With every advancement our world makes, our technological abilities look more like Science Fiction.
We want that Science Fiction Future to look like the Star Trek Federation.
And we believe we have the responsibility to do what we can to make that happen.
What we want from the future
All people have guaranteed access to their basic needs - food, shelter, healthcare, and community
Maslow got to it first. You need to survive before you can thrive. We believe that no person should be wanting for food, shelter, health, or community.
We hope for a Universal Basic Income, and for an eventual post-capitalist, post-monetary society to meet this goal.
Civil rights are inalienably protected for all people
We want an end to discrimination based on race, gender, sex, sexuality, nationality, disability status, religion, and other personal traits.
We believe strongly that Due Process is a right belonging to all people, and a necessity for a functioning society.
We believe in a right to bodily autonomy, extending across the board. From the right to safe, legal abortions to death with dignity. From the ability to make body modifications like tattoos and piercings, to plastic surgery. From deserving informed consent in medicine to knowing what is in our food and that it is safe. From being able to reject a hug or handshake from a family member, to expecting consent in sexual relationships.
We believe that children are people with their own rights to bodily autonomy, self-identity, and privacy.
We believe that workers are owed a living wage, humane working conditions, and strong protections.
Technology is used to make life better for the many, not to enrich the few.
Technology should be used to improve safety, reduce required working hours, remove barriers to accessibility, and generally increase peoples’ quality of life.
Additionally, the financial benefits of increased automation and productivity should be used to improve wages for the workers, and must be used ensure the financial and physical security of the workers who were displaced by the need for decreased workforce.
Why that future is not a reality yet
Right now, those ideals are not being met. Physiological needs like food, water, and shelter are not guaranteed for all people. Civil rights are under attack, and discrimination is rampant.
On the tech-specific side, we are dealing with a phenomenon that Cory Doctorow called Enshittification - the namesake for Unshittify. As Cory describes it:
Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.
Cory has a number of fantastic articles about Enshittification, as well as about digital rights and human rights, and corporate and governmental responsibility.
As part of enshittification, as part of monopolization, as part of deregulation, large corporations are taking advantage of consumers. They’re taking advantage of every technological intervention possible to hoard power, money, and data. They are taking away individuals’ ability and rights to maintain their privacy, to own the things they pay for, to maintain their financial stability.
Corporations are actively working against the ideals that we want for our future, for their owners’ benefits.
And unfortunately, our cooperation with that system enforces their control.
How Unshittify brings us closer to our ideal future
Unshittify is about refusing to cooperate with that system. It’s about taking back our right to privacy, our right to ownership, and our right to consumer protections.
It’s about taking back the power these companies have stolen from us. We reclaim that power by switching to open-source options where we can, and when we can’t, we dilute the monopolies’ power by switching to companies and services that actively support and promote human rights.
How to use Unshittify
We have 3 main ways to use this website.
The Blog
Our blog is a mostly-choronological record of the projects we have done, and the changes we have made to our subscriptions, services, and products.
You should read the blog if:
- You want to follow along on our specific projects
- You want to see two somewhat-capable adults floundering about at the edge of their technical abilities
- You enjoy a fairly informal writing style
- You want to see everything that didn’t work for us.
The Outhouse
The Outhouse is a sortable, filterable list of common companies, services and products - we have assessed that they suffer from enshittification, or that their policies are regressive or otherwise antithetical to moving towards the future that we want.
Each entry in the Outhouse has a brief overview of our objections, and links to pages describing our recommended alternatives and in-depth documentation of how to make the switch.
We do our best to make a variety of suggested alternatives, including a low-cost option, a low-effort option, and an option that prioritizes privacy and control, even if it’s expensive and difficult.
You should use the Outhouse if:
- You want to Unshittify some specific part of your life
- You want an overview of the issues we find with common companies
- You need recommendations for Unshittifying on a low budget or with little capacity for DIY work
- You want step-by-step instructions
GNUtopia
GNUtopia is a curated collection of our favorite work from doing Unshittify. It mostly includes high-impact projects we’ve done and swaps we’ve personally made, but also has links to open-source products and helpful resources.
The name is a portmanteau of “Utopia” and “GNU,” the free-as-in-speech-not-beer operating system (which has a large open-source community around it).
You should check out GNUtopia if:
- You want an overview of what you can expect from Unshittify
- You want less-frequent updates
- You need an idea for what you should Unshittify next for the highest impact.