Synware – free software syndicates

how
December 13, 2023

synware-001-cover

The Synware (sinwɛːʁ) collection explores the modalities of using, creating, and maintaining digital technologies collectively. Synware documents decentralized free software, their usage and community organization as much technical as conceptual, aesthetic and political.

This inaugural volume introduces the notion of free software syndicalism and questions the modalities of the free software movement facing up the transformation from a grass-roots movement in the 1980s to mainstreaming in the 2010s, industrialization in the 2020s, and the momentum towards becoming a public digital infrastructure.

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© 2021-2023 petites singularités
On the Fediverse: https://re.lire.im/@ps

Copyleft: this is a free work, you can copy, distribute, and modify it under the terms of the Free Art License.
https://artlibre.org/licence/lal/en/

This work is available in full at https://synware.zoethical.org
Legal deposit: D/2023/14.239/2

Where and when to meet with us?

When Where With
2023/12/27-30 37C3: Unlocked First print run of 40 copies gone!
2024/02/03-04 O₄FFDEM More books!
2024/05/21-22 Empodera Live Some books!

We’re looking forward to print more. If you could not get a copy at 37C3, but received a flyer instead, you can still order books with the reduction code until the end of the month of January 2024.

synware-is-here

Availability and download

Version ISBN Files
print 978-2-931254-00-4 synware-001-free-software-syndicates_v1.0.print.pdf (794.3 KB), synware-001-couv-recto.pdf (6.3 MB), synware-001-couv-verso.pdf (6.3 MB)
screen 978-2-931254-01-1 synware-001-free-software-syndicates_v1.0.screen.pdf (1.2 MB)

Sources

synware.odt (923.0 KB)
synware.screen.odt (7.6 MB)

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

010 Editor’s preface

012 On software syndicalism

013 Abstract

015 Problem domain

019 Principles

025 Syndicalism

028 Opportunities

039 Challenges

046 A software syndicate, for whom?

048 Scavenging of free radicals

053 Polyglot technologies

062 Proximity transmission

076 Community

080 Supporting resistances

081 Dispelling the fog

084 Promoting mutual aid

087 Asserting ourselves together

090 Take me to your leader

108 What is at Stake with Interoperability

109 Consent & interoperability

110 Interoperability & interconnection

111 Interconnection & data portability

116 The threat to free software

116 An OFFDEM manifesto

123 The factory of technical violence

130 O4FFDEM Call for Presence

132 2-3 February 2024, Brussels

140 Post-truth Afterword

148 Countermeasures

Discussion

Please head to Synware to discuss this book. You’ll need access to @synware.wg.