Photo by Marten Newhall on Unsplash
Well, at least the internet…
Okay, maybe some people. I think it’s clear that one cannot make simple proclamations without applying major caveats, so I won’t. I honestly have no idea whether or not my concepts will benefit humanity at all, but I’m can’t-code-myself-out-of-a-paper-bag levels of confident.
I won’t outline the details here, but let’s talk about some of the overarching goals I want to achieve and what aspects of human internet life in 2023 these concepts might affect for the better.
Buckle in for an exciting bullet point list! A new internet will:
- be fully open source. Zero exceptions.
- utilize web technologies that are mature and well supported.
- utilize development tools that are mature and well supported.
- utilize programming languages that are mature and well supported.
- focus on services versus purchasing monolithic blocks of proprietary code that required support contracts to maintain.
- focus on providing users safe, secure, personalized spaces that are affordable, accessible, and portable.
- have no ads, no data scraping, no logging, and no bullshit.
In the broadest possible terms, I need assistance in creating a framework for a new spin on current, mature, secure web technologies, one that prioritizes the singular user first and foremost.
What can you do for me?
I’m a writer. While I worked on over 100 computer book titles over a period of more than twenty years, I’m not a programmer. I’m great at concepts, not so much execution… unless the result is words.
So, I’d love it if I could pick your brain and get some assistance in outlining a more detailed version of my plan. To be absolutely clear, the end result WILL be full open source and freely available to all.
I don’t want any patents or to get paid or anything silly like getting rich quickly. I just have a very well developed idea in my head about a wide range of things internet, and I need a coder to help me understand what can and cannot be done.
What this is not…
I’m not offering a job. I simply don’t have any friends who both program and can make some time. I get it. It’s hard work. I also know quite a few of them are high-strung and I’m not interested in adding to anyone’s personal emotional weight being carried, so there’s that…
If you have the time, maybe a few hours a week over a few weeks, I’d love it if you’d lend me a hand. My goal is to get the first draft out before the end of the year.
So, maybe a little help from an empathetic soul could help me achieve that goal.
I’m interested. Now what?
Just comment down below and I’ll keep track. We’ll talk and then develop further communications channels. While I’d be shocked right out of my shorts if more than one person stepped , I may even consider more than one selection. We’ll see. I have my doubts.
I’m not a coder, either. What can I do?
Don’t know what to tell you there, peep. It’s rough and I feel you. My last job job was in 2013 and my last book was 2015, and the interceding years have been… difficult. I’ll likely write about it at some point, but I can say Long Covid is involved which, by it’s very nature, complicates that which was previously less so.
Be positive? Promote the concepts and posts? I know; embrace that change for good is possible, which I am aware is critically difficult in 2023!
You may also wish to swing over to my Ko-Fi page to see what I’m doing there. As a part of my overall plan to save the Internet, I’m taking monthly $1 donations (and no other values) to see what large groups of people can accomplish when we merge into a singular entity for humanism and the overall social good.
It will take some time, but it should be interesting :)
That’s pretty much it… for now
To be clear, I have a load of ideas swimming around in my head and written down in a disjointed, unclear manner over dozens of documents and web services. It’s a real mess.
What I believe needs to happen, however, is that these concepts be evaluated and developed to a baseline level of coherence before unleashing them on an unsuspecting public. I’ve labored over this problem for a few years now, but I see the tides turning in a number of critical areas, which makes me feel like time is short to make a meaningful attempt at fixing all the crap that’s terribly broken right now.
Got some time? Prefer that humanity keep advancing? Join me :)
I do all this in the name and memory of Gary Kildall, the ideological founder of what became the open source movement. For more on him, watch this: