Happy new year and > 1000 members
First off, happy new year to everyone π
We also surpassed 1000 members on slrpnk.net near the end of last month. This is a nice milestone and another reason to celebrate.
While we had some server issues last month and also did not yet upgrade to the latest version of Lemmy (due to federation bugs with it), we can still welcome more users in 2024.
Of course the actually active number of users is quite a bit lower, as many of the Reddit migrants did not stick around. But I think we managed to get a healthy number of regular posters and our communities are also well subscribed to in the larger Fediverse.
I also managed to promote our instance a bit on the 37C3 congress in Hamburg a few days ago. Great Fediverse presence there and good solarpunk vibes as well.
New moderators / communities
We got two new communities in recent weeks that seem to be quite popular:
- @toaster@slrpnk.net started !asksolarpunk@slrpnk.net
- @activistPnk@slrpnk.net started !climate_action_individual@slrpnk.net
Technical updates
Besides the upcoming upgrade to Lemmy 0.19.x we thought a bit about other services to host. One idea is a collaborative text editor, for which the new Hedgedocs2 alpha is being tested on https://docs.slrpnk.net (BEWARE users and documents might be wiped without notice during the test period). We will update you when this service stabilizes sufficiently and also if we find a way to integrate accounts with the main Lemmy user database like we do for the XMPP & Movim service. Stay tuned π
Open discussion
As always, this is your thread. Youβre welcome to comment about any meta stuff you donβt think is big enough for its own post. New communities, Lemmy or Movim issues, personal news, and questions for the community will be visible to the entire community here through the month of January.
On the art of solar concentrators, I did one scene of a solar furnace and got some ideas on how to make a more realistic version from the discussions over on the subreddit - I think solarpunk industry is an underexplored concept overall. I also like the idea of low tech solar power (including solar cookers) because its so approachable and because I tend to imagine solarpunk as a guide for rebuilding. Mirrors and water tanks are pretty straightforward and easily acquired.
Awesome! I appreciated the writing to go with it, particularly about asking where all the things depicted in solarpunk scenes come from. Generally as a culture we are blind to the embodied energy in the structures around us and goods we use, which shows up in art.
I don't want to come off as negative to anyone creating art and expressing themselves imagining the future they want. I just think it's also important that others critically examine the space of what is imagined for what is actually possible in the real world. Happy to hear any feedback on how do that in line with the intentions of this server.
If you're asking about offering criticism of my photobashes, I certainly don't mind! I make these for the discussions, to cause conversations and examinations of whatever concept I'm building the scene around. Solarpunk spaces tend to be pretty quick to point out deficiencies. I research a bit, and definitely try to get it right, but I'm often combining multiple concepts I've only just read about, so I expect to get things wrong.
Oh no, no criticism here. Keep it up!