Nov 11 Updates / Sidequests & Hibernation

So, to start off, I would like to say that I do not have a lot to say about Amane specifically.

I have finished all the coding stuff. All the images have been resized and assigned to their product, all without me dragging a single image around. Instead, I only had to spent a month learning to code. But hey, in the long run it will pay off, right? I even made a start at fetching financial data from my site which I can then automatically put into a CSV file for a certain time period, this would make doing taxes much easier. For now, I do not need it though, so I am done with it. In fact, I have applied for a small business tax exemption, because having to declare taxes made me fucking depressed. And the good news is, that I got it. It means that until I have an annual revenue of €20.000, I will not have to declare my taxes every quarter. I do still have to declare income taxes once a year. What this also means is that my enterprise now has a financial goal: to earn less than €20.000 annually. I am proud to announce that I am on track of reaching my goal this year.

So far, all the automation that has happened behind the scenes.

After I was done with that, I moved on.

The following steps are clear. I need more pictures, more canvases to sell, and then start advertising them. I know how to do each step. Although, I have never done paid advertising, but it seems rather self-evident so I assume it will just be a matter of some time and effort to figure out.

However,

I got distracted…

I sorta lost my motivation. Instead, I started to research Linux. It’s a free and open source operating system that can do most things anyone needs. Think of it this way: the vast majority of people use windows. Not because they chose to, but because it is the default.

And why is it the default? Because Microsoft has been using their market dominance, to express even more dominance. Through their business strategies they ensure that Windows stays the default. It is typical business behavior, but not ideal.

Windows 11 costs $139 as a standalone. If you buy it pre-installed, it’s probably cheaper than that, but you still pay for it. In other words, everyone who has ever bought a Windows computer, has been lured into paying Microsoft simply because there is no alternative provided. There are, however, alternatives.

So then, my proposition to each and every PC manufacturer and reseller is this: allow users the option for their computer to come pre-installed with Linux, rather than Windows. It would be cheaper anyways.

There is an argument that says that Windows is better because it is more compatible, but this is a circular argument.

Windows is more compatible, because more people use it. More people use it, because it comes pre-installed. It comes pre-installed, because it is more compatible, ad infinitum.

In order to create a different circle, a transition must happen that will inevitably cause some issues with compatibility and muscle memory and whatever. But, that is life. When Linux becomes pre-installed, more people will use it, it will become more widely compatible, and then more resellers will want to pre-install it, etc. Why not start now?

So, yeah, this is what I have been looking into rather than putting any meaningful work in Amane.

I also learned that there also exist a free and open source RAW editor, darktable. Personally, I am not vibing with Adobe’s market dominance and their stupid subscription models. So, I wanted to see if darktable is any good and one thing that I notice is that it requires a lot more understanding of how image processing actually works which was actually kinda cool. After all, I do like to understand what I am doing. The tradeoff is that it certainly doesn’t have the same ease of use and beginner friendliness as Lightroom. But, the fact that you can do very similar things with darktable as with Lightroom, despite their size differences, is actually astounding.

If you simply try out Lightroom and darktable, you will find they are very similar. Generally, the consensus is that Lightroom is a bit more capable.

However, if we take in account that Adobe is a monolithic beast of a company that makes over $19 billion per year and that darktable is a community based project driven by a handful of volunteers, it suddenly makes the fact that Lightroom is a bit more capable a bit underwhelming. In terms of capabilities relative to invested (financial) resources, I would guess that darktable is probably a couple orders of magnitude more efficient. Besides, who doesn’t like a classic David VS Goliath story?

And hey, the same principle applies as with Linux. If darktable would become more widely adopted, more people would contribute, the software would become more capable, which would lead it to become more widely adopted, etc.

How great would it, if the most used software used in the world would be free, community-drive, and open-source?

By then, the software would actually even be better than proprietary software, because more people would work on it and the quality of the software depends on how many people work on it.

I would even go as far as to postulate that proprietary software would die out if that were to happen. Why would anyone choose to pay for something when you can get something more capable and more trustworthy, for free? This makes me want to become a programmer.

Well. Anyways…

…

As I said, I got distracted.

Besides being distracted, I have also been sleepy, so that’s that.

The next steps for Amane remain the same and luckily for me, I can afford the luxury of doing nothing. I do not have any financial goals to hit for this year, except for ensuring I remain tax exempted.

When will I take these steps? Who knows.

To be continued…

Featured image is AI generated by ChatGPT.

 

Nov 18 edit:

I saw a meme on reddit that perfectly encapsulates the train of thought I posted here.