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All the spirit of the old 90s internet is still here! You just have to look a little harder to find it. I used to muse that in the early 90s only nerdier types were online or doing things with computers, then in the 2000s it all became very mainstream, then by the late 2010s it was a nerdier activity again (because the overwhelming majority of users just access a few social media services via smartphones.) Getting into anti-corporate and underground things (like the fediverse, or even here) is super nostalgic and definitely makes me feel like I'm engaging in something hidden, something nice, something profoundly nerdy again.

In addition, there are mechanisms that keep things like the Fediverse from being taken over by corporate entities who would have it all well-lit, sterilized and centralized. The way a lot of free software is licensed is designed to keep this from happening.

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