Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
Remember the critique of open-source software (which is completely true, btw): you may have the ability to edit the code in theory, but how many people actually feel comfortable editing it in practice?
(not many, because Linux/Chromium/etc code is way too long, it's not at hand in the UI, it requires a recompile, it requires specialized programming knowledge, it's not socially normal, …)
https://social.omar.website/@omar/statuses/01J778E499DGB6D8FDTKTNNEKR
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
I think a very similar critique still applies here: you may have the ability to edit the system core in theory, but how many people do it in practice?
(not many, because you don't have the tacit knowledge to change things, you're worried about breaking stuff because it's a shared space / because you don't have confidence in your stake there, you don't want to invest too much into something that isn't yours, you don't have the unbounded time to experiment and learn, …)
Jes Wolfe
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@jes5199, @mastodon.social
@omar it seems hard to avoid the forces that reify/productize software.
even if you have your own completely personal, malleable environment, the further you depart from the consensus version the more you lose compatibility, lose the ability to ask for support
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
@jes5199 yeah, I think there are all these interesting social-cultural-economic dynamics around what makes software malleable that aren't just about the inherent qualities of the software or the documentation: can you Google for stuff? do you have a local coworker expert? are there Stack Overflow answers?
Jes Wolfe
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@jes5199, @mastodon.social
@omar I used to run modded open l-source software on my laptop, stuff no one else would want to change, just to suit my own preferences. but upgrades break patches, and eventually it just wasn’t worth it
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
somewhat ironic that as the system has gotten technically easier to edit (they eliminated the engine, which moves things like GPU interface and fiducial recognition into 'user space' on the table & out of git repo / monolithic shared library / laptop space), the set of people editing it seems to have shrunk even further to 1-2