Code is Power!

From Code to Control: How Big Tech Claims Ownership of the User

September 2025 has been a brutal reminder of a truth we at Purism have been voicing for years: code is power. And when that code is closed, opaque, or controlled by Big Tech vendors who prioritize convenience or monetization over user rights, the end-user becomes the product, not the principal.

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Цифровой звук на PC Speaker

Я часто рассказываю о временах, когда домашние компьютеры 1980-х годов только обретали звуковые возможности, и о различных формах ранней компьютерной музыки, создаваемой на этих машинах программными синтезаторами, специализированными звуковыми чипами, или проигрывателями оцифровок реальных звуков.

Уделял я внимание и такому базовому звуковому устройству, как PC Speaker — его наследие до сих пор присутствует в современных ПК. В прошлый раз, однако, речь шла про его способности в области имитации многоголосия в монофонических квадратно-волновых мелодиях.

Сегодня же я коснусь такой темы, как воспроизведение реалистичных звуков, «оцифровок», привычных нам в современности. Это нота ностальгии по техническому чуду, когда ПК, обычно издававший звуки не сильно лучше...

Purism Defends the Fourth Amendment in the Digital Age

A newly revealed WIRED investigation shows that the United States Government is creating a vast social media surveillance network, one that will operate around the clock and rely heavily on private contractors. Officials insist the system targets foreign nationals—but its scope and design make it inevitable that millions of Americans’ online activity will also be swept up. This is unconstitutional.

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OpenStreetMap x Wikidata Collaboration: Taiwan Case (sotm2025)

Not only NSI, but Wikidata can be integrated with OpenStreetMap, and vice versa! Many years ago, with the help of Wikidata Taiwan, OpenStreetMap Taiwan has mapped all 7,000 villages, and also cross-linked to Wikidata. We also have a similar river project of mapping all rivers in Taiwan and crosslinking to Wikidata with the help of the river code published by the Taiwan government. In this talk, we want to further talk about the school, mountain, church, temple, and hiking trail mapping projects, which also have the corresponding external 3rd-party Wikidata property. We will also...

The Ugandan Geo Quests: Mapping Libraries and Museums into the Knowledge Commons (sotm2025)

Across Uganda, countless community libraries and local museums hold untold stories, cultural memory, and untapped knowledge—but remain invisible on the digital map. The Ugandan Geo Quests project aims to change that. This session introduces two complementary national mapping initiatives: The Ugandan Libraries Geo Quest and The Ugandan Museums Geo Quest, which leverage OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, and Wikipedia to bring local knowledge institutions into the global digital commons. We’ll explore how we: Mobilized local communities, Wikimedians, and mappers for participatory documentation Used tools like uMap, ODK Collect and KoboToolbox to ensure data quality and visibility Linked OSM data with Wikidata and...

Threads From the 2025 Cypherpunk Retreat

Key takeaways from the Cypherpunk Retreat, where 100 leading builders advanced privacy-tech coordination.

What opinions do LLMs/chatbots have about OpenStreetMap? (sotm2025)

In this work we develop a reproducible pipeline for querying multiple LLMs/chatbots in order to access and analyse their opinion on OpenStreetMap by prompting these systems to answer a series of questions on OSM. People are turning to chatbots and LLMs for opinions and advice on practically every topic. We believe it is important that we begin to assess how chatbots and the LLMs provide information and opinion about OSM. Among other outputs, this work can providing evidence to the OSM community that can be used to shape future public engagement strategies about...

Behaviour-Based Quality Assessment of OpenStreetMap Data in Data Scarce Area Using Unsupervised Machine Learning (sotm2025)

This study introduces a behavior-dependent, unsupervised machine learning approach to assess the intrinsic quality of OpenStreetMap (OSM) data in Dhaka, which is both data-starved and urbanizing rapidly urbanizing area. Leveraging enriched contributor metadata and Principal Component Analysis (PCA), latent behavioral patterns and segmented contributors identified using KMeans and HDBSCAN. The silhouette score for PCA-based clustering was 0.951. The results show superior interpretability of KMeans over HDBSCAN. This repeatable methodology provides a scalable and reference-free solution to take quality assurance of VGI datasets to the front-line, in cases of limited or no authoritative data. OpenStreetMap (OSM) is an important...

Platinum Sponsor Session: OSM Data for Two-Wheelers and Safety (sotm2025)

This talk delves into the unique challenges and opportunities of enhancing OpenStreetMap (OSM) data for two-wheeler routing and safety. Two-wheelers are a vital mode of transportation within SEA, yet their safety needs are often overlooked. Drawing from our experience in building and contributing enriched safety data back to OSM, we explore how attributes like lighting conditions, speed bumps, and pothole assessments can make navigation safer and more efficient for two-wheelers. Through this talk, we aim to inspire the OSM community to prioritize safety attributes for improving map data quality for two-wheelers. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported...

Intelligent Enough? Evaluating Collective Action in HOT Tasking Manager Mapping Projects (sotm2025)

This talk examines the dynamics of collective intelligence in humanitarian mapping projects coordinated through the HOT Tasking Manager, using a dataset of 746 projects and 312,289 tasks to evaluate participation, collaboration, and evidence of intelligent group behavior. Humanitarian mapping projects coordinated through the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team Tasking Manager (HOT-TM) represent a paradigmatic case of large-scale digital collaboration. Yet, while their practical utility in disaster response and preparedness is increasingly evident, the underlying collective dynamics that allow these efforts to function effectively remain under-explored. This talk builds on our recent article published in ACM Transactions on...