We tend to throw around the word ‘community’ pretty loosely, but I’ve always tried to make O:P (and its’ predecessors) a place where folks can gather and feel welcome, which is at least in the right direction of a ‘community’.
In the post-Twitter world where there’s a new interest in non-algorithmic traffic generation, this is more important than ever. This very site has seen a noted uptick in traffic since I started doing these blogs, for example, and part of that is driven by Mastodon. Mastodon is where I found out about Bring Back Blogging, for example, and that stirred my renewed interested in RSS propagation, which is prompting me to learn Python, etc etc. It’s a cascade of small but positive and healthy changes. And it all wraps around to intentionally disengaging with corporate controlled algorithmic media.
However zealous I am about it though, I recognize we’re not there yet and maybe never will be. I’m not so starry-eyed that I think one day we’ll all be on our Fediverse instances, spending our money on server Patreons instead of Amazon in order to keep The Internet truly free, etc.
However like Terry Pratchett said, you need to believe in something that doesn’t exist in order for it to become true. Every artist aims for perfection, but no one ever attains it; the act of striving for something better is itself the goal. Growth is a process that never stops. There is no finish line. Next year is always the year of the Linux Desktop.
Thinking of Operation: Puppet as a ‘community’ is part of it. Yeah my business is what underlies it and keeps the lights on, but instead of the goal being to generating ‘wealth’, what I want to generate is a friendly non-corporate space for people to hang out and be entertained. I have certain skills (at least I hope I do) to enable this, so that’s how I’m going to use them.
So if this is the first of these blog entries you’re reading, welcome (join the Discord!). If you’ve been here a while, thank you, I’m glad you’re around. We all have challenges in life, these weird years more than ever, but I hope you’ll find this community a little oasis of gentle silliness.
And now, you guessed it… time for coffee.