DEV Community: Enri Marini

The Hijacked Promise of Smart Manufacturing

Enri Marini — Sun, 21 Sep 2025 16:41:52 +0000

Smart manufacturing was born with a powerful mission. It was supposed to be the next great public good — an open technological commons that would make production more efficient, more resilient, and more equitable. The dream was bold: an interoperable ecosystem where data flowed freely, hardware was modular and plentiful, and anyone — from the smallest startup to the largest factory — could innovate without barriers.

At its core, the promise was simple. Waste not, want not. By tracking every input and output with precision, society could reduce waste, improve safety, and maximize yield. Supply chains could become resilient instead of brittle. Workers could gain better jobs with better pay. Communities could share in the wealth created by smarter, leaner, more sustainable production.

Billions of public dollars have been spent chasing this vision. Yet more than a decade later, the results are paltry at best — and in many ways, worse than nothing. Instead of a flourishing public commons, we are left with an ecosystem dominated by a handful of industry associations and OEMs who have turned a public mission into a private feeding trough.

Captured Institutions

Organizations like CESMII, ISA, A3 and countless others were supposed to be the vanguard of this movement. They presented themselves as neutral, mission-driven bodies, stewarding taxpayer funds into projects that would democratize technology. But in reality, their boards are packed with executives from the very corporations that profit most from closed systems. The fox was put in charge of the henhouse.

These groups have collectively managed billions in federal and state public funds. Their processes for distributing funds are opaque, proprietary, and shielded from scrutiny. Conflicts of interest are rampant — board members sit at the very companies that receive the funding. And most damning of all, there are no requirements that the results of publicly funded projects be released to the public.

Inquiries made into each state's programs dedicated to this cause, like New York State's NYSTAR (Empire State Development's Division of Science, Technology, and Innovation) and all of its counterparts, have clarified they do not have any interest or policies mandating any discoveries made with the public funds to be public. To go even further, there are no internal policies or risk management assessment to merely CONSIDER open technologies as part of their technology stack portfolio when advising customers who purchase their services, let alone actually using them.

A Fraudulent Machine

This is not simply mismanagement. It is systemic fraud: public money disappearing into consulting contracts, vanity projects, or “initiatives” that never see daylight. Taxpayers subsidize the risk, while private corporations pocket the rewards.

Try following the money. Ask for records. You’ll find roadblocks at every turn. These organizations insist on their neutrality, but will not disclose the criteria by which they select projects. They will not say how much weight they give to small businesses or startups. They will not explain why public money flows so easily to entrenched incumbents, while grassroots innovators are left starving.

The parallels to defense contracting and infrastructure boondoggles are striking. The money is allocated, the press releases are glowing, the ribbon-cuttings are staged — and then the results quietly vanish into private hands. I found out first hand when my email address was blocked by the OPC Foundation, ISA, CESMII. My repeated inquiry then resulted in board members blocking me on social media and turning off comments sections when I made inquiries or challenged their claims.

Silencing Critics

Those who attempt to shine light on this corruption quickly learn how deep the rot goes. Journalists and watchdogs like myself who send critical inquiries are stonewalled. Public records requests are delayed, denied, or buried under bureaucratic games.

Industry press, which should serve as an independent watchdog, is largely captured as well. Trade publications rely on advertising dollars from OEMs and industry associations, and so they dutifully echo the talking points they are fed. Instead of journalism, we get propaganda. Instead of scrutiny, we get hype.

The Propaganda Narrative

And what a narrative it is. The story these associations sell to industry is simple: you need us. You need the good old boys club. You need legacy OEMs, proprietary systems, and closed ecosystems, because anything else is unsafe, unreliable, or unprofessional.

It is a myth propped up by nostalgia — “back to the way things were” — as though the past was more capable or resilient than today. In reality, today’s needs are more complex than ever. Real-time data analytics, interoperable devices, and open systems are the only way to track resource use, optimize production, and build resilience. Yet the associations use fear and doubt to keep customers locked into their closed systems.

**Grassroots Innovation

Contrast this with the grassroots. Arduino, FlowFuse, United Manufacturing Hub — just some examples of projects operate on shoestring budgets, fueled by community contributions and volunteer labor. They embrace openness, publish their work, and invite collaboration. And unlike the billion-dollar associations, they actually produce results.

They are proving that smart manufacturing does not require authoritarian monopolies. It requires openness, collaboration, and accountability. It requires systems designed to be shared, not hoarded.

Taking Back The Mission

The betrayal of smart manufacturing is not just a disappointment. It is a crime — a fraudulent use of public funds that demands accountability. Legal, financial, and cultural reforms are urgently needed. Public money must come with public obligations: transparency in allocation, publication of results, and real safeguards against conflicts of interest.

We do not need the good old boys club. We do not need captured associations that exist to serve themselves. We need a true technological commons — one where the benefits of smart manufacturing are available to all, not siphoned off by a few.

The mission is still worth fighting for. The only question is whether we allow it to remain hijacked, or whether we take it back.

Education For Sale

One of the core promises of these associations was education. With billions in taxpayer funding, they were supposed to create a freely available training infrastructure — curricula, certifications, and resources to upskill workers, empower small businesses, and prepare the next generation of manufacturers.

Instead, they’ve turned education into another profit center. Despite being bankrolled by public money, these organizations routinely charge obscene fees — sometimes tens of thousands of dollars — for access to training programs. The very people whose tax dollars funded these initiatives are asked to pay again, and at premium rates.

This is not just bad optics; it is a betrayal of the public mission. Education is the easiest area to make open and accessible. A video series, a digital textbook, an online lab environment — all of these could be made freely available at minimal cost once developed. But instead of building a true public learning commons, the institutes have built gated platforms designed to extract revenue.

The irony is painful. While small businesses and community colleges struggle to cobble together resources to train workers affordably, the organizations sitting on taxpayer billions have chosen to hoard knowledge behind paywalls. What was supposed to be a democratizing force has instead become another barrier to entry.

Conclusion: Reclaiming the Public Mission

Smart manufacturing began as a vision of openness, efficiency, and shared prosperity. Instead, it has been hijacked by institutions that siphon off public funds, lock away discoveries, and even sell back “educational opportunities” at extortionate prices to the very taxpayers who already paid for them. The mission that should have democratized technology has been twisted into yet another mechanism of exclusion and control — a “good old boys club” that tells industry it cannot survive without them.

But the truth is the opposite. The most meaningful progress is already being made outside these captured institutions — by grassroots communities, small innovators, and open-source projects. They are proving that resilience, efficiency, and interoperability do not require secrecy, paywalls, or monopolistic control.

The fraud must be called what it is: a systemic looting of public resources. Accountability must be demanded. Transparency, open publication of results, real conflict-of-interest rules, and free public education must be the baseline conditions of any future public investment. Otherwise, we will keep paying for promises that never materialize, while the benefits remain privatized.

The choice is stark but simple. Either we accept a future where smart manufacturing is another closed, extractive system controlled by a few — or we reclaim the mission and build the open technological commons we were promised. One future deepens stagnation. The other fuels innovation, sustainability, and shared prosperity. The stakes are too high to let the hijackers win.

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Fake Activism In The Digital Age

Enri Marini — Thu, 26 Sep 2024 12:00:00 +0000

In modern society, perception trumps reality.

The easiest way to paint a false reality and sell it to others is through social media. The latest social media fad is pretending to be an activist & ally for a movement while actively working behind the scenes to dismantle the very same protest movement.

The Role of Transparency and Decentralization

The best way for a movement to be successful is to completely decentralize it by teaching others how to be their own advocates by taking direct, concrete actions to implement long-term change. These actions specifically include lobbying local government officials by writing letters, calling, emailing, and attending board meetings to make public comment. Publicly confronting corrupt officials and video live streaming the incident while specifically calling out their exact corrupt behaviors is another fantastically effective method of protesting.

The goal is to be specific and hone in on a particular message while speaking out so that the message does not get lost in translation. Be very clear, direct, and to the point. Videotaping the incident is a must as well, because in today’s day in age, unless it was videotaped then it did not happen. Everyone has a phone nowadays, which means everyone has a video camera.

The Power of Direct Action

Public street interviews and picketing are also powerfully effective methods, just be sure you understand the difference and boundaries of the easement versus the sidewalk versus private property. Public shaming can be a powerful tool when used correctly – namely by sticking to the facts and avoiding violent language. The goal is to bring in the support of the general public and being an aggressor is not a good way of doing so.

The Distracting Influence of Celebrity Figures – The Modern Day Roman Circus

Now, contrast these direct, specific, practical, and effective methods that anyone can take by themselves to the methods touted by celebrity figures and mainstream influencers pretending to be activists.

Their approach is primarily covering celebrity gossip without ever addressing local events and raising the voices of smaller social media journalists – unless it fits with their narrative. They distract people from the topic at hand using what I call the modern-day Roman circus – general mainstream events and brain-rotting entertainment to distract from what’s happening in people’s local community. The goal is to keep people sedated with nonsensical media shilling only noise & talking heads to make people feel good and feel like they’re positively contributing to a cause when all they are really doing is consuming junk content that is self-serving just to the influencer peddling the content.

The energy that people sink into the useless celebrity gossip and self-serving media could instead have been time & energy better spent writing letters to elected officials, showing up to offer public comment at committee meetings, and confronting corrupt officials publicly in person. The biggest tell that someone is engaging in self-serving grifting behaviors while pretending to be an ally is keeping discussions privately.

The worst thing you can do for any activist movement is keep any manner of correspondence private. The success of any movement fundamentally hinges on absolute transparency, which necessitates all correspondence being public. This allows everyone & anyone at any point in time to independently audit whether a person’s actions match their words. Entire movements have ended miserably because they failed to grasp this fundamental concept. This ultimately allowed issues to boil beneath the surface before they ultimately inevitably burst into the public sphere in the worst of ways.

The need for power and control will always be present, and thus larger-than-life figures are expected to arise. But the success of the movement is bigger than any singular individual and those that choose to allow their dislike of any individual get in the way of achieving the desired long-term outcomes from the protest movement have chosen to allow their personal feelings to blind them of what’s truly important.

Sympathy and empathy for victims who were hurt by the very thing the movement is trying to combat is important. However, be careful that this grace does not extend so far as to make prior victims impervious to any criticism. Everyone is deserving of criticism and it is oftentimes the case that parasocial relationships develop between protestors and victims. They develop a sort of trauma bond with victims and can even begin using the same outdated coded language that oftentimes obscures the real message at hand. This coded language creates a sort of in-group that does not lend itself well to bringing in support of the general public while also remaining on point with the desired message of the protest movement.

Case Studies In Fake Activism

The most powerful step to being an effective activist, however, is the ability to paint a very clear narrative. Issues like fraud, theft, and violence are important but what really makes people connect are the personal stories of those affected, especially how children, women, and the elderly are victims. The problem with talking about generalities like fraud is that it does not elicit an emotional response from people to spark passion & allow them to feel the outrage of the indecency. Numbers on a balance sheet are just that – numbers. But when those numbers are attached to real people and real stories, then it means something.

Take, for example, the story of fraud I covered with Li-Cycle. Obviously, fraud and lying to investors, which is what Li-Cycle did, is bad and unlawful. It involved nepotism, cronyism, and gross incompetence. However, the mainstream media, as well as Li-Cycle executives, failed to show the real story of Li-Cycle executives’ fraudulent behaviors. General contractors losing their homes because Li-Cycle executives knowingly hemorrhaged money on completely unnecessary technologies and services despite the advice of subject matter experts. Families not being able to put food on the table because they caused local businesses to pay for Li-Cycle's incompetence. The children of those families going hungry because of a greenwashing scam backed by powerful lobbyists and politicians like Chuck Schumer without any consideration of the complex, finer details. An erosion of trust of the public’s trust in legitimate climate & environmental science. Setting a precedent for future lithium recycling companies to treat environmental science technology as one giant grift like back in the old days of the Wild West.

In other protest movements, it is often the case that existing foundations/organizations, as well as their associated leaders, are not what they seem. This occurred in the Black Lives Matter protests, with the fundraising foundations being primarily used to fraudulently feed a few organizers to purchase luxurious mansions rather than spend the money on assisting protestors to handle issues that occurred during their protesting – namely court cases for bogus charges and physical damages they received while being victims of police brutality as police escalated situations unnecessarily.

In the case of the Scientology protest movement, it has been the departure from relying on existing figures and making protests completely decentralized by empowering individuals to become their own advocates. I believe we are living in the golden age of decentralization, especially when it comes to supporting protest movements. There is simply no longer a need for a middleman like an association/foundation in today’s digital age to manage resources and connections. The internet allows everyone to be instantly connected at all times and simply provide aid directly to the individual(s) who need the support. Doing so greatly saves on management fees as well as drastically lowers the chance of corruption & misappropriation of funds. There is immediate, real-time feedback showing how your funds are being used.

In the case of industrial automation and the broader right to repair & open source movement, it is coming to terms with the failure of existing institutions and calling out charlatans & grifters. Industry associations have undoubtedly failed to educate the public as well as customers, existing as mere husks of what they may have originally intended themselves to be. Industry associations primarily serve the bidding of a few large conglomerate corporate masters shilling propaganda to instill fear, uncertainty, and doubt about public technology. It is easy, in this setup, to avoid the needs of the stakeholders namely because they do not have a say when it comes to the governance of the association. Board members are not publicly elected and oftentimes these same board members get a salary both from the association they lead as well as a company that directly competes in the same market, they have political influence in thanks to their board position. It is a clear conflict of interest to have the authority to sway trends, politics, and laws of the same industry in which you are also a business executive in. Unfortunately, this message continues to get lost in translation despite repeatedly sharing it with leaders of the OPC Foundation, CESMII, ISA, and dozens of others.

The Necessity of Public Technology Assets

Furthermore, because industrial automation lacks software engineers - chiefly due to the poor working conditions, benefits, and lack of upward mobility bred by a culture stained with deep-rooted nepotism & cronyism - it is an industry ripe for charlatans and grifters to come around touting competency in areas they have no business in. This is because when you have an uninformed audience, it becomes that much easier to mislead them. The reality is public technology assets are THE only way forward for any technology field to make progress. This is exactly how the digital software technology sector has progressed so rapidly. To publicly state that the open sourcing of technology is NOT necessary to a successful digital transformation journey shows just how much of a charlatan you are.

Public technology assets greatly reduce the need for upfront investment to build the necessary foundations of a project by providing economies of scale by decentralizing the burden of auditing, innovating, scaling, and building new features. This is because public technology assets provide absolute transparency at all levels. From how the social correspondence of trusted contributors occurs in the development of the project, to the funds the project receives, all the way to stakeholders directly contributing & steering the project’s trajectory. The victims for not pursuing open source are primarily children, who get shut out of opportunities to engage in technology at all levels at a young age, regardless of socioeconomic background.

Before Arduino microcontrollers, and now compact programmable logic controllers (PLC), it used to be the case that you had to spend an entire undergraduate degree to have the chance of using industrial electronics. No longer is this the case and because of it, an entire generation of children have grown up with the ability to build their own projects at home for cheap. The gatekeepers of old, like Rockwell Automation for instance, are no longer a roadblock to obtaining information and experience. In other words, the barrier to entry has effectively been removed and the public is now undergoing a digital transformation journey whereby they are unlearning the propaganda shilled by proprietary technology gatekeepers like Rockwell/Siemens/Schneider/Emerson as well as exploring the art of the possible with open hardware and software technologies.

This open access to information, data, and technology assets is fundamental for continued innovation and success. Living in this age of free access to software and hardware technology is great for the public and for business – it is ONLY bad for those bad actors who want to keep the status quo of technology asset control & ownership under a select few private hands. The old approach of private equity of taking public information and funds to sponsor progress while keeping the assets under private control is a scourge to humanity.

Conclusion

Be wary of wolves in sheep's clothing in an age where people are actively speaking out in protest of the old ways. The best way to suppress civil unrest is to plant an agent inside the movement to run controlled opposition. Give people the feeling that they are making successful long-term positive change without taking concrete action to achieve said outcome. Progress is acceptable but only if it’s done in the confines of a tightly controlled narrative that seeks to basically put lipstick on a pig.

Real activism and change require pissing off a lot of people by refusing all current established narratives and carving out your own through independent critical thinking based using the scientific method to uncover oftentimes harsh convoluted truths. The pursuit of the truth, free from personal biases and removed from a cult-like attachments, is what makes a true skeptic.

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Open Source and Capitalism

Enri Marini — Wed, 07 Aug 2024 12:00:00 +0000

A recent interaction I had with a fellow colleague graciously reminded me of how effective the propaganda is. The current mainstream narrative seeks to instill Fear/Uncertainty/Doubt (FUD) into the hearts & minds of tech practitioners & the public regarding open source — namely that “open source = bad”.

I feel a wave of both sadness and inspiration when I encounter such moments. The sadness is because it demonstrates that if technology practitioners are this persuaded by the lie that open source projects = bad, then imagine how confused and easily manipulated the general public is.

Fundamentally, public technology assets — which I define as the research & development artifacts (like source code) that built the tooling being publicly accessible to all for use as well as the social artifacts that went into the asset’s creation also being publicly accessible — are superior than proprietary tech assets.

It is true that a technology asset, be it a pharmaceutical drug or a software solution or hardware product, is oftentimes by necessity proprietary in its initial stages because it can be more cost effective and faster to develop a minimally viable product under such tight control and limited access. However, these benefits do not extend once a product gets into the hands of users. Design flaws are discovered, user needs change, and managing all of this becomes an undue burden to bear by a single proprietor, especially at scale.

This natural evolution necessitates that the entire lifecycle of the product be public, which is to say that its design methods, the code, its manufacturing process, and all other information should be publicly released — and doing so comes at great benefits for everyone, including the original contributors.

Imagine if the chemistry for a life saving drug was kept proprietary and the pharmaceutical company strongly insisted you “take our word for it bro”. The good news we don’t have to imagine this and sadly, there are countless cases where people suffered grave illnesses as a result of such snake oil concoctions — hence the origins of the name “snake oil”.
With that out of the way, let’s get into the reasons why public tech assets — from software to hardware to pharmaceuticals and beyond — are superior than proprietary counterparts.

Complex projects will ALWAYS require significant investment. All of the current major OEM companies and software tech companies received significant public dollars to fund the research & development of various technology assets, in addition to the private equity they raised. Without these public funds, they would not have been able to create said assets. Hypocrites talk about capitalism and rewarding those that took major risk.

The public takes significant risk by sacrificing their public funds to invest into these companies. These public funds could have been instead used to pay for home health aide workers, daycare programs, foster homes for abandoned children, homeless shelters, and domestic violence safety shelters. I would say that NOT investing into public welfare programs to protect children and the elderly is a significant risk.

Where’s the empathy for children and the elderly not getting the care & protection they need & deserve? Why only extend this empathy to companies that, regardless of whether they succeed or fail, face no repercussions thanks to the corporate veil that gives them a safety net? That same safety net could and should have been extended to children and the elderly.

The public deserves — nay, is entitled to — a direct return on investment for supplying funds to develop these assets, just like private equity investors. There is an amicable way to mutually serve a return both to private equity investors and the public. This method is by simply making the technology assets public. With software projects, we have a proven track record of effectively doing so, with the Linux operating system being the most popular success story. Similarly in the pharmaceutical realm, releasing the chemistry makeup and manufacturing process to fabricate a drug publicly allows for mass production of the drug, with cheaper non-name-brand options that perform at the same quality as the name-brand option.

This stewardship of public assets is deeply ingrained into the very fabric of our psyche. Our ancestors survived and thrived because they were good stewards of farm land by protecting it from being over grazed and keeping trash out of the water supply. Being a good steward of these public assets — land and water — seamlessly transitions into technology assets as well. There is no legitimate reason to refuse publicizing technology assets — unless your mission is to prevent the public and customers from truly owning the things the pay for.

This process of information sharing and public ownership of assets happens to also be a recipe for combating wealth inequality. The basics of understanding wealth inequality is just by looking at what pathways exist to create and own assets, who presently owns the most assets, and how these owners came to control said assets.

The beautiful part with public technology projects is that even if the business that conducted the initial research & development fails, all the information remains in the public domain for another competitor to come along and improve upon.

Proprietary systems lack of transparency at every level. It is for this simple reason that agencies like the Department of Defense are hesitant to invest into proprietary commercial products. The real key to security is being able to independently audit the entire system at all times. To do so, the entire technology must provide absolute transparency at every level, which is only possible with open source projects. Bad actors will always happen and bad design will always exist. The “security through obscurity” approach is a charlatan’s approach to being “secure”. Furthermore, the DoD also does not want to pay perpetual licenses for products that they cannot enhance on their own accord. They, just like every manufacturer, want tools that they can customize on their own at any & every point in time after purchasing. Proprietary tech simply does NOT allow you to do so.

There is a positive return to all investors and users of these technology assets if they are public. The biggest return is that each subsequent user of the project did not have to cough up the initial capital investment to make the viable product. The next benefit is that publishing the work publicly saves on duplicated efforts. Why try to completely reinvent the wheel, especially in cases that do not need it, when you can simply build off of the existing technology?

The most significant benefit that public tech assets have is they enable true competition by providing a level playing field, whereby everyone has the same level of access to assets to compete with. This helps ensure a healthy level of competition and promotes upward mobility, namely by providing a real option of asset ownership. Regardless of whether somebody takes that option up, the important issue is whether the pathway exists and with proprietary assets, the option simply never exists.
These 5 fundamental issues are why I wrote my original piece titled “Open Source Has Nothing To Do With Technology”.

The premise remains the same in this article — it does not. The fundamental issue has always been and will always be the matter of ownership and control of assets.

Regardless of whether the technology we are discussing is a pharmaceutical drug or a telecommunications edge device or a human-machine-interface software application, the fundamental issue is who owns the asset. This question of ownership then feeds into all other facets that many are familiar with in the technology sphere — cybersecurity, quality, the ability to adapt to user needs, and so on.

The question of ownership and control of the asset supersedes the ability to address these tangential facets. Public technology assets are more secure than their proprietary counterparts because of the absolute transparency at all levels they provide which in turns allows for everyone to independently audit its operation, they are more adept at changing to rapidly meet the needs of their users thanks to the direct channel of communication to users, and they have a higher quality because they allow equal access by all which in turn allows for competitors to arise and improve on its flaws.

The current narrative around open source and right to repair advocacy would have you believing that these tangential facets can be discussed without ever addressing ownership and control — that if you just buy more into the consumerist mindset & purchase “the right product”, then everything will be alright. This is simply false. This narrative is what I like to call “capitalism for me but not for thee”. It is fake capitalism, whereby you are politically astroturfing being in class solidarity but in reality you cozy up to billionaires because of the personal gains it brings you at the expense of others.

Thanks and I’ll see you in the next one.

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Open Source and Ownership

Enri Marini — Thu, 25 Jul 2024 18:33:14 +0000

The quintessential problem of this century is ownership - specifically whether you have the real option to truly own the products you paid for.

Ownership dives into the economic and political realms - subjects that many techies believe are trivial, pedantic, and beneath them. Introducing the language of ownership allows us to tap into well known frameworks using the language of assets to accurately depict & intimately cover the complex world of science & technology.

Sadly, this indifference exhibited by many in the tech world is exactly why the current state of the scientific profession is filled with charlatans, bad actors, and influence peddlers looking to ingratiate themselves by exploiting inexperienced customers and members of the public.

These apathetic folks tout "stick to the facts" as a way to avoid conducting due diligence and keeping a status quo - eerily similar to controlled opposition found in social movements like abortion rights. Unfortunately, these same folks fail to accept the reality of the scientific method - which necessitates skepticism of the economic and political kind, in addition to the mathematical one.

This is especially true for manufacturing. The matter of ownership is the foundational topic from which all other aspects of technology-centered discussions derive from.

In the technology world, there is a universal fact that I argue must first be accepted if there is to be any real long-term and equitable progress made on this purported path of "digital transformation".

FACT: Public assets (AKA real open source technologies) are THE only way forward to a digitally mature world filled with jobs that provide a living wage, real competition, strong security posture, and innovation.

The goal of this article is to serve as a comprehensive, exhaustive list explaining in detail EXACTLY how the language of ownership ties into this “technology” driven matter. Let this article serve as an easy reference/cheat-sheet whenever you may find yourself wondering exactly how politics, economics, cybersecurity, open source, right-to-repair, and public assets are inextricably linked with each other.

I have split it into the following sections to make it easier for people to jump between them as they see fit. The sections are "Cost, Security, Politics, Involving the Public, Technology".

I remain steadfast in my belief of the superiority and future of public technology comprising the majority of all technology stacks in the future – both at the hardware and software levels. However, I am also realistic. Pain can be a wonderful teacher and the only capable of reaching those who fail to see rationality & logic. That is why I believe many more practitioners and businesses will need to needlessly suffer harsher financial realities before they acknowledge the above universal fact regarding public assets.

Even then, knowing is only 20% of the battle. Ideally, it is my wish that this pain bring about solidarity within and outside of the technology profession supporting public assets, so that we may build more of them in every facet of life, especially within manufacturing and healthcare.

Cost

Public Assets Are Not Free

Public technologies always have associated costs.
Proprietary tech companies spread FUD, suggesting public assets require significant upfront costs, making them seem more expensive.

Economies of Scale

Public assets leverage economies of scale for longevity and quality. Initial costs are kept intentionally small while a minimally viable product is achieved, then larger investments are sought with support of public funds in addition to private funds, with the caveat that all assets are kept public.
Investors are attracted to the project because they share similar needs and the project asset helps meet their need.
Initial stages are kept proprietary until a minimally viable product is achieved, then released publicly for rapid adoption and integration.

Collaborative Financial Support

Collaboration with governments, companies, individuals, and investors creates financial support pathways.
These pathways help build new businesses and offer deployment management services at various scales.

Shared Maintenance Costs

Maintenance costs are not solely borne by original contributors.
Stakeholders provide direct feedback, fostering a community aimed at the project's success.

Innovation at Lowered Costs

Individuals and businesses can innovate faster without fronting the entire initial capital investment.
Continued development, including new features and security patches, is not at the original contributors' expense.

Reduction of Duplicated Efforts

Public technologies prevent the duplication of efforts.
Businesses can form alliances to collaborate, reducing expenses for market research, capital investment, and cybersecurity staffing.

Lowered Maintenance and Enhancement Costs

Technology development has high initial risk and capital investment.
Maintenance and enhancement costs are reduced due to economies of scale, something proprietary systems can't achieve.

Avoidance of Planned Obsolescence

Proprietary offerings suffer from planned obsolescence, requiring more resources for continued operation and updates.
Public assets provide long-term viability without the need for constant costly upgrades.

Transparent Service Costs

Public access to technology assets allows visibility into reasonable service charges for deployment management.
This transparency helps in evaluating and comparing service costs effectively.

Security

Public Technology Resilience

Peer-reviewed research shows public technology is more resilient to attacks and entropy.
Public technology benefits from greater exposure to exploits, leading to quicker patch creation and improved security practices.

Transparency

Absolute transparency is the only defense against bad actors, both internal and external. Entropy and vulnerabilities are two universal absolutes guaranteed to occur & never go away.
Proprietary systems rely on "security through obscurity," a debunked practice.

Security Through Obscurity

The idea that hiding code prevents compromises is flawed. Just because you cannot see it does NOT mean it doesn’t exist.
Transparency ensures that vulnerabilities are identified and addressed quickly.

Incentives for Backdoors

Proprietary system developers may have incentives to build backdoors and sell secrets to bad actors.
Governments may exploit these backdoors for spying, often unbeknownst to the public.
By the time the public does find out, it's far too late and severe incalculable damage has been wrought.

Public Suspicion

People are suspicious of data and device spying but may not know the full extent.
Open technology allows employees and the public to be aware of any shady dealings.

Audits and Trustworthiness

Proprietary systems rely on "security professionals" whose audits lack standardization and transparency into what exactly they audited & how they did it.
Public technology provides transparency, making it unnecessary to rely solely on someone's word.

Industrial Environments

Security is critical in industrial settings due to dangerous chemicals and heavy robotics.
Open technology ensures safer and more secure industrial operations by being able to directly see, at all times, exactly what the technology is alleging to be doing versus what it is actually doing. This goes for the technology used to load the program as well as the loaded program itself.
The entire system must be absolutely transparent, with the minimum standard being showing the entirety of the code used to build the platform, in order to truly be able to verify & backup any claims made.

Historical Example

Edward Snowden exposed government spying through proprietary backdoors, illustrating the need for transparency.

Politics

Hiding of Information

Proprietary systems often hide critical information, making technologies like vaccines and life-saving pharmaceuticals unaffordable and inaccessible.
Markups on essential technologies effectively negate the benefits of their discovery.

Limited Accessibility

Discovery does not equate to accessibility; proprietary models restrict benefits to a select few.
Despite using public resources such as tax breaks, grants, and public university backing, only certain entities profit.

Public Resources Misuse

Public funding and resources are frequently exploited by private entities for profit.
Taxpayer money supports research and development, but the resulting technologies are not made publicly accessible.

Economic Inequality

Proprietary models exacerbate economic inequality by limiting access to essential technologies.
Wealthier individuals and entities can afford innovations, while others are left behind.

Stifling Innovation

Proprietary restrictions can stifle innovation by limiting who can work on and improve technologies.
Open access encourages broader collaboration and faster technological advancements.

Ethical Concerns

Ethical issues arise when life-saving technologies are withheld from those in need due to profit motives.
Public assets promote ethical practices by ensuring accessibility and equitable distribution.

Transparency and Accountability

Proprietary systems lack transparency, leading to potential misuse and abuse of power.
Public assets ensure transparency and accountability, fostering trust and responsible use of technologies.

Democratization, Government and Corporate Influence

Governments and corporations often influence proprietary systems to serve their interests.
Public assets reduce undue influence by decentralizing control and promoting open collaboration.
Public assets democratize technology, making it available to everyone regardless of socioeconomic status. This promotes equality and social mobility by providing tools for innovation and improvement.

Preventing Monopolies

Proprietary systems can lead to monopolies, limiting competition and driving up costs.
Public assets encourage competition and lower costs through widespread accessibility and collaborative development.

Involving the Public - A Holistic Approach

Human Progress and Diversity

Progress relies on diversity, diffusion of information, and real access to information.
Real access means the ability to obtain and use information to build wealth and achieve social mobility.

Barriers to Utilization

Socioeconomic factors can prevent individuals from making use of accessible information. Difference between being able to use something versus simply having the knowledge of something.
Lack of social equity and connections to key decision-makers can hinder the utilization of information.

The Myth of the Underdog Story

American culture fetishizes the underdog story, but these narratives are rarely reflective of reality.
Socioeconomic barriers and factors beyond individual control make "bootstrapping" nearly impossible for many.

Collective Failure

Society has collectively failed to support many capable individuals due to systemic issues.
Instead, the system often props up exploitative and abusive figures.

Free Dissemination of Information

The free dissemination of information and the ability to use it are crucial for a well-informed populace and democratic society.
Open access to information enables critical thinking, innovation, and informed decision-making.

Power and Control

There will always be groups seeking to assert their will over others.
Open access to information helps counteract the concentration of power and control.

Global Perspective

Issues of information access and control are prevalent even in democratic countries.
Corrupt leaders and systemic inequalities exacerbate these problems globally.

Proprietary Offerings and Ideologies

Predominantly proprietary systems push specific ideologies about ownership and control.
This leads to a loss of free will, critical thinking, and independent thought.

Control Over Destiny

Proprietary systems often strip individuals of the ability to control their own destiny.
Public assets promote free will and independent decision-making by decentralizing control and providing open access to information.

Empowerment through Education

Involving the public in the dissemination and utilization of information empowers individuals.
Access to information should come with the opportunity to use it effectively, fostering a more equitable society.

Combating Propaganda

Proprietary systems can be used to spread propaganda and manipulate public perception.
Public assets and open information counteract these efforts by promoting transparency and truth.

Real-World Examples

Experiences from war-torn and corrupt regions highlight the importance of open access to information.
Ensuring an informed populace is critical for resisting oppressive regimes and fostering democratic principles.

Technology

Ceasing Pointless Duplication of Efforts

Public assets prevent the duplication of technological efforts.
Example: HMI design suffers from terrible UI and insecure data handling due to each OEM creating their own versions.
Adopting open technologies as standards for HMI implementation ensures safer, more secure, and standardized methods.

Improving Security and New Features

Focus can shift to the two most challenging steps post-MVP: enhancing security and developing new features.
Open technologies benefit from economies of scale, reducing the burden on individual contributors.

Shared Development and Maintenance

Public technologies allow for shared development efforts, lowering individual maintenance costs.
Communities contribute to documentation, threat tracking, and security, distributing the workload.

Access to Coalitions

Open technologies provide access to coalitions and communities that assist in various aspects of development and maintenance.
These collaborations lead to reduced costs and increased innovation.

Leveraging Economies of Scale

Open technologies leverage economies of scale for maintenance and development, lowering overall costs.
Shared resources and community support reduce the financial and labor burden on individual entities.

Innovation and Feature Development

Public assets promote continuous innovation as more people contribute to feature development.
New features are developed by a broader community, accelerating technological advancement.

Security Enhancement

Open technologies allow for a collective approach to security enhancement.
Communities track and address threat vectors more efficiently than isolated proprietary teams.

Standardization and Interoperability

Open technologies encourage standardization and interoperability between systems.
This leads to more efficient and compatible technological ecosystems.

Cost Efficiency

Reduced duplication of efforts and shared maintenance lower the total cost of ownership.
Businesses save on development, security, and maintenance expenses by leveraging public assets.

Scalability and Flexibility

Open technologies offer greater scalability and flexibility in adapting to new requirements.
Public assets can be easily extended and customized, meeting diverse needs without starting from scratch.

Collaborative Innovation

Public assets foster a culture of collaborative innovation, bringing diverse perspectives and expertise together.
This collective approach accelerates technological progress and quality improvements.

Transparency and Trust

Open technologies ensure transparency in development processes, building trust among users and developers.
Transparent practices lead to higher quality and more reliable technologies.

Thanks again for your time. See you in the next one.

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Open Source And The Tragedy Of The Commons

Enri Marini — Tue, 28 May 2024 12:00:00 +0000

The tragedy of the commons phenomenon is a foundational topic to cover when discussing publicized assets and open source.

The core tenet of the tragedy of the commons states that when given access to public assets, individuals will primarily behave in a self-serving manner to exploit the resource for selfish gain at the expense of everyone else. This abuse leads to over-consumption, thereby depleting the resource with no regard for the consequences this has on anyone else.

It is important to acknowledge that the tragedy of the commons is real and provides valuable wisdom. Abusing public resources can be seen in scenarios like herders overgrazing on public land, which leads to the destruction of natural biodiversity. Fishermen overfishing can lead to the extinction of certain species and the eradication of natural predators that would otherwise manage the population of other invasive species. It is true that bad actors who exploit public resources for themselves will always exist, but this does not mean that we should live in fear. These abuses can be prevented, and turning over public resources to private control will never automatically fix all the problems faced when they were public.

Join me as we unravel misconceptions about the tragedy of the commons phenomenon and how it relates to the open-source movement.

Misconceptions and Criticisms

The tragedy of the commons is typically used to conclude that the public cannot be trusted to take care of public resources. Therefore, the solution to this issue must be to turn over control and ownership of these public assets to private hands. This logic is flawed because it grossly oversimplifies human behavior and ignores cultural, social, and institutional factors that prevent the tragedy.

There are countless real-world examples that clearly disprove the purely selfish nature that the tragedy of the commons phenomenon portrays human behavior to be. I will share some personal ones with you below and then expand into covering examples in the digital space that shatter the phenomenon’s flawed logic.

Personal Example – New England Lobster Fisheries

I come from New England, where lobster fishing is all the rage. Maine lobster fisheries have done and continue to do a fantastic job at self-policing against the overfishing of lobsters. They have an entire mechanism for identifying and tagging fertile male and female lobsters, which are protected and released if caught. The local community in Maine has come together on their own accord to protect their public resources—the water and lobsters—from pollution and overfishing.

This grassroots community self-policing consists primarily of fishermen, fisheries, and local universities that track the behavioral patterns of lobsters and other marine life. They report bad actors to law enforcement and have a running Brady list for such bad actors, where fisheries refuse to do business with them and grocery stores refuse to buy from them. This self-policing is so successful that there is even a popular YouTube channel that creates vlogs about what it’s like being out on the Maine waters. YouTuber Jacob Knowles has almost 2 million subscribers and is a fifth-generation lobster fisherman from Maine. His footage, which gets hundreds of thousands of views per video, is a testament to how much Maine residents respect and care for their public resources. It shows that even large public assets like bodies of water and wildlife can be effectively managed to prevent bad actors from exploiting them for themselves.

Personal Example – Public Park

Growing up, I played lots of sports and joined the sports teams for my school and city. One of my favorite sports was soccer and I loved played on this one particular field. It was a beautiful, well-kept natural grass field that was publicly accessible. In my free time, I would frequently visit the field to hang out with friends and practice or just get a good workout in. The best part of this field was that it had fully functional hardwired bathroom facilities in a separate building right next to the field. In all my years of playing on that field, there was never any crime, the field was always well taken care of, and families would frequently take their children there to play.

Most of the people in my hometown work in the skilled trades. Many of them happen to be landscapers. When the grass got too tall, locals would typically mow the grass themselves because they wanted their children to enjoy the area. When patches of grass got dry and destroyed from soccer cleats, locals would buy mulch and grass seeds on their own accord to repair the field because they wanted their children to enjoy the field.

The field was also in full view of all nearby residents. Adults were constantly supervising the field—their homes were literally right next to the field with a direct line of sight. Littering was not an issue—the school teams and the rest of the public always cleaned up after themselves, and in the rare case when there were leftovers, the public would quickly clean it up.

I recently learned that this field was sold off to a giant telecommunications company in a behind-closed-doors sweetheart deal to Charter Communications (also known by consumers as Spectrum) because city officials got greedy, and the telco company wanted public recognition locally, thus concocting a scheme to earn more money from taxpayers. If you didn’t hate telecommunications companies already, you will now. Charter purchased the field, and the city entered into a deal where public school teams can still play on it for free only during their seasonally scheduled games, but the rest of the public must pay to access the field.

An ugly 15-foot-tall fence now surrounds the field, blocking access. The natural grassland was ripped apart and replaced with turf material, which is known to be extremely toxic and very costly to maintain. Precision, industrial-grade cameras were installed on every corner of the field, along with a ridiculous amount of overpowered floodlights to light up a field that now maybe gets used once a week during the school year.

In order to access the field, the public needs to pay the city and a private security company to rent it out, with a minimum of 2 hours of rental time required. Last I checked, the hourly rate is $200/hr, plus a mandatory one-time fee for the Department of Public Works to pay a security company to come unlock the gates.

The parking lot where my brother first learned how to ride his bike now bars the public from walking on it under threat of trespassing and arrest. It too is under strict camera supervision. An entire generation of children will now grow up without access to the same public park that their parents and grandparents enjoyed because a private bad actor wanted to exploit public assets for themselves.

Everyday Example – Public Gym

On a more benign level, we can see this self-policing to protect public assets by the way people clean up after using the gym equipment at public recreational centers. In most of the public gyms that I have attended, regardless of the socioeconomic status of the neighborhood, I have always seen local residents pay respect to the facilities. They wipe down equipment after using it, re-rack weights, and tidy up a room after hosting an event. The mutual understanding is clear—if we do not take care of this space, we will all lose it, and nobody wants that, especially in neighborhoods where residents may not have the financial means to easily travel to other parks. Residents also understand that without these public facilities, there would be no other options for them to spend recreational free time. These facilities also serve as safe spaces and even outlets for teenagers who may not have access to the internet at home. I know because I was one of these kids.

Private Control Over Public Assets

To summarize the flawed logic of the tragedy of the commons phenomenon, lawmakers and skeptics argue that public assets are better managed under private control. Unfortunately, none of these critics ever demonstrate exactly why transitioning ownership to private hands automatically fixes the stewardship issues faced under public ownership. The reality is that those same problems exist regardless of public or private ownership. There will always be a need to manage bad actors who wish to exploit resources for personal gain. It has been proven time and time again that local communities are far superior at preventing such tragedies when left to their own devices by establishing cultural norms and boundaries that are reinforced through generations. It costs the local community, private businesses, and the public at large much less to do so on their own compared to privately held alternatives.

The bigger problem is when public assets succumb to private ownership and control. Private owners have no incentive to be good stewards of the asset. In fact, most of the time, private owners magnify the effects of the tragedy of the commons exponentially. Private owners are not beholden to the stakeholders that rely on those assets and have every incentive to exploit the assets for personal gain, even if the benefits are short-lived. They move on to the next asset to exploit for short-term gain, rinse, and repeat.

Open Source and the Tragedy of the Commons

Local residents have their lives directly impacted by public assets, which is why they make the best stewards of said assets. It is in their best interest to prevent tragedies if they wish to continue using the assets sustainably because their well-being and livelihoods are at stake. Their free labor keeps the cost of maintenance, policing, and adjudication low because there are few tragedies that occur from their constant watch and toil.

This same outcome can be seen in the realm of hardware and software systems. Open-source projects like the Linux operating system have proven that open-source projects are far superior when it comes to security, maintenance cost, new feature development costs, long-term sustainability costs, and provide much richer functionality and flexibility than their closed-source counterparts. They accomplish these feats through economies of scale, and this time around, community members are not restricted by physical borders.

People from all over the world keep a watchful eye on the project and in return, they get a technological asset to solve problems in their personal lives as well as making their businesses run better without having to invest in major capital expenditures upfront. More importantly, the public gets transparency into the operation of the asset to ensure it doesn’t encroach on their right to privacy and empowers their consumer rights to truly own the things they spend money on.

Another example of an open-source project defeating the tragedy of the commons is OpenStreetMap, which is used by countless environmental researchers to track animal behavior patterns, by civil engineers to develop optimal roadways, and by historians to track changes to the land which helps to supplement other geological records.

Without these open-source projects, and many others, individuals and businesses would be left to raise capital investment on their own to meet a need that is universal. Their project would subsequently suffer from a lack of security resilience and robustness because they would only have themselves to rely on to harden against a multitude of attack vectors, a task that is absolutely impossible. Furthermore, the development of a digital project (hardware and software) can satisfy the needs of many people far better when other stakeholders suffering from the same issue can publicly and directly provide input. This decentralized and democratic approach of soliciting feedback leads to a project that more aptly meets the needs of stakeholders compared to a closed-source one.

Summary

The tragedy of the commons is a real phenomenon that highlights the potential for overuse and depletion of shared resources when individuals act in their own self-interest. However, this concept does not imply that all public assets are doomed to be mismanaged. As seen in various real-world examples, such as the Maine lobster fisheries and well-maintained public parks, communities can effectively manage shared resources through self-policing, community involvement, and the establishment of cultural norms.

Open-source projects like Linux and OpenStreetMap further challenge the notion that communal resources are inherently prone to failure. These projects thrive on global collaboration, transparency, and decentralized management, proving that when stakeholders are directly involved and invested in the success of a shared resource, the outcomes can be highly sustainable and beneficial to all.

The key takeaway is that the success of both physical commons and digital open-source projects lies in active community engagement and decentralized control. By fostering a sense of ownership and responsibility among users, communities can develop resilient systems that prevent the tragedy of the commons and ensure long-term sustainability. This approach addresses the potential pitfalls highlighted by the tragedy of the commons and leverages collective wisdom and effort to create robust, adaptable, and thriving public assets.

Check out the following YouTube link for a video episode I did on this topic "Open Source And The Tragedy Of The Commons" .

Thanks and I'll see you in the next one.

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Exposing The Corruption Of Industry Associations

Enri Marini — Thu, 16 May 2024 12:00:00 +0000

Industry associations have grossly failed their industries and members by misappropriating funds and failing to deliver value. These organizations, once necessary for centralized communication and knowledge sharing, have become obsolete in the age of the internet.

Sadly, these associations cling to their undeserved power and influence through decades-old behavior that shows resentment of members, hatred of innovation, apathy towards their industries, animosity towards the public, and outright disgust at progressivism.

Industry associations can best be described as leeches who benefit from free labor and public funds. They use these resources to ingratiate themselves with corporations, generating social proof to peddle as propaganda. This article aims to expose how industry associations erode public trust and abuse their power.

Origin Stories of Industry Associations

As the world wars progressed, so did the need for standards to promote safety, reliability, efficiency, repeatability, and innovation. The pace of technological advancement outpaced what traditional education venues could provide. Thus, industry associations were created to corral practitioners, develop standards, and provide continuing education.

Before the internet, monolithic centralized organizations made sense for keeping up with technological changes. These associations also provided networking opportunities. However, the internet has made such centralized communication and knowledge sharing obsolete.

Humans rapidly create and decommission social structures to adapt and thrive. For decades, people have self-organized into niche online communities. This diversity of sources improves information accuracy and adaptability, reducing corruption.

The Predatory Behaviors of Industry Associations

Industry associations primarily receive funding from public grants, corporate donations, and membership dues. Despite their mission to advance their industries through publicly accessible knowledge, they keep vital information behind paywalls, fostering a cult-like mentality among members. This behavior undermines collaboration and fails to educate the public.

The most despicable thing about industry associations is that their standards are developed by volunteers, yet the associations hide this knowledge behind paywalls. Continuing education programs are now largely defunct, as knowledge travels faster in the decentralized internet ecosystem. Professionals can network independently, researchers can establish standards without associations, and practitioners can find suppliers and funding directly. Why be subservient to an association when professionals can now simply independently network with each other directly through the internet?

It is stomach-turning to realize that industry associations have basically devolved into perverting the scientific profession by obfuscating information, manipulating customers into buying their wares by peddling propaganda using social proof, and doing nothing to educate the public on the state of affairs in their respective industries.

The Industry Association Propaganda Machine

Creation of Standards: Standards are created with little real-world application. The internet has rendered this centralized forum moot, yet impractical standards continue to be produced.
Pitch to Companies: Companies are told these standards will solve their problems and must buy products/services from accredited companies.
Customer Manipulation: Unsuspecting customers are sold unnecessary products and services using social proof.

Industry associations are not law enforcement agencies. They also claim to not engage in politics. However, they frequently use their social proof to lobby for laws that incentivize the adoption of their standards and punish those who do not. Within industrial automation, it is shameful that no industry association supports open source and right to repair.

Progressive laws protecting consumer rights and promoting open source have come exclusively from grassroots activism, not industry associations. These associations are propaganda mouthpieces that pervert the industries they operate in and encourage bad actors.

The tides are turning. Practitioners, the market, businesses, and the public have grown tired of the corrupt ways of industry associations. They grow tired of the unwillingness of industry associations to serve as watchdogs to hold bad actors accountable. They grow tired of a litany of standards that take entire departments to decipher, let alone actually implement as intended. They grow tired of industry associations choosing to not advocate for progressive laws to make knowledge publicly available and for fair competition.

Summary

Industry associations have become predatory entities that leverage their social proof to sell unnecessary products and services to unsuspecting customers. They receive public funds and rely on volunteer work, yet they hide their work behind paywalls. They also fail to educate the public and do not act as watchdogs for bad actors. This pattern of behavior shows their apathy and resentment towards the industries they serve, and their refusal to engage in public discourse or support progressive laws. In essence, industry associations have failed to be good stewards of their professions.

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Open Source Hardware

Enri Marini — Tue, 14 May 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This is NOT an article about what laundry list of bells & whistles open source hardware should or should not have. The reason for this is because open source hardware has nothing to do with the technology capabilities of the hardware.

This fundamental truth is what most practitioners, social media influencers, tech hobbyists, and the public do not understand. Open source has nothing to do with software and hardware. Open source is about combating wealth inequality through publicization of assets. This means open source has everything to do with economics & power – namely ownership and control.

Thus, I posit that open source anything – in this case hardware – is only truly “open source” if the asset, once money is exchanged for its procurement, is under complete control and ownership of the asset buyer. In the famed words of James Carville:

“It’s [about] the economy, stupid.” - James Carville

Assets, Ownership and Transparency

Allow me to briefly recap our most important definition.

Asset = A resource with economic value that an individual, corporation, or country owns and controls with the expectation that it will provide a future benefit. Assets are bought or created.

True ownership of an asset means you can utilize that asset however you wish, whenever you wish, with whomever you wish, for whatever you wish, wherever you wish. Ownership of an asset is when the asset, as well as all artifacts that were generated in the creation and selling of said asset, are within your complete control.

This means all knowledge and information about that asset are also yours.

Owning company stock is a clear example of complete ownership and control. As a stockholder, you have the right to vote on corporate policies, access financial information, and receive dividends. You don't need permission from anyone to exercise these rights. Additionally, you can sell the stock at any time, transferring ownership without restrictions. This autonomy in decision-making and the ability to freely manage the asset exemplify true ownership.

With these important definitions out of the way, let’s now shift our focus to explaining how this all plays out for hardware worthy of being called open source. I have made the following list to clarify what I believe true open source hardware, especially PLC, looks like.

Open Source Hardware Criteria

Design Artifacts

Provide all artifacts used in design, simulation, testing, servicing, and burn-in of all electronic and mechanical components (e.g., CAD files, compute models, test scripts, and correspondence) at the time of purchase.

Manufacturing Processes

Disclose manufacturing process recipes and yield results for all electrical and mechanical parts and sub-assemblies.

Diagnostic Tools

Supply all diagnostic and troubleshooting tools at the time of purchase needed to service the hardware, regardless of user skill level.

Bill of Materials (BOM)

Include a detailed BOM listing all parts, raw materials, and services used in fabrication. Specify vendor names, procurement details (date/time/location), costs, and procurement methods. Also, include costs for services (e.g., PCB epoxy layering from Vendor A at $5 per PCB).

Firmware and Software

Provide all firmware files, data models, executables, binaries, and encryption keys for all electronic components.

Warranty Registry

Maintain a public, immutable registry of all warranty claims, past and present.

Servicing and Modifications

Allow servicing and modification without voiding the warranty by default. The manufacturer must prove that user actions caused any hardware failure or damage. Handle each warranty claim individually and publicly.

Component Replication

Permit the free fabrication of component replicas for servicing and repairs.

Resale Freedom

Allow unrestricted resale of the asset to anyone, anywhere, at any time, for any reason.

Interoperability

Ensure the hardware can be used freely with any other assets, without manufacturer-imposed restrictions.

How this pertains to open source PLCs

Open source hardware has nothing to do with the technology capabilities of the hardware. It is about whether the asset, once money is exchanged for its procurement, is under complete control and ownership of the asset buyer.

The only way this happens is if the hardware is free to be used with any software whenever, by whomever, wherever, for whatever reason. This currently does not exist with any PLC commercially available. Full stop.

As for features, an open source PLC would have the same functionality as any commercially available PLC product today. Mount rails, various interface ports (USB, ethernet, serial), clearly labeled modules, expandable slots to add on inputs/outputs, digital and analog inputs/outputs, CPU cycle counts, real-time clock, interrupt handling, PID control, internal data storage, ALU/mathematical operations, sequential control, signal conditioning, signal isolation, bumpless transfer, environmental monitoring, energy management, hardware-level security, and so on.

The best part is that we have already figured out how to do all of the above, do it well, and have been doing it for decades. What needs to come next is free the hardware asset from software assets AND open the hardware to be used however the purchaser wants to use it. It really is just that simple.

Addressing Concerns About Open Source Hardware

Naturally, there will be concerns about these items listed above. Let’s get into some of them.

Earning a Living and Market Copying

While open access might raise concerns about fabrication and copying, it's important to note that not everyone has the capital to produce on a large scale. The iron triangle of cost, scope, schedule, and quality plays a crucial role. Mass production benefits some items, but specialized needs ensure a market for unique, non-commoditized products. The market will naturally balance itself as specialized demands arise.

Intellectual Property (IP) Law

Access to information doesn't guarantee execution. Different firms and individuals have varying priorities and risk appetites, fostering innovation. Opportunity cost acts as a natural barrier to stagnation. Real competition, without artificial barriers, allows the best solutions to emerge. To truly support innovators, the USPTO system should be reformed to prevent patent hoarding and promote fair competition.

Business Profitability with Public Assets

The question of business profitability when assets are publicized needs careful discourse. The sole purpose of a business is to profit, but the means and ends of profit matter. Profit for its own sake leads to unbounded self-aggrandizement. The inconsistency in opposing public assets while relying on publicly accessible knowledge highlights a cognitive dissonance in capitalism.

Security Concerns

Open-source industrial networking equipment already exists, demonstrating that hardware doesn't need to be forcibly linked to software for security. This approach, driven by greed, isn't scientifically justified. If open-source solutions work for critical infrastructure, there's no reason they can't work for PLCs. The argument that PLCs are more critical than industrial networking equipment is unfounded, as networking failures can also lead to catastrophic outcomes.

Summary

Open source hardware isn't about the technology's bells and whistles; it's about combating wealth inequality through public ownership and control of assets. This movement is fundamentally about economics and power, ensuring that once an asset is purchased, it is fully owned and controlled by the buyer. True open source hardware allows for complete freedom in how the asset is used, modified, and resold, without artificial barriers imposed by manufacturers.

Addressing concerns about open source hardware reveals that many fears are unfounded or stem from misconceptions. The market will naturally balance itself, and real competition without artificial barriers fosters innovation and better solutions. Reforming the USPTO system is crucial to support innovators and prevent patent hoarding.

Businesses must reconsider the means and ends of profit, recognizing the inconsistency in opposing public assets while relying on publicly accessible knowledge. Security concerns, too, can be managed effectively, as demonstrated by existing open-source industrial networking equipment.

However, the success of this movement hinges on involving the general public in the conversation. It’s not enough to focus solely on the technical aspects; we must also engage in public discourse on the economic and political facets of open source. Without widespread public engagement and understanding, the effort to combat wealth inequality through open source will falter.

I urge you to join this discussion, advocate for open source principles, and help shape a future where ownership and control of assets are democratized. Together, we can ensure that open source hardware fulfills its potential to create a more equitable and innovative world.

Thank you, and I look forward to continuing this important conversation with you.

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Open Source Creates Opportunities For All

Enri Marini — Wed, 08 May 2024 16:00:00 +0000

Open source creates and sustains boundless business opportunities. The best part of it all is that the technology will be publicly accessible long after the entity that created the project.

I created the following list to help serve as a guide explaining just how open source creates boundless opportunities and how it sustains them. This article is meant to be welcoming for rookies and experts alike, as well as for the general public.

Notice that there is no explicit mention of any particular project or technology. This is intentional because these guidelines are applicable to any open source project. The true power and selling point for open source is that it is a highly profitable endeavor because it leverages economies of scale to reduce the burden of research & development. These assets then get publicized, which combats wealth inequality by reducing barrier to entry & enriching the public through knowledge sharing.

Remember, open source has nothing to do with technology – it is simply one layer in the onion helping to combat wealth inequality. One final note before the list – open source projects have a very strange symbiosis with malicious actors. While ethical hacking (white hat) is helpful, the often unpredictable wildcard behavior that malicious (black hat) hackers bring serve just as important of a role in increasing a project’s resiliency. Yin and yang are necessary and inevitable – it is up to us as practitioners to educate the public and each other to reduce as much harm as possible.

Opportunities Created By Open Source

A singular project does NOT have to do it all – front facing client, account authentication, load-balancing, infrastructure hosting, application monitoring, data pipelines build-out, data pipeline management, and so on. Instead, it can focus on 1 or a few of the above & ensure that it does them well. Because its open source, other projects can then build upon this foundation to piece together these various functions.
Open source alleviates the burden for 1 organization to exclusively bear the long-term cost of selling & marketing the project. There will always be a need for direct B2B sales. Open source projects simply create a new marketing pipeline that is predominantly autonomous once a minimally viable product is developed. This organic growth works on its own to catch the interest of investors (individual/institutional/governmental), thereby allowing your trusted contributors to focus their resources on quality technical development.
Focusing on narrow scope & functionality allows the project to greatly save on resources & make more effective use of its community members. It allows the project to solicit user feedback quickly, which results in a faster time to value.
Modularity of technology functionality exponentially reduces corruption. Inevitably, when bad actors arise and destructive incidents like a project being infiltrated & overtaken by a private entity occur, aspects of the technology can still be utilized publicly. This allows for new open source spinoffs to be built, which often turn out to be more refined & of higher quality (better security hardening & reducing compute consumption) because they have a rich history of lessons learned.
Diversity of products leads to transparent pricing. Businesses and the public alike can verify for themselves exactly how much compute resources a product requires and compare with similar projects. This especially helps businesses make better estimates on how many people they will need on their staff internally to manage the project, what limitations the project has that may be built internally, and how much businesses offering said services can reasonably charge.
Open source strongly encourages competition & keeps it alive by publicizing the project’s assets – both the technological assets & social assets. When everyone is able to take part of the development process, even if it’s just passively spectating, it leads to a better educated populace and a precariatized aristocracy. Precariatized specifically of another community leveraging the open source ecosystem to create a better product. Precariatizing capitalism ensures more equitable power dynamics. Remember – open source succeeds when solving stakeholder needs. Closed source succeeds by shilling to shareholder greeds.
Open source leads to more resilient products because it allows academic researchers, businesses, independent watchdog groups, anonymous white hat hackers, and the general public to audit the technology without a middleman censoring access to information. It has been proven through countless scientific peer-reviewed studies and ethical hacking conferences like DEFCON that open source projects are far more secure and resilient than their closed source counterparts because they are open source. Open source projects encourage cleaner code, an immutable trail of timestamped changes showing exactly who made what changes, and the option to build on the project for yourself to fit your specific needs. Malicious actors are inevitable – with open source, we can see how they may have executed their nefarious deeds & work to patch it.
Open source allows you to fully try before you buy. Regardless of how complex a project’s technology may be to self-host, it is always better for that option to exist than not. Businesses will create unique services, as well as contribute to other open source projects, that offer dev ops capabilities for the project. At the end of the day, if a project reduces costs, increases productivity, is intuitive to use/manage, and increases transparency of costing, more businesses will want to use it, thereby increasing adoption. Higher adoption of open source projects naturally leads to more contribution to existing open source projects and creation of new ones.
Even if a project may not have every bit of documentation, such as how-to articles demonstrating installation/hosting/initialization and use depending on the user’s needs, businesses can be leveraged that specialize in helping projects create and manage said artifacts. Inevitably, new open source technologies, like automated parsers, will come about that scan open source projects and suggest documentation based on their project’s public commits. In fact, this is a common way LLMs are used. Vulnerability scanners & patch suggestion frameworks already exist for open source projects. More specialized frameworks & projects will emerge to handle these administrative tasks for projects based on the sector that the project resides in.
Open source alleviates the expectation and burden for a handful of businesses to meet the numerous diverse needs of the market. This results in combating against concentrated economic and political power. Decentralization and redistribution of assets (and subsequently wealth) more evenly into public hands. It encourages fluid social systems that are flexible enough to meet needs as they arise. This agility is also rooted in human psychology, which is what strongly differentiates us from others in the animal kingdom. Humans have a unique ability to dynamically build & decommission social systems to fit current needs & iterate upon them, reminiscent of the software development lifecycle following the framework provided by the Agile Manifesto.

Summary

Open source is more than innovation – it's a pathway to a more equitable society. By participating in and advocating for open source, we can collectively reduce wealth inequality, enhance transparency, and drive technological resilience. I urge each reader, whether a tech novice or expert, to actively support and contribute to open source projects. Write and call your government officials asking for their stance on open source. Ask your colleagues what their understanding and views on open source are. Challenge the corporations you have an investment stake in on what their stance is on open source.

Take the discourse on open source – which is entirely about combating wealth inequality – to the mainstream masses through the language of combating wealth inequality. This public engagement is the only way to sustain this vital movement towards a more inclusive and balanced future. Be an activist of the open source community today — every contribution makes a difference.

Thanks again for your time and consideration. I’ll see you in the next one.

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Open Source Has Nothing To Do With Technology

Enri Marini — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000

Open source has nothing to do with technology. Open source is about combating wealth inequality, and wealth inequality occurs when assets are allowed to be entirely privately owned by select few special interest groups, all the while those same private special interest groups bask in public funds. This process is enabled by quantitative easing. It results in empowering individuals and groups to behave in a rapacious manner that seeks self-aggrandizement at everyone else’s expense.

For the psychology nerds out there, this pattern of behavior would rightfully be tagged as narcissistic and psychopathic.

It is self-evident that technology practitioners are deeply uneducated on the fact that the entirety of open source has nothing to do with technology. It has everything to do with combating wealth inequality through the publicization of
assets to serve as one fail-safe in a web of other fail-safes working in perpetual solidarity.

Still, in this day in age of April 2024, there are frontline tech workers who hold all manner of job positions – end users, engineers/developers, researchers, sales/marketing - doubting the legitimacy and power of open source while using & developing on ecosystems built entirely on open source. This is nothing short of
absolute insanity and severe delusion meriting serious clinical psychological evaluation.

Fundamentally, open source has always been and will always be about combating wealth inequality by not allowing select few special interest groups mass control over assets. Since time immemorial, when any individual or group behaves
rapaciously with little to no consequence, it emboldens other individuals/groups to continue acting on self-serving behavior.

The recent acquisition of HashiCorp by IBM is yet another example of this rapacious, self-serving behavior at play – the complete privatization & domination over a publicly developed & funded asset. This is to say that IBM stole from the public by feasting on the countless unpaid labor hours used to develop an asset widely used by countless private & public businesses (and even government entities) to perform fundamental business operations. It just so happens to be that this particular asset is an asset operating in the IT sector, but it could be anywhere.

Take drug manufacturers who deploy their extreme wealth to bully lawmakers into enacting intellectual property laws preventing the manufacture of off-brand alternatives capable of doing the same thing a brand-name drug does. Or automotive manufacturers fining mechanics for manufacturing copies of piston components that are of equal or greater quality than the originals because it now doesn’t have their brand on it. Let’s not stop there. Wheelchair manufacturers who charge obscene premiums on what is essentially carbon steel used to fabricate consumer goods like microphone boom arms and decorative dresser drawer handles.

As I mentioned in my last post on "Open Source Manifesto", fencesitters who doubt/deny the existence of evil and doubt/deny the legitimacy of open source technology pose a bigger threat to the eradication of open source than malicious actors. You know exactly where malicious actors stand in their values and convictions. Fencesitters serve only to peck away at the psyche of those who genuinely do not know much about the topic at hand and those who have chosen to be in favor of open source but may not be confident in their convictions. Fencesitters are simply enablers and malicious actors can only thrive when there are truckloads of enablers of said despicable behavior.

They do this through half-truths, sweet lies, and avoidance of ever publicly taking a stance on a matter while simultaneously peacocking a false confidence intended to win people over with charisma & cult of personality.

We see this peacocking constantly by social media influencers within industrial automation. Doublespeak jargon buzzwords that are poorly defined – so much so they literally have to backpedal to redefine their own words because they cannot keep up with their own lies, conflating unalike concepts, attempting to repackage existing time-tested concepts with cool sounding names. I’m talking specifically about buzz junk like “open architecture”, “unified namespace”, and the promotion of fencesitting through doubling down on using closed source solutions without explicitly publicly supporting open source.

This fencesitting needs to stop and we need to bring back public shaming of such behavior because it is widely resulting in misleading both automation practitioners & the public on the real issue at hand.

Again, the issue at hand is complete privatization & control of assets under few special interest groups (the wealthy), who for decades have been going around using the asset price inflation of their large pool of assets to buy out other assets. This leads to wealth inequality, as this rapacious cycle will never end unless serious roadblocks are placed, namely taxes on wealth. This does not exist in USA and in many other parts of the world. Personal homes are allowed to be used as investment vehicles (assets) by corporations. Assets like x-ray machines that are required for many fundamental healthcare procedures are privatized & intentionally inflated in price.

Wealth inequality is not just about private domination of assets. Allow me to explain. Here in New York State, there are 2 government programs funded entirely by taxpayer dollars called NYSTAR and the Upstate Revitalization Initiative. As I have shown with my coverage (and will continue to do so), these 2 initiatives have failed miserably due to the non-existence of publicly released scientific/technological discoveries. This misuse of $3 billion in taxpayer money has all gone towards privatized closed source assets that primarily benefit individual corporations and none of this development has trickled down to anyone else. NYSTAR literally said so themselves that they do not have any policies mandating that the projects they fund AT LEAST be considered to be open source. There are ZERO incentives and ZERO consequences for taking taxpayer dollars and using it for your own personal gain.

Here’s where it gets worse. For all of you economics nerds out there, this robbery is called “quantitative easing”. This process sounds good in theory, where the government prints money under the auspices to stimulate the economy. In reality, these funds only pad the pockets of a select few, turning public investments into private wealth without benefiting the broader populace.

Basically, there is a pool of over $3 billion in funds. The treasury prints money and the government borrows money to be the executor of said finances. You and I did not receive this $3 billion, THEREFORE WE ARE NOW BOTH OVER $3 BILLION. Except in this case, it is not just this hypothetical duo of you (the reader) and me (the author). It is society at large, with New York State having the top 5 highest population count in all of America. Therefore, we are talking about tens of millions of people suffering as victims due to this clear criminality of sending public funds directly into private pockets to line the asset portfolio of a special few interest groups.

Quantitative easing is counterproductive. Government keeps going down this path because the people who benefit from it are in government & cronies with government officials. This is why Rockwell, Siemens, Schneider, Emerson, SAP, Apple, stick VERY closely to intellectual property lawyers using a propaganda machine to lobby against consumer protections, right to repair, and ultimately open source as a whole. They justify this predatory behavior on the basis of GDP rising, and therefore give no craps about the uneven distribution

Number go up, therefore good!!!!

I can already hear people saying “bUt eNri, wE LiVE iN uSa, uNfeTTereD CAPiTaliSm GOod“!

No, this uneven distribution allows the mega wealthy to continue buying assets to drive your family from your homes, aspiring businesses out of potential customers because they bought up market share through the shilling of proprietary closed source solutions, or in the case of IBM just outright bought & privatized the existing open source asset.

Like many researchers, I’ve had to pay fees to publish in journals like IEEE, only to see my work locked behind paywalls, inaccessible to many who could benefit from it. Knowledge should not be privatized and allowed to be transformed into an asset. Scientific and technological discoveries should never be assets to befall private control.

It is very telling to have the entirety of industrial automation to continue arguing over how badly they want to be screwed – with or without lube.

It doesn’t have to be this way. There is a better option and I absolutely promise you that it does work. What is this secret sauce?

Oscillating your vocal chords to take a clear & explicit stance in support of open source and against private domination of assets. Have conversations with fellow technology practitioners, stage public demonstrations, write & call politicians, write & call to corporations, talk to your neighbors, demand academic figures from colleges (especially public ones) to take a stance, conduct investigative research to serve as a watchdog.

Anyone can do it, you don’t need someone else dictating to you that “it’s within scope” or that it’s an acceptable opinion to have. Have a stance and argue it – don't be a fencesitter and try to play both sides. You absolutely will lose everyone.

No one is coming to save industrial automation. Popular social media influencers from the giant corporate realm & the self-proclaimed “independent” integrator will not save you. Government will not save you. Industry associations absolutely hate you and will never save you. A benevolent billionaire will not save you.

Your only salvation is to take a stand and exercise the power of your voice by sharing your personal story of frustration, the unnecessary suffering & struggles you’ve experienced at the heavy hand of “quantitative easing”, and why you support open source.

Speak up and help educate other fellow practitioners & the public on the importance & nuance of open source & privatization of assets under the control of a select few special interest groups. This is what activism and building solidarity looks like.

This is the way forward. To normalize speaking out and do so consistently. Get away from cults of personality & tribalism. We are all already damned if we do and damned if we don’t, so you might as well try. I absolutely can personally guarantee you it will get far worse if we individually & collectively do NOT directly stand FOR open source & bring it to the public mainstream through the lens of economics. That’s because open source has always been about combating wealth inequality and domination of assets by a select few special interest groups.

Industrial automation and progress in humanity at large absolutely depend on fearless activism in support of open source. It’s not about being right or being a self-proclaimed god-tier programmer. It’s about having the guts to take a stand and fight for it, even if everyone else may not be doing it. Let's turn our collective frustrations into a catalyst for change. Join me in this fight, not just to speak up, but to act. Together, we can reshape the future of technology and society. Stay engaged, stay vocal, and yes, we will discuss more in our next conversation.

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What Is Best In Class Industry 4.0?

Enri Marini — Sat, 27 Apr 2024 22:58:10 +0000

In recent years, Industry 4.0 has become a buzzword in the manufacturing world, referring to the fourth industrial revolution characterized by the integration of advanced technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Cloud Computing. This transformation has already started to change the manufacturing landscape, with businesses automating their processes, reducing downtime, and improving production quality. However, the implementation of Industry 4.0 technologies is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, the best in class Industry 4.0 is a tailored approach that meets specific business needs and goals.

To understand what best in class Industry 4.0 looks like, we need to first examine the current state of the industry. Most manufacturers implement proprietary point-to-point integration, where different machines and systems communicate with each other through custom-made interfaces. This approach has several limitations, including lack of flexibility, scalability, and interoperability. It also requires significant effort and investment to maintain and upgrade.

The best in class Industry 4.0, on the other hand, adopts a more open and modular approach. It leverages standard communication protocols like OPC-UA and MQTT to connect different machines and systems, regardless of their vendor or type. Using the ISA-95 standard to create the structure of your business real-time events provides several advantages, including easier integration, greater flexibility, scalability, and interoperability, and reduced maintenance costs.

However, it is essential to note that the best in class and best of breed approaches assume that there is an off-the-shelf product and solution-stack that will automatically fix all business problems. This assumption is often far from the truth, as every business has its unique needs, goals, and challenges. Therefore, the best in class Industry 4.0 should be a tailored approach that aligns with specific business needs, goals, and challenges — as long as your development adheres to the 4 principles of digital transformation.

To achieve the best in class Industry 4.0, businesses must embrace digital transformation, a process of integrating digital technologies into all aspects of their operations. Digital transformation is based on four core principles: report by exception, open architecture, edge-driven, and lightweight protocol.

The report by exception principle suggests that businesses should only report on exceptional events, i.e., events that require attention or action. This approach reduces the amount of data transmitted, processed, and stored, reducing the associated costs and complexity.

The open architecture principle suggests that businesses should use standard communication protocols and interfaces, allowing different machines and systems to communicate with each other seamlessly. This approach provides greater flexibility, scalability, and interoperability. The edge-driven principle suggests that businesses should push some of the processing and decision-making to the edge of the network, closer to the data source.

This approach reduces latency, improves real-time responsiveness, and enhances reliability. The lightweight protocol principle suggests that businesses should use lightweight protocols like MQTT and CoAP, which are designed for constrained environments like IoT devices. These protocols reduce the amount of data transmitted and the associated costs and complexity.

Creative commons photo of tool belt.

Digital transformation enables rapid custom development suited to your particular needs through concepts like the unified namespace and the unified analytics framework. The unified namespace provides a single view of all data across different machines and systems, enabling businesses to gain greater visibility and insights into their operations. The unified analytics framework provides a platform for developing custom analytics solutions tailored to specific business needs and goals, providing greater value and ROI.

The best in class Industry 4.0 only means an organization that has embraced that they are no longer a commodities provider but a data company and fundamentally conducts business in a new environment that embraces integration among internal systems and between external companies. The best in class Industry 4.0 must align with specific business needs, goals, and challenges and leverage digital transformation principles to achieve greater flexibility, scalability, interoperability, and value. It is not a one-size-fits-all solution but a tailored approach that provides a competitive advantage and enables businesses to thrive in the rapidly changing manufacturing landscape.

To achieve best in class Industry 4.0, businesses must also consider the role of data in their operations. Data is the backbone of Industry 4.0, and businesses that can effectively collect, analyze, and leverage data will have a significant advantage over their competitors. This requires a robust data strategy that includes data governance, data quality, data security, and data analytics.

Data governance ensures that data is managed effectively across the organization and that there are clear policies and procedures for data management. Data quality ensures that data is accurate, consistent, and relevant to the business needs. Data security ensures that data is protected from unauthorized access, theft, and misuse. Data analytics provides the insights needed to make informed decisions and drive business growth.

To effectively leverage data, businesses must also embrace artificial intelligence and machine learning. AI and ML provide the ability to analyze vast amounts of data, identify patterns and trends, and make predictions about future events that are otherwise invisible to the human eye. This provides businesses with a competitive advantage by enabling them to make data-driven decisions, automate processes, and optimize operations.

The best in class Industry 4.0 also requires a culture of transformative and disruptive leadership. Anyone can manage, very few people can truly effectively lead. This means embracing new technologies, exploring new business models, and experimenting with new ideas. It also means fostering a culture of collaboration, where employees, customers, and partners work together to drive innovation and achieve business success.

Creative commons image of teamwork.

To achieve best in class Industry 4.0, businesses must also consider the role of sustainability. Sustainability is becoming an increasingly critical issue in the manufacturing industry, with consumers and stakeholders demanding more sustainable products and practices. This requires businesses to adopt more sustainable manufacturing processes, reduce waste and emissions, and embrace circular economy principles.

In conclusion, the best in class Industry 4.0 is not a one-size-fits-all solution, but a tailored approach that meets specific business needs, goals, and challenges. It requires businesses to embrace digital transformation principles, leverage data and artificial intelligence, foster a culture of innovation and collaboration, and embrace sustainability practices. By doing so, businesses can gain a competitive advantage, optimize their operations, and achieve sustainable business growth in the rapidly changing manufacturing landscape.

Thanks for tuning in. Critical discourse is encouraged and welcomed. See you in the next article.

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What Is Digital Transformation?

Enri Marini — Sat, 27 Apr 2024 22:38:16 +0000

Digital Transformation enables the integration of digital technology into all areas of a business, resulting in fundamental changes to how the business operates and delivers value to customers. It is a strategic process that empowers organizations to leverage technology to improve their processes, products and services. The key to understanding digital transformation is that it is a strategy driven primarily by technology in service of enabling people to become self-sufficient.

More specifically, digital transformation empowers people to solve complex enterprise problems rapidly on their own by automating menial tasks so they can focus on value-add work. It is important to note that digital technologies are any electronic tools, systems, devices, and resources that generate, capture, store, or process data from humans and machines.

Digital transformation is not a project or series of projects. Furthermore, it is not drastically reducing your workforce for a false pipedream that their jobs will entirely be replaced by automation. In fact, digitally transformed organizations work in conjunction with their workforce to realign responsibilities to encourage decentralized, self-managed teams.

Strategy is ongoing and requires continuing education at all levels of an organization in a scientific manner free from vendor bias about how digital technology is transforming members of an organization on an individual and collective level. Strategy requires that an organization continuously learn how digital technology is transforming it as a whole relative to other organizations and the market.

By its nature, for digital transformation to work, it requires transformative and disruptive leadership who have deep technical competency and are free from financial sponsorships that would otherwise steer them towards a solution-stack driven approach. It necessitates adopting an Agile philosophy at every layer of the business due to the inherently high levels of complexity and rapid change. The Agile philosophy uses rolling wave planning, iterative and incremental delivery, rapid and flexible response to change, coupled with open communication between all teams, stakeholders, and customers at all times.

In an Agile business, progress is measured in terms of working software to the degree that end-users feel their business case needs are solved and the project is integrated into existing systems. Traditional progress is measured on completed tasks or deliverables set against a fixed pre-planned schedule. The primary goal of the Agile philosophy is to deliver value to the customer as quickly as possible in an iterative manner.

This is achieved by recognizing that the value you deliver is a function of newfound knowledge gained from customer feedback. This means the value of any undertaking and its return on investment is unknown until such a time that a minimum viable product is delivered to customers and feedback is acquired from customers.

Traditional businesses use earned value, which measures cost as a function of time spent based on the assumption that you know exactly what your deliverable looks like, operates, the numerical value it will provide, and how operations will sustain this value over time. This does not work for the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) landscape because actual cost and value are a function of newfound knowledge acquired after building a technology and iteratively acquiring feedback from customers.

Minimum technical requirements may help illustrate what an IIoT project needs to accomplish but it is not exactly clear on what the tangible mechanisms to achieve this feat will look like, let alone explicit details as to how operations will sustain its value over time.

The key to mastering digital transformation is first understanding the 4 key principles on which it is built.

O̶p̶e̶n̶ a̶r̶c̶h̶i̶t̶e̶c̶t̶u̶r̶e̶ Open source
Data is streamed on a report-by-exception basis instead of poll-response
Use a lightweight protocol
Edge-driven

Industrial automation tech stack. Credits go to 4.0 Solutions

Regardless of an organization’s size and vertical, a tapestry of tools are necessary to function. There has never been one tool that can do it all. This tooling diversity allows you to decouple the solution from the technology underneath the hood. O̶p̶e̶n̶ a̶r̶c̶h̶i̶t̶e̶c̶t̶u̶r̶e̶ Open source means that your organization is free from a monolithic technology ecosystem that utilizes one vendor’s mainly proprietary, tightly-coupled, closed-loop solutions incapable of natively communicating with tooling from different vendors. Most data does not change value in a significant amount and frequency. This means it is not necessary to store and report this data until it changes.

A lightweight protocol that standardizes and compresses the payload delivered over the wire while simultaneously decreasing the compute power of the edge device is equally as important. IIoT means more and more interconnected devices, which means heavier network usage. Streaming data through report-by-exception instead of poll-response will significantly reduce unnecessary network traffic and allow you to accommodate more interconnected devices. Last but not least, edge-driven means that the smart devices are informing the business what to do. Digital transformation uses real-time data to improve efficiency, reduce downtime, and increase revenue by connecting, collecting, storing, analyzing, and acting on this data.

This real-time access to data is essential for making informed decisions about how to allocate resources and manage costs. It helps supplement human decisions using verifiable evidence. This is possible through the application of machine learning and artificial intelligence to capture efficiencies that are otherwise invisible to the human eye. Traditionally, business decisions are largely made on anecdotal evidence and no contextual information to your specific situation.

Equally important to note is that these principles alone are not enough to digitally transform an organization. A paradigm shift in the fundamental way a business exists needs to occur. Organizations are no longer commodities providers. Instead, they need to recognize that they are in fact data companies, whereby their products and services are merely the medium in which data is aggregated and contextualized to optimize their business.

All of this to say that digital transformation is a strategy built on the 4 aforementioned principles, which enables an organization to undergo an educational journey rooted in a technology-first, vendor-neutral, solution-stack agnostic manner.

Digitally transformed organizations focus primarily on technology and its integration into existing systems. This is to say that they value mutual trust and collaboration, integrity, humility, interoperability, scalability, extensibility, and flexibility above all else. Traditional businesses view technology as an afterthought, and costs are only allocated to it after the scope and budget have been defined. In IIoT projects, technology is a central focus, and costs must be allocated to it from the very beginning.

This means that a significant portion of the budget will be allocated to research and development, as well as testing and deployment of new technologies. In most cases, this means eradicating proprietary technology at every layer of the business because it creates data silos. Digitally transformed organizations favor open technologies (MQTT, Sparkplug B, Ignition, etc.) and meaningfully engage with open-source communities.

Organizations that wish to remain in business must meaningfully engage with open-source communities, they cannot afford not to. An example of what meaningful engagement does NOT look like is the “embrace, extend, extinguish” framework, also known as the three E’s. Widely adopted by larger organizations, this approach has been repeatedly used to suppress innovation by artificially reducing competition through acquisitions. Fundamentally, the three E’s framework cannot work to aid digital transformation because it promotes a monolithic cookie-cutter solution.

Manufacturers in particular share the same automation technology stack but their use-cases uniquely drive customization that do not meet the needs of other organizations. Therefore what works for one business will not make any sense for another. Value is not held constant with complex environments that involve digital software technology. What you build today may only be valuable for 24 hours and keeping it operational for any longer will bury your organization into significant technical debt.

This pressure to rapidly change and adapt is equally felt by open-source communities. Their successful existence is dependent upon delivering working software quickly, to the degree that users feel it solves real business needs.

Relation of reactive systems as defined by the reactive manifesto. Shows the connection between responsive, resilient, message driven, and elastic characteristics

Digital transformation inevitably fundamentally redefines existing job responsibilities and organizational hierarchies. Divisions that have previously held unilateral decision making power will find themselves turned upside down. Information Technology departments in particular have historically been granted ever increasing responsibilities without seeing a proportional increase in resources, namely due to the exponential rise in technological complexity.

In the same swipe, front-line business staff have found their voices no longer being heard, ultimately leading to an organization disconnected with what their customers need and how to empower its workforce to meet those demands. A digitally transformed organization recognizes that its technology teams are primarily service staff and their sole mission is educating the rest of the business about technology. This paradigm shift is in service to achieving a more accurate digital representation of the entire business, whereby all events are captured electronically.

In Conclusion

Digital transformation is a strategy, not a series of projects. A key reason why digital transformation journeys fail, often before they ever begin, is due to technical debt. Simply put, technical debt is the implicit and explicit cost of rework to improve the quality of an asset in service to make it easier to maintain, extend, and decommission. Digital enterprise architecture has largely been driven by linear, deterministic, tightly-coupled proprietary solutions thanks to the false promise of “integrating the business” shilled by enterprise resource planning providers and their network of consultant systems integrators.

Financial partnerships in service to maintaining market dominance created the system integrator philosophy of “go long and deep”, whereby mismatched cookie-cutter solution-stacks were pitched over continuing digital transformation education.

Although technical debt is unavoidable, accepting it must be consciously deliberated by the entire organization with emphasis on interoperability, ease of use, extensibility, resiliency, and decommissioning. Technical debt leads to unplanned work, which detracts from value-added work. With the exponential growth in technological complexity, manufacturing leadership have universally historically chosen short-term gain via point-to-point solutions over long-term continuing education.

The 4 principles that drive digital transformation are not enough to succeed on this journey. Disruptive and transformational leaders with deep technical knowledge are required at the helm to successfully steer the organization towards vendor-neutral, solution-stack agnostic, technology-driven scientific consensus on what digital transformation uniquely looks like for them.

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The Efficiency Paradox

Enri Marini — Sat, 27 Apr 2024 21:59:20 +0000

Efficiency has become an important buzzword today. From business executives to engineers and scientists, everyone is looking for ways to be more efficient. It’s not hard to see why — efficiency can lead to increased profits, improved productivity, and reduced waste. However, there is a paradox of efficiency that is often overlooked — the pursuit of efficiency can lead to less sustainable, less equitable, and less efficient outcomes.

With the rise of digital transformation in mainstream discourse, the future looks bright in how a truly digitally interconnected ecosystem helps accomplish this premise of doing more with less. Following in the footsteps of disruption and innovation that digital transformation brings, this article aims to ask the question — “To what end are we pursuing optimization and efficiency?”

The paradox of efficiency was brilliantly explored by Edward Tenner in his TED Talk. Tenner explains that efficiency is a double-edged sword — while it can bring about many benefits, it can also have unintended consequences. One of the main issues with pursuing efficiency is that it often leads to a narrow focus on short-term gains at the expense of long-term sustainability.

This is especially true when it comes to the environment. Many businesses and individuals pursue efficiency to consume more and generate more profits. They may seek efficiency to reduce waste and improve productivity, but they are simply consuming more resources at a faster rate. This can have devastating effects on the environment, as natural resources are depleted, and waste accumulates. Furthermore, the benefits of increased efficiency are often enjoyed by a select few, while the costs are borne by society.

The pursuit of efficiency is not inherently bad. However, it is important to consider the long-term consequences of our actions. We must ask ourselves why we are pursuing efficiency — is it for selfish reasons, or is it to create a more sustainable and equitable world? If our goal is the latter, then we must look beyond short-term gains and consider the impact of our actions on future generations.

One way to shift our focus towards sustainability and equity is by taking inspiration from the benefits of fasting. Fasting is the practice of abstaining from food for a period, often for improving overall health and wellbeing. There are countless well-documented benefits to fasting, including but not limited to: weight loss and improved metabolism, improved cardiovascular health, improved brain function, improved immune function, and anti-aging effects by reducing oxidative stress and inflammation.

Symbolic representation of fasting

Fasting can also offer valuable insights into the benefits of conscientious and deliberate consumption of all things. By consuming less, we can reduce our impact on the environment and create a more equitable world. Digital transformation is an absolute necessity for humanity to effectively do more with less and reduce waste by seeing what the data tells us where we are consuming far more than necessary. Fasting from consumerism offers similar benefits. By consuming less, we can reduce our carbon footprint and generate less waste.

We can also redirect our resources towards more sustainable and equitable practices. On a micro level, instead of buying a new phone every year, we can invest in repairing and upgrading our current device. On a macro level, designing cities, decommissioning unsalvageable buildings, retrofitting existing infrastructure, and shifting away from private ownership of infrastructure promotes sustainable long-term growth.

This not only reduces waste, but also supports local businesses and reinforces the careful consideration of the circular economy. Innovation is born out of necessity and passion, which is why remarkable technology like the Framework laptop and Fairphone exist.

Another way to shift our focus towards sustainability and equity is by rethinking the way we approach digital transformation. The pursuit of digital transformation can also lead to unintended consequences. For example, simply running a production machine 24/7 may seem like an efficient use of resources.

In reality, it is oftentimes more costly and less productive than periodically taking the machine down for maintenance and adapting to availability of raw materials by allowing the environment to heal post resource extraction. By neglecting maintenance, the machine is more likely to break down, leading to costly repairs and downtime. In addition, the constant use of the machine may lead to increased wear and tear, reducing its lifespan and requiring more frequent replacements, which leads to further environmental damage.

The key to avoiding the paradox of efficiency in digital transformation is to consider the long-term consequences of our actions. We must take a holistic approach to digital transformation, considering not only the short-term gains, but also the long-term impact on sustainability and equity. This may mean investing in more efficient technology, but it may also mean rethinking our approach to work and production.

Circular economy infographic showing relation between inputs, production, distribution, usage, waste, and reuse

One way to achieve this is by embracing the concept of circular economy, which aims to minimize waste and maximize the use of resources. In a circular economy, materials are kept in use for as long as possible, and waste is minimized through reuse, repair, and recycling. This not only reduces our impact on the environment, but also creates new business opportunities and promotes economic growth.

Another way to achieve sustainability and equity is by promoting social and environmental responsibility in the workplace. This can be done by implementing sustainability policies and practices, promoting diversity and inclusion, and investing in the education and well-being of employees. By doing so, businesses can create a culture of responsibility and accountability, and foster a more sustainable and equitable future.

Solution Proposal

To create a more sustainable and equitable future, we must go beyond the surface-level pursuit of efficiency and consider the deeper psychological and societal factors that contribute to our actions. One such factor is trauma, which can have a profound impact on our individual and collective psyches. Trauma affects our behavior, our relationships, and our ability to make long-term decisions that prioritize sustainability and equity.

One effective framework for addressing trauma is trauma-informed care. This approach is based on the understanding that trauma is pervasive, and everyone experiences trauma in their lives. This matter is further complicated by the fact that everyone responds differently to traumatic circumstances and its impact is different depending upon whether the individual was a child or an adult at the time of the event. Trauma-informed care involves creating a supportive environment that promotes healing and resilience through teaching effective self-regulating techniques and empowering people to solve problems through self-sufficient methods in order to implement rational solutions for long-term sustainability.

This approach can be applied in a variety of settings, from healthcare and education to business and community development. By incorporating trauma-informed care principles into our work, legislation, and personal lives, we can create a more compassionate and resilient society. This leads to improved mental health, better decision-making, a greater focus on sustainability and equity, and successful innovative businesses.

The key to understanding trauma is learning about the impact of stress on our individual and collective psyches. When we are under stress, our brains shift into survival mode, which can lead to short-term thinking and a focus on immediate needs rather than long-term goals.

We can apply the Tuckman model of group development to implement effective long-term pro-social changes because it offers us a scientific understanding of how stress affects people on a collective level. The Tuckman model is a well-known framework that describes the stages of group development and effective strategies to overcoming group obstacles. By understanding these stages of group development, we can create a more effective and sustainable approach to group work based on a scientifically sound foundation instead of platitudes and irrelevant cultural analogies..

For example, in the forming stage, we can establish clear goals and expectations for the group. In the storming stage, we can address any conflicts or challenges that arise in a constructive and respectful manner. In the norming stage, we can establish a sense of shared values and norms that guide our work. In the performing stage, we can work together to achieve our goals, while in the adjourning stage, we can reflect on our progress and celebrate our achievements, as well as offering support to assist people with the natural bereavement process that occurs after any group is disbanded.

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you are still a rat. - Lily Tomlin

By incorporating these frameworks into our work and personal lives, we can create a more sustainable and equitable society. We can address the impact of trauma, reduce stress levels, and implement effective long-term pro-social changes that prioritize sustainability and equity. Ultimately, by going beyond the surface-level pursuit of efficiency, we can create a brighter future for all.

Summary

In conclusion, the paradox of efficiency is a complex issue that requires critical thinking and a long-term perspective. I ask the question again but with a spin — To what end are we pursuing this efficiency and optimization? Is it so we can just continue consuming at a constant pace and being able to consume more in certain periods due to the optimization info our digitally transformed organization has gathered?

Or is it instead to connect with prosocial values where conscientious decisions and mutual collaboration are deliberately baked in through prolonged periods of downtime to allow the environment and naturally occurring ecosystems a chance to heal from the inevitable damage we cause?

By embracing the concept of circular economy, promoting social and environmental responsibility in the workplace, and taking inspiration from the benefits of fasting, we can create a future that is not only more efficient, but also more just and equitable for all.

Thanks for tuning in. Critical discourse is encouraged and welcomed. See you in the next article.

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