James Westman @flyingpimonster@fosstodon.org

Wow, using my computer as a Bluetooth speaker was surprisingly easy. It literally just works.

(This is because I have two computers at my desk, and would like to hear audio from both of them).

I am really liking my Kindle. It's more comfortable to curl up on the couch than with a heavy book, and I can read as much as I want without going out to the library.

Also made a bit of progress on Hourglass. This is the Versions tab redesign, which is mostly done

I found a project called mconnect that implements the KDE Connect protocol, and I'm working on a patch to support outgoing battery level packets.

Took a couple days' break from frustrating Camera issues and did something cool

We all know "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," but I'd say there's a corollary that's just as important:

If it is broke, do fix it!

In the meantime, try `sudo apt install gstreamer1.0-tools` then `gst-launch-1.0 autovideosrc ! videoconvert ! autovideosink`

Should be noted that the awful framerate in Camera is the app's fault, not drivers or your device. Should hopefully be fixed soon.

I'm so excited to see my camera app working on a real #PinePhone! Now I just need it to work *well*.

I'm not too fond of the crates system, though. Why do all the examples for something as simple as generating a random number involve downloading a separate crate?

Serde is also awesome.

I'm trying to learn WebAssembly/Rust, and it's surprisingly easy.

The mockups of Hourglass, our third-party project manager for #GodotEngine, are starting to come to life! Here is the Projects tab.

Federation is what gives Mastodon users control over the platform, but I think of that as an implementation detail, not the main point.

"User-run," I think, gets straight to the last point: Mastodon is better for society because its users control it.

And *now* we get to the part that's important for society: federated systems are resistant to censorship and abuse of power, because there is no single organization to take down, and if users aren't happy with *any* available options, they can create a new one with minimal effort and consequences.

Then you have to understand the main impact of federation: that there are multiple, interoperable providers that you get to choose from, and if you aren't happy with the options, you are free to start your own.

First, you have to know what "federated" means in the context of web services. In an age where centralized platforms are the norm, most people have no concept of what a not-centralized platform would look like.

The closest well-known analogy is email, but even that is a bit of a complicated jump, going from direct messaging to social media.

To understand the benefits of a "federated" network, you have to understand multiple layers of definitions.

I wonder if, instead of promoting Mastodon to the general public as "federated," we should call it "user-run." That emphasizes the governance model of our network rather than the technical implementation.