#problem being that i have very niche interests and most people aren't as insane about media as i am | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thosearentcrimes · 7 months

Text

I feel like FOSS should probably split definitively into separate "we would like to make usable free software to empower users to get the most out of their computers and to undercut rent-seeking software companies" and "computer touchers only, normies fuck off" factions, would probably resolve a substantial amount of confusion!

Like, there's absolutely nothing wrong with the latter point of view! It's not like anyone expects guys who work on classic cars or constantly have three motorcycles taken apart in their shed and zero operational ones to do free maintenance for them. Well, ok, maybe their friends and family might, I've never owned a car so I'm not really familiar, but at the very least they shouldn't. Even for ostensibly utilitarian tools, there are hobbyists or specialists whose interests and preoccupations are drastically different from those of general users, and they will develop communities and jargon and so on, and they will feel alienated from (and perhaps even hostile to) the general public, even see themselves as naturally superior because of their deeper understanding of the tool. That's normal and there's basically nothing wrong with it. Power tool guys are like this too I gather.

But it's inconvenient for this conception of the computer, as a niche hobby or skill with its own insular community, to coexist with the concept of FOSS. I'm not a computer toucher myself (though I have them among my friends and family) but I really appreciate that there is this huge community which does insane amounts of work and coordination and it all allows me to use a computer without having to worry about being trapped in Microsoft or Apple or Google's walled gardens, that maintains a lot of software that is competitive with (and sometimes superior to) paid alternatives, and that pays attention to accessibility so that I have this ability without having to learn to be a sysadmin (and in fact with less effort and specialized knowledge than making Windows usable would take, though I do also have the aforementioned computer touchers who I can ask for help in a pinch). It is an immense boon to my life and I think it would be one to a lot of people currently stuck using proprietary software and hating every minute of it. If that's someone reading, then trust me, it's not that tricky, for the most part it just works and it's really user friendly these days.

The problem is that when both of these groups can be identified as "FOSS" and run in the same circles and have the same culture to the point of being indistinguishable (and in some cases, the same person but on a good/bad day), the former group are inundated with normies and the latter group are starved of new users, on account of how the aforementioned normies take one look at FOSS, see someone who seems personally aggrieved that they have dared to use a computer, and retreat to the walled garden.

Also if installing that program really had been just a matter of running three console commands in sequence it would have been easy to make an "executable" shell script, right, but it's not that simple is it. There's actually a lot of complexities involved (python environment) that make it impossible to reliably just run three commands in sequence and get it working, aren't there. Complexities that might frustrate someone used to simple executables, perhaps. The developer is not obligated to do the impossible and manage builds for every environment for a random side project they're sharing out of good will, and the user shouldn't be a pissy bitch about the way things are without having any idea of why they are that way, obviously. Ideally people would be taught what computer is and how to use it.

7 notes · View notes

lyxthen · 11 months

Text

Extremely mildly niche academic-ish rambling ahead. Might wanna skip this one. It is long and boring

One thing that does make me happy is the Latinoamerican Literary Boom was so big it actually went on to be translated in other languages. There are still authors that I feel need to have their works translated (mostly women, I wonder why) but many of the video essayist I watch keep mentioning Borges in their videos, and truly I can't blame them because his work is rad. I don't know about him as a person but he lives 30 layers of post ironic meta fantasy or some shit like that. Cortazar is really cool also. In terms of living authors I really like Juan Villoro, his writing style is very fun. The Wild Book is a children's book about literary theory, like, Theory of Reception, Death of the Author, stuff like that. It was a really fun read as a child but the themes are interesting as well.

I feel like, I don't know, it's so hard to find Latin American fantasy books these days, or at least they are not as available. The YA genre is dominated by books originally writen in English or on books written in Spain (think Laura Gallego, which I just found out has a Netflix series made out of her most famous series of novels, but I am derailing) with the exception of Benito Taibo, who is Mexican, and has one (1) high fantasy trilogy that is kinda mid. The ideas were great, but they could've been expanded, you know? Camino a Sognum had so much potential, and you can *see* that it was inspired by classic epic fantasy like Earthsea, but it needed some more *spark* to actually work. I have not read Normal Person, but I plan to. Maybe it is better made?

And it's funny, because a book like Mexican Gothic, that was written in English, is so darn good! But only if you read it *in English* because the Spanish translation did this thing where they try to "neutralize" the accent and manerismd of the characters to make it appeal to the wider Spanish-speaking world and it doesn't sound or feel Mexican at all.

I am not sure where I am going with this. I have been discovering the local literary scene lately (and I mean *local*, like city-wide local) and it is mostly so boring because no one is writing fantasy! No magic realism! It's all kind of depressing dwellings on how we are being gentrified and indigenous people keep being oppressed by the mestizo majority and corporations and the goverment keep stealing the land to make Coca Cola and we are dying of diabetes and we don't got water and Capitalism sucks. LIKE I AGREE BUT CAN YOU PUT FAIRIES IN THERE OR SOMETHING. And I guess that's why I've never wanted to read Cómo Agua para Chocolate, because it is just *too real*, cuz it's a story I know by memory and I don't wanna live it all over again verbatim. Probably a great book, but I just cannot.

I don't know man idk idk.

The funniest think about this is that my favorite book ever (like actually, for real) is a children's book, written from the perspective of the imaginary friend of a child, and it is so gracefully narrated, and the characters so well constructed, and it touches real problems like Teen Pregnancy and Childhood Depression and Anxiety while also managing to be funny and whimsical? The very premise of the book (memories of an almost true friend, it's called) is already so creative and the execution is masterful. BUT I AM THE ONLY GUY ON PLANET EARTH THAT SEEMS TO KNOW ABOUT ITS EXISTENCE ITS DRIVING ME INSANE.

Where was I going with this. Ah yes. Youtubers talking about Borges. Well. Um. I. I think imma translate some of my own texts to English and put them on Wattpad or something. They are not the kind of thing Wattpad people are into but I gotta archive them somewhere and doing it on AO3 feels wrong since they aren't fan works. And on that note, I also wanna write more fan works.

Ugh I could be writing an essay but you got me writing a Tumblr post. What is wrong with me. I'm too bad at word weaving.

Aaaa (??????

Thoughts?

Help

I did take my meds today BTW. I don't know what is happening to me I just wanna WRITE ok I LOVE WRITING BUT WHY MUST I DO TUMBLR INSTEAD OF MY PASSIONS?

Oi I'll end it there

5 notes · View notes