a creator, well … it’s not my source of income, but I sure would like it to be. And if I ever decide to make that step, I’m pretty sure that I’s have to make amends to my “no corporate platforms” approach. The Fediverse doesn’t feed you.
- Comment on "United States" in French (États-Unis) would have made a very confusing acronym 1 month ago:
Dunno, as a German, I’d find it ahistorical if everybody was using “Deutschland” … the nation-state as an idea, and a unified nation state, are relatively young. Before that, what we call Deutschland today was a mess. It’s no surprise that romance languages use some or another variation of “Allemagne” … the german dialect spoken around the southwestern border is still called “Allemannisch” even in Germany, same with “Saxon” and the variations “Saksa” to the east …
I kinda prefer it the way it is in this case, honestly …
- Comment on [deleted] 5 months ago:
I get that … It’s just my impression that the “can’t teach an old dog new tricks” mentality is pretty prevalent in general and people might read an article and use it to confirm that mentality, see a phrase like “critical learning period is closed” and say “see, why even try”. Not you personally, just to be clear.
So I didn’t want to leave that uncommented because I think despite that we should foster a culture of learning at any age.
- Comment on [deleted] 5 months ago:
It might be scientifically accurate but I think the notion of an age cap is misguided. Just because it’s harder doesn’t mean it’s impossible, and the idea of an “age cap” just makes it seem like you shouldn’t even try (might just be my interpretation).
Also it’s just super helpful to learn something even though you’re not perfect.
I’ve started learning English at 10, put in a lot of work over the years, and it got to near-native in my late 20ies (certified by my language-nerd native-english-speaker wife). At 20 I had trouble booking hostel rooms over the phone.
In my 40ies now and I feel like I learned most of the skills that make “me” today, including playing instruments, programming languages, I learned way past ten and many of them past 20. Started learning Spanish at around 35, nowhere near native but decently conversational. About to start the next course in Catalan soon.
So, this is the one thing where I think people just should ignore the science (which is usually not my stance at all) and get cracking, you can teach an old dog new tricks, and it’s always helpful and fun.
- Comment on What programs do you wish a good FOSS alternative existed, but doesn't or most of the FOSS alternatives simply aren't good? 7 months ago:
My first ever smartphone (in 2015) was a BQ Aquaris 4.5 Ubuntu Edition that came with Ubuntu Phone pre-installed … a lightweight, 4.5" smartphone … there wasn’t much of an app ecosystem at the time but I didn’t miss it because up to that date I used a dumb phone, and the smartphone allowed me to do eMail and use a browser, which was enough for me.
At some point I accidentially dropped it on a hard floor and it broke, and I was quite unhappy that the company didn’t continue that line :(
- Comment on What programs do you wish a good FOSS alternative existed, but doesn't or most of the FOSS alternatives simply aren't good? 7 months ago:
I guess it depends a lot on what you think of as “an alternative”. I’m really happy using FOSS because I generally try to find a different angle on things, and it allows me to do that.
Luckily I’m not dependent on using common office software, the few spreadsheet tasks that I need can be done with online tools, either open or proprietary. For documents I usually use markdown and pandoc. For music making, I use my own software or Ardour for mastering, etc. For modeling and 3D printing I started using OpenSCAD.
There’s also many things that proprietary software just can’t do. Like, my day-to-day workflow is based on a minimalist approach to computing, with the most common operations being very easy to perform (browser, editor, terminal) … MacOS is always hailed for their great UI but honestly, it seems slow and clunky to me event though I used it daily for a long time …
- Comment on What programs do you wish a good FOSS alternative existed, but doesn't or most of the FOSS alternatives simply aren't good? 7 months ago:
Second this, I’ve tried TinkerCAD before and the whole Idea of CSG started to make sense, and then I found that OpenSCAD does something very similar, just with code … I find it very satisfying … I guess if you’re making highly asymmetrical, organic shapes, you might have some puzzles to solve … but I’m mostly making loudspeakers, so basically boxed with holes, and it’s not a huge problem.
- Comment on What programs do you wish a good FOSS alternative existed, but doesn't or most of the FOSS alternatives simply aren't good? 7 months ago:
Hmm I think the issue is that Ardour is more focused on recording than electronic music production … There’s more intuitive DAWs out there but I suppose in terms of what it can do it doesn’t have to stand back … compared to ProTools I’d say it’s still quite intuitive (not a high bar for sure).
- Comment on What are some FOSS programs that are objectively better than their proprietary counterparts? 7 months ago:
hmm I might be biased because I’m a programmer by trade, and even make music with code, so describing things as code is pretty natural to me … but I once I got the hang of it I found it easier than TinkerCAD in some sense, because there I would always get lost in the stack of objects … and FreeCAD … well, I couldn’t even get a basic box designed … 😅
- Comment on What are some FOSS programs that are objectively better than their proprietary counterparts? 7 months ago:
Yes :)
- Comment on For me, it's going to be Fediverse or nothing 7 months ago:
Meh … I wish there was a middle ground. Non-corporate, yet effective. Unfortunately, the Fediverse is only the first.
Discovery algorithms can be great, if applied with care. And I really think ActivityPub is not very effective at showing interesting stuff, while from a user perspective it’s super intransparent. Personally I’d prefer a centralized user experience to the Fediverse fragmentation any day … I guess I’m really only here because I’m fed up with corporate bullshit.
- Comment on What are some FOSS programs that are objectively better than their proprietary counterparts? 7 months ago:
OBS for streaming is amazing.
Ardour is a pretty amazing DAW that can compete with proprietary ones. There’re also loads of FOSS plugins out there that don’t have to hide behind the commercial ones. My favorites are the Calf Plugins and the Luftikus EQ for mastering. Helm and Yoshimi are great synths. Pure Data is lightweight and can compete with MaxMSP.
Krita has already been mentioned.
But, I think what strikes me most is that there’s a lot of FLOSS software out there that just doesn’t have direct proprietary counterpart. Small command-line tools like FFMPEG or ImageMagick. Linux as an customizable OS. Programming Languages to make music like SuperCollider. I never learned how to use proprietary CAD software but recently got into OpenSCAD to model some things and it’s really fun once you get the hang of it. I don’t do this professionally so there’s no need for me to learn Fusion360.
Some have a bit of a learning curve but are all the more satisfying to use once you get into them. People are just too stuck in their “industry standard” (which really just means “the most common product that has been around the longest”), but if you’re not bound to that, there’s just a huge number of programs out there that allow you to do amazing things. That to me is the beauty of FLOSS.