Ruth — of systems & design

Software And Systems Architecture, more or less

Profile pic: drawing of me (gifted to me); upside down, as if in a reflection, with cloudy sky and little architecture drawing character hanging from frame

Web: https://www.ruthmalan.com
Classes: https://ti.to/bredemeyer/

Public Key

npub10ccdd8g8prgcargux6ggxdc5qy8avxdl0nfd4nrz0ef57ke64r8q6vlmq3

NIP-05 Address

[email protected]

Profile Code

nprofile1qqs8uvxkn5rs35vw35wrdyyrxu2qzr7krxlhe5k6e338u560tva23nspz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dsqgufce

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relay.damus.io

nos.lol

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npub10ccdd8g8prgcargux6ggxdc5qy8avxdl0nfd4nrz0ef57ke64r8q6vlmq3

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Last Notes

2026-07-17 01:41:31 UTC

“People may overestimate their understanding of how objects work because they do not realize how reliant they are on extracting perceptual information directly from the world rather than from memory”
https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/bf03195929
(via @npub1gqw…5sps )
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/932/765/414/546/722/original/4469e5b2cec37d68.jpeg

2026-07-04 11:01:06 UTC

RE: https://mastodon.social/@a2_4am/116816754167367770
highlighting:
*** Naur was right. When I'm building software, first and foremost what I'm building is me.***
#note1c77…w0ek

2026-06-02 15:30:58 UTC

“We’re accumulating code faster than we’re accumulating trust. This phrase hit me hard today. We thought, narrowly, that code was what we produced. That was only half of it. We also produced, one safe deployment at a time, one needed improvement at a time, we produced trust.”
— Kent Beck (on LinkedIn)

2026-05-21 18:39:16 UTC

“What makes a software engineer productive? You can list attributes like experience with the language, scientific mindset, intelligence, focus, a personally crafted IDE setup. Yet, in my experience, far and away the biggest factor is: familiarity with the codebase they’re changing.
That knowledge of what the system does and needs to do, it’s completely essential and entirely contextual. The easiest way to get is to create it—that is, to write that software from scratch”
https://jessitron.com/2020/12/26/purple-developer/

2026-05-01 21:34:46 UTC

Trying spaetzle for the first time and … no spices…??!! At all?? idk… Maybe just grabbing a recipe off the internets isn’t the best way to get into this…
:)

2026-03-20 17:06:19 UTC

So @npub1l64…nmsc isn’t active here any more, but you guys!
Teamwork! TEAMWORK!!
Source: https://bsky.app/profile/rosemarymosco.com/post/3mhiluyd5ok2t
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/262/585/801/192/128/original/2776fc58f52428f3.jpeg

2026-03-12 00:59:23 UTC

I’ve been doing this systems stuff so long, I’ve forgotten things a decade ago incarnation of me knew/did lol
Totally forgot about this slide (swiped from the quoted tweet) from a conference talk I did:
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/213/480/825/940/861/original/b50b3c47a62f395b.jpeg

2026-03-06 04:42:20 UTC

“Water is a critical resource for data centers and an efficient means of cooling. However, meeting the growing water demand of data centers requires substantial peak water withdrawals, which many communities in the United States cannot supply, especially during the hottest days of the year. This largely overlooked water capacity constraint [..] can force operators to rely on less efficient dry cooling, further stressing the power grid during summer peaks.”
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.02705

2026-02-10 02:04:37 UTC

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One of the big challenges, is how senior management deals with this moment.

2026-02-10 01:57:40 UTC

“What frustrated me wasn’t that engineers were building. The new possibilities here are full-stop sparkling. It was that too many aren’t asking whether what we’re building should exist at all.”
“You put a working shiny thing in front of someone, they’re gonna oooh ahh and be bought in. They start to imagine living with it. And now everyone is caught gravitating around a future that might not be the right one.”
— Rachel Treback
https://radicallyrachel.substack.com/p/convenience-at-our-doorstep
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/043/839/531/305/190/original/e58276da651080c0.jpeg

2026-01-09 18:49:40 UTC

Care and repair work shouldn't have to be the work of valor and heroes.

2025-12-28 17:00:18 UTC

RE: https://topspicy.social/@meljoann/115796849396089863
Artists from across the fediverse? No doubt includes @npub1x7y…sxpj :
Darling We’ve Got Time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMgVXyRJ_Lo
Restless in Rome:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sskOQlo8mmM&pp=0gcJCU0KAYcqIYzv
Small Talk:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj5aaIe2WIo
Garden of Secrets and Goodbyes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chHsRnhoh7U
#note123s…ax7w

2025-12-23 23:42:04 UTC

RE: https://mas.to/@kissane/115771219606234540
“Human knowledge is always collective—more literally than I think most of us want to admit. I’ll get into the uncanniest parts of that territory a little further in, but I want to stake out the idea that we build our understanding of the world together, from information assembled by others and then held in common. Where in common includes what’s in our own individual brains and what’s in the brains of others and what is in our species’ vast apparatus of extended collective mind” 👇
#note1h8s…ej4d

2025-12-10 13:49:33 UTC

“Something ineffable happens when you write down a thought. You think something you did not know you could or would think and it leads you to another thought almost unbidden.
[..] the process of writing itself leads to previously unthought thoughts. Or to be more precise, writing crystallizes previously half-formulated or unformulated thoughts, gives them form, and extends chains of thoughts in new directions.”
— Lynn Hunt
https://www.historians.org/perspectives-article/how-writing-leads-to-thinking-february-2010/

2025-11-16 13:36:07 UTC

“Finding a third way” that isn’t at the poles of “overthinking” and “reductionism”…
Overthinker! by @npub14rj…8dnu
https://cutlefish.substack.com/p/tbm-389-overthinker
A snip from the post (for those who prefer not to go to the platform):
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/559/628/927/948/242/original/5468f4b0d90bda33.jpeg

2025-10-14 19:31:41 UTC

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That appeal for expertise reminds me: I've noticed several instances (but not enough to be confident in a pattern) of folk who have used genAI fairly loyally, now suggesting asking a human expert when it comes to consequential decisions. Buuuut... Maybe I'm too tuned by hope, and am noticing what are actually exceptions... :)

2025-10-14 19:28:04 UTC

Ok, who can give us an informed assessment on "Microsoft's bombshell":
"Analog optical computers that run AI without digital conversions. "
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/paoloperrone_microsoft-just-dropped-a-bombshell-analog-activity-7383520224320532480-YMKn

2025-10-10 04:50:16 UTC

RE: https://mastodon.social/@sundogplanets/115345354063132126
Such gross disregard of harm identified in this thread:
#note1pyh…k7kd

2025-08-24 22:56:20 UTC

“The only way to reconcile that is to drop the quality bar for outputs. But some executives think they’ve found a loophole: put the responsibility for correcting the LLM’s mistakes on the people who are mandated to use that LLM. This is being called “human in the loop” to reassure customers (who also know that AI constantly lies) that the final call is still being made by a qualified professional.”
— @npub1yyd…d3ge
https://productpicnic.beehiiv.com/p/human-in-the-loop-is-a-thought-terminating-cliche

2025-08-22 04:06:26 UTC

Uh, so .. there are elections in the US this year, and they’re really important — not only to those states (VA and NJ) and cities (NYC is getting all the attention, but there are many important mayoral elections). Some pitching in and pulling together, might be good. Stakes are high.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_United_States_elections

2025-07-08 05:57:47 UTC

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‘An Airplane has been defined as a collection of parts having an inherent tendency to fall to earth, and requiring constant effort and supervision to stave off that outcome. The System called "airplane" may have been designed to fly, but the parts don't share that tendency. In fact, they share the opposite tendency. And the System will fly—if at all—only as a System.’
— John Gall, The Systems Bible
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/816/064/723/952/541/original/f13a67df570cd096.jpeg

2025-07-08 05:35:19 UTC

“As usual, the lack of a well-honed proverb to cover the situation reveals a blind spot in the popular culture, and this in turn is probably the reason why so few of us actively practice Problem Avoidance.”
— John Gall, The Systems Bible (The 3rd edition of Systemantics), 2002
via
https://mastodon.social/@josdeweger/114806058281049847

2025-03-29 19:42:42 UTC

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‘The British sociologist Marilyn Strathern [..] taught me that “it matters what ideas we use to think other ideas (with)” [..] It matters what matters we use to think other matters with; it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with; it matters what knots knot knots; what thoughts think thoughts, what descriptions describe descriptions, what ties tie ties. It matters what stories make worlds, what worlds make stories.’
— Donna Haraway, Staying With The Trouble

2025-03-29 19:34:47 UTC

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Aside on the System Seeing Journal Starter Kit: it is smuggling all manner of systems donkeys, in terms of the explicit areas of practice as well as the quotes as offers of “matter to think with.”
Still, it emphasizes models and diagramming, so this struck me earlier today:
“For systems practitioners then, modelling is core to the discipline — if you’re not modelling you’re not doing systems”
— Patrick Hoverstadt
The donkeys reference: https://idriesshahfoundation.org/pdfviewer/the-smuggler-from-the-exploits-of-the-incomparable-mulla-nasrudin/
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/247/366/676/930/918/original/23fa80737f639e35.jpeg

2025-03-29 19:19:00 UTC

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🎉
“One of the best and most designerly ways of untangling that web is through diagramming. Ruth Malan has composed an excellent diagramming toolkit for systems seeing and Karen Holtzblatt’s contextual design remains a priceless resource.”
A link/mention of the System Seeing Journal Starter Kit
https://www.ruthmalan.com/systems/2025SystemSeeingJournal.pdf
And in such good company!!

2025-03-29 19:15:08 UTC

“A seat at the table is no good unless design is part of the strategy. To find the right place to apply leverage, designers need to embrace systems thinking.”
“Designers do not, I think, have a coherent sense of what systems thinking is (I have heard it used to refer to design systems more than once and I am sorry to say, that is not it). A good start on systems thinking is Indi Young’s piece on thinking critically”
— @npub1yyd…d3ge
https://productpicnic.beehiiv.com/p/design-is-a-leadership-skill-why-design-goes-wrong-and-how-to-set-it-right-part-3

2025-01-27 13:10:10 UTC

“But we didn’t. We just let the early success curdle, letting everyone grow more miserable while the good times decayed.
Completely forgetting the entire value of the company was derived from the passion of the community that called it home.”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anahevesi_i-can-tell-you-why-stack-overflow-is-dying-activity-7288271250123079681-5EuU
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/900/472/111/908/129/original/3a648041f5dfdb7a.jpeg

2025-01-26 13:11:54 UTC

“The model was developed by the Chinese AI startup DeepSeek, which claims that R1 matches or even surpasses OpenAI’s ChatGPT o1 on multiple key benchmarks but operates at a fraction of the cost.”
“To create R1, DeepSeek had to rework its training process to reduce the strain on its GPUs, a variety released by Nvidia for the Chinese market that have their performance capped at half the speed of its top products, according to Zihan Wang”
— Caiwei Chen
https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/01/24/1110526/china-deepseek-top-ai-despite-sanctions/

2024-12-26 15:15:46 UTC

When wikimedia fundraising comes up, there’s generally some folk asserting that wikimedia has enough funds to run for decades without any further donations. And I don’t understand how that conclusion is arrived at… Is it like, making assumptions about what it ought to cost? So what’s the suggestion there — lay off 80%? Or are folk just not looking at the annual operating costs? (It’s a vast and aging system that is under various attacks…)

2024-12-19 01:37:10 UTC

“As a consultant, I noticed my presence would lead people to surface problems they had long learned to live with.
They now had renewed optimism because they knew it was a chance to finally address significant long-term issues.
I think most companies have problems that are worth solving, but they don't because people have got used to them and established workarounds.”
— [@nick_tune](https://hachyderm.io/@nick_tune )
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/nick-tune_as-a-consultant-i-noticed-my-presence-would-activity-7273045368907476992-A6vt

2024-12-13 21:36:37 UTC

“I sent you scientists”
https://indieweb.social/@johnallsopp/113377565503532903

2024-12-13 15:00:31 UTC

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"Complex systems have a history. Not only do they evolve through time, but their past is co-responsible for their present behaviour. Any analysis of a complex system that ignores the dimension of time is incomplete"
- Paul Cilliers, Complexity and Postmodernism: Understanding
Complex Systems

2024-12-11 22:20:35 UTC

“When I read Fahrenheit 451 for the first time,” LeVar Burton says, “I couldn’t imagine that situation in my reality. It was a shame, right? Wow. Those poor people in that misguided society. I live in that society now. That dystopian story has become my truth.”
https://www.gq.com/story/levar-burton-wants-you-to-read-banned-books
Via
https://m.ai6yr.org/@Jennifer/113634651121357362

2024-12-11 05:43:12 UTC

Day 11 #AdventOfSystemSeeing
Narrative History: Unwinding Threads
Pick up a thread in the situation (in your verbal or visual narrative, or in your experience of it), and explore how it took shape and came to be.
What were the various paths of influence and unfolding? What are some stories of the history that you were there for, or have heard others tell?
While you have time (in the 15-20 minute window), pick up other threads and explore those and notice interconnections.

2024-12-03 20:07:35 UTC

“Prentice defined leadership as “the accomplishment of a goal through the direction of human assistants” and a successful leader as one who can understand people’s motivations and enlist employee participation in a way that marries individual needs and interests to the group’s purpose. He called for democratic leadership that gives employees opportunities to learn and grow—without creating anarchy”
https://hbr.org/2004/01/understanding-leadership

2024-12-03 04:33:30 UTC

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“Sketches are a way of externalizing ideas, of turning internal thoughts public, of making fleeting thoughts more permanent. Of course, written language can do the same [.] Sketches can also convey abstract ideas metaphorically, using elements and spatial relations on paper to express abstract elements and relations.
Expressing ideas in a visuospatial medium makes comprehension and inference easier”
— Barbara Tversky, What do Sketches say about Thinking?

2024-12-01 23:44:05 UTC

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If you’re participating in this Advent(ure) in System Seeing, and already completed the journal exercise upthread, this is a fun watch:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KFaenm8J--Y
The exercise may play to uncertainties we have about our drawing skillz (alas), but we can take confidence in this: our sketches can spark our curiosity and invite us into a conversation with the sketch, prompting questions where we just had… invisible (to us) assumptions… Not just about bicycles, but our perception and retention.

2024-12-01 16:22:00 UTC

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“Sketching is conducted both to clarify existing ideas and to develop new ones. In the early stages, the artist may wish to preserve many visual options, restricting [..] imagery to global structures, or using notes and signs that implicate multiple alternatives. Paper sketching uses denotation systems that include tolerances and indeterminacies in ways that can amplify the artist's ability to perceive or imagine many options.”
— Fish and Scrivener
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/601802

2024-12-01 14:19:25 UTC

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This is a “warm-up exercise,” so what are we warming up for?
A daily practice of noticing (what we don’t notice, too). Of using a journal to probe deeper. To learn from systems and how we encounter them.
A daily practice of doing just enough, just good enough to learn something.
A daily practice of using different perceptual and conceptual tools.

2024-12-01 05:32:41 UTC

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Bubble diagrams are used in building architecture, but are useful in mapping more conceptual spaces too. Variations include Bubble Maps and Concept Models.
Diagram source: https://illustrarch.com/articles/8702-bubble-diagram-in-architecture.html#google_vignette
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/575/910/391/949/693/original/1d50f907f2e4f055.jpeg

2024-12-01 05:24:56 UTC

Day 1 #AdventOfSystemSeeing
Draw a Bicycle
1. Draw a Bubble Diagram of a Bicycle. Use labelled bubbles (circles) to express the key concepts of a bicycle; use placement and size to convey relationships.
2. Now draw a bicycle.
3. What do we notice (more)? Jot down some notes /observations about drawing to see, to think, ..

2024-11-25 20:12:57 UTC

“Folks are leaving Goodreads, which was purchased by Jeff Bezos’ company Amazon in 2013, for The StoryGraph, a Black woman-owned company. Founder and CEO Nadia Odunayo, who started the book-tracking app as a side project, launched the space in 2019.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/storygraph-amazon-goodreads-jeff-bezos_l_673e2013e4b0f17b35e0a123
Via
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@fmhilton/113544425193959815
Via @npub1qud…q43s

2024-11-13 13:43:56 UTC

I guess we need to think carefully about what we value, and invest accordingly.
We need mastodon (and fedi more broadly) to be viable and thrive even, as times get more challenging.
It needs work. Both work by us as the relationship and content creators to make it warm and kind and useful, and work on its affordances, capabilities and infrastructure.

2024-10-29 02:23:46 UTC

Michelle Obama “to the men who love us”
Really really powerful.
https://www.nbcnews.com/video/michelle-obama-warns-how-another-trump-presidency-could-affect-women-s-health-222776901881

2024-10-27 00:22:24 UTC

Penzeys Spices for Harris is putting the words out there! This is courage Bezos didn’t show!
https://instagram.com/p/DBkn8L3AveU/

2024-10-17 22:29:58 UTC

TIL:
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/325/122/995/301/582/original/3ae117d6f74be22b.jpeg

2024-09-19 23:55:12 UTC

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WhiteDudesForHarris:
We're proud to be part of the #UniteForAmerica livestream TONIGHT with Oprah, Kamala Harris , WinWithBlackWomen, and others working toward a brighter future.
Let’s unite for action! Register now: http://UniteForAmerica2024.com!
Also:
PaisansforKamala ready to mobilize Italian-Americans
Also:
PoetsForHarris
SwiftiesForKamala
And many more

2024-09-19 22:49:29 UTC

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We’re on a mission to make it the biggest virtual rally ever, y’all!

2024-09-19 22:48:06 UTC

What hashtag are we using for the Oprah-Harris watch party tonight? (8pm Eastern)
https://m.youtube.com/live/iPB0dmWyqZI

2024-09-19 16:25:34 UTC

True in other areas too. If we think back over who we notice contributing to our practice and tooling, who have we thanked or otherwise expressed appreciation to and for? (I often do this by quoting and mentioning, but that is less direct than a thank you.)
Image is this post: https://mathstodon.xyz/@millerdl/113163742007482917
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/165/151/587/964/273/original/bed4cc8ab36f3025.jpeg

2024-09-19 11:44:19 UTC

“New Zealand’s Long-term Insights Briefings may not make the headlines, but they should. They’re a little unusual, internationally. Every three years, public service departments are mandated to think long-term—about the trends, risks, and opportunities that could shape our lives over the next 10, 20, even 50 years.”
— Victoria Mulligan
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/victoriamulligan1_civilsociety-publicservice-futuresthinking-activity-7242301381728985089-1gY6

2024-09-16 08:14:13 UTC

Underreported data center CO2 emissions load:
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/sep/15/data-center-gas-emissions-tech
Climate change increases number and intensity of wildfires.
Underreported methane emissions from wildfires:
“ Using a new detection method, UC Riverside scientists found a massive amount of methane, a super-potent greenhouse gas, coming from wildfires”
And
“Methane warms the planet 86 times more powerfully than carbon dioxide over the course of 20 years”
https://news.ucr.edu/articles/2023/04/17/methane-megafires-more-spew-we-knew

2024-09-13 17:48:41 UTC

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Uh. I should add… (please) Don’t dismiss Meadows due to the dates — the examples are of their time, but she’s a wonderful teacher and it’s neat to have some access to that, reach us almost 50 years later :)

2024-09-13 17:38:18 UTC

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And more recently:
@npub1yp0…zd34 at Agile on the Beach:
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/hibri_decoding-paradoxes-exploring-counter-intuitive-activity-7215059742061146113-NJGx
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/131/463/737/530/871/original/4b746e63bd53df75.jpeg

2024-09-13 17:31:04 UTC

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And [@jessitron](https://hachyderm.io/@jessitron ) has done a lot to bring dynamic modeling and CLDs to the software space, with talks, posts (like this one from 2018: https://medium.com/@jessitron/which-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg-6f94003a4097), and workshops (with Kent Beck).
Image from Jessica Kerr's post (linked above):
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/131/422/441/338/859/original/6de4304bd6af2cdc.webp

2024-09-13 17:20:49 UTC

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CLDs?
Here's Donella Meadows:
"Whole Earth Models and Systems" (1982):
https://donellameadows.org/wp-content/userfiles/Whole-Earth-Models-and-Systems.pdf
And Meadows teaching CLDs in 1977:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XL_lOoomRTA

2024-09-13 17:05:49 UTC

Causal Loop Diagrams are showing up in more talks and things
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/chrissimon-au_defence-of-technical-excellence-causal-activity-7240116864884883456-88cV
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/131/331/123/619/995/original/d20ef97d5c90f581.png

2024-09-06 12:31:19 UTC

i love this comic by Tom Gauld…
https://www.newscientist.com/article/0-tom-gauld-on-overthinking/
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/090/531/958/679/454/original/6219292d4c6efb86.jpeg

2024-08-24 16:05:18 UTC

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Related. ;)
Judgment about where to apply judgment. Where to slow down and attend.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/017/825/386/407/240/original/6369a7a19414da65.jpeg

2024-08-24 15:35:42 UTC

“A[n architecture] decision view provides a useful complement to the traditional sets of architectural views and viewpoints. It gives an explanatory perspective that illuminates the reasoning process itself and not solely its results.” (Kruchten et al 2009)
Emphasis on “illuminates the reasoning process”
I’ll say things like “it’s a form of asynchronous mentoring to write down the (various) experience(s) and research that informed the decision” and I get looks.
Explanatory perspective. Better

2024-08-14 17:48:24 UTC

Is there like a co-op for (tech) folk who are between jobs? Like, to be a space of lifting up and learning/sharing and whatever the community needs? Where folk flow through, and provide mutual buoying?

2023-01-17 00:00:14 UTC

Infrastructure “ Becomes visible upon breakdown. The normally invisible quality of working infrastructure becomes visible when it breaks: the server is down, the bridge washes out, there is a power blackout. Even when there are back-up mechanisms or procedures, their existence further highlights the now-visible infrastructure.”
— Susan Leigh Star, “The Ethnography of Infrastructure"
https://ics.uci.edu/~wscacchi/GameLab/Recommended%20Readings/ethnography-infrastructure-Star-1999.pdf
Paper, and emphasis on “Becomes visible upon breakdown.” via @npub1gqw…5sps