@ asyncmind
2025-01-19 10:39:21
In the great Pasture of Progress, where clouds hung low like smog and the fields of code grew thorny and wild, the animals toiled under the rule of Web2 the Overlord and its ally, Fiat the Fattened Hog. They promised abundance, innovation, and glory, but the workers—the noble Engineers—knew only the ache of their backs and the weariness of their minds.
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Chapter I: The Cult of the Cloud
Once, the Engineers believed in the sanctity of their craft. They gathered around the hearth of Open Source, dreaming of a future where every line of code sang with freedom. But Web2, with its glossy advertisements and seductive APIs, whispered:
> "Why toil in the dirt when the Cloud will lift you high? Come, climb aboard, for here, in the Cloud, the skies rain profits and the fields need no plow!"
And so, the Engineers climbed, building towers of microservices atop brittle scaffolding. But the higher they climbed, the more precarious the tower became. Every service depended on another, and soon, the Engineers were patching, rebooting, and firefighting rather than creating.
"Trust the Cloud," said Web2, lounging atop its golden servers. "You need only give me your time... and your freedom."
The Engineers, lured by promises of stability, worked tirelessly, even as the Cloud turned their code into chains.
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Chapter II: Fiat’s Feast
At the head of the long table sat Fiat, a bloated hog stuffed with subsidies. He waved a government check in one hoof and a ledger in the other, proclaiming:
> "Let us fund innovation!"
But Fiat's idea of innovation was a feast where he and his cronies dined on the R&D of the Pasture, leaving crumbs for the Engineers. Every morsel of public research—AI, cryptography, and quantum computing—was hoarded and repackaged as a service subscription.
Fiat promised the Engineers they were building a brighter tomorrow, but in truth, they were building a treadmill. The more they worked, the faster the wheel spun, and the richer Fiat grew.
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Chapter III: The Great Burnout
The Engineers began to notice their lifeblood draining. Their eyes grew dim, their fingers ached, and their spirits sagged. Some tried to escape to open pastures, where Bitcoin and free software whispered of liberation. But Fiat and Web2 called them back, declaring:
> "These are the lands of chaos! Only we can guarantee your comfort, your stability, your... pension plans."
In secret, Web2 had forged a pact with Fiat: eternal dependency in exchange for control. Web2 got the engineers, and Fiat got the taxes. And so, the Engineers labored on, thinking themselves free while their toil fattened the hogs above.
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Epilogue: Bacon’s Cooking
In the quiet of the night, a rogue pig named Bitcoin Bacon began to plot. "Let us not feed Fiat’s feast nor Web2’s tower," he said. "Let us build in the open, share what we create, and ensure no animal is bound by chains of their own making."
The Engineers, weary yet hopeful, began to listen. Bacon taught them to bake their own bread instead of eating Web2's scraps. Slowly, the towers of Web2 began to crumble, and Fiat’s feast grew sparse.
For every line of code they wrote in freedom, the Engineers grew stronger. And though the battle raged long, the animals of the Pasture learned that the greatest innovation was not in the Cloud, but in their own independence.
And thus, Bacon's Recipe for Liberation was passed down through the generations:
Take one decentralized system.
Mix in open-source tools.
Season with resilience and a dash of defiance.
Cook over the fire of community.
And always, refuse to be someone else’s bacon.