-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA512 Hello,
I wish I had took the time to publish monthly issues of the GNU consensus Whistle, our "allegedly monthly" newsletter. But the truth is, publishing a newsletter is a lot of work. In order to make it happen, I'm calling for volunteers to help shaping the upcoming issues. Topics we should address, in no particular order: - - Post-30C3 report and perspectives A lot of interesting stuff happened at the Chaos Computer Congress last December in Hamburg, Germany. Among other things, meetings between GNUnet, I2P, and Tor people; Funding meetings with the Wau Holland Foundation, and a new untitled organization (as in one year old) that goes under the name of "the Umbrella", and TorServers.net, all concerning funding of free software projects for radical change; last but not least, an impressive (in)side-event at the NoisySquare, with many debates and a world-class series of workshops around the theme of "You Broke The Internet! (We're Making Ourselves a GNU One.). - - Blockchain-based systems DarkWallet, Ethereum, NameCoin, Twister, WeTube... Bitcoin afficionados are coming up with lots of ingenuity and projects that warrant some attention. A dedicated issue would be nice, to give some perspectives on the promises and caveats of the blockchains, for interested developers. - - Cryptography and Usability Another hot topic is how to protect citizens and journalists against repressive--and potential lethal--powers who don't want you to know the truth. How to make cryptography more usable to the layman? How to practice good OPSEC? - - Economy of Sociability The dominant economy of social networking is to sell your activity, your habits, your specificity to marketers who want to feed you their products, and to governments who want to keep you in line. All of this happens within a narrative called "Economics" where "markets" "balance" "offer" and "demand". But this paradigm has a bit of a problem: there is no human here. An exploration of social economy should counter-balance what the failing political economy has been spoon-feeding us for a couple of Centuries. - - Funding Free Social Software Now, that's real economy: how can we ensure that free software, that does not have the incentive of control and monitoring, but of empowering the individual and the collective, can succeed? - - The GNU Name System A key piece of the upcoming Internet revolution, the GNS promises to square Zooko's triangle, offering secure, decentralized, and human-readable names. - - How To Choose Where To Contribute? Young developers, or old programmers revolted by the current situation have a plethora of programs to contribute to. One of the important missions of the GNU consensus is to help them make an informed decision on their choices. - - Indie Web / Linked Data The original idea of the Web is a cooperative, decentralized network of interrelated documents. How it came to the horrible site-centered, centralized commercial silos that know dominate it is preoccupying, but not that interesting. Let's look at how the original model developed instead, and--despite the obvious security flaws it has to face, from the brokenness of protocols to the clumsiness of the Web browsers--how it will contribute to the demise of the surveillance machine. - - Secushare API Get ready for the new oil. As soon as it is ready for developer consumption, we'll have a special issue on the Secushare API, and the social services it can help build on top of GNUnet, on your localhost, where your social network belongs. - - Sexifying Free Software (Accessibility, Graphic Design, Usability, UX) Engineers usually suck at designing things for their fellow human becomings. We need inspiration from successful projects, and ways to involve graphic and interaction designers more into the fabrication of free software. Making freedom more sexy than a golden jail, so to speak. - - UnHosted Apps The Web, without the Web. Or close. UnHosted Apps allow to reduce the Web as a commodity, and run all the important (and private) code locally. Now that's the Web I like: there's no place like ::1. (I separate it from Indie Web / Linked Data, because I suppose there's a slightly different interest, but I might be wrong, and I certainly consider them going hand in hand with each other.) * So, here is in brief (some of) the topics I'd like to address in the upcoming issues of the GNU consensus Whistle. If you're interested in participating, please say so, join the IRC channel, edit the wiki, flood the mailing list (well, not that much). Other topic proposals are also welcome (videoconferencing, OSes, mobility, gaming...): anything social that will help free us and our loved ones is on-topic. Cheers, == hk -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.12 (GNU/Linux) iQJ8BAEBCgBmBQJS5ceqXxSAAAAAAC4AKGlzc3Vlci1mcHJAbm90YXRpb25zLm9w ZW5wZ3AuZmlmdGhob3JzZW1hbi5uZXRFQ0IyNkIyRTNDNzEyMTc2OUEzNEM4ODU0 ODA2QzM2M0ZDMTg5ODNEAAoJEEgGw2P8GJg907AP/12moEpa92EuCFWasxbHQBNB NBQ+0GXtd4YiaLTwZyRWn0uOfaucPvMGsyWBQP24LnibdJO9qPWVh3k+HAyEGGHc dFuvGlO8v65V2qYx3yRlv9piLZswc5ksJamMkUXYSNmY/bxsC+sFULqdnQeVY3nr Mz6kMz483kx4gmur8g5V7mHA6ygVzyo3AvYwhR+tEXJ15BYiL3zK73eZOIDvf4Gb PqcSAMzJNGuYefJBXmFzgcf/IvtDG+AeWMYIc1ZHJnS05xrQNn1U8wAp6ahVorb5 jsVKaH+J73/C27yZroiin+4hrABjXmTtHdCJq35d2WaRJnamVFKp7lxJ5hJFaIk+ VdJEYxbo77zuO6Igt2jX3pNDeriWoLnABpoeDFPLhl1n0n+Eegz/cQ3N1+L+Uvoq +2eguXeOwEqX8XqqjV8zcgck1sXfOsUqqVvDI8vBzvwiv278q7dm26Ftx9Cux3xi +M5mGI4U+HZ9sX/hjXZ0v+CZU6sbq6FpC/jxnOYepqebmLSSZ6AAfPpkXGZrLvKo 9jyvsVhdoU7xY3spnW8quLaGs20Lqa4SAwwj75qfEGEgPAQN6c4ELX/xqkb4AnrD 9GuusBnVwlO/e8NRdiYbL7BL1c5otJFiZ9DnHyvGTMt2P18SsJdkMvmcWAeW0S8m 5uCr4Xs6Zr+yMx/maD2L =zmK5 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
