the d/acc conference was great
"d/acc" is a movement for decentralized, defensive tech. it aims to usher in a technological golden age neither dominated by global government nor destroyed by unilateralist supervillains. it is vitalik buterin's response to the current times. this conference marks about a year since vitalik first coined the term.
I arrived in the afternoon. sadly this means I was too late for the epistemic panels (metaculus, community notes).
the lobby had a few people demoing their open-source hardware projects. one of them was a passive covid-detection machine. I talked to that guy about far-UV. all the other ones were
diy semiconductor manufacturing. i got to try out using a beam microscope to etch valleys onto a microchip. I knew the guy demoing a different open-source laser lithography machine, because i used to have a crush on his femboy roommate.
by far the most impressive talk was by Openwater. they make an open-source device that uses infrared and ultrasound to image the brain. they can even use the brain to fry parts of it from the inside, not at all like a microwave oven. they were able to treat cancer in mice and depression in humans (n=20). they're hoping to vastly speed up the lead time of medical advances by turning medicine into a software problem.
Why I went
There's a thin line between being a founder and being unemployed.
No but I do think this open source is quite important to manifold.love. I want to create a polycentric place where matchmakers of very different backgrounds and leaders of very different communities can come together to create great things. I don't recuse myself of the responsibility to creating good experiences, but I’m also not arrogant enough to believe I should rule from on high like zuckerberg. I can't do this myself - I’d like your warmth and energy too.
I plan to be at the Funding The Commons event at the Internet Archive on Saturday 3/15. Always happy to chat about open source, open funding, and open relationships!