Neil's Digital Stream

• Zettled:
  • Digital dependency is the opposite of digital sovereignty.
  • The US uses digital dependency as a weapon in trade negotiations.
  • The US constitutes most of Big Tech.
  • The public sector should be the first arena we push for sovereign tech alternatives.
• I'm finding doing Zettelkasten-y things, particulary as outlined in A System for Writing, very useful.
  • And, most importantly, resulting in me publishing more writing (see my blog posts).
  • I do have a slight concern at the back of my mind that it's making my digital garden less interesting to navigate around for an external party. I think there's something to be said for dishevelled narrative over tidy structure.
  • The idea though is that the narrative moves to the blog posts, so, as long as they are discoverable, hopefully it's a net gain.
  • Will keep it in mind.

• Wrote:
  • A digital shock doctrine for the left
  • Some thoughts on digital capitalism
• Zettled:
  • We must understand digital capitalism in order to transition away from it.
  • In digital capitalism, the accumulation of capital and power is mediated by digital technologies
  • Digital capitalism has economic, political, and cultural dimensions.
• Read:
  • Critical Theory Foundations of Digital Capitalism: A Critical Political Economy Perspective
• I set up Anagora as a bang provider in WebLibre.
  • I like using Anagora for searching topics.
  • It surfaces any notes I might have made about the past on something.
  • I also see anything my friends and comrades might have written about the topic.
  • Then I can fall back to Wikipedia and web search if I want more.
• Listened:
  • Macrodose: Digital Sovereignty vs Big Tech w/ Cecilia Rikap & Paolo Gerbaudo
    • Digital dependency is the opposite of digital sovereignty.
    • The US uses digital dependency on its Big Tech as a lever in trade negotiations.
    • The US constitutes most of Big Tech.
    • Public sector should be the first realm to adopt sovereign tech alternatives.

• Zettled:
  • Capitalism is prone to crisis.
  • Rapid societal transformations are common.
• Read:
  • Leveraging Digital Disruptions for a Climate-Safe and Equitable World: The D^2S Agenda
    • Skimming through, the notion of digital disruptions and leverage is good, right on point for me right now.
    • The analysis of where leverage might best be applied also looks useful.
    • The proposed tactics seem quite tame and reformist however.

• Read:
  • Technodiversity, permacomputing and anticapitalism
• Listened:
  • Macrodose: Digital Sovereignty vs Big Tech w/ Cecilia Rikap & Paolo Gerbaudo

• Jammed:
  • The Sight Below - Dour
  • Gescom - Key Nell 3
• Read:
  • Technodiversity, permacomputing and anticapitalism
    • Defines technocapitalism.
    • Evolution of industrial capitalism to beyond just the material to incorporate knowledge.
    • Similarish analysis to platform capitalism, Vectoralism, technofeudalism, etc.

• Bookmarked:
  • BrowserGate
    • "Microsoft is running one of the largest corporate espionage operations in modern history. Every time any of LinkedIn’s one billion users visits linkedin.com, hidden code searches their computer for installed software, collects the results, and transmits them to LinkedIn’s servers and to third-party companies including an American-Israeli cybersecurity firm."
    • Ugo
• Read:
  • Barbells
    • I used to really enjoy reading Gordon Brander. I still do, to be fair. Very knowledgeable and engaging.
    • But you could not find a more depressing pivot - the trajectory from building tools for collective knowledge commoning to bunkering down into an awful AI-fuelled individualism is a sad tale of our times, I think.
    • It's The Road for the LLM era.
• Thatcherism, 2026: There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and their families of agents.

• Bookmarked:
  • Global PC Shipments Grow 3.2% YoY in Q1 2026 on Pre-emptive Buying Before Memory-led Price Increases
    • "The growth was fueled by two key drivers – pre-emptive buying before memory-led price increases hit the retail level, and the necessary hardware refreshes caused by the termination of Windows 10 support."
    • global memory shortage crisis / Windows 10 end-of-life
  • France is ditching Windows for digital sovereignty - and its new Linux stack is taking shape
    • "France's government is switching from Windows to a Linux desktop. The desktop will be based on the police Linux distro, GendBuntu. The distro includes France's own suite of open-source desktop programs."
• I'm trying to recognise digital shocks, to see how are playing out in relation to resilience and transition. To learn from that for future shocks.
  • The global memory shortage crisis is a digital shock.
  • Windows 10 end-of-life is a digital shock.
  • The onset of AI is a digital shock.

Notes that link to this note (AKA backlinks).

• Neil's Digital Garden
• Neil's Digital Stream

• Anagora - Neil's Digital Stream