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FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
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Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#12Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#13> Not every open source project exists to solve geopolitical problems, and not every contributor arrives with a policy agenda. FOSDEM has always thrived on its diversity of motivations, and maintaining that balance will be increasingly challenging.
It’s not just the FOSS scene but there is an increasing crowd (mostly on the internet) of “everything is political”. Honestly I’m not sure what will happen in the coming years but personally I try to take a step back and detach myself from all these things. Some (even here on HN) call this as privilege but then so be it I value my mental health more.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hello from a packed devroom. You can't attend all 30+ tracks at once anyway, you need to see recordings afterwards anyway if you are remotely interested in consuming the conference. I'd say the experience is just as much about meeting the people behind all the internet handles, getting into a full lecture room one talk in advance and listening in to something you otherwise wouldn't, join something bigger than email l…
The most important realization about FOSDEM is really: There's no way you can fully experience it or do it optimal. It's really about making sure you get value out of it, listen to some interesting talks and meet some people.
It's about collecting stickers.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
The most important realization about FOSDEM is really: There's no way you can fully experience it or do it optimal. It's really about making sure you get value out of it, listen to some interesting talks and meet some people.
It's about collecting stickers.
It's about the friends you make when collecting stickers.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#16> The quality of the talks was high
Maybe I was in the wrong rooms, but the quality of the talks were really low.. Most of them were advertising one kind of service or another.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#17> Not every open source project exists to solve geopolitical problems, and not every contributor arrives with a policy agenda. FOSDEM has always thrived on its diversity of motivations, and maintaining that balance will be increasingly challenging. It’s not just the FOSS scene but there is an increasing crowd (mostly on the internet) of “everything is political”. Honestly I’m not sure what will happen in the coming y…
with AI we have entered capitalistic computing, where it's the scale of computing that makes it political (before, it was a clever idea that brought the political thing, like MP3, encryption, etc.). As it is massive scale (think 2GWatt data centers), I'm afraid the poor little FOSS guy won't be able to be as relevant as before. It's not David against Goliath anymore, it's FOSS against billions of zombies.
I happen to be one of these FOSS guys though and as you do, I think it's better to stay off to keep my mental health; else it makes me feel powerless. How sad: 20 years ago I thought the fight was possible.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#18> The quality of the talks was high Maybe I was in the wrong rooms, but the quality of the talks were really low.. Most of them were advertising one kind of service or another.
Fosdem just has a huge amount of talks. Some are great, most aren't.
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#19The contrast of this text is really awful, how does anyone even read it without reader mode?
Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
#20gyptazy provided a recap of the FOSDEM conference in Brussels, Belgium and it sounds great again. But his concerns about scaling are real and so, also I had often no chance to get a place for a talk. Wondering if it's still worth to get onsite next year or just to watch the recordings afterwards.
Scale has been an issue for years. The last time I went I just hung out in one DevRoom for a chunk of the conference. Running from room to room tends to be an exercise in frustration. There are a lot of people and the campus isn't that straightforward to navigate.