Hey, welcome to the forums. Stating this so far: Surely you are not that alone with the feelings. But it is not wrong to take a step back. So let's start at this as a wise and beloved human being from my spheres told: "When something is not working in the smallest parts, it is not working also in the greater ones."

The meaning is clear to see: Let's build small parts, small projects, take steps more and more back. Leave the so-called "internet" to whoever wants it as it is clearly not a place to run for. Let's take small niches, small systems, small software running. Without the dreams for whatever kind of sizing bigger. That's not working. But with the good ideas and good deeds there are perhaps others around interested also within those smaller "places" instead trying always to rethink what is broken. Something broken can be repaired, if there is a will. The question is: Is there really any will to "repair"? Or for the moment only more interest into hatred, harassment, derailing, fakes, lies and propaganda around? So if that's the point, we take a step backwards and preserve what's possible while also keep a warm and comfy place for all democrats and defenders of a colourful living space.

Regarding the steps back and finding niches: I hope to find one here.

Where there's people who can reason there's more good to come, irregardless of that's about (foo | bar); because both foo & bar would be reasonable.

Since some time now I have wondered whether a solution to the loss of autonomy a webbrowser "gives" each (used) person might be to return to networking without browsing... there are many wonderful FUSE mounting programs already ⁰. I will want to wrap these when I can, so a FUSE-Manager.

Searching without the ubiquitous blackbox that is a searchengine. Just

find ./ | grep -iF FooBar

and

grep -rnw ./ -e FooBar

, those who care also care to organize their directories. So federating directories with eachother. It will certainly be a niche, but a source of power in communicating messages containing knowledge without mediation.

At the same time I dream of giving others an EXIT CHANNEL inside their regularly scheduled indoctrination... a "hey, here's all i know, no payment plans and no gatekept knowledge that's watered down!" However a good reason to stay this is not - the opposite: staying presents a problem for all.

[0] SSHFS, to mention one i find very interesting. Perhaps equally interesting to me is the ENiGMA BBS that also is run over SSH.

Ideologically I've understood this later, personally realizing the consequences of existing within such influences of Windows or Steam or Google/Youtube (search engines, hosting, et al) before grasping the importance of finding that one binding thread. Though it does come as simple and obvious as ideology can let the world be: i never learnt how to use an operating system when using Windows, by design... i never learnt how to make games while playing on Steam, by design... i never learnt how to organize nor share files when using Google's sites, by design.

Just now I found SPIN - based on MODULA-3 - and add this alongisde AOS - based on Active Oberon. I can actually begin to understand the source code in these. Thanks to modularity, thanks to structure, thanks to the ascetically simple intent from designers and implementers of these languages(!!!)

I feel fractally similar to how discovering Decker⁰ was... here is a game in which the tools are kept as part of the game. I can at any moment stop a game made in Decker, edit the code- edit the of text & sprites- then move on to continue playing. This is as daunting as it is because of that indoctrination to the contrary... in feudalist terms: the peasant fears wielding the sword for themselves, instead wanton a knight to go along with that sword (a peasant isn't a knight) BUT That is where fairytales help let the peasant grow into a knight and fend for themselves.

Similarly was it daunting to sit infront of the timeless void of the console. I was always inexpliccably afraid, much because of a lack of kinaesthesia and visual elements to proxy an understanding of concepts onto, however a decade later and I feel comfortable in a console. Much more about what I know there to be than what is shown. so much is shown that isn't true today, with caches of wellmeaning programs even, that infering according to an autonomous understanding of a machine's state is necessary. "no, the data is still in RAM, not on disk. sync MIGHT put it onto disk." and "no, my computer isn't old, despite this website saying so. exiting the website doesn't change that- closing the webbrowser MIGHT free RAM."

It is not only HyperbolaBSD or better not only exclusive as Hyperbola GNU/Linux-libre is the base for HyperbolaBSD upcoming. All packages included are for this elementary goal.