Hi Gabriel and guix-devel, [I'm breaking the thread, if interested here are the referenced messages <[email protected]> <[email protected]>]
Please forgive me if I'm adding a quick off-topic comment about the often
misunderstood Luddite term.
On 2026-07-27, Gabriel Wicki wrote:
[...]
> 5. Technically: The (please excuse the potentially wrong label)
A label is a label is a label :-)
> "Luddite" angle ("these tools hurt real craftspersonship") seems to be
> historically wrong, in a way that is ignorant in how progress works in
> the tech world.
I just want to note that, despite /coded/ [1] common (mis)understanding on the
matter, some scholars are descibing the movement this way:
https://web.archive.org/web/20140301111725/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-the-luddites-really-fought-against-264412/?c=y&page=1
«What the Luddites Really Fought Against»
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[...] Despite their modern reputation, the original Luddites were neither
opposed to technology nor inept at using it. Many were highly skilled machine
operators in the textile industry.
[...] As the Industrial Revolution began, workers naturally worried about being
displaced by increasingly efficient machines. But the Luddites themselves “were
totally fine with machines,” says Kevin Binfield, editor of the 2004 collection
Writings of the Luddites. They confined their attacks to manufacturers who used
machines in what they called “a fraudulent and deceitful manner” to get around
standard labor practices. “They just wanted machines that made high-quality
goods,” says Binfield, “and they wanted these machines to be run by workers who
had gone through an apprenticeship and got paid decent wages. Those were their
only concerns.”
[...] standing up against technologies that put money or convenience above
other human values. If we don’t want to become, as Carlyle warned, “mechanical
in head and in heart,” it may help, every now and then, to ask which of our
modern machines General and Eliza Ludd would choose to break. And which they
would use to break them.
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In other words, they where _hackers_. :-)
So IMHO the "Luddite angle", as you called it, would be to choose the
"machines" we are going to use to break (hack) the "machines" we don't like.
Loving, Gio'
[1] «In modern usage, the term has come to refer to those who are opposed to
new technologies.[7]» (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddites, [7]refers to
P.S.: other than Luddite, I am a humanist, since technology is _part_ of the
human nature ;-)
--
Giovanni Biscuolo
Xelera IT Infrastructures
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