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# Bloat # Bloat
Bloat is a very wide term that in the context of software and technology means extreme growth in terms of source code size, complexity, number of [dependencies](dependency.md), useless features and resource usage, all of which lead to inefficient, badly designed technology with bugs and [security](security.md) vulnerabilities, as well as **loss of [freedom](free_software.md)**, waste of human effort and great obscurity and ugliness. Bloat is extremely bad and one of the greatest technological issues of today. Creating bloat is bad engineering at it worst and unfortunately it is what's absolutely taking over all technology nowadays, mostly due to [capitalism](capitalism.md), commercialization, consumerism and incompetent people trying to take on jobs they are in no way qualified to do. Bloat is a very wide term that in the context of [software](software.md) and technology means extreme growth in terms of source code size, complexity, number of [dependencies](dependency.md), [redundancy](redundancy.md), unnecessary or useless features (e.g. [feature creep](feature_creep.md)) and resource usage, all of which lead to inefficient, badly designed technology with bugs and [security](security.md) vulnerabilities, as well as **loss of [freedom](free_software.md)**, waste of human effort and great obscurity and ugliness. Bloat is extremely bad and one of the greatest technological issues of today. Creating bloat is bad engineering at it worst and unfortunately it is what's absolutely taking over all technology nowadays, mostly due to [capitalism](capitalism.md), commercialization, consumerism and incompetent people trying to take on jobs they are in no way qualified to do.
[LRS](lrs.md), [suckless](suckless.md) and some others small groups are trying to address the issue and write software that is good, minimal, safe, efficient and well functioning. Nevertheless our numbers are very small and in this endeavor we are basically standing against the whole world and the most powerful tech corporations. [LRS](lrs.md), [suckless](suckless.md) and some others rather small groups are trying to address the issue and write software that is good, minimal, safe, efficient and well functioning. Nevertheless our numbers are very small and in this endeavor we are basically standing against the whole world and the most powerful tech corporations.
One of a very frequent questions you may hear a noob ask is **"How can bloat limit software freedom if such software has a [free](free_software.md) license?"** Bloat de-facto limits some of the four essential freedoms (to use, study, modify and share) required for a software to be free. A free license grants these freedoms legally, but if some of those freedoms are subsequently limited by other circumstances, the software becomes effectively less free. It is important to realize that **complexity itself goes against freedom** because a more complex system will inevitably reduce the number of people being able to execute freedoms such as modifying the software (the number of programmers being able to understand and modify a trivial program is much greater than the number of programmers being able to understand and modify a highly complex million [LOC](loc.md) program). As the number of people being able to execute the basic freedom drops, we're approaching the scenario in which the software is de-facto controlled by a small number of people who can (e.g. due to the cost) effectively study, modify and maintain the program -- and a program that is controlled by a small group of people (e.g. a corporation) is by definition [proprietary](proprietary.md). If there is a web browser that has a free license but you, a lone programmer, can't afford to study it, modify it significantly and maintain it, and your friends aren't able to do that either, when the only one who can practically do this is the developer of the browser himself and perhaps a few other rich corporations that can pay dozens of full time programmers, then such browser cannot be considered free as it won't be shaped to benefit you, the user, but rather the developer, a corporation. One of a very frequent questions you may hear a noob ask is **"How can bloat limit software freedom if such software has a [free](free_software.md) license?"** Bloat [de-facto](de_facto.md) limits some of the four essential freedoms (to use, study, modify and share) required for a software to be free. A free license grants these freedoms legally, but if some of those freedoms are subsequently limited by other circumstances, the software becomes effectively less free. It is important to realize that **complexity itself goes against freedom** because a more complex system will inevitably reduce the number of people being able to execute freedoms such as modifying the software (the number of programmers being able to understand and modify a trivial program is much greater than the number of programmers being able to understand and modify a highly complex million [LOC](loc.md) program). As the number of people being able to execute the basic freedom drops, we're approaching the scenario in which the software is de-facto controlled by a small number of people who can (e.g. due to the cost) effectively study, modify and maintain the program -- and a program that is controlled by a small group of people (e.g. a corporation) is by definition [proprietary](proprietary.md). If there is a web browser that has a free license but you, a lone programmer, can't afford to study it, modify it significantly and maintain it, and your friends aren't able to do that either, when the only one who can practically do this is the developer of the browser himself and perhaps a few other rich corporations that can pay dozens of full time programmers, then such browser cannot be considered free as it won't be shaped to benefit you, the user, but rather the developer, a corporation.
## Example of Bloat ## Typical Bloat
The following is a list of software usually considered a good example of bloat. However keep in mind that bloat is a relative term, for example [vim](vim.md) can be seen as a minimalist suckless editor when compared to mainstream software ([IDEs](ide.md)), but at the same time it's pretty bloated when compared to strictly [suckless](suckless.md) programs. The following is a list of software usually considered a good, typical example of bloat. However keep in mind that bloat is a relative term, for example [vim](vim.md) can be seen as a minimalist suckless editor when compared to mainstream software ([IDEs](ide.md)), but at the same time it's pretty bloated when compared to strictly [suckless](suckless.md) programs.
- [Web](web.md) since the onset of "web 2.0" has been steadily becoming more and more bloated with things such as Adobe Flash and [JavaScript](javascript.md). By today the situation about web bloat is reaching almost unbearable levels, especially in [modern](modern.md) sites such as [YouTube](youtube.md). For a great read see [The Website Obesity Crisis](https://idlewords.com/talks/website_obesity.htm). - [Web](web.md) since the onset of "web 2.0" has been steadily becoming more and more bloated with things such as Adobe Flash and [JavaScript](javascript.md). By today the situation about web bloat is reaching almost unbearable levels, especially in [modern](modern.md) sites such as [YouTube](youtube.md). For a great read see [The Website Obesity Crisis](https://idlewords.com/talks/website_obesity.htm).
- Ads, [spyware](spyware.md), [DRM](drm.md), anti-cheats, anti-viruses, anti-repair and other anti-user "features" are bloat. - Ads, [spyware](spyware.md), [DRM](drm.md), anti-cheats, anti-viruses, anti-repair and other anti-user "features" are bloat.
@ -17,4 +17,34 @@ The following is a list of software usually considered a good example of bloat.
- [Blender](blender.md): quite useful [FOSS](foss.md) 3D editor which however integrates things like a whole video editor, game engine, several renderers, scripting language with text editor and so on - [Blender](blender.md): quite useful [FOSS](foss.md) 3D editor which however integrates things like a whole video editor, game engine, several renderers, scripting language with text editor and so on
- [CMake](cmake.md): gigantic build system that stands above other build systems (lol) - [CMake](cmake.md): gigantic build system that stands above other build systems (lol)
- [Electron](electron.md): [GUI](gui.md) [framework](framework.md) infamous for its huge resource consumption - [Electron](electron.md): [GUI](gui.md) [framework](framework.md) infamous for its huge resource consumption
- [glibc](glibc.md): TODO - [systemd](systemd.md): Huge anti-[unix](unix_philosophy.md) do-it-all system taking over [GNU](gnu.md)/[Linux](linux.md)
- [virtual machines](vm.md)/environments/sandboxes, big abstraction sandwiches (e.g. program running in an interpreter running in a sandbox inside web browser that's running in a virtual machine that's running on an operating system)
- [Firefox](firefox.md), [Chromium](chromium.md) and other mainstream web browsers
- [Java](java.md), [Python](python.md) and similar languages
- [IDEs](ide.md) such as [VSCode](vscode.md)
- [neural networks](neural_network.md) aka "AI"
## Small Bloat
Besides the typical big programs that even normies admit are bloated there exists also a smaller bloat which many people don't see as such but are nevertheless considered unnecessarily complex by some experts and/or idealists and hardcore minimalists, including [us](lrs.md). This includes for example:
- [floating point](float.md) (complex standard with design issues, requires special hardware for acceleration, [fixed point](fixed_point.md) is better)
- config files (and other unnecessary file I/O that requires a file I/O library, not all computers have file systems, configs should be part of source code)
- any [GPU](gpu.md), [openGL](opengl.md) (complex hardware, not all computers have GPUs, [software rendering](software_rendering.md) is better)
- [Unicode](unicode.md) (big specification requiring special libraries and big fonts, [ASCII](ascii.md) is better)
- anything that's not strictly needed such as [antialiasing](antialiasing.md) or colors in text rendering
- [linking](linking.md), build systems/scripts, directories and multiple source code files (single file, [header only](header_only.md) libraries and [single compilation unit](single_compilation_unit.md) programs are better)
- any [GUI](gui.md)
- [operating system](os.md) ([bare metal](bare_metal.md) is better)
- [multithreading](multithreading.md), [parallelism](parallelism.md)
- [encryption](encryption.md), [security](security.md), [memory safety](memory_safery.md) (just don't care and/or don't handle sensitive data with computers connected to the internet, don't live in a shitty society)
- [database](database.md) software (plain files are better)
- [C](c.md) (something in between C and [brainfuck](brainfuck.md) would be ideal, e.g. [Forth](forth.md) may come close)
- [glibc](glibc.md), [gcc](gcc.md), [clang](clang.md) etc. (better alternatives are [tcc](tcc.md), [musl](musl.md), [uclibc](uclibc.md) etc.)
- [jpg](jpg.md), [png](png.md), [svg](svg.md) and similar formats (e.g. [ppm](ppm.md) or [farbfeld](farbfeld.md) is better)
- [html](html.md), [markdown](md.md) ([plain text](plaintext.md) is better)
- [x86](x86.md) instruction set (e.g. [ARM](arm.md) is probably better, { not completely sure how bloated ARM really is. ~drummyfish })
- any non-[public-domain](public_domain.md) license (any legal burden introduced by a license is unnecessary bloat)
- [computers](computer.md) (pen and paper is better)
- dynamic [linking](linking.md) (static linking is better)
- ...

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ubi.md
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# Universal Basic Income # Universal Basic Income
Universal basic income (UBI) is the idea that all people should get regular pay from the state without any conditions, i.e. even if they don't work, even if they are rich etc. It is a great idea and **[we](lrs.md) fully support it** as the first step towards the ideal society in which people don't have to work. As [automation](automation.md) takes away more and more jobs, it is being discussed more and experiments with UBI are being conducted, even though capitalist idiots rather try to invent more and more [bullshit jobs](bullshit_job.md) to keep people enslaved. Universal basic income (UBI) is the idea that all people should get regular pay from the state without any conditions, i.e. even if they don't work, even if they are rich, criminals etc. It is a great idea and **[we](lrs.md) fully support it** as the first step towards the [ideal society](less_retarded_society.md) in which people don't have to work. As [automation](automation.md) takes away more and more jobs, it is being discussed more and experiments with UBI are being conducted, even though capitalist idiots rather try to invent more and more [bullshit jobs](bullshit_job.md) to keep people enslaved.
UBI that itself covers all basic needs is called full, otherwise it is called partial. UBI subscribes to the idea that **the goal of progress is to eliminate the need for work**, which is correct -- we should leave all work to machines eventually, that's why we started civilization. This doesn't mean we can't work, just that we aren't obliged. UBI that itself covers all basic needs is called full, otherwise it is called partial. UBI subscribes to the idea that **the goal of progress is to eliminate the need for work**, which is correct -- we should leave all work to machines eventually, that's why we started civilization. This doesn't mean we can't work, just that we aren't obliged.
@ -13,17 +13,19 @@ Advantages of UBI:
- **People will seize to be slaves of capitalist employers** as it will no longer be mandatory to work somewhere. Nowadays people have to accept shitty working conditions because they have no other choice. They can't go elsewhere because it is the same everywhere or their conditions don't allow them to move, every employer abuses his employees as much as possible so people today can only choose their slave master but they can't choose not being slaves. **If people can actually leave, employers will have to offer good conditions to keep people working for them**. It may also lead to e.g. greater freedom from consumerism as people can e.g. decide to not use certain bad technology which they are nowadays forced to use by employers. - **People will seize to be slaves of capitalist employers** as it will no longer be mandatory to work somewhere. Nowadays people have to accept shitty working conditions because they have no other choice. They can't go elsewhere because it is the same everywhere or their conditions don't allow them to move, every employer abuses his employees as much as possible so people today can only choose their slave master but they can't choose not being slaves. **If people can actually leave, employers will have to offer good conditions to keep people working for them**. It may also lead to e.g. greater freedom from consumerism as people can e.g. decide to not use certain bad technology which they are nowadays forced to use by employers.
- **It will greatly suppress [bullshit jobs](bullshit_job.md)** and undesirable phenomena such as the [antivirus paradox](antivirus_paradox.md). People who stop doing bullshit jobs will be able to actually focus on useful things. - **It will greatly suppress [bullshit jobs](bullshit_job.md)** and undesirable phenomena such as the [antivirus paradox](antivirus_paradox.md). People who stop doing bullshit jobs will be able to actually focus on useful things.
- **Suffering of many people will be lowered or eliminated**. Simple as that. - **Suffering of many people will be lowered or eliminated**. Simple as that.
- **We may actually save money** because the system will simplify a lot. Nowadays we have complex bureaucracy and commissions that judge who can get social welfare, who can get disability pensions etc. If everyone gets the money, we can save on this bureaucracy, commissions, on doctor examinations, caring about the homeless, maintaining special laws etc. If people become less stressed, mental health will also improve and we will save money on treatment of mentally ill people. Money may also be saved on organization of worker unions as they may become much less important. - **We will actually save money and other resources** because the system will simplify a lot. Nowadays we have complex bureaucracy and commissions that judge who can get social welfare, who can get disability pensions etc. If everyone gets the money, we can save on this bureaucracy, commissions, on doctor examinations, caring about the homeless, maintaining special laws etc. If people become less stressed, mental health will also improve and we will save money on treatment of mentally ill people. Money may also be saved on organization of worker unions as they may become much less important.
- **Society will become more [ecological](ecology.md)** thanks to the elimination of bullshit and saving resources, as mentioned above.
- **People will become less stressed**, happier, will have security and as a result perhaps even become more "productive" (this has been confirmed by some experiments). - **People will become less stressed**, happier, will have security and as a result perhaps even become more "productive" (this has been confirmed by some experiments).
- **Criminality will greatly decrease** as it is directly linked to poverty, this will of course further save money on police, lawyers, medical bills etc. - **Criminality will greatly decrease** as it is directly linked to poverty, this will of course further save money on police, lawyers, medical bills etc.
- **People will become more equal** which will shift us closer to the [ideal society](ideal_society.md). - **People will become more equal** which will shift us closer to the [ideal society](less_retarded_society.md).
- **People will be able to do more important things than work if needed**, for example they may choose to focus on education for a few years, which will make the population better educated and therefore better. - **People will be able to do more important things than work if needed**, for example they may choose to focus on education for a few years, which will make the population better educated and therefore better.
- **Social security will suppress fear in people** and therefore make them less xenophobic, less militant etc. - **Social security will suppress fear in people** and therefore make them less xenophobic, less militant, less fascist etc.
- **Homelessness will greatly decrease**. - **Homelessness will greatly decrease**, streets will be cleaner, we'll be able to close many homeless centers etc.
- **There will be many more indirect benefits**, e.g. people may start to live without unnecessary things that are nowadays forced on them by jobs such as cell phones, cars or bank accounts, which will subsequently make people consume less, spend less time on toxic social networks and live more healthy lives among friends in local communities, lowering the negative effects of globalization such as the spread of the US culture etc.
- **Capitalists will be crying like little babies**.
Disadvantages of UBI: Disadvantages of UBI:
- none - none
Of course, UBI works with [money](money.md) and money is bad, however the core idea is simply about sharing resources, i.e. true [communism](communism.md) which surpasses the concept of money. That is once money is eliminated, the idea of UBI will stay as the right of everyone to get things such as food and health care unconditionally. LRS supports UBI as the immediate next step towards making money less important and eventually eliminate them altogether. Of course, UBI works with [money](money.md) and money is bad, however the core idea is simply about sharing resources, i.e. true [communism](communism.md) which surpasses the concept of money. That is once money is eliminated, the idea of UBI will stay as the right of everyone to get things such as food and health care unconditionally. LRS supports UBI as the immediate next step towards making money less important and eventually eliminating them altogether.