At the 39th Chaos Communication Congress (39C3), Marc-Uwe Kling introduced the idea of a Digital Independence Day and it deeply resonated with me.
We already saw examples of misuse of power when U.S. sanctions abruptly cut ICC officials off from everyday essentials: email, bank accounts, credit cards, and even services like Alexa and e-books.
(Marc-Uwe Kling is a popular German author and the writer of the Kangaroo books (the “Känguru-Chroniken” universe)).
On every first Sunday of the month, you spend a bit of time becoming less dependent on Big Tech.
Not in a dramatic “delete everything and move to a cave” kind of way. More like: small, repeatable, realistic steps.
Here are a few examples, one thing a month is plenty:
If you happen to know what the points on this list mean, you should help others becoming digitally independent.
The magic isn’t in doing everything. It’s in doing something regularly, so “I should really…” becomes actual progress over time.
If you want, treat this as a recurring appointment with your future self: an hour a month, for more autonomy and less platform gravity.
For convenience, here’s an ICS calendar event you can subscribe to:
Digital Independence Day Calendar Event
…and I am an Specialist for Web Accessibility and UX-Engineer with over 20 years of experience, by day and a podcaster by night.
I help organizations build accessible websites by offering talks about accessibility, workshops & trainings, accessibility reviews and developing strategies for developers and management.
If that sounds like you could use my help, let’s talk! 💬