Chris Lowis
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chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Chris Lowis
@chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
27 followers 1 following 26 posts
Worker/owner at Go Free Range, a friendly tech co-operative.

Working on https://jam.coop - a co-operatively owned online music store.

#ruby #cooperatives […]

[bridged from https://ruby.social/@chrislowis on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]
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chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
> SuperCollider's powerful audio synthesis engine scsynth running in the browser as an AudioWorklet.

https://sonic-pi.net/supersonic/demo.html
SuperSonic - SuperCollider's Synthesis Engine in the Browser
SuperCollider's powerful scsynth audio synthesis engine running in the browser as an AudioWorklet. Zero installation.
sonic-pi.net
October 27, 2025 at 5:14 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Heartbreaking. Rest in peace Daniel.
https://www.chess.com/news/view/grandmaster-daniel-naroditsky-dies-at-29
Grandmaster, Popular Commentator Daniel Naroditsky Tragically Passes Away At 29
GM Daniel Naroditsky, the popular U.S. grandmaster, commentator, creator, educator, and author, unexpectedly passed away on Sunday at the age of only 29.
www.chess.com
October 20, 2025 at 8:11 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
"Spotify's purpose is to transport hundreds of millions of dollars created by musicians into the bank accounts of the owners of humanity's most advanced autonomous weapons platforms."

https://terminal.ahumanfuture.co/posts/2025-10-17/the-world-is-something-that-we-make/
The world is something that we make // Terminal
“...and could just as easily make differently.”
terminal.ahumanfuture.co
October 20, 2025 at 6:13 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Today I learnt about dark-skinned, blue-eyed ancient England native Cheddar Gorge Man: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheddar_Man. Don't tell Dave.
Cheddar Man - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
September 22, 2025 at 4:05 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Dear David: https://chrislowis.co.uk/2025/09/17/dear-david
Dear David
Dear David, Ruby has brought me immense joy during my life and I’ve made many close friends thanks to a shared love of the language. Rails, thanks to the contributions of you and hundreds of others, has allowed me to experience that joy at work too. However, I can’t describe how disappointed I was to read your recent blog post “As I remember London”. I remember when you visited the London Ruby User Group. We didn’t speak but you came to the after-talk drinks at a packed Lamb and Flag pub. I’m sure when you looked around that pub you saw, like me, a couple of hundred rubyists of many different nationalities, backgrounds, ethnicities. I’m sure several of those rubyists shook your hand, welcomed you to London and made sure you had a drink. That, to me as a Londoner, is London in microcosm. Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (aka Tommy Robinson) does not campaign for “Britain for the Brits”. He campaigns, as I’m sure you’re aware from the Wikipedia page you cited as evidence, for Britain for White Brits. As a White Brit he doesn’t make me feel proud, or patriotic. He makes me feel scared - scared for my wife, my non-White British friends, my neighbours, the teachers of all races and religions who teach my kids. But we won’t give up. We did survive the Blitz (my grandparents fought the Nazis). Britain hasn’t gone anywhere. Minaswan, Chris
chrislowis.co.uk
September 17, 2025 at 9:36 AM
Reposted by Chris Lowis
boffbowsh.mastodon.me.uk.ap.brid.gy
Hi Fedi. I've been working on a #strictlycomedancing prediction site. This started as a small manual Google Forms-based league with friends and family during lockdown, and was quite good fun.

This year I finally got around to doing it all "properly", so it's now open to everyone […]
Original post on mastodon.me.uk
mastodon.me.uk
August 25, 2025 at 8:04 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Really lovely and restorative day and a bit in Brighton for #brightonruby . Thank you @andycroll for putting on a fantastic event and giving me the excuse to come and catch up with some old ruby friends.
June 19, 2025 at 10:07 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
@janmon love the pihole post. Been on my list for a while now I've moved house so thanks for the tips and nudge!
May 31, 2025 at 5:18 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: 🔗 Quoting Jason Gorman https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/28/quoting-jason-gorman.html
🔗 Quoting Jason Gorman
🔗 Quoting Jason Gorman > Most managers see teams as vehicles for delivering software. This misses the bigger picture. The value of any iteration of the software is ephemeral, and the code itself is a liability: it has negative value. > > What has far more value over the lifetime of a software product or system is the capability of the dev team to keep hitting a moving target - to rapidly, reliably and sustainably adapt the software. > > I see software delivery as a vehicle for building teams. The team is the _real_ product.
chrislowis.co.uk
April 28, 2025 at 11:03 AM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: 🔗 Emacs Lisp Elements https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/18/emacs-lisp-elements.html
🔗 Emacs Lisp Elements
🔗 Emacs Lisp Elements > The fun part is how you go about writing the code. There are no duties you have to conform with. None! You program for the sake of programming. It is a recreational activity that expands your horizons.
chrislowis.co.uk
April 18, 2025 at 8:27 AM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: 🔗 The composer still making music four years after his death https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/18/the-composer-still-making-music-four-years-after-his-death.html
🔗 The composer still making music four years after his death
🔗 The composer still making music four years after his death > Under a magnifying lens sit two white blobs, like a tiny pair of jellyfish. Together, they form the lab-grown “mini-brain” of the late US musician Alvin Lucier – composing a posthumous score in real time. Artists grow stem cells taken from Alvin Lucier and incorporate it into an artwork. There’s always a lot of “AI will destroy us all” commentary around stories like this, in practice I suspect whatever is in the petri-dish is behaving more-or-less as a random number generator. I love Lucier’s collection of lectures on contemporary music Music 109 and I’m sure he intended this project to be thought-provoking and make for a good yarn.
chrislowis.co.uk
April 18, 2025 at 8:20 AM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: 🔗 Photographs of Old Japan https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/18/photographs-of-old-japan.html
🔗 Photographs of Old Japan
🔗 Photographs of Old Japan > These pictures, the work of several different photographers,1 were assembled by a pair of collectors named Henry and Nancy Rosin. They were originally shot in black and white, then hand-coloured by artists — a technique common at the time. All were taken between the years 1860-1900, meaning the earliest of them just predates the Meiji Restoration, when the last shōgun still ruled Japan. I visited the Daibutsu statue in Kamakura a long time again. I remember thinking at the time that for the rest of my life it would also be there, sitting. These photos were taken long before then, between 1860-1900.
chrislowis.co.uk
April 18, 2025 at 8:14 AM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: CSS Naked Day https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/08/css-naked-day.html
CSS Naked Day
CSS Naked Day > The idea behind CSS Naked Day is to promote web standards. Plain and simple. This includes proper use of HTML, semantic markup, a good hierarchy structure, and of course, a good old play on words. In the words of 2006, it’s time to show off your <body> for what it really is. On or around April 9th a little bit of code disables CSS on our co-op’s website. The web, and the world, has changed a lot since 2006 but traditions like this still make me feel part of something. A reminder of a gentler web, but one that still exists if we want it to.
chrislowis.co.uk
April 8, 2025 at 9:17 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Blog post: Comradery - co-op run Patreon alternative https://chrislowis.co.uk/link/2025/04/07/comradery-co-op-run-patreon-alternative.html
Comradery - co-op run Patreon alternative
Comradery - co-op run Patreon alternative > Comradery is a digital platform where creators can receive monthly payments from supporters, and optionally give those supporters exclusive access to posts and media. > > What makes Comradery different is we are a worker cooperative democratically owned and controlled equally by all the creators in our organization (that means you!). Interesting Patreon-like service run as a co-operative. It seems like they are considering the governance and co-op structure up-front which is something we talked about when starting jam.coop but decided to iterate on as we grow. I really like > Comradery rejects the “hypergrowth” paradigm of the tech industry I don’t think Patreon creators (or supporters) really want it to keep growing and changing. It’s infrastructure, not a product in itself. /via James
chrislowis.co.uk
April 7, 2025 at 11:06 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Gary Stevenson said in a recent interview that going to the gym is really popular among young people because, unlike pretty much everything else in late-stage capitalism, if you put in the work you'll see positive results.

That, but in my 40's.

#chess
A copy of Brunia and van Wijgerden's book "Learning Chess - Step 2" on top of a notebook with handwritten solutions to chess puzzles.
January 29, 2025 at 10:43 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
My Yearnotes for 2024: https://chrislowis.co.uk/weeknotes/2025/01/17/yearnotes

#weeknotes #yearnotes
Yearnotes 2024
<p>For Christmas 2023 I bought A- some more rollerskating lessons. On the first lesson back in 2024 she fell and broke her leg in two places. This had a pretty big impact on the first half of 2024! The surgery went well and she was able to make it home to us after a week in hospital. As soon as her Mum heard she flew over to us and stayed for several weeks. We were extremely grateful for this as handling the day-to-day with the boys as well as looking after A- was a lot for me to take on. It was really hard to watch A- in pain, and as the pain gave way to the frustration of being immobile it was hard to find things to keep spirits up. But as the year went on with some physiotherapy and a hard work on A-‘s part she started to become more mobile and able to handle the day-to-day routine. Her parents visited us during the school summer holidays and we were able to explore <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portreath">Cornwall</a> together for a week.</p> <p>I spent a lot more time indoors in the first part of the year than I would otherwise. I spent some of that time working on <a href="https://jam.coop">jam.coop</a> and made a little progress, but I soon got quite burned out. I find it mentally harder now to work on “serious” side projects alongside the (programming) day job. I think the reality of jam.coop is that it is only likely to gain traction if there is a serious move away from Bandcamp. In the meantime, there’s features I know I need to build and conversations I know I need to have, but finding the motivation is hard. Despite this, I’m proud that it more-or-less runs without too much intervention. Later in the year I found some time to improve the design and make <a href="https://github.com/freerange/jam-coop">some other improvements</a>.</p> <p>Another consequence of spending time indoors was that I fell into a chess rabbit hole. N- had started to show a bit of interest in the game and I decided to “brush up” a bit so that I didn’t pass on too many bad habits. Soon I’d started playing regularly myself on <a href="https://chess.com">chess.com</a> (and later on <a href="https://lichess.org/@/theharvestbow">lichess</a>). I even played a tournament at the <a href="https://www.hendonchessclub.com/">local chess club</a> where I was roundly humbled by a parade of kids. I really enjoy solving chess puzzles, and that - combined with a less helpful interest in <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8npkrey66o">chess drama</a> - turned out to be surprisingly useful when I needed a distraction from global events.</p> <p>I spent less time making music this year, but still kept up a bit of a habit. I’ve been enjoying a few music-making apps on the iPad - in particular <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/samplr/id560756420">Samplr</a> and <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/borderlands-granular/id561369733">Borderlands</a> which really make the most of the touch screen.</p> <p>Work was mostly enjoyable too. We worked with the Government Digital Service and the Raspberry Pi Foundation again, as well as a fun shorter project doing some client-side-only prototyping. It was a more stressful end to the year than we’d hoped when work dried up and it seemed very hard to find something new. Fortunately we agreed a new project for 2025 just as we broke up for Christmas.</p> <p>I’ve continued to make regular visits to the hospital as part of the <a href="https://chrislowis.co.uk/weeknotes/2024/01/01/yearnotes">clinical trial</a> and on the whole I feel well. The new medicine is proving to be very effective in a scientific sense, and is also working well for me personally.</p> <p>I spent the Christmas holiday’s in Colombia visiting family. A- and I were able to sneak away for a fun couple of days in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medell%C3%ADn">Medellín</a> and the whole family had a relaxing few days just outside Bogotá in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anapoima">Anapoima</a>. I say relaxing. F-‘s first action upon arriving at the holiday house was to take his clothes off and jump into the swimming pool. F- can’t swim. After an unscheduled, fully-clothed dip to rescue him I was grateful of the glass of whisky my father-in-law passed me.</p>
chrislowis.co.uk
January 17, 2025 at 7:34 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
- Photo above is for reference only - Actual object is a bit different
December 23, 2024 at 1:09 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Had a tidy up and simplification of my #emacs config and put it on github: https://github.com/chrislo/emacs
November 16, 2024 at 12:35 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Well said @james, well said.

https://interblah.net/not-all-accusations-are-baseless
November 9, 2024 at 2:05 PM
chrislowis.ruby.social.ap.brid.gy
Hey folks! We (@freerange) have some availability at the moment. Do you need help building software?

Our ideal project involves working as part of a multi-disciplinary team on a creative, web-based application. We like small-"a" agile approaches and can help you get better at working in that […]
Original post on ruby.social
ruby.social
October 23, 2024 at 2:57 PM
Reposted by Chris Lowis
raganwald.social.bau-ha.us.ap.brid.gy
Disclaimer: I do not have a degree in business, so this opinion is for entertainment purposes only. but here goes...

Capitalists like businesses that are capital-intensive. I recall one of Canada's resource robber-barons saying that the thing he liked […]

[Original post on social.bau-ha.us]
Low rear three-quarter view of a black vehicle with the Uber logo in white on its foank.
September 24, 2024 at 4:38 PM