Even last December there weren't any regulations in Germany that would have prevented the congress.

It was a weird time last December: After the cancellation of the congress was announced, there was a large congress of intensive care workers in Germany where the attendees were going around mostly maskless. I mean, who would be better at estimating the risks?

I also don't understand why the German hacker scene was and still is so much in favor Covid restrictions. There are hackerspaces that still require N95 masks today while in the general population nobody cares anymore. I honestly think that it's mostly virtue signalling, i.e. showing that you're a good member of the scene.

It's a combination of virtue signaling/perceiving the risk to be higher than others perceive it to be (right or wrong; not commenting on the merits), and the long lead times/limited financial reserves the org has in planning events.

The go/no go decision had to be made months before, and there was some risk of covid restrictions being in place in December which would have made the event suck or not happen. Probably harder to cancel a single event in, say, 2019 over that level of risk, but easier to continue not running it in 2020, 2021, and then in 2022, I think. I really hope it happens this year.

> I honestly think that it's mostly virtue signalling, i.e. showing that you're a good member of the scene.

Completely agree. At the beginning of the pandemic, people who opposed the restrictions were considered selfish and showing a lack of solidarity, if not harmful. It quickly turned out that right-leaning people were more likely to oppose the restrictions. This turned the mask already into a symbol of virtue signaling which seemed to stuck with a certain part of the population.

It seems that the only people left caring about COVID restrictions are left-leaning academics who, since I rarely encounter them IRL, spend a lot of time online. So exactly what the CCC is.

The CCC and German hacker/makerspace scene has been taken over by communist groups who attempt to use it for their own purposes. Members with different view points are thrown out. Replace 'hacking' with 'woke bullshit' and you get the idea...

Utter bullshit.

They are somewhat leftist, but certainly not communist. Do you know what communist means or are you just using at as an insult?

No. You are talking utter bullshit.

The founder of my local maker space was an actual communist party member so yes I know what it means. He was not the only one and I have no doubt other maker spaces with close CCC ties will be similar. Somewhat leftist is the understatement of the year.

Personally I have absolutely no problem with a persons political beliefs so that is not an insult. I have a problem with fascism. If I believe something different I should not be penalized or viewed as a threat.

I am not a fan of the CCC or their organization and will continue to share my experiences of them with others.

You may want to look up the CCC‘s founding history.

Was there not some rather dramatic change in the leadership in the last ~5 years?

Admittedly it's very murky to see how it's organized and run..

Stop smoking crack.

> taken over by

Many German hacker/maker spaces and groups were founded by people who are somewhat leftist or anarchist in outlook. There was no takeover.

Also, to Americans, even centrists or conservatives in Europe look like communists.

Funny. Have you tried crack? Discussing maker spaces will be further down your priority list if you do.

German maker spaces are not nice for people with different views i.e. not left wing.

Simply not true.

I know a lot of people who couldn’t be described as leftists in the German makerspace scene, even in the CCC itself.

If you are rabidly right wing (AfD, for example), then yes you will be shunned. But if you are a normal decent person you will be fine.

The CCC being political and left-wing is a feature and not a bug.

Isn’t anarchism typically aligned with libertarian views?

They are a lot more compatible than people like to admit.

Both have a strong ethos towards promoting individual liberty, and generally agree somewhat on the approach that an individuals rights have a “limit” when they infringe on the rights of another person.

The main difference seems to be that a lot of libertarians take a strictly individualistic approach, whereas anarchists tend to prefer a mutualism approach.

Honestly, if you explain both in neutral terms to someone, they sound almost the same with minor differences.

Ah, here it is, the clueless/idiotic comment about the CCC being left that is guaranteed to show up every year on HN.

> Even last December

While I believe the general CCC public to be more careful regarding covid, I'd say they had to make that decision long before december. I don't know how long beforehand though, as many rules ran out around a year ago(? not super sure).

> I honestly think that it's mostly virtue signalling, i.e. showing that you're a good member of the scene.

Out of curiosity, how would you describe the difference between virtue signaling and actually possessing a virtue, e.g., showing that you're a good member vs being a good member of the scene.

For me, virtue signalling always seemed to imply words instead of actions, claiming things instead of doing things. But actually wearing masks and canceling events are actions to me, not just words. (This relies on the assumption that the people organizing the events and spaces, actually care about them, and don't just run them to show how much they care.)

Or it's simply that it wasn't pragmatic for them to take the risk, because it would be PR hit and the winter months are a likely time for new "waves" to hit.

Because obsession with the covid stuff is closely tied to political philosophy, and, as the CCC itself likes to say, the CCC is a political organisation.

Because they are complete bed-wetters! This is the generation who are frightened to even shake hands now. Man or mouse? Definitely mouse...