Permacomputing Principles • Hacker News Board

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#211

Post by yawpitch » Fri, May 08, 2026, 6:32 AM UTC

zahlman wrote: post #202

yawpitch wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You truly do have an impressive imagination. Again, there’s no insult, there’s simply an observation. Nothing on that page is particularly political from any position but a substantially polarized one. It’s not entirely apolitical, sure, but it’s pretty milquetoast for a manifesto. If you see polarization there it’s because you’re looking through a polarized filter, in the literal photographic sense as much as the po…

> Nothing on that page is particularly political from any position but a substantially polarized one. For example: > The history of computing is deeply intertwined with capitalism and militarism. To assert this as if it were significant , and continue on as the article does, is inherently making a political statement. It is trying to paint capitalism and militarism as inherently bad, and draw ingroup/outgroup lines i…

They didn’t assert it as if it were significant, they asserted it as if it were fact. Which, let’s be clear, it is. And no sufficiently informed person could argue otherwise, given that the historical development of computing was driven, in its entirety, by the needs of, and investments made by, businesses and militaries. The early development of computing cannot be anything but intertwined with the nature of its early developers, which form the foundation upon which all further historical (and political) development of computing must stand. You’re supplying the idea that recognizing this basic, ground truth, and really ludicrously obvious fact is also casting those foundations as “inherently bad”.

Also capitalism is not comprised exclusively of capitalists, any more than militarism is composed exclusively of military supporters. Capitalism is a political framework centered on economic power, militarism is a political framework centered on martial power, both of them are ways of understanding the cultural and political and economic and rational systems we all live within, whether we support them or not.

Nothing on the linked page says anything particularly supportive or pejorative about those frameworks, it just acknowledges them as foundational to computing. It arguably makes a very (if not inherently) capitalist argument for environmental-conserving usage of computing resources, but that, really, is about it.

Anything else you’re supplying, from your perspective… my point is that such a perspective is, itself, already polarized.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#212

Post by ulbu » Fri, May 08, 2026, 10:11 AM UTC

rolandhvar wrote: post #143

ulbu wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

to introduce a perspective and a community to someone who might want to be informed about it or participate.

Probably not a popular opinion around here, but here goes anyway: the fundamental problem is that unless your net worth is $100m+, there is no point being a do-gooder as any attempts to fix big moral hazards are only going to harm you more than it's worth. So why bother?

it's not about mending the world. it's about finding pleasure in living out what's right. it's embodying of a value, a moral principle.

the way you express it says that the breadth of the effect of your choices is an essential parameter in considering your processes. I dislike this position due to its administrative, almost corporate undertone; I do understand it and ascribe to it myself in administrative matters, but not the personal.

but look at it this way: you won't change much by feeding homeless animals or birds, or by planting a couple of trees, but it may still bring great pleasure to do it. one way that i see it differ from permacomputing is that the feedback / perception of its effect is more immediate; or that permacomputing is following a more abstract, mediated value. but both are about finding some joy and meaning in doing something purely out of care. if not pleasure, it at least gives a little framework, a heuristic when making decisions.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#213

Post by myrmidon » Fri, May 08, 2026, 12:28 PM UTC

jefurii wrote: post #164

myrmidon wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discussions on colonialism and sustainable computing are completely unrelated topics by themselves (as is post-marxism). You can advocate for sustainability, right-to-repair, privacy etc. while being strongly capitalist just fine. The point is that the page puts "correct" political alignment very prominently, excluding a large intersection of people otherwise interested in the non-political parts of the movement.

Sorry to break it to you, but computing is totally related to colonialism. Where do you think the materials that go into a modern computer come from? It'd be nice if all that was mined in the good ol' U.S. of A but it's not, and that's where we get connected to colonialism. Not to mention labor.

What do you mean by colonialism? If industrial production/mining in lower wage countries is "colonialism" to you, then I strongly disagree, and so would most dictionaries.

Colonialism, to me, implies exerting direct political control over a territory (without allowing it democratic participation) and ressource/value extraction against the will of the local population.

Assembling phones in China/buying silicone in Brasil does neither.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#214

Post by yawpitch » Fri, May 08, 2026, 2:35 PM UTC

perching_aix wrote: post #190

yawpitch wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You truly do have an impressive imagination. Again, there’s no insult, there’s simply an observation. Nothing on that page is particularly political from any position but a substantially polarized one. It’s not entirely apolitical, sure, but it’s pretty milquetoast for a manifesto. If you see polarization there it’s because you’re looking through a polarized filter, in the literal photographic sense as much as the po…

I think it's best if we segment things a bit more carefully here. Their homepage makes explicit references and expresses alignment with a whole host of political movements and philosophies. I believe it stands to reason that people recognizing related motifs and tropes on the subpage shared above thus shouldn't be surprising, and that it certainly isn't just people's imagination going into overdrive based on personal…

Speaking of a form of filibustering, this forum rejects any reasonable response I write as too long. Email me at michael at yawpitchroll d’aught com and I’d be happy to give this another round.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#215

Post by botanrice » Fri, May 08, 2026, 3:17 PM UTC

keybored wrote: post #206

botanrice wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

idk man I see your points for sure but feel like you're taking a pessimistic and dramatic take on it. Doing a little something is better than nothing when it comes to climate action. And doing a little something a couple times might lead to greater involvement. environmentalists (myself included) have tried the doomsday "we need to act now!" approach and it turns off a lot of people, clearly, as evidenced by our soci…

So far I’ve indulged the complaining from OP in this subthread. Here’s a contrast. I have always hated environmentalism that is solely about individual, piecemeal work. A cause that correctly identifies the political problem is exactly something that I would get behind. So it’s not this simplistic picture (presented by OP) of being some “inclusive” and “non-political” group that can get all the normies on board, or b…

well there's place for both, right? I think it's valid for us to agree at the end of the day that you need to have so-called radical groups that accept nothing less than what they stand for to push, what they call it, the "Overton window" of societally acceptable policies and whatnot? Sure so the radical group pushes these ideas into mainstream consciousness but you need sympathetic, but more moderate groups to make it palatteable to everyone. I think this is a good thing.

The tricky part is where to draw the line? Let's take on the behemoth of black lives matter movement for sake of discussion. Anyone with progressive ideals can get behind the base premise and of course empathize with the origin of it. Many people, whether they identify with left politics or not, maybe saw those origin moments in 2020 and agreed it was messed up and we should be better as a society. And ofc you wouldn't expect the leaders of the movement ot say, "no we dont want to scare the slightly racist people so we just want more bodyacms, its okay if there is still systemic racism" - no! they should push for the most equitable possible society. Cops should be held more accountable for bad acts, any potentially racial motivations need to be investigated, shit, while we're at it, there should be less cops since they are so militaristic in many places! (I agree).

But one thing leads to another and then that push for radical change becomes "defund the police" and all of a sudden you have a cultural backlash because now you're coming after 'good hardworking cops' and now it's a culture war! Now you've got those sympathetic, if apathetic, people who felt bad about george floyd, etc. suddenly hearing that we need to 'get rid of the police' and that could lead to safety issues or their cousin is a cop, whatever. Now they're against it.

--

So, interesting thought experiment. If permacomputing folks say, no, you must be anti-capitlist and feminist and post-marxist to practice sustainable computing, essentially, now some of prime demographic who could have joined the movement (hackernews) are a little skeptical because they maybe are a little capitalist or don't understand feminism. Then the average wealthy non-tech person who buys a new phone every year hears this and instead of hearing the core principle of, huh, maybe i could buy less phones if that would foster all these positive things instead hears that by doing so they are being anti-capitlist, marxist, whatever tf it is and they get turned off, then it's "woke"!

So where is the line drawn? Do you say, eh it's fine this is for a radical group and that's how it is. Or do you try to draw in others? Quite an interesting sociological discussion actually!

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#216

Post by zahlman » Fri, May 08, 2026, 4:17 PM UTC

yawpitch wrote: post #211

zahlman wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing on that page is particularly political from any position but a substantially polarized one. For example: > The history of computing is deeply intertwined with capitalism and militarism. To assert this as if it were significant , and continue on as the article does, is inherently making a political statement. It is trying to paint capitalism and militarism as inherently bad, and draw ingroup/outgroup lines i…

They didn’t assert it as if it were significant, they asserted it as if it were fact . Which, let’s be clear, it is. And no sufficiently informed person could argue otherwise, given that the historical development of computing was driven, in its entirety, by the needs of, and investments made by, businesses and militaries. The early development of computing cannot be anything but intertwined with the nature of its ea…

> They didn’t assert it as if it were significant, they asserted it as if it were fact.

The same people who wish to tell me that "everything is political", will apparently not recognize the significance of choosing to do something when it clearly would have been easier not to do so.

The fact that the assertion is present demonstrates the imputed significance. Writing it is about making implications and value judgments, because it cannot serve another purpose in context, and it would be easier to say nothing.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#217

Post by theodric » Fri, May 08, 2026, 7:04 PM UTC

jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

But everything is political, don't'cha know

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#218

Post by perching_aix » Fri, May 08, 2026, 8:04 PM UTC

yawpitch wrote: post #214

perching_aix wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's best if we segment things a bit more carefully here. Their homepage makes explicit references and expresses alignment with a whole host of political movements and philosophies. I believe it stands to reason that people recognizing related motifs and tropes on the subpage shared above thus shouldn't be surprising, and that it certainly isn't just people's imagination going into overdrive based on personal…

Speaking of a form of filibustering, this forum rejects any reasonable response I write as too long. Email me at michael at yawpitchroll d’aught com and I’d be happy to give this another round.

I was actually pretty worried that I would run into a character limit myself, I don't usually write comments this long for a number of reasons, and I only noticed how excessively long it was by the time I submitted it. I guess there really is a limit then and I just fell short of it.

I appreciate this is kind of a dick move from me after I made you read all that (and write something evidently even longer!), but truth be told, my engagement on the matter was more instinctual than deliberate, so when presented with the option to willfully continue afresh elsewhere, I'd prefer to decline. Thank you for willing to engage me in depth and even offering to continue separately. This now does suggest to me I might have legitimately got off on the wrong foot earlier.

While I might change my mind depending, if you do receive any emails to that address claiming to be connected to this, please do assume it is not actually me, and ask for some "proof of identity" (e.g. changing the text on my bio to at least demonstrate control of this account). Won't perfectly guarantee it's me, but then nothing really can. You probably already figured as much, but I felt it's best I explicitly called this out regardless.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#219

Post by yawpitch » Fri, May 08, 2026, 9:06 PM UTC

perching_aix wrote: post #218

yawpitch wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking of a form of filibustering, this forum rejects any reasonable response I write as too long. Email me at michael at yawpitchroll d’aught com and I’d be happy to give this another round.

I was actually pretty worried that I would run into a character limit myself, I don't usually write comments this long for a number of reasons, and I only noticed how excessively long it was by the time I submitted it. I guess there really is a limit then and I just fell short of it. I appreciate this is kind of a dick move from me after I made you read all that (and write something evidently even longer!), but truth…

I appreciate the opsec advice. Honestly would have preferred to be able to reply here, for the public benefit of others, but I think you just came in under the artificial verbosity limit and there were a lot of interesting threads I didn’t want to butcher or not respond to thoughtfully.

Shame these sort of forums haven’t figured out a better means of handling the kind of longer form back and forth required to find common ground, especially where political philosophy gets involved.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#220

Post by yawpitch » Fri, May 08, 2026, 9:23 PM UTC

zahlman wrote: post #216

yawpitch wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn’t assert it as if it were significant, they asserted it as if it were fact . Which, let’s be clear, it is. And no sufficiently informed person could argue otherwise, given that the historical development of computing was driven, in its entirety, by the needs of, and investments made by, businesses and militaries. The early development of computing cannot be anything but intertwined with the nature of its ea…

> They didn’t assert it as if it were significant, they asserted it as if it were fact. The same people who wish to tell me that "everything is political", will apparently not recognize the significance of choosing to do something when it clearly would have been easier not to do so. The fact that the assertion is present demonstrates the imputed significance. Writing it is about making implications and value judgment…

Somewhat ironic that you think it would be easier to do nothing when that section is specifically asking people to consider doing nothing when doing something unnecessary with computing resources would necessarily be harmful.

Now, I might also be doing redundant work here, and maybe it’s not worth doing so, but I should think that anyone on any part of the political spectrum could find some pretty egregious examples of waste and inefficiency in the military / industrial complex.