@BenAveling Indeed much the same can be said of the Romans too. The system teeters and doesn't topple all at once, but there are nevertheless inflection points along th eway.

@cybeej @oscarfalcon

The Internet.

@hnapel There's an audiobook version of this I have somewhere as a collection of MP3s... it is VERY VERY long.

@oscarfalcon Yes. there was no democracy again in those territories for ... 1500 years or so.

(admittedly democracy as practiced by the Roman republic excluded huge proportions of the population but still).

And change didn't move against THAT needle until a massive pandemic wiped out a third of the population and made the feudal lifestyles that the Church had naturalized impossible.

From Wikipedia: "Romans regarded peace not as an absence of war, but as a rare situation which existed when all opponents had been beaten down and lost the ability to resist."

Again, so goshdarn interesting innit...

The Pax Americana's namesake is, of course, the Pax Romana, which also endured about 200 years and oversaw and impressive expansion of the empire and influence. That is, until a series of disastrous leaders starting with the narcissistic and dictatorial Commodus with his cult of personality (based on wrestling matches, hmmm), brought the empire to ruin. His death precipitated a period of crisis in leadership in the vacuum and the empire fell gradually over the ensuing third century through subsequent invasions, loss of influence and territory.

Gosh history is just so darn fascinating. Just one terrible leader can bring the economic and political stability the world depends on crashing down and completely re-draw the geopolitical map.

@nygl the thing about the opt out project is ... it's all about choice. you choose what you want to use and what you want to use it for. And also, you choose knowing that it's a much bigger option space than we're told, and that where you put your time and energy matters -- not because this is only a story about ethical consumption but because we are the ones being consumed, extracted from, and mined daily, and we can refuse that labor if we choose.

@nygl @aj lol so many responses!! I hope they're helpful. You can join us at Tech Reclaimers -- we have a Signal group and a Discord chat -- if you want to follow up or get help installing or help others too

(that goes for anyone else reading!)

+100 to all this.

@aj do you have experience with the YUNOHOST Matrix install/bridge or Element install? I've tried to run it myself before and like many newcomers I gave up, but I'm a fan in principle and would like to see it have wider use...

@nygl

@corbden one hundred million percent

Watch this space -- @TheBulletin -- the Tech Reclaimers have some plans to boost online activities in this direction this year.

@nygl (PS if you are switching everyday users from Mac you should also check out #elementaryOS, flexible and functional and inviting for everyday Mac users)

@nygl YES!!! very doable.

#Nextcloud is the best replacement for Office 365. If you're in an organization you can run local hosting, contacts, shared documents, email, video confererencing, and a whole lot more. Nextcloud is easy to deploy on your own hardware and many hosting companies offer the option to install out of the box.

You can easily #Linux individual machines in the organization. My preferred recco for easy switching from MS is #ZorinOS because it allows you to fully imitate the MS desktop environment so people don't feel lost or like they don't know where their settings are.

Then for the MS office suite tools, #LibreOffice is so, so good. They'll remind you of how stable and capable MS Office tools were like, 15 years ago before they went all Cloud-centered. Does everything you want and nothing you don't want, and NO AI.

Most MS cloud infra can run on linux anyway so it's a question of moving from Windows Server (ugh) over to Ubuntu or Fedora (far better).

LMK If you want more help. And this is obv more about how the organization works and collaborates, as that is my specialty, but I am also happy to discuss other options and issues.