The status quo
So far, we’ve established what practices to follow and not to follow, but there is a question we haven’t covered yet: What is the status quo? For example, in modern society, Neoliberalism is the status quo, but there isn’t an established status quo that I’ve covered in my book yet!
Principles
The core principles of the status quo is – as explained in “Foss culture” – largely libertarian, both on the consumption side and governing side.
Consumption
On the consumption side, I’d describe the status quo as conlibertist, as it largely believes in almost unlimited consumption (as we can see with most OSS-licenses, like GPL or MIT). I have already gone into detail on why it’s bad, so I’ll just quote myself (“Liberty”):
… You know, I was planning to put a satirical piece right here, but the problem with libertarianism – unlike Godotism – is that it’s not very funny, it’s just plain bad. I guess I’ll use this section to highlight the core problems with Conlibertism, I guess. These are:
- In their eyes, “Any customization is good customization.”
- It leads to a worse project overall.
- They prefer extensibility over quality.
It’s quite honestly a sad reflection upon our society that these kinds of philosophies have thrived, since they’re largely reactionary. They poke up in response to authoritarianism in FOSS, and I honestly can’t blame them.
Governance
On the governing side… It’s mixed. A lot of projects don’t clearly follow any of the governance-systems mentioned in chapters 3 - 7. You know what time it is: Unintuitive-solution-with-no-real-meaning-that-can-be-accomplished-in-a-simpler-way-time! So let’s use a graph! We’ll have the x scale representing how egalitarian it is (left: most, right: least) and the y scale representing how authoritarian it is (up: most, down: least). With that said, let’s plot some systems onto this graph:
Working from here, we can calculate that the status quo would be libertarian (as we’ve already covered that), and as such, in the “-y” section. From here, we know that FOSS is very unequal but not dystopia-unequal, with this, we can calculate that it is in the +x-y section, but where? Well, it’s very libertarian, but not dystopia unequal, so maybe on the y level of actocracy, with almost the x level of oligarchy? Yes, that would be it! Working from this, we can calculate that the position for the status quo is
Using this visual representation, we can accurately calculate that the status quo of FOSS is… A largely unequal and libertarian governing system!
But… Why?
Why is the status quo like this? Why is it so largely unequal? Well, that’s probably because – and it’s probably time to realize this – no one cares. I’m like, the only person that cares! They’re not the ones writing books about FOSS-governance systems, that’s me! People throw together governing systems on a whim, not like us: Carefully considering every possibility. For them, the… Coding is the most important part. And while I praise them for actually coding – unlike me, just writing a weird book – this leads to inequality in masses. But I think it’s time to come to the sad realization that nobody cares.
NOBODY EVER CARES.
NOBODY EVER DID.
NOBODY EVER WILL.
NOBODY EVER SHOULD.
NOBODY EVER.
Or is it that
- bribery,
- donations,
- corruption,
- comically evil people,
- dictators,
- fascists,
- nazis
- wannabe dictators
- elitists,
- oligarchs,
- capitalism and
- plutocracy
is ruining FOSS? Is it that FOSS is getting ruined, and my writing wasn’t for nothing? Wow! This book just started because I was just really passionate about both FOSS and politics, but maybe there actually are problems with FOSS, not just illusions I made up while trying to entertain myself on a Sunday afternoon? Are there actual problems with FOSS? Are there problems with the governance of FOSS projects? Do FOSS cults actually exist? Are fascists actually prevalent in FOSS? I actually wrote about something original, for once! And not just something original, something important! And not just something important, something special.
So, without further ado, let’s get onto the sumarization/ending of this book. It’s good, I hope… It compiles all of my ideas into a short manifesto, at least!