This seems kind of unnecessary. They’ve been pretty reasonable and polite, and after a quick look at their post history I didn’t see any sign that this was asked in bad faith.

I get that anarchists probably get tired of answering questions, but it also seems like an important part of getting people who aren’t already 100% onboard to better understand anarchy?

It may be a lack of imagination on my part, but I had trouble understanding most of the answers they got too, so I guess I sympathize.

I think it’s just reinforcing endless consumption as normal/good and blaming the youngest adult generation for whatever problems are happening.

When some CEO or economist goes on the evening news claiming that young people are deliberately sabotaging the economy (and their profits) by not consuming as much as previous generations, that’s the ‘under’ in underconsuming.

I don’t know if you’d find it worthwhile to put them all in one place too, but if you do, PoVoq (who runs the site) got the Movim microblogging platform set up and linked with Lemmy so if you have an account here, you can just start using it. It also uses the same markup language as Lemmy so you can just set a Lemmy post to edit, copy it, and paste it over there. I use it for my making and fixing stuff projects.

I love the concept of passive greenhouses, and even did a photobash of one when people in another community were wanting more winter solarpunk art (though these are more like the passive greenhouses highlighted in the Low Tech magazine article than a proper Walipini with the steeper windows etc).

I also like this image for walipinis, as it shows the cold sump though I don’t think the roof is right for where I am.

I definitely like the look of some of them

Very cool! Also just wanted to say I really appreciate these posts with their mix of text and images. Thanks for highlighting so many cool solarpunk concepts!

I’m so glad! And I’m glad you took a look at Harbour!

I’m not sure how seriously I’m going about promoting my work, exactly. I’m not trying to make money or anything, but I do want it to reach any audience that seems like a good fit, and I’ve found Lemmy and Mastodon to be great and encouraging spaces so far! I use a mix of federated and corporate sites for sharing the stuff I make. I’ve found that I have good conversations on both, but the corporate sites are much more aggressive at getting my stuff to the top of the search engine results. Some of them seem to have much less community though.

When I was regularly working on my Postcards from a Solarpunk Future series, I was very much trying to hit as many solarpunk communities as I could, as well as influence the first impressions people from outside the movement get of the genre, if possible, so I posted all over the place, my wordpress site, reddit, imgur, artstation, deviantart, as well as Lemmy, mastodon, and pixelfed. Even discord, occasionally. When you search relevant keywords, the reddit, deviantart, and artstation posts pop right up.

For ol’ President Deer, I’m not as aggressive about trying to get it seen, it was more just a for-fun project. I post it weekly on my wordpress website, deviantart, Mastodon, and pixelfed, and occasionally to Lemmy and reddit when it seems like a good fit for a specific community, but that’s not too often. It seems to be finding it’s audience (some old pages recently got some interest from a bunch of folks on Mastodon) though it’s obvious still quite small.

I’m not sure if that helps, but I hope it does. I’d say from what I’ve seen, I feel like I get more real interactions with other people on federated spaces, and I appreciate that I don’t feel like I’m getting buried by the whims of the algorithm. Though on the small subreddits I still use (/r/solarpunk and /r/CoreCyberpunk) it still seems okay?

With a mountain stream fed by springs or snowmelt, I’d trust that to rinse sweat and dirt out of clothes or blankets well enough. If you’re making surgical dressings or something, yeah, sterilize them separately.

Edit: plus, there may very well be a basin nearby you can use to suds up the fabric (ideally with something less damaging to waterways than most laundry soaps)

This is really cool! I think getting solar coolers into form factors compatible with how kitchens already operate could be a huge step towards adoption of the tech. It’s part of why I really like (this slightly simpler design)[https://solarcooking.fandom.com/wiki/Scheffler_Community_Kitchen]. I think the convenience factor in systems like this, where the cooks can operate basically as if it was a conventional oven, is great

Site prep is key, so make sure to bring a sledgehammer.

Happy to help!

There was this very cool handmade bike trailer wagon thing: https://slrpnk.net/post/1833883

For the artist’s experiences living out of it: https://theaimlesslywanderingartist.blogspot.com/2013/12/winter-comes-to-southern-california.html

But that’s a trailer. It sounds like you’re describing something closer to a Bicycle Rickshaw, possibly on a tricycle frame.

You could even do a recumbent bike:

It seems like either could be enclosed using techniques learned from popup campers for a fairly comfortable living space.

(I think a lot about all the crazy contraptions people would make if the roads weren’t exclusively the domain of giant trucks and SUVs, and if cargo bikes didn’t have to fit themselves into narrow bike lanes and roadsides. I think people would come up with some really cool and weird stuff. Add solar panels and ebike parts, and they’d get really interesting.)

That’s true of sedans and hatchbacks too though. Any reasonably sized car is unsafe while sharing the road with the giant trucks and SUVs they’re making to skirt around emissions requirements. I know Kei trucks in particular further lack crumple zones and other protections, but they’re otherwise so practical I wish there was a way to get them approved. Not every vehicle should be built to double as a daily driver.

My long-term dream is a much less car-dependant society, where most people have access to public transit and vehicles like this are there for actual truck purposes.

Speed limits would be a nice change, if only because they could reduce the endless campaign to expand roads to make them safer at higher and higher speeds, but I think it’d be an endless, contentious fight with very little to prevent people (who’ve spent their whole lives dependant on cars for anything they need) from changing them back. I have been impressed with my city for gradually narrowing it’s streets and converting lanes into restaurant space, bike lanes, and I think parks.

I love this kind of solarpunk art, showing largely practical reuse of existing buildings and infrastructure. Especially with the modifications to strengthen community and reduce car reliance.

Absolute worst case, the pavement was used to cap a contaminated site (rather than excavate the contaminated soil and move it to a lined and capped landfill).

Thank you!

Yeah I don’t think they’re talking about you

It depends on what you need to enjoy the space.

If you’re looking for a grass alternative and aren’t running around on it all the time, roman chamomile can be a good, low-growing, pet-safe plant. We used this on my neighbor’s postage stamp front lawn so he wouldn’t have to mow but it would still look nice and intentional. There are also a handful of other low-growing plants which require much less maintenance and are more drought-tolerant than grass, but they tend to be best for low-traffic areas, so if you’re out there playing catch or capture the flag with your kids most days they’re probably not as good as grass.

If you’re in a shady area, moss might be an option. It also prefers low traffic.

And the option abhored by HOAs and your fussiest neighbors: just don’t bother maintaining a perfect lawn. A lot of the work and environmental damage comes from keeping a perfect monocrop of a specific grass cultivar. Fertilizer to keep the soil good enough (which gets washed into local waterways and causes algae blooms) pesticides (which kill bees and a slew of other insects) and herbicides to kill any plants that try to compete with the grass (which remain in the soil as well). Traps for rodents that try to exist in the yard. Not to mention the energy and person-hours spent on trimming it frequently. Just accepting that grass isn’t really meant to form a thick lawn in most areas, and will look a bit patchy, multi-hued, and feature some other plants, will greatly reduce the effort and damage caused.

Or if you can’t stand the thought of doing that (or will get in trouble) consider downsizing it a little - section off the least-used sections of your lawn, plant some cool native trees or shrubs, throw down some mulch so it looks intentional.

And the last option (where applicable): no grass.

When I was a kid our house was in the woods, with no clearing to speak of, so we mostly just played on the forest floor, which was mostly leaves and pine needles. If you pick up the sticks and keep it somewhat open, it can look really beautiful.

Some kindle books I ‘owned’ recently got updates pushed to them, which in this case included a new cover or I probably wouldn’t have noticed. In 1984 they were fucking about with recalling books and issuing ‘corrected’ ones. But with online media, centralized in a company’s server, it’s comparatively easy to push changes.

Thank you! And thanks for the reminder to update the links, I’ll fix those shortly.

I actually haven’t heard of We3 but I’ll check it out, thanks for the recommendation!