I have so far managed one word sprint. I did not factor in the amount of time I would spend on novel-related wikiventures today.
I was recently asked about "fediverse culture" - whether there's one, or many? Where the technology stops and the culture starts? I have turned my reply into this not-very-refined blog post. The short answer, in my opinion, is that there is definitely no universal culture on the fediverse. There are certainly lots of people who have ideas about what the "fediverse" is or should be. Note that the fediverse is not Mastodon alone; Friendica and GNU Social also interoperate with Mastodon to degrees, and that there are different frontends for Mastodon available that might impact how people feel about their community and interact with the system(s). And other non-twitter like sites that also interoperate - peertube, pleroma, pixelfed - and that very small customisations to the normal Mastodon software done by server admins can have an impact on the usage and expectations of that server. And I'm just talking about the UI here really, not even moderation tools/rules. That's a whole nother blogpost/thesis. For example: when I joined toot.cat, many thousands of years ago, the UI was customised to read "boop" and "bap" (or something) instead of "toot" and "boost". It was my first time on a mastodon instance (pre-ActivityPub, can you imagine?!). I posted something like "what is the difference between bap and a boost" and had a lot of responses from people on other servers along the lines of "what are you on about". Only people on the toot.cat instance understood, and as a new user I didn't know that every other server did not present the same experience. It's a tiny example, but scale that up across thousands of different UIs, norms, and contexts. That line between technology and culture; I posit: no such thing! I find this whole thing absolutely fascinating, and tried to write about it in my thesis, but it was more of an afterthought than a focus at the time. Thinking about the circular relationship between UX and human behaviour - how they shape each other. The affordances of the system determine certain usage patterns, but people subvert those affordances, turn them to unexpected ends, and the system is often changed (if not directly by the designers, then indirectly through reinterpretation by the users) as a result. I don't see how there could possibly be anything like a uniform culture across the fediverse. There isn't a uniform culture on twitter, and everyone is using more or less the same UIs/apps to interact with it. Anyone who says there is is actually just describing the part of it they've experienced - which might be significant - but there's no way it's "all" of it. Related tangent: Most of the focus in terms of development has been on the federation - server-to-server APIs. Which is all well and good, but I've always been more interested in the implications of standard client-to-server APIs. Mastodon doesn't implement the ActivityPub client-to-server last time I checked, which hampers my dream. The dream: is as many options for your posting apps as there are for todo list apps, or, I dunno, raincoats. Posting clients would fall along the spectrum from highly specialised (do one thing - eg. individual photo sharing - and do it well) to very generic, and along the spectrum of highly personalised for your specific context to super generic everyone's is the same. We have a lot of options for raincoats, from really fancy high tech water repellent ones, to basic plastic ponchos, to ones that are cosy and warm, to ones that keep the wind off best or are lightweight and optimised for hiking, and you can usually get them all in a range of colours and sizes, but they're all recogniseable as raincoats. Federation in that world is to me extremely exciting - it probably opens up a lot more questions than answers, but I'd love to see how it played out. It would necessitate 'reader' applications (whether or not these are integrated into posting applications) to be a lot more able to gracefully handle post formats they weren't specialised in (fortunately(?) we have standards to help), which probably mostly means being able to fall back on a plain text representation for everything as a minimum. I'd love it to be normal and everyday to not assume that when you post a message on your social network, every person is reading it in a similar UI, either to the one you posted from, or to the one everyone else is reading it in. I love it because it embodies the fact that everyone really is operating from a different perspective, in a different context, a different mood, with a different set of life experiences, than everyone else. I see a lot of people forgetting this when they're discussing/arguing about stuff in general (in 'normal' life, not even web standards!) and find it uniquely frustrating.
Good morning! The first day in November I have had no plans! So my plan for today is to alternate catch up on photo posts with NaNoWriMo word sprints. I started strong with two pages of plot outlining at 1am, and a page of story progression on the beach at sunrise.
I'm seeing a lot of mixing up ActivityPub with Mastodon/implementation details and I keep almost replying but managing not to. Deep breaths. I'm much happier when I keep my head down and stick to foraging mushrooms and sitting quietly on the beach. I think it's mostly just the novelty that so many people are talking about ActivityPub at all tbh.
Lots of people I know from not online and also not web standards world are starting to show up on mastodon which is really exciting but also quite strange?!
Amy added 5 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-fife/
Good morning, final day of November. As braw as the first. But colder.
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A break in the Peak District. I stayed at the Quaker community in Bamford, where I met some truly wonderful people, ate fantastic food, had plenty of time to write and read, and also learnt hedgelaying. I've never had the chance to swing a billhook with my full strength before. It was mostly drizzly/overcast, but I did catch a best-effort sunrise.
Amy added 27 photos to https://i.amy.gy/202211-bamford/
Another day of woodland working, where I weeded a vegetable plot and pressed apples. A walk to the nearby dam/reservoir, and a muddy stomp back in the almost-dark, to a cosy bonfire (and cake).
Amy added 37 photos to https://i.amy.gy/202211-bamford/
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Dramatic sunrises and beach walkies with Max, by seas serene to stormy.
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Cold but clear days, sunrises, sunsets and beach walkies.
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Turned the massive tomato and chilli harvests into 15 jars of spicy tomato sauce and 5 jars of pickled whole chillis (in homemade apple cider vinegar).
Amy added 4 photos to https://i.amy.gy/madefood/
Rose and pistachio cake with a lime drizzle at the Community Kitchen, as well as homemade baked falafels.
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Nachoooos. Orange coconut cake with apricots inside. Nice texture.
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Matcha and mixed nuts cake with dark chocolate ganache. Mmmm. Improv spiced pumpkin pies at the Community Kitchen. Nachos with leftover bolognese-turned-chilli and 'cheese' made from carrots, potatoes and nutritional yeast. Surpisingly good!
Amy added 6 photos to https://i.amy.gy/madefood/
At the Community Kitchen this week I was charged with making pfeffernusse - which I hadn't heard of until that moment - and also they had to be vegan and gluten free. I have no idea how authentic these are, but the main thing is they tasted nice.
Sunrise. And a visit with Jess and Maud.
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Matcha cookies with secret dark chocolate inside for Community Kitchen.
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A couple of mushrooms to ID from the walk home. The big ones growing out of logs I'm not sure but the best guess is a pluteus of some kind. The very wee one was already kicked up, I didn't pull it out. It's probably an agaricus - growing in a spot where I've found Prince before.
Amy added 10 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-foraging/
A tall tree of old oyster mushrooms. Would have been a huge flush if I'd found it in time! Maybe a couple of weeks to a month too late.
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A hidden stash of shaggy parasols in mounds of leaf litter and woodland waste in a nearby park. The big ones are too old, but a whole flush of babies is coming up. Pictures are from two visits, 3 days apart, but they're not growing very fast. Also found lyophyllum decastes ("chicken mushroom" or clustered domecap) for the first time, though it was too old to eat. I'm 99% sure that's what it was, anyway.. I brought one home to ID, left it on the open mushroom book, which my brother moved to a different table, I forgot about until some days later when the mushroom had completely decomposed and was wriggling in a big splat. A circle of damp shroomy damage done from parasols to just before the amanitas xD
Amy added 14 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-foraging/
Tomatoes in the polytunnel are still ripening. Chilli harvest is also still huge. Giant brussels sprouts from the garden. Picked the last of the tomatoes from the footpath garden as the plants are basically dead. These can ripen on the windowsill.
Amy added 7 photos to https://i.amy.gy/growstuff/
I was running late, but that didn't prevent me from stopping to take pictures of this beautiful little inkcap in the park.
Amy added 2 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-foraging/
A morning of writing with Maud, in which she stole Jess's biscuits, sunned herself, and helped really excellently with nanowrimo.
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K and I went for a sunset wetsuit swim at Pittenweem tidal pool. Promptly followed by hot chocolate and hearty soup at Cocoa Tree.
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I got enough writing done in the morning, so I went on a rock trunting hip. The quarry at sunset was great inspiration for alien landscapes. Quartz crystal and amethyst abounds.
Amy added 20 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-fife/
I absolutely lost my mind at these clouds. I was raving on the beach. Rendered utterly helpless. Was it aliens? Was it a dragon? These possibilities and more occurred to me. My phone doesn't even come close to capturing the depth and power.
Amy added 14 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-fife/
A bright and vivid sunrise over very very big waves. Lunch at the Aberdour Hotel (which has a revamped "green" (code for vegan) menu) with friends from Greener Kirkcaldy. Later, walkies with Max, and then he curled up to help me with my novel.
Amy added 28 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-fife/
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Lunch at Roots & Seeds. Burying Max in leaves. Sunset walk home.
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A small writing retreat. Lowenna/void was very helpful. She also took excessive mud baths. And I painted a ceiling.
Amy added 16 photos to https://i.amy.gy/2022-livingston/
Starting to discover that one of the things I liked in particular about my mastodon feed(s) is that it wasn't full of the same people as twitter. But as I see people I follow on twitter moving over, I have to follow them via mastodon because I don't necessarily want to lose them, but don't have the headspace to sort things out properly right now.
Wrote every day, with help from Max and on the beach. Lunch in Aberdour. Switched to alternately reading Stealing Light and one of Dave's Lovecraft short story collections, depending on which thread of my novel I was working on. Accidentally wrote about fediverse culture instead of my novel. Spent a few days in the Peak District, learnt how to lay hedges, general woodland working and gardening, and writing and meeting lovely people. Ended the week with 23,511 words.
Wrote every day, on the beach. Made pumpkin pies at the Community Kitchen, and matcha/nut/chocolate cake, and nacho 'cheese' sauce at home. Visited with Jess and Maud. Went to look for shiny rocks. Generally snowed under with TAG and Co-op stuff. Stressed. Dave has been looking after me. Walkies and lunch with Max. Found shaggy parasols and chicken mushroom. Ended the week with 32,870 words.
'Did' hallowe'en at K's house. I was in charge of activating the smoke machine whenever trick-or-treaters rang the bell, and was rewarded with small screams. I wore my dinosaur onesie (which I wear all the time anyway). This was the most hallowe'en I've ever done. NaNoWriMo begins! Poor progress. Writing on the beach during braw sunrises though. Productive co-op business strategy coworking in Edinburgh. Max is back. Made matcha cookies at the Community Kitchen. Started Lovecraft Country. Ten thousand people an hour are starting to follow me on mastodon which is slightly alarming. Absolute next level sunrise one morning which almost drove me mad through its beauty. Really gorgeous days; went for a dusk wetsuit swim near home. Ended the week with 5068 words.
Week in review: 31st October - 6th November
The Mastodon influx continues. Lots of things resurfacing... Tried to make space for nanowrimo with limited success. Mostly writing on the beach, at Kangus and Grain & Sustain. Visited Lowenna (and K and M) for walkies. Found wood blewits and put them in a burger. Made rose and pistachio cake and falafel at the Community Kitchen, and orange coconut cake at home. Ended up helping out with a bid for Co-op work which took time I was intending to use for other things. Also Co-op business strategy, and governance stuff. Many beach walks. Hastily assembled my TAG renomination statement as I discovered the deadline day on the deadline day. Went for a swim in Pittenweem sea pool (and a hot chocolate after). Ended the week with 14,648 words.
My two year term on the W3C TAG has flown by, and it's election time again. If you're a W3C AC representative, you can vote here (link restricted to AC reps) or read all of the candidate nomination statements here. Please consider ranking me favourably! I grew up alongside the Web, and have never known the world without it. Early tinkering with HTML and CSS shaped the course of my life and became a formative part of how I interacted with the world. It is deeply important to me to see the Web move forward as a positive force, and to push back against the surveillance, manipulation, and abuse that are routine across many parts of the Web today. The TAG has a great record over recent years of promoting security, privacy, and accessibility as core parts of Web architecture. I have spent my efforts during my two years as a member of the TAG pushing to go above and beyond these foundations; as a member of the TAG's Privacy Task Force, as well as editor of the draft Societal Impacts Questionnaire. I intend to continue enabling and encouraging specification authors and implementers to consider the broader consequences of their work in the context of a global web which is part of an enormous and ever-changing landscape of cultural norms, legislation, and innovation. I hold a PhD in Informatics from the University of Edinburgh, with a visiting year at MIT. My thesis builds on my personal experiences with online communities; I researched self-expression on the Web and how interconnected social and technical systems support or impede online interactions. At the same time, I helped shape the future of the social Web through co-editing and implementing several specifications of the W3C Social Web Working Group, including the ActivityPub specification which has seen recent attention due to a surge in public interest in decentralised social networks. I also spent a year and a half as the Working Group's Team Contact, which familiarised me with W3C processes and politics. I spent the years since developing software to support openness and transparency for public good. I have worked with investigative journalists and open data activists, facilitating the efforts of civil society groups, governments, and the private sector internationally. I continue this work as a Director of Open Data Services Co-operative, building and maintaining tools that use the Web to promote civic use of data and fight corruption worldwide. I also work with Digital Bazaar on Web standards related to decentralisation, with the goal of enabling a foundational layer of technologies to support individual agency on the Web. These experiences at the intersection of civic work and cutting edge standards development give me a unique perspective for my time on the TAG. There is no need for trade-offs between participation and privacy, or between community and autonomy, when building empowering Web technologies. My strengths lie in listening to input from a range of perspectives, discerning the common grounds on which to move forwards, and turning consensus into concrete specification text. Should my term be renewed, I will continue to advocate for thoughtful and intentional design of web platform features which account for diverse perspectives and usage scenarios, as well as bringing this mindset to specification design reviews. Find me at rhiaro.co.uk.