{"items":[{"id":"65aba5a8-ac85-4f9c-8aec-025dea523f98","title":"Analog roots in a Digital Age","slug":"analog-roots-in-a-digital-age","contentHtml":"

It's been over a year since I started experimenting with Linux, dedicating my time to creating a personalized virtual environment that suits me.

It was the beginning of November 2023 when, after retrieving an old 2011 MacBook Pro, I installed an SSD in it and began tinkering with Arch Linux to get it running smoothly.
Since then, I sold my main notebook to buy a mini desktop PC to integrate with my existing 35\" wide monitor, I stopped (or at least paused) my distro-hopping after discovering Solus OS in its KDE Plasma version, I created a Mastodon account (quite impulsively at first—I later closed it, and after a few months I opened another one with a more careful approach to using this tool), I started maintaining this blog in English, I discovered Bitwig for music production on Linux, I deepened my knowledge and skills (especially logical ones) regarding Linux, and much more.

As I said, I quit distro-hopping, perhaps because my obsession faded and I truly began using Solus OS daily without worrying too much about what else I might need or like.
There was a long period with Arch Linux and testing a variety of DE/WM through spring-summer 2024, but in the end—despite having spent about a month with the interesting ArchCraft—I switched to Solus OS after testing it for several months on an old notebook with the Budgie DE.

Well, I simply didn’t need anything more than to set aside the compulsive interest in testing various distros and DEs and instead use it as a “mainstream” system.
And I'm much better off now.

I enjoy discovering clever tricks, customizing my DE, and knowing I have a \"sandbox\" I can really work in after having had some fun with it.

My awareness has grown over time, also noticing how the environment on Mastodon is full of people genuinely interested in discovering novelties in GNU/Linux operating systems and open source alternatives to multinational IT products, yet it is also a place marked by increasing fundamentalism and intolerance toward those who don't consider themselves politically \"progressive.\"

At 33 years old (soon to be 34), I consider myself a conservative who has discovered that progress can be (very) good.
I don’t like the way various groups behave online—the nostalgic types, the ultra-progressives, activists and SJWs, fans of Trump and Musk, voters of Italy's center-left PD, deniers and anti-vaxxers, proselytizers of the new AI church, FOSS fundamentalists, flat earthers and veteran xenophobic fascists, furries, and the like.

In short, I have issues with how so many categories of people operate online.
And yet, I don't have a problem with individuals per se.
In fact, I often encounter people who are very helpful, courteous, and keen on making you understand the importance of their opinions without imposing them, while also respecting your point of view.

I have realized that in a world that, like a 100% green train, is speeding toward a cliff, I still prefer to use a gasoline car—only if I can’t get around by bike.
I use—and indeed exploit—Mastodon and FOSS for my own purposes; I don’t hide that fact.

Occasionally, I've even contributed to Italian translations of the open-source projects I use, using Mastodon as a communication channel with developers, and I support frequently used projects with small donations.
However, I do not believe that humanity truly needs social networks (and I intentionally generalize), nor that it's necessary to “form a community” around a federated social platform like, for example, the \"mastodon.uno\" instance to which I’m registered.

In fact, I claim the freedom to live as “digital monads,” without any particularly significant connections.
I believe that, as always—and even more so in recent decades—humanity simply needs to disconnect from its digital devices and return to the land, to work the soil, to discover local festivals, to explore the anachronistic traditions and delve deeper into their less obvious meanings, and to gaze at the starry sky pondering existential questions of meaning.

I really like generative AI as a tool and have been using it for about a year to translate and rework/improve texts.
And yet, when it comes to art, I believe that humanity needs to keep a diary, to take photos inspired by one’s favorite photographers and store them on a hard disk where no one will ever see them, to paint and sculpt (even without being particularly skilled), to play in a band and record on one’s PC without being famous, and still expect to call all of this \"art.\"

After all, for those who already have everything, the only thing left may be the frantic search for more money, more satisfaction, more stimuli, and more sensations—unless one understands the importance of simply returning to being a wandering homo sapiens on this Earth.

After all this digression, the question that comes to mind is: What is the point of getting passionate about a technology, using clever tricks to foretell the future and explain it to our eyes, basing one's identity on one's interpretation of the internet, software, or hardware... if, in the end, humanity loses the ability to change the environment in which it lives with its own hands?

We see a blooming of YouTube channels featuring people who renovate houses by themselves, build wooden cabins in the woods, or declutter wardrobes, rooms, or entire houses, yet we seem unable to be simple men and women as our grandparents and great-grandparents once were.
\"There was war and misery in those days,\" some might say—but isn't that what we see in the human spirit even today? And increasingly so, I would add...

Once we recover our \"analog\" roots, looking toward the \"digital\" future will make even more sense.

","contentJson":{"type":"doc","content":[{"type":"image","attrs":{"alt":null,"src":"/api/uploads/92c8d468-10c8-4fd5-a35a-4d7e4079d067.webp","title":null,"width":null,"height":null}},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"It's been over a year since I started experimenting with Linux, dedicating my time to creating a personalized virtual environment that suits me.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"It was the beginning of November 2023 when, after retrieving an old 2011 MacBook Pro, I installed an SSD in it and began tinkering with Arch Linux to get it running smoothly.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"Since then, I sold my main notebook to buy a mini desktop PC to integrate with my existing 35\" wide monitor, I stopped (or at least paused) my distro-hopping after discovering Solus OS in its KDE Plasma version, I created a Mastodon account (quite impulsively at first—I later closed it, and after a few months I opened another one with a more careful approach to using this tool), I started maintaining this blog in English, I discovered Bitwig for music production on Linux, I deepened my knowledge and skills (especially logical ones) regarding Linux, and much more.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"As I said, I quit distro-hopping, perhaps because my obsession faded and I truly began using Solus OS daily without worrying too much about what else I might need or like.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"There was a long period with Arch Linux and testing a variety of DE/WM through spring-summer 2024, but in the end—despite having spent about a month with the interesting ArchCraft—I switched to Solus OS after testing it for several months on an old notebook with the Budgie DE.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"Well, I simply didn’t need anything more than to set aside the compulsive interest in testing various distros and DEs and instead use it as a “mainstream” system.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"And I'm much better off now.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"I enjoy discovering clever tricks, customizing my DE, and knowing I have a \"sandbox\" I can really work in after having had some fun with it.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"My awareness has grown over time, also noticing how the environment on Mastodon is full of people genuinely interested in discovering novelties in GNU/Linux operating systems and open source alternatives to multinational IT products, yet it is also a place marked by increasing fundamentalism and intolerance toward those who don't consider themselves politically \"progressive.\"","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"At 33 years old (soon to be 34), I consider myself a conservative who has discovered that progress can be (very) good.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"I don’t like the way various groups behave online—the nostalgic types, the ultra-progressives, activists and SJWs, fans of Trump and Musk, voters of Italy's center-left PD, deniers and anti-vaxxers, proselytizers of the new AI church, FOSS fundamentalists, flat earthers and veteran xenophobic fascists, furries, and the like.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"In short, I have issues with how so many categories of people operate online.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"And yet, I don't have a problem with individuals per se.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"In fact, I often encounter people who are very helpful, courteous, and keen on making you understand the importance of their opinions without imposing them, while also respecting your point of view.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"I have realized that in a world that, like a 100% green train, is speeding toward a cliff, I still prefer to use a gasoline car—only if I can’t get around by bike.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"I use—and indeed exploit—Mastodon and FOSS for my own purposes; I don’t hide that fact.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"Occasionally, I've even contributed to Italian translations of the open-source projects I use, using Mastodon as a communication channel with developers, and I support frequently used projects with small donations.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"However, I do not believe that humanity truly needs social networks (and I intentionally generalize), nor that it's necessary to “form a community” around a federated social platform like, for example, the \"","type":"text"},{"text":"mastodon.uno","type":"text","marks":[{"type":"link","attrs":{"rel":"noopener noreferrer nofollow","href":"http://mastodon.uno","class":null,"title":null,"target":"_blank"}}]},{"text":"\" instance to which I’m registered.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"In fact, I claim the freedom to live as “digital monads,” without any particularly significant connections.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"I believe that, as always—and even more so in recent decades—humanity simply needs to disconnect from its digital devices and return to the land, to work the soil, to discover local festivals, to explore the anachronistic traditions and delve deeper into their less obvious meanings, and to gaze at the starry sky pondering existential questions of meaning.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"I really like generative AI as a tool and have been using it for about a year to translate and rework/improve texts.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"And yet, when it comes to art, I believe that humanity needs to keep a diary, to take photos inspired by one’s favorite photographers and store them on a hard disk where no one will ever see them, to paint and sculpt (even without being particularly skilled), to play in a band and record on one’s PC without being famous, and still expect to call all of this \"art.\"","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"After all, for those who already have everything, the only thing left may be the frantic search for more money, more satisfaction, more stimuli, and more sensations—unless one understands the importance of simply returning to being a wandering homo sapiens on this Earth.","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"After all this digression, the question that comes to mind is: What is the point of getting passionate about a technology, using clever tricks to foretell the future and explain it to our eyes, basing one's identity on one's interpretation of the internet, software, or hardware... if, in the end, humanity loses the ability to change the environment in which it lives with its own hands?","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"We see a blooming of YouTube channels featuring people who renovate houses by themselves, build wooden cabins in the woods, or declutter wardrobes, rooms, or entire houses, yet we seem unable to be simple men and women as our grandparents and great-grandparents once were.","type":"text"},{"type":"hardBreak"},{"text":"\"There was war and misery in those days,\" some might say—but isn't that what we see in the human spirit even today? And increasingly so, I would add...","type":"text"}]},{"type":"paragraph","content":[{"text":"Once we recover our \"analog\" roots, looking toward the \"digital\" future will make even more sense.","type":"text"}]}]},"remote":false,"status":"published","publishAt":null,"language":"en","summary":null,"coverUrl":null,"bannerUrl":"/api/uploads/92c8d468-10c8-4fd5-a35a-4d7e4079d067.webp","coverCredit":null,"createdAt":"2026-07-17T10:33:29.196Z","updatedAt":"2026-07-17T10:33:29.196Z","author":{"id":"31ad3a39-dc1e-406f-b583-b87f9d490af5","username":"tommasocroce","displayName":"Tommaso Croce","avatarUrl":"/api/uploads/b73372b8-b93e-4313-be43-a4b6799c03c7.webp","remote":false},"tags":[{"slug":"analog","name":"analog"},{"slug":"art","name":"art"},{"slug":"digital","name":"digital"},{"slug":"identitity","name":"identitity"},{"slug":"tradition","name":"tradition"}],"likeCount":1,"liked":false,"commentCount":1,"recommendCount":0,"recommended":false,"recommendedBy":null}],"nextCursor":null}