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Author: ola <ola@web>
Date: Fri, 6 Jun 2025 10:43:45 +0200
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diff --git a/principles2.mdwn b/principles2.mdwn
@@ -1,23 +1,38 @@
-INTRO
-
-Exploring the Permacomputing Principles ~
+## Exploring the Permacomputing Principles ~
Introduction
Contemporary permaculture is founded on three core ethics: Earth Care, People Care, and Fair Share. These ethics serve as a guiding compass for its design principles, co-creating a holistic framework for regenerative living. Similarly, permacomputing is built upon 10 principles that encourage and raise awareness about more sustainable digital practices.
-Whether you are a tech specialist or someone who only occasionally uses a computer, there are steps that individuals and groups can take to reduce the environmental and socio-economic impact of their digital activities. The following section explores the permacomputing principles, each illustrated through:
+Whether you are a tech specialist or someone who only occasionally uses a computer, there are steps that individuals and groups can take to reduce the environmental and socio-economic impact of their digital activities.
+
+On this page, you can explore permacomputing principles, each illustrated through:
+
+- **Urgency/background**
+- **What can YOU do?**
+Strategies and interventions for all, from techie to casual user, or something in between
+- **Principle in action & examples**
+Further reading, tools for deeper engagement, and examples of implementation
+
+Contemporary permaculture is founded on three core ethics: Earth Care, People Care, and Fair Share. These ethics serve as a guiding compass for its design principles, co-creating a holistic framework for regenerative living. Similarly, permacomputing is built upon 10 principles that encourage and raise awareness about more sustainable digital practices.
+
+Whether you are a tech specialist, someone who uses computer for daily tasks or only occasionally, there are steps that individuals and groups can take to reduce the environmental and socio-economic impact of their digital activities. The following section explores the permacomputing principles, each illustrated through:
- Urgency/background
- What can YOU do? strategies and interventions for all, from techie to casual user, or something in between
- Principle in action & examples – further reading, tools for deeper engagement and examples of implementation
-The community of permacomputing promotes a comprehensive approach to design human technology taking into account social and ecological issues, encouraging resilience and supporting a fair coexistence. These design principles are not just technical guidelines but represent strategies for positive changes. That said, permacomputing is not prescriptive; it instead favors situatedness and an awareness of contextual diversity. We, the Permacomputing working group hope these design principles can serve both as a guide for practice in specific situations and as a tool for identifying systemic issues in the relationship between computer technology and ecology.
+The community of permacomputing promotes a comprehensive approach to the design of human technology, taking into account social and ecological issues, encouraging resilience and supporting a fair coexistence.
+These design principles are not just technical guidelines but represent strategies for positive changes. That said, permacomputing is not prescriptive; it instead favors situatedness and an awareness of contextual diversity.
+We, the Permacomputing working group, hope these design principles can serve both as a guide for practice in specific situations and as a tool for identifying systemic issues in the relationship between computer technology and ecology.
+
-These principles are intended to be continually developed and refined. They are meant to serve as a starting point. :)
+Furthermore, the Permacomputing community is more than this site!
+It is inspired by—and builds upon—a diverse range of initiatives, research, projects, and bodies of knowledge.
-Furthermore, the Permacomputing community is inspired by—and builds upon—a diverse range of initiatives, research, projects, and bodies of knowledge. We are grateful for these contributions, which are acknowledged on our ‘credits page’ (link).
+These principles are intended to be continually developed and refined.
+The text below is meant to serve as a starting point. :)
---
-Principle 1: Hope for the Best, Prepare for the Worst
+## Hope for the Best, Prepare for the Worst
It is good practice to design systems that are resilient and tolerant to interruptions and even if you do not personally believe such scenarios are imminent. This principle invites reflection: why prioritize resilience? Rather than being a defeatist mindset, it is a practical exercise. By imagining a world shaped by scarcity, you sharpen your creativity and adaptability. Acknowledging breakages happen and taking into account the possibility of collapse can inspire self-imposed limitations that lead to resourceful solutions—often uncovering societal scenarios previously unexplored, while also acknowledging that less privileged groups are already experiencing harm and damage.
What can YOU do?
@@ -38,7 +53,7 @@ Principle in action & examples
---
-Principle 2: Care for All Hardware — Especially the Chips
+## Care for All Hardware — Especially the Chips
Caring for the planet also means caring for the material foundations of digital technology: our hardware. Every device, chip, and component originates from Earth’s finite resources—and eventually end up as e-waste.
The production of new hardware—especially microchips, which are at the heart of nearly every device we use, is highly resource-intensive and energy-consuming. Microchips are particularly problematic because they are difficult to recycle, cost an immense amount of energy and resources to manufacture and their production is highly polluting. Maximizing the lifespan of hardware components is critical for reducing environmental impact and promoting a more sustainable and less harmful digital culture.
@@ -99,7 +114,7 @@ Principle in action & examples
---
-Principle 3b: Not Doing
+## Not Doing
To reduce the resource use and waste generated by technology, embracing 'not doing' aka 'refusal' is essential for achieving degrowth. Refusal suggests a starting point of resistance and a deliberate move towards reimagining more just futures. With computing's potential to be employed in violent and oppressive ways, refusal and collective resistance and interconnected tools that need to go beyond simply turning abstract notions of justice and fairness by creating opportunities to re-evauluate foundational assumptions of technical projects and thus allowing for active re-imagination of just futures. By refusing technological inevitablility we enable forms of resistance to emerge and alternative techno-futures to be considered.
The history of computing is deeply intertwined with capitalism and militarism. From playing a role in warfare and geopolitical power struggles to driving the automation of labor, computing has significantly contributed to the increased use of resources and fossil energy. The latest example of this trend is the construction of hyperscale data centers for running generative AI. Despite the promise of increased efficiency, the Jevons Paradox applies: higher efficiency tends to lead to greater resource use. Efficiency is often presented as a technical solution to a political issue—making decisions about how and why we use computing on a heating planet—without questioning the extractive business model.
@@ -124,7 +139,7 @@ But also: The SIDN case illustrates not doing as a political and infrastructural
---
-Principle 4: Expose the seams
+## Expose the seams
Seamlessness in software obfuscates inner-workings and is a myth: things are only seamless to those who fit an idealized standard. To complicate things, software vendors often use the term "transparency" when in fact still designing interfaces in which underlying processes remain hidden to the user. However, making a technology appear transparent or seamless to users, can become an obstacle to understanding how it works, to critical engagement, and to knowledge and skill sharing. Obfuscating inner-workings makes it harder to question and challenge a technology.
@@ -154,7 +169,7 @@ Resources/Links
---
-Principle 5: Consider carefully the interaction between simplicity, complexity and scale
+## Consider carefully the interaction between simplicity, complexity and scale
Some simple systems need less energy, less hardware, and less maintenance. They are easier to understand, adapt, and share. By keeping things simple, we create space for care, accessibility, and long-term sustainability. At the same time, specially in relation to programming languages and hardware design, what is perceived as simple can be energy inefficient and arcane. Similarly, from scaling up datacenters to scaling up the resilience of off-the-internet wireless networks and protocols, scale is also an ambivalent notion in telecommunication, network infrastructure and topologies.
@@ -185,7 +200,7 @@ Principle in Action
---
-Principle 6: Keep it flexible
+## Keep it flexible
Flexibility means adaptability to different purposes and circumstances, including ones that were never even considered by the original designer. While we value simplicity, we know that very simple systems can also be inflexible, and this principle exists as a counterweight to that kind of oversimplicity. Ideally, one should aim at a mutually supportive balance between simplicity and flexibility.
@@ -213,7 +228,7 @@ Principle in Action
---
-Principle 7: Build on solid ground
+## Build on solid ground
Consider when to build on solid ground and when to design for disappearance. If longetivity is required some considerations are needed.
@@ -225,7 +240,7 @@ It is good to experiment with new ideas, concepts and languages, but forming har
What can YOU do
With or without a computer:
- * Consider using software that runs locally, is open-sourced, and has a thriving user community or is well-documented
+ - Consider using software that runs locally, is open-sourced, and has a thriving user community or is well-documented
* Try to pick software that favours slow release cycles and thorough testing over rolling updates.
* try to use smaller, more general-purpose tools instead of complex, prescriptive all-in-one solutions
* You may also read this as "grow roots to a solid ground". Learn things that last. Learn the history of the technology you use.
@@ -246,11 +261,11 @@ Principle in action:
---
-Principle 8: (Almost) Everything has a place
+## (Almost) Everything has a place
There is a place for almost everything. Nothing is obsolete or irrelevant. Even if they lose their original meaning and context, most programmable systems may be readapted to new purposes they were not originally designed for. Think about technology as a rhizome rather than a "highway of progress and constant obsolescence".
-Computing is often framed as a kind of ideal universal medium. But the reality is that computing is culture! It can be very diverse, full of the color, contingency and expression that is part of any cultural production. Sadly in practice, and in its current form with military industrial roots, this culture exists mostly to reproduce and reinforce existing power structures within societies and support ecomic growth. Today's computing cultures are still dominated by Human Interface Guidelines designed and controlled by a small groups of people with similar backgrounds, priorities and values. But if we can let go of some of the ideas of technological conformity, we might start to see a much wider spectrum of possible ways of computing, some of which might better reflect local needs, desires and societal issues.
+Computing is often framed as a kind of ideal universal medium. But the reality is that **computing is culture!** It can be very diverse, full of the color, contingency and expression that is part of any cultural production. Sadly in practice, and in its current form with military industrial roots, this culture exists mostly to reproduce and reinforce existing power structures within societies and support ecomic growth. Today's computing cultures are still dominated by Human Interface Guidelines designed and controlled by a small groups of people with similar backgrounds, priorities and values. But if we can let go of some of the ideas of technological conformity, we might start to see a much wider spectrum of possible ways of computing, some of which might better reflect local needs, desires and societal issues.
This can also open to much wilder and diverse creative practices and aesthetics.
@@ -276,7 +291,7 @@ Principles In Action:
---
-Principle 9: Integrate biological and renewable resources
+## Integrate biological and renewable resources
Permacomputing seeks to support sustainable and regenerative practices, playing a beneficial role in natural ecosystems, but until we can grow computers on trees, this goal remains largely aspirational. The whole electronic industry is based on using some of the most artificial materials ever created. The majority of computer components are firmly tied to complex, extractive and exploitative manufacturing processes linked to the semi-conductory industry. There is an increasing incentive and an increasing number of experiments to replace some physical parts of digital hardware with more sustainable materials, while rethinking how supply chains can be more ethical. How can this be encouraged? How can this be priositised? How can this be more than symbolic or marketting?
