The viewpoints that the folks who run this site have are probably quite alien to your own. They remind me more of the hackers of yore, how people who interacted with technology at the margins of society used to be, before computer tech became the new finance. Iconoclasts, idealists.
I think it's worth reading the some of the rest of their site if you have time. If you look at this page and are about to crap on it on HN, take a bit and read collapse and goals and see if you have a more nuanced view of who they are and what they're doing.
Fears of a collapse are overblown by people who underestimate the resilience of communities, and over-index on individualism, i.e. preppers.
There is no shame in being a prepper - if you're completely honest with yourself in the odds of the apocalypse you're gearing for, and perhaps after talking to your therapist about ways your childhood fears and insecurities may be showing up in your adult life.
The permacomputing community aren’t quite preppers, although there is some overlap in interests with that community. Preppers are usually concerned about one or more possible disasters and think that with the right gear they can survive the big war, the solar flare, whatever. Permacomputing is a mix of people who think we are already doomed due to climate change, concerned people who think we aren’t yet doomed and want to help/lead by example with simpler tech, and tech minimalists who aren’t worried about doom and who find the projects congruent with their desire for a simpler lifestyle.
>If you look at this page and are about to crap on it on HN
Hundred Rabbits pops up here pretty frequently and people mostly have good things to say, how can anyone dislike them, they're an oasis in a desert full of AI crap these days. I always end up going down some rabbit hole (no pun intended) on their site.
My main critique is their non-commercial licensing. For example, the linked article is BY-NC-SA4.0.
My critique is pretty minor as most of the technical releases from 100 rabbits, as far as I can tell, is libre/free licensed, with the non-commercial licensing reserved for writing and art. Even so, it means there's effort required to decouple the non-commercial aspects of projects from their libre parts and sends a big signal, to me at least, that I should only ever consider their strictly technical work for use.
When talking about permacomputing, for example, I don't know why one wouldn't encourage, in any way possible, commercial viability that would lead to the stated goal.
I have an affinity for the 100 rabbits folks, and I deeply respect a lot of their work, but their reliance on non-commercial licenses means that they're tacitly supporting copyright terms that are dis-proportionally long that, in most cases, is well over a century at this point.
Note that Stallman also has the same stance, putting his work under a "no-derivatives" license, so it's not like free software folks believe in "free culture", either.
I find the CollapseOS approach unrealistic and somewhat self-indulgent. In a real collapse scenario, having a portable Forth environment for arbitrary microcontrollers wouldn’t put us meaningfully ahead. The primary value of computers wouldn’t be to run new minimalistic programs from scratch for stuff we only automate in a situaton where we are living in economic and technical abundance, but to access and preserve existing information systems and whatever remains of digital infrastructure, especially libraries, CAD/CAM systems, etc.
A more practical strategy would be maintaining simple yet complete computing environments that can operate on salvaged hardware. NetBSD is a good example: it supports a wide range of hardware, has a relatively straightforward codebase, and provides a full source-based system with a usable graphical userland, with a wide variety of tools available.
In a “collapse computing” context, it is far more plausible to repair and reuse an x86-compatible machine than to rely on extremely minimal custom setups that can barely run a Forth interpreter. With salvaged x86 hardware, one could install a robust OS like NetBSD and immediately run a broad set of existing tools, which is likely to be far more useful than rebuilding a software ecosystem from near-zero on constrained microcontrollers.
This is why having a NetBSD and pkgsrc mirror is my approach to collapse computing instead of fantasizing on building from scratch.
Your reasoning is sound, but is already covered by Collapse OS' manifesto. It refers to two stages of collapse, Collapse OS being for the second.
As long as we have working modern machines, self-contained modern open source OSes, NetBSD being one, are good choices.
One problem there is with such system is their overall complexity. Sure, you can use them, and they're pretty flexible for the user. However, when necessity forces you to crack the kernel open, the learning curve is pretty big.
For example, let's imagine a computer with a broken SATA controller. How would NetBSD behave on it? Hard to say, NetBSD developers don't develop with that target machine in mind. Usually, when you have such a machine, you replace it or repair it. But what if you can't? Maybe you'll have to play in the kernel to manage to do something with that machine, route around it. Maybe it will work, but maybe you'll be stuck, and maybe that in that particular situation, it's going to have tragic consequences.
Exactly, DuskOS is for maintaining a somewhat degraded level of civilization and perhaps rebuilding, while salvaged machines are still common. CollapseOS is there if things get even worse, to retain a minimal level of computing capability during the transition to whatever comes next. It’s hard to imagine the need for CollapseOS while things are still working, but in some horrible future where it’s the only system keeping the water system running, people will appreciate it.
Personally, I think there would be more value for most people in having the .zim of wikipedia (.en) on their phone.
Even when cellular communications and wifi are no longer useful, having the entirety of wikipedia in a solar-rechargeable device strikes me as incredibly valuable. The copy I took last year is about 103GB.
Depends what you are accounting and optimizing for. At the high end of computing this is generally true but occasionally vendors get pretty far in front of their skis to goose performance like current Nvidia hardware or the P4 of yore. There are plenty of SoCs over the last decades that use a few watts that can do useful work. An MSP430 of any vintage could run for years on a battery bank. If the desired work meets a small power envelope newer doesn't automatically win if you are working in small quantity like home projects.
There's something alien about pages like this. Seems like ramblings of an artistic that is vaguely tech themed but it's of course possible it contains deep insights. I just rarely get through one of these enough to learn what those are.
They're an interesting set of people. I highly recommend reading some of the rest of their pages - you may not agree with everything they put forth, but they are clearly thoughtful people with a coherent if alien ideology.
I think about collapse more after encountering their writing. What it means for us, what it means for the people after us, what we owe them.
Permaculture is the art of picking words that sounds logical and smart, make studies with n=1 to determine what is better, erect rules to follow based on that, and the communities that group around that.
This is the same thing for computers.
The idea seems to be a simple enough computing system (instruction set, programs, CPU, etc.) so that it can be documented, operated, and recreated indefinitely with the least amount of hassle, ideally reusing existing hardware.
Howso? I can understand why there may be some parallels when it comes to ensuring agency and sufficiency, but in a much broader context, these ideas and movements seem to come from opposite sides of the same coin.
The viewpoints that the folks who run this site have are probably quite alien to your own. They remind me more of the hackers of yore, how people who interacted with technology at the margins of society used to be, before computer tech became the new finance. Iconoclasts, idealists.
I think it's worth reading the some of the rest of their site if you have time. If you look at this page and are about to crap on it on HN, take a bit and read collapse and goals and see if you have a more nuanced view of who they are and what they're doing.
Whoooooo, this comment made me feel ancient. For what it's worth, the time when this sort of thinking was the dominant paradigm _overlapped_ with HN.
https://100r.co/site/about.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Rabbits
Remembering that HN is where results (serendipity) are nonlinearly coupled to effort, by design
Keeps my work on track to _increase everyone's luck_ and not turn into "new finance"
>who run this site
This breaks their hearts, because you got upvotes for literally quite opposite of the truth.
I've read this comment about 5 times and still have no idea what you're trying to say
I'm sure I got some things wrong but I'm not sure from your comment what exactly that is.
> take a bit and read collapse
Fears of a collapse are overblown by people who underestimate the resilience of communities, and over-index on individualism, i.e. preppers.
There is no shame in being a prepper - if you're completely honest with yourself in the odds of the apocalypse you're gearing for, and perhaps after talking to your therapist about ways your childhood fears and insecurities may be showing up in your adult life.
The permacomputing community aren’t quite preppers, although there is some overlap in interests with that community. Preppers are usually concerned about one or more possible disasters and think that with the right gear they can survive the big war, the solar flare, whatever. Permacomputing is a mix of people who think we are already doomed due to climate change, concerned people who think we aren’t yet doomed and want to help/lead by example with simpler tech, and tech minimalists who aren’t worried about doom and who find the projects congruent with their desire for a simpler lifestyle.
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>If you look at this page and are about to crap on it on HN
Hundred Rabbits pops up here pretty frequently and people mostly have good things to say, how can anyone dislike them, they're an oasis in a desert full of AI crap these days. I always end up going down some rabbit hole (no pun intended) on their site.
My main critique is their non-commercial licensing. For example, the linked article is BY-NC-SA4.0.
My critique is pretty minor as most of the technical releases from 100 rabbits, as far as I can tell, is libre/free licensed, with the non-commercial licensing reserved for writing and art. Even so, it means there's effort required to decouple the non-commercial aspects of projects from their libre parts and sends a big signal, to me at least, that I should only ever consider their strictly technical work for use.
When talking about permacomputing, for example, I don't know why one wouldn't encourage, in any way possible, commercial viability that would lead to the stated goal.
I have an affinity for the 100 rabbits folks, and I deeply respect a lot of their work, but their reliance on non-commercial licenses means that they're tacitly supporting copyright terms that are dis-proportionally long that, in most cases, is well over a century at this point.
Note that Stallman also has the same stance, putting his work under a "no-derivatives" license, so it's not like free software folks believe in "free culture", either.
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I find the CollapseOS approach unrealistic and somewhat self-indulgent. In a real collapse scenario, having a portable Forth environment for arbitrary microcontrollers wouldn’t put us meaningfully ahead. The primary value of computers wouldn’t be to run new minimalistic programs from scratch for stuff we only automate in a situaton where we are living in economic and technical abundance, but to access and preserve existing information systems and whatever remains of digital infrastructure, especially libraries, CAD/CAM systems, etc.
A more practical strategy would be maintaining simple yet complete computing environments that can operate on salvaged hardware. NetBSD is a good example: it supports a wide range of hardware, has a relatively straightforward codebase, and provides a full source-based system with a usable graphical userland, with a wide variety of tools available.
In a “collapse computing” context, it is far more plausible to repair and reuse an x86-compatible machine than to rely on extremely minimal custom setups that can barely run a Forth interpreter. With salvaged x86 hardware, one could install a robust OS like NetBSD and immediately run a broad set of existing tools, which is likely to be far more useful than rebuilding a software ecosystem from near-zero on constrained microcontrollers.
This is why having a NetBSD and pkgsrc mirror is my approach to collapse computing instead of fantasizing on building from scratch.
Your reasoning is sound, but is already covered by Collapse OS' manifesto. It refers to two stages of collapse, Collapse OS being for the second.
As long as we have working modern machines, self-contained modern open source OSes, NetBSD being one, are good choices.
One problem there is with such system is their overall complexity. Sure, you can use them, and they're pretty flexible for the user. However, when necessity forces you to crack the kernel open, the learning curve is pretty big.
For example, let's imagine a computer with a broken SATA controller. How would NetBSD behave on it? Hard to say, NetBSD developers don't develop with that target machine in mind. Usually, when you have such a machine, you replace it or repair it. But what if you can't? Maybe you'll have to play in the kernel to manage to do something with that machine, route around it. Maybe it will work, but maybe you'll be stuck, and maybe that in that particular situation, it's going to have tragic consequences.
And that's kind of what Dusk OS (http://duskos.org/) is about.
Exactly, DuskOS is for maintaining a somewhat degraded level of civilization and perhaps rebuilding, while salvaged machines are still common. CollapseOS is there if things get even worse, to retain a minimal level of computing capability during the transition to whatever comes next. It’s hard to imagine the need for CollapseOS while things are still working, but in some horrible future where it’s the only system keeping the water system running, people will appreciate it.
Permacomputing meeting in SF March 1st
https://alexwennerberg.com/permacomputing.html
This is insane. why program Lisp when u can write in assembler or bootstrap FORTH interpreter?
Btw. books rules in apocalypse. Just print them on some platinium paper and voila!
AI can't destroy them (yet).
Personally, I think there would be more value for most people in having the .zim of wikipedia (.en) on their phone.
Even when cellular communications and wifi are no longer useful, having the entirety of wikipedia in a solar-rechargeable device strikes me as incredibly valuable. The copy I took last year is about 103GB.
> Permacomputing is a design practice that encourages the maximization of hardware lifespan, minimization of energy usage
These two aims are diametrically opposed.
Compare performance per watt, P4, to Centrino, to M3 for example.
Depends what you are accounting and optimizing for. At the high end of computing this is generally true but occasionally vendors get pretty far in front of their skis to goose performance like current Nvidia hardware or the P4 of yore. There are plenty of SoCs over the last decades that use a few watts that can do useful work. An MSP430 of any vintage could run for years on a battery bank. If the desired work meets a small power envelope newer doesn't automatically win if you are working in small quantity like home projects.
There's something alien about pages like this. Seems like ramblings of an artistic that is vaguely tech themed but it's of course possible it contains deep insights. I just rarely get through one of these enough to learn what those are.
They're an interesting set of people. I highly recommend reading some of the rest of their pages - you may not agree with everything they put forth, but they are clearly thoughtful people with a coherent if alien ideology.
I think about collapse more after encountering their writing. What it means for us, what it means for the people after us, what we owe them.
Permaculture is the art of picking words that sounds logical and smart, make studies with n=1 to determine what is better, erect rules to follow based on that, and the communities that group around that. This is the same thing for computers.
I've read a few years ago about permacomputing and _still_ don't know what permacomputing is
The idea seems to be a simple enough computing system (instruction set, programs, CPU, etc.) so that it can be documented, operated, and recreated indefinitely with the least amount of hassle, ideally reusing existing hardware.
[dead]
Urbit vibes
Howso? I can understand why there may be some parallels when it comes to ensuring agency and sufficiency, but in a much broader context, these ideas and movements seem to come from opposite sides of the same coin.
~~Written by the same people?~~
EDIT: ha, confused with https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/uxn.html
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