My take on the 'file over app' philosophy and why it’s essential for keeping my data resilient and built to last.
Rethinking Digital Storage for Community-Based Archives
Over the last few decades, the standard procedure for storing and backing up data has been ‘put it in the cloud.’ Many of us use cloud…
Personal data storage is an idea whose time has come
Data Ownership as a conversation changes when data resides primarily with people-governed institutions rather than corporations.
Digital Topology & Economic Power
The autonomous file, once the basic unit of user agency in personal computing, was first hollowed out through proprietary formats and data internalization, then abolished entirely by cloud platforms, relocating control toward incumbents at each stage. Enclosure succeeds not by offering users less, but by bundling genuine capability gains with topological restructuring, so that the user cannot accept the improvement without accepting the new relationship of power.
Local-first software: You own your data, in spite of the cloud
A new generation of collaborative software that allows users to retain ownership of their data.
Local-First Software: Taking Back Control of Our Data | a mini-doc
Your files. Your account.
AT Storage keeps exact media originals in an owner-only permissioned Space, organizes them into albums. Other file types will be added soon™
ar.io - Permanent Cloud Storage for Critical Data
Protect critical data with ar.io's permanent, decentralized cloud storage. Ransomware-proof, always accessible, and pay once for forever access. Zero data lost since launch.
psf (@psf@oldbytes.space)
In their article ["Malleable Software"](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/malleable-software), Ink & Switch list various ways that modern software applications fail to serve the user: - Software is too rigid: users can’t tailor it to suit their workflow, except by entering the role of programmers. - Software applications are overspecialized "avocado slicers", not general tools like "knives", so their lack of tailorability is keenly felt. - Software doesn’t provide a reasonable learning curve from beginner to expert; in other words, time spent learning an application doesn’t unlock tailorability, instead the end user must learn an unrelated skill like a markup/scripting language or even the tool’s implementation language. - Software applications are increasingly siloed, so sharing data between apps, let alone orchestrating cross-app workflows, is overly difficult. These are real problems. From what I can tell, Ink & Switch are software researchers, and view the problems from a highly technical perspective, focusing on novel infrastructure that enables end-user programmability. They pose questions such as "how do we ease users into programming?" and "instead of shipping a dead, static binary, can we ship a living image containing programming tools allowing it to be modified in arbitrary ways while still running?" These ideas are technologically exquisite, but they fail to provide a gentle learning curve. (cont'd) 🧵
dropb.at
Share and manage text, photos and other files on the AT Protocol. Your data, your server.
ATmosphere Games
Your games. Your data. Your control. Fun experiences that are yours to keep!
but should apps see our data? - building [at] habitat
thinking small on the protocol
Restate - Build innately resilient distributed apps
Restate is a lightweight runtime that lets developers build innately resilient distributed apps without the complexity tax.
