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  "description": "Remembering to stop and protect my boundaries, writing a mishmash of the history of climbing and AI, having some incredible feedback from two programmes, planning The Field Station, TechFreedom stickers ",
  "path": "/weeknote/weeknote-53/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-06-05T19:46:23.000Z",
  "site": "https://tomcw.xyz",
  "tags": [
    "Abi",
    "Helen",
    "techfreedom | Tom WatsonI’m not quite sure when it happened. Like most things it wasn’t a sudden, but just a slow chipping away. Between closing Data for Action , starting #TechFreedom, building multiple new products and generally trying to find my thing again, I stopped protecting my Forest Fridays. “Just that one little feature in a morning and then I’ll go.”\n“Yeah I can fit in a quick meeting even though I don’t do them on Fridays. ” Chip, chip I suppose that’s maybe where The Slow Post came from, my body reacting to missing out on the things that bring me joy and keep me right. I just needed to notice, and put the boundary back in. And keep it there. So, forest and flower FridayLinkedInTom Watson",
    "Drift",
    "Strap in (and harness up)Is the harness more important that the model? A ramble through climbing history and the AI present and future. Random alrightTomcw.xyzTom Watson",
    "here",
    "TechFreedom Dispatch",
    "CrankGPT — Local Human-powered AIA human-powered, fully local, fully private AI solution.CrankGPT",
    "Your AI Use Is Destroying the Planet",
    "DeepSWE",
    "To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks.",
    "Jamie Hurst's Blog - Is this sustainable?",
    "Systemic Investing Summit 2026 - Collated Reflections",
    "Farming the Future: We've Seen What Patient Funding Grows",
    "We finally (sort of) know what the National Data Library is",
    "The EU Open Source Strategy",
    "What mushrooms tell us about the fragility of our economy – and what we need to do to transform it — Opus",
    "The community-first software era"
  ],
  "textContent": "### What I did\n\n  * Caught up on a lot of admin and things that just needed doing for a few clients. The boring and necessary, yes this stuff still needs doing, and I'm better when I do this in solid blocks, so monday was mainly this. Emails, specs, scheduling. A load off.\n  * Had a conversation with the Ada Lovelace institute about maybe joining a forum around AI and Community. Will see where that goes.\n  * Caught up on several things OR with various people from Lloyds Bank Foundation as we near the end of this programme. I've been putting quite a bit of design and effort into thinking about the final resources for this. Shared a bit of thinking around it. Want to create something really good and lasting.\n  * Spent wednesday morning with Doug (and his daughter who is on work experience - she got to see how not to do business from me!) - was a good productive morning as we looked at feedback from the TechFreedom pilot (which was overwhelmingly positive but also some really useful bits of feedback which will really improve the next one). Planned out improvements for a new cohort in September. Also talked about developing pitches for funders in two ways\n1. Support your grant holders to access this. Hugely important for social purpose organisations to understand and reduce their risks\n2. For funders themselves! Do they have the language, the insight to understand the risks they themselves are under and they are facilitating for their grant holders.\nAll of this is hugely important for organisations working with organisers/people most at risk from surveillance and jurisdiction issues. I don't think it's on many peoples radars...\n  * We also spent time scoping out The Field Station which we are loosely describing as thinking and doing stuff on '**_the future of work, the reach of technology and the shape of society'_**. More on this to come.\n\n\n\nPink lane bakery delivering the goods again. A Pain au Chocolate and a pastel de nata which was chefs kiss. Exceptional on the tom pastry scale.\n\n  * Also, we got some TechFreedom stickers\n\n\n\n\n  * Thursday was a day of OR, a final reflection session for the cohort. I love these sessions. Give good prompts, give some space, get out the way. But to get to here has taken lots of work and relationship building. A whole 1.5 hours just to reflect?? Yes. And it's of so much value. And we so easily miss things like this.\n  * Also on Thursday I got to sit in with Abi and Helen as they delivered sessions on Collective Governance and How to Fail for the OR cohort as part of the skills sessions which was great.\n  * As we approach the end of the OR cohort some of the participants have email us, unprompted, to let us know how much they've valued it, what they've taken from it, what it's helped them do. Honestly I got a little emotional.\n  * Friday I went to the Forest. I know that I should do this, it's good for my health, my wellbeing, my mind, my soul. But I'd let it slip bit by bit this year. I didn't protect the time enough. \"Just build this little feature and then I'll go\" i'd say to myself. 5 hours later I still be there building. Or I'd fit in a little call when I shouldn't. But I got out, and reminded myself to protect this time more fiercely\n\n#techfreedom | Tom WatsonI’m not quite sure when it happened. Like most things it wasn’t a sudden, but just a slow chipping away. Between closing Data for Action , starting #TechFreedom, building multiple new products and generally trying to find my thing again, I stopped protecting my Forest Fridays. “Just that one little feature in a morning and then I’ll go.”\n“Yeah I can fit in a quick meeting even though I don’t do them on Fridays. ” Chip, chip I suppose that’s maybe where The Slow Post came from, my body reacting to missing out on the things that bring me joy and keep me right. I just needed to notice, and put the boundary back in. And keep it there. So, forest and flower FridayLinkedInTom Watson\n\nMe in the forest on friday, and then just enjoying some of the flowers around my garden, a lupin, some honeysuckle and a clematis. Yes I am showing off\n\n### Building\n\nAdded some new features to Drift this week. You can now take payments in a form (via stripe). I'll be adding non US tech payment options soon. This feels like a nice step and a bit of a maturing of the platform. Adding a field type to the platform is one thing...ensuring the AI assistants know how to use it is another.\n\n### Silly Cartoons\n\nAnother silly cartoon on Friday. Yes i have more to come still.\n\n### Writing\n\nWrote a post about the history of climbing, equipment and AI. Honestly it's not that weird. Or maybe it is.\n\nStrap in (and harness up)Is the harness more important that the model? A ramble through climbing history and the AI present and future. Random alrightTomcw.xyzTom Watson\n\n### TechFreedom Newsletter\n\nThe 3rd TechFreedom newsletter went out this week. You can read it here\n\nTechFreedom Dispatch\n\n* * *\n\n## Links This Week\n\n###\n\nIf you only click one this week, it should be this one below.\n\nCrankGPT — Local Human-powered AIA human-powered, fully local, fully private AI solution.CrankGPT\n\n  * Your AI Use Is Destroying the Planet - Introducing the Good Steward Principle To Curb It\n  * DeepSWE - DeepSWE measures frontier coding agents on original, long-horizon software engineering tasks.\nTo have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks.\n  * Jamie Hurst's Blog - Is this sustainable?\n  * Systemic Investing Summit 2026 - Collated Reflections\nFarming the Future: We've Seen What Patient Funding Grows\n  * We finally (sort of) know what the National Data Library is - They even let me speak to the Digital Minister about it\n  * The EU Open Source Strategy\n  * What mushrooms tell us about the fragility of our economy – and what we need to do to transform it — Opus\n  * The community-first software era\n\n",
  "title": "Weeknote 53",
  "updatedAt": "2026-06-05T19:46:24.126Z"
}