The first TROM Meeting was in 2019, in May. Some 12 people came. We rented something for 3 weeks here where I live. It was very exciting at first, to see everyone for the first time:

But then I started to realize how tiring it is to have so many people around at once. So I was struggling a bit. However the worst was when I started to pee blood, mid way the meeting, and I thought am gonna die :D. It was a hellish experience for me. Read this blog post to know more about.

However looking back it was a very nice time, those first days, maybe the first 2 weeks, when I was not as sick. Memories, you know. I’ll try to keep the best and discard the worse.

Since then a bunch of things have changed. My health greatly improved, some people lost interest in TROM, new people gained interest. I created trom.tf and a bunch more stuff, plus managed to finish the TROM II documentary that should be released this month. So we decided to make another TROM Meeting, 4 years after the first one. EXCITED!

All healthy, the documentary (huge project) done and shared with the ones coming at the meeting, new excitement felt in the air. We rented a place near where we live in Spain, and invited some 14 people. Only around 10 or so could come, but then things got more complicated because now most people had jobs (unlike the first time we met) and had a hard time taking some time off for the meeting. I struggled to organize it, but we finally decided to meet for 8-10 days. Based on the first meeting, 3 weeks was way too long.

Unfortunately, again, a few could not come for health reasons or unable to get time off from their jobs, and others came later. But we were all set. I organized everything. Sasha and Georgi helped me prepare it all :). Was so excited about it. I needed a break! I wanted to laugh, to dance, to hike, to spend time with some wonderful beings. I worked too much on the documentary for the past 2-3 years. So I needed a break. It was a great timing since Sasha also finished her book and she also felt similarly.

All set. GO!

I went to the house with Sasha to organize things:

She was not feeling that well. Some abdominal discomfort on and off for the past weeks. But nothing too serious. We continued.

Vicky and Rafa came first, with their car. Drove for 6 hours. They are such positive creatures you will smile 90% of the time when you are with them. So kind, so organized, so friendly. Roma came the next day after the train he supposed to take here, was canceled numerous times. Roma is my brother for sure 🙂 – friendly, organized, in a good mood, helpful, so kind. We were all getting used to being with each other, but a bit tired. They were tired because they had to travel for so long, we were tired because we had to radically change our sleeping schedule to wake up earlier.

Then Alexio came. He was the only one we did not meet in person. He was so tall, and his kindness on par with that 🙂

So positive, always smiling, always friendly.

Me, Sasha, Georgi, Vicky, Rafa, Roma and Alexio. That was the team. Unfortunately Guil had a bad accident a few days before the meeting so he could not come 🙁 – he would need a few months to recover. Aaron was also unable to take any days off from his job…

We were all quite sad that that they could not come.

Ok. Let’s have some fun.

We went to some parks nearby:

To show off our athletic skills 🙂

And coolness 🙂

We then visited the seaside:

And found some alien creatures:

The next day we decided to go to a nearby park in the forest and we spent some really fun time there.

Laying down in the hammocks in the shade:

We played “mime”, a game where someone gives you 2 words, like say “inhabitable exoplanet”, and you have to mime that without making any sounds, and the rest have to guess it. I love this game because everyone is engaged. We laughed, it was fun.

I had to mime: endless time. Go figure….how do you do that? But I managed it eventually haha.

I’ll let you guess what Sasha might be miming here haha. Or Georgi.

Or Rafa being an octopus stripper:

We had such a great time there. Was not too hot, it was calm, it was fun. I felt like a kid again 🙂

Going there, coming back, cooking food, staying in the house, were flavored with us talking about all sort of interesting things, from TROM to the universe, from computers to us.

Later that day we had a barbecue. And I always end up in charge of that and smelling like a burned piece of wood at the end.

At night we could see the Moon and Venus from the backyard:

Unfortunately I had no time to get the telescope from home to watch some of this stuff….You see, the food aspect of life takes so much time. Especially when you are 7 or so people, and some like me having to cook separately because of stomach issues. It is so time consuming and exhausting to buy food, deposit it, cook, eat, clean….I started to get a bit tired. Sasha kept on having those health issues and would wake up in the middle of the night because of that. I tried to keep myself engaged and positive because I had many reasons to. But it was tiring….and a bit stressful because of Sasha’s issues.

You see when these wonderful people come for these meetings they are so eager to talk. And talk. And talk about many many interesting things. And that can become very tiring. Especially for me since I just finished a 2-3 years work for the documentary and I wanted to mostly chill and relax. But I cannot ignore interesting people and discussions. I can’t :D.

Ok.

Next. We visited a medieval town nearby. Was quite nice.

And at home we reinstalled TROMjaro on Rafa’s MiniPC:

But Sasha’s issues did not go away. She had them every morning. Not too painful really, just a weird discomfort in the lower part of the abdomen, as if you have an UTI. We went to the doctor and no UTI. Strange. She was sent for more tests. You see Sasha’s stomach, the digestive machine, is amazing 🙂 – she can eat anything and pretty much never has any stomach issues. But now suddenly she started to have these uncomfortable stomach issues that were on a daily basis and lasted on and off for more than a month by this time. And for the past days it was a daily occurrence.

I was like….wtf….the first TROM Meeting was ruined by my weird health issues and now Sasha has these weird health problems. This is too much….

Of course, the important bit was for her to be healthy, the meeting was secondary. But I was thinking how unlucky we are… Her health issues made us kinda stressed, tired, and cut the fun in half. At least for me for sure.

But anyway, we tried to still keep ourselves happy.

The Song.

A year or so ago we (I, Georgi and Sasha) made a song. Original lyrics and all that. So we printed it for everyone and sang it together. These are the lyrics:

And here’s a bad recording of us trying it out 🙂 – bad in terms of video quality 🙂

Everyone really liked the song. Actually we had a guitar and an ukulele and we jammed a bunch of times together. I know how to play them but only a little bit :), Sasha and Rafa know a lot more. Roma knows some too :). So it was fun to play some songs together.

Two more people came the following days: Matthias and Ann.

I met Matthias when he came a year or two ago to our place for a barbecue with Dima. He was volunteering with the same organization as Dima and came back with him to stay at his place for a day or so. I really liked the guy. He seemed very interested in TROM. He said he will visit us but we had to kindly refuse any visit for the past year or so in order to finish our documentary and the book. So I told him that he can come for the meeting. He is so kind, interested and interesting. Same is Ann. Very nice and calm people. Chill as fuck :).

We were more now, but Matthias and Ann had a van and a tent and they were staying near by in that nice forest where we put the hammocks. So the house was still not that crowded.

The next days we went to visit a very nice botanical garden. Another reason to talk more about interesting things.

Vicky is studying the plants for some courses she takes and she knew a lot about plants and insects. Her English improved since the last meeting, by a lot, and she is so funny. She uses the word “fuck” many times, and that’s so hilarious when combined with her Spanish accent.

By the way, I really like the girl from this above photo. Just saying.

We spent several hours in that garden and took a million photos. Right Alexio!? 🙂

We then visited a castle that’s on a very high hill where you can see all of the surrounding areas.

I was getting more and more tired. And a bit stressed because of Sasha’s issues. But the “party” continued. One night we made some TROM tshirts like we did the last time. Basically all you need is some tshirts (old or buy new ones) and some normal paint.

And then you can put your handprint on them. That easy!

Unfortunately it was late at night and Matthias and Ann were “long gone” to their cozy forest, so we did not make any for them 🙁 .

We wanted to do one more trip before the meeting was over. To a place where we always find friendly octopuses. And so we went:

It is such a beautiful place. Sasha found a grumpy old octopus a bit far, so only Rafa, Matthias and Ann adventured to see it.

You may wonder….this all sounds like a fun nice vacation. What’s so TROM about it?

You see, the work I/we do for TROM is happening behind the screens. I work like a maniac almost every single day. Alexio is always on the chats helping out, Roma helped the project financially so many times it is insane, plus he helps with TROMjaro and such; And so are the rest helping whenever they can. The meeting is supposed to be for creating some bonds, some relationships; to talk, to enjoy, to get to know each other better. You can’t realistically do more than that. I know a bunch of projects that have these “brainstorm” gatherings and in reality they do not do anything more than that.

For TROM is the opposite. The work is done in silence, individually, by each of us. And when we meet is for the connections between us.

Sasha worked quite a bit on the transcription in that meantime is true, I tried too. But it is difficult to focus much on these things. Too many people around, doing many things.

She also cooked for everyone a bunch of times, for hours. Even thought Alexio how to cook 🙂

I think that’s by FAR the best outcome from these meetings. To know each other, get comfortable with each other, and create new relationships. After all that’s how I and Sasha ended up together. That’s how I and Aaron became best friends and how I see this happening with Roma and Alexio and me. That’s how we got to know Vicky and not only Rafa, and get so close to them. That’s how we now got to know Matthias and Ann and who knows maybe we will meet again with them, maybe they’ll get involved with the TROM project in the future….

One comment I’ve seen from Matthias and Ann was that they were expecting more talks about TROM, maybe even to watch the documentary together and such, however for one I was exhausted, and second I did not want to shove down people’s throat this project. We have so many materials online so I thought to not make it look like a “cult meeting” :). In any case, this meeting was (from the get-go) one about friends more than one about TROM.

Dima and Mara came basically after the meeting was officially over, when Vicky and Rafa were already gone. Unfortunately we were all too tired by that time.

I kept in touch with Dima over Signal for these past 2 years so it was nice to see him again. The last 2 days were basically all about Alexio kicking everyone’s butt at chess 🙂 – apparently he is a grand-master at chess.

He was so good no one stood a single chance. And yet so funny and kind. You can’t get angry at having your ass kicked by him :).

Final days.

It was getting very hot, Sasha’s problems were still problems, we were getting only a few hours of sleep, and it was becoming more and more of a struggle for us. Oh, did I mention that all of this time Sasha was forced to deal with a lot of papers? The residency, the work, the this, the that….It was insane and endless. We still did not solve the paper situation….

We needed a break.

Everyone left except Roma who stayed 3 more days to our place and we had a more chill time together.

Such a wonderful kind! Despite us being tired and all that, this guy did not bother us at all. He manages his own shit and is so friendly you can’t be bothered by him.

I wish Roko or Shas could have come too, but they live far far away and on this paper planet you need a ton of papers to go from one place to another.

The meeting was better than I expected now that I look at it in perspective. Was quite comfortable and despite tiring it was super fun many times.

Why no more TROM Meetings?

When we rented a new place I did NOT want to rent the same house because that house looks haunted to me :D. It was the place where I had to stay while having so many health issues. It felt like an awful place towards the end of that meeting. For this new meeting me and Sasha stayed in a weird room, tho comfy still. The room was partly a bathroom.

Had a sink and a shower inside. The toilette was in a separate room. I mean is cozy to have your own shower and sink in the room, but because of Sasha’s health issues and waking up in the middle of the night and all that, I started to feel like being in a hospital for the last days. And that felt very strange. I mean it kinda looks like a hospital room.

So I honestly am sick of being sick when we do these sort of meetings. It is too much planning involved, too much responsibility for me to organize stuff for everyone, and so on. So I do not want to do this anymore. I want to relax more. If we meet we should do it somewhere else and I should not have to organize it, but all of us to.

The TROM Meeting is also more of a personal meeting so it may make no sense to call it that way.

Therefore I think this could have been the last “TROM Meeting” but for sure not the last meeting that we will have. Maybe even this year at the end of it we may meet again, at least some of us.

Sasha feels a bit better now, but we are still investigating. So far it does not seem to be anything that serious.

Conclusion.

Despite that interpretation of the bathroom/bedroom, the house was very nice:

With a cozy living-room and a fireplace:

A nice backyard:

And a nice terrace:

And despite the tiredness, everything was wonderful and I absolutely appreciate these awesome human beings:

And I hope to see each other more often, and dance, and play the guitar and ukulele, and make a new song, and go in nature, and have fun, and talk about interesting things, and live. Because life is like a domino game that has already started for all of us. And at times it is tricky and complex, at times it is smooth, but the fact is, that IT IS. And we should enjoy it while it is. The fun part of a domino game is while it is “rolling”, not when it ends.

So let’s enjoy the ride folks, as long as the ride is riding!

I appreciate you all very much, and if there is one victory I can claim in my personal life so far, it cannot be the change of this trade system that I talk about, it cannot be the popularity of the content I’ve created over the years, and it cannot be any big success with TROM. But I can claim victory when it comes to the relationships and the humans I’ve met. They are real, and they are enough for me.

Thank you!

I donated my old laptop to a dear friend who also helps with the TROM project. I used this laptop for many years but I needed a more portable one and luckily others helped me buy a better one for myself. I am happy to know that my dear friend the laptop, that helped me make 80% of the TROM II documentary, and trom.tf, and tromcasts, tromjaro, and so many books, and so on, now has a new home 😀

Others helped me, I am helping others too. We should all help each other. We should share the vast amount of stuff we have in this world, rather than keeping that stuff around and not use it, or throwing it into the garbage.

I too often see these in the town I live in:

Massive waste of stuff. Unacceptable!

BUT:

• We are incentivized to buy and buy and buy; every day bombarded with such messages. And thus people buy even when they don’t have to.
• There is no sharing platform that is useful enough, or some place where you can put these things to then be repaired and shared with others.
• People have no time to take any initiative. If people had the time to get involved they can create all sorts of sharing platforms and places. Like for the place where I live: imagine if some people can have the time to take the stuff people put at the garbage bin, repair and clean, and have a central place in the town where anyone can pick that stuff.

So. Yeah, anyway, I am super happy I could send my laptop to someone who will likely make good use of. I have 1 more laptop and a tablet that I want to give to others. I don’t like to have much stuff anyway. I will try to get more and more involved with this physical-stuff sharing in the future, like https://sharebay.org/ that’s made by our friend Colin. I will try to share stuff on that website too after TROM II is released.

When I scream about how trade is the origin of most problems, some people think that I am crazy and I exaggerate. Well either read the thousands of pages I wrote so far or watch the tens of hours of videos that I made, or here’s another clear example:

I and Sasha. Much love. Love love, you know. We are together for the past 3 or so years. All we want is to stay on this planet somewhere. Can we? The answer is no. It is yes. It is maybe. It is confusing. Is it any answer?

After going through the bullshit of the marriage ritual, and went to lawyers here in Spain and all that, we still didn’t figure that out until today.

Ok so listen. If you want to be able to stay in Spain, 2 humans that is, one of you is a resident in Spain and an EU citizen, one an American citizen, here’s what you have to do:

• Prove that you are together and you love each other.
• That’s it. Now you can live here and we (Spain) will take care of you to make sure you won’t end up in the streets, or doing bad things.

See how easy that was!?

Oh wait….that’s just my imagination. Hold on. Hmmm….Sorry, actually no one cares if you love each other, can take care of yourself, or you are a good human. Sorry, that was a different planet.

On Earth here’s what you need:

• Be “married” (the ritual) with a resident/citizen of Spain.
• The resident/citizen has to prove that they have a job for the past year (so at least a year contract) and make at least 1.000 Euros a month.
• A bunch of other IDs and documents.

OR:

• Does not matter if you are with someone or not, you just have to stay in Spain for 3 consecutive years. Illegally.
• Do not get into any sort of issues with the police.
• Get a criminal record from your country of origin.
• Do a course (at least 40 hours) for the local language, in our case a dialect….
• Get a job offer.
• A bunch of other documents.

Alright Planet Earth, I see you are so kind with your hoomans.

So, a tribe (say Spain) will give 0 fucks about love, relationships, health, being a good human and such. But they will give 100% to TRADE. If you TRADE in their tribe, that’s all they need really. If you invest money into a tribe, guess what, they will let you in no problemos – see. How many rich fucks that have been in jail or did so many illegal things are traveling all around the world!? Countless.

Fuck the “morality, ethics”, equality, human rights, being a good human, and all of that crap. Or being a Christian, a Muslim, a whateverthefuck. These do not matter in our society. All it matters is that TRADE.

SO. It’s all about that trade, ’bout that trade… – sing with me!

My mother has a Samsung Galaxy J5 that she bought several years ago. The phone is in great condition physically. However it only has 16GB of internal storage. Problem is she uses 99% of that space, making the device extremely slow and 0 updates possible or the ability to install any new app.

Only 10 apps out of perhaps hundreds on her phone can be removed, since the rest came pre-installed with the phone. Bloatware. Google + Samsung apps that are 100% useless. And they cannot be removed.

So, we cannot uninstall/remove anything. Now what can she do? Buy a new phone probably.

And this is how you create a massive amount of waste. On these phones you have no control over your OS, so if your phone is a few years old you can say bye bye to system updates. You cannot remove the bloatware. You cannot change the battery or any other components. And yes probably you can do some of those if you have a ton of time and skills to install a custom Android and have the guts to unglue your phone and change the battery. But most people will never do this.

I tried to make the SD card of her phone part of the system to expand the storage. Worked. But then what for if I cannot move 99% of apps there? I then enabled the developer mode and enabled the “force move the apps to the SD card”. That allowed me to move a bit more apps but still 80% cannot be moved.

However when these moved apps update, they are reinstalled on the internal storage again. Basically ‘d have to move them to the SD card all the time….sucks. Not sustainable…

I eventually managed to install adbmanager and luckily that allowed me to remove any bloatware I wanted.

Problem is you have to know the exact name of these apps and they look like “samsung.android.visioncloudagent” so you have to figure which app does what…. I found some websites where they list this bloatware like this or this. But it takes time to remove because you have to be VERY careful not to brick your phone.

After doing all of these she has some 1.7GB of free space. Which is fine for now but still unsustainable. I wonder if the next Android update will add back all of that bloatware….after all when I got some updates years ago Samsung decided to install Facebook and Instagram for me, without the ability to remove them.

So, her laptop uses Linux and not Windows, despite having Windows pre-installed when we bought it. Why not install a sane Android OS on her phone?

With laptops is a ton easier, especially for older models, to install an OS. My mother could do it if I gave her the instructions. With the phones it is a different world. People are already googlefied so you can’t just install a new Android without connecting it to their previous account since everything is tied to that. You need to root the phone and hope that it won’t brick it. That’s something that can make your phone useless. Plus all of these custom Androids that have removed the bloatware only support a tiny fraction of all phones.

LineageOS for example, the one that supports by far the most models – https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/ – does not support that phone.

The rest support mostly the Pixel phones, namely the newer ones. And that’s another issue…even these custom OSes will support this or that device for a bit, then bye bye. Therefore you still have to buy newer devices even when you want a custom Android that is bloatware free.


Some of these even add their own bloatware like https://e.foundation/e-os/ – with their own subscription models.

I was considering to compromise on buying a second hand but newer model Pixel and then install one of those bloatfree Androids, but then if you buy such a phone second hand and the battery is crap and you can’t replace it….what can you do!?

Linux phones, if anyone wonders, are an experiment at best at this stage. Plus they only support a few models too.

It is such a different world when it comes to computers. This Microsoft tablet is more than 10 years old:

And it still works with TROMjaro Linux. Granted to make the bluetooth and wifi work I had to install a custom kernel and do some gymnastics. Easier than installing a custom Android on a phone. But this tablet receives constant updates. And this was a special case since these tablets used some weird hardware for the bluetooth and wifi. Most decade old laptops/computers work just fine with the latest Linux.

So you can bring to life old computers but not old phones.

That’s one major reason why I hate smartphones. They are disposable. They come bloated with a ton of crap. It is hard if not impossible to block ads on phones. Plus they are with you all the time so notifications and all that crap will make your life a hell.

Even a Linux phone would not be something I would use much since I do not want to always be trapped in the digital space.

In this trade based society companies are incentivized to release newer model of phones constantly. They support each model for a few years then bye bye. They pre-install a lot of crap to make more off of you. Trades: attention, data, subscriptions. So we end up with a world full of disposable ad-devices that people call as “smartphones”. The irony of using the word “smart” for those devices.

And I get it, these devices if they were Linux based only, and supported indefinitely, could be useful in certain circumstances such as navigation, keeping in touch with close friends, etc.. But the rest seems to me like just a tool for consuming, trading. Your life being sucked away from you by companies and individuals who want your currency, your attention, your data.

UGLY.

I will eventually install a custom Android on my own personal phone, a Galaxy S7, 8 years old. To put some life into it. Just so that I get rid of the pile of shit that the software is on all phones nowadays, even if I only use my phone for GPS, maps, and such purposes.

Yesterday I went to the dentist. I didn’t have to go for the past 4 or so years so that’s the positive side. I used to go there for 3 or so years almost weekly, not long ago, because I had braces. I had really fucked up teeth and it took 3 years to fix them.

Anyway, I go there and they tell me to wait in the waiting room. I enter and I see a few C’s. Some young, some oldish. By C’s I mean people. Why C? Because that’s how they look to me, like the letter C when they sit down and are bent over their phone screens.

I said a timid “Ola”, and I think an older dude said “Ola” on just 5% volume.

I remember not long ago when I was going to the same dentist, waiting in the same waiting room, that most people were just sitting around. They had some magazines there and some were picking them up and browsing through them.

So I sit down and look around like I normally do. I could see through a big glass door how strongly it is raining outside. It was pouring. My mind shifted to the TROM II documentary, the stuff that I want to do next, my plans for the next months, and so forth. My mind drifted towards the scenery for a bit and I was thinking how weird that this water falls from the sky and how it sounds….those rain droplets falling on the pavement make a lot of sound. And sound is basically energy. The atmosphere, the stuff around, shaking, and the vibrations reach our ears. How cool.

I remember waiting in this waiting room for many hours when I was going for my braces. And had a lot of thoughts. I like to think about stuff.

I then look around me and the C’s are still C. I am thinking “Do they think that I am a weirdo…the only one here just sitting like that and not bent as a C? Am I more like an L when I sit down?” – but then I thought…..are these people even thinking about that? Or thinking in general?

Not to be mean, but it seems to me like pretty much everyone nowadays has no more “free time” to think. That time is completely eaten by the phones and the computers and the tv….

Like….if they go to school/work, then they have to solve all sorts of issues they may have, then they have to buy food, cook, drive, take care of family members (like the soft-brained kids they may have), have homework…..then they are nonstop on their phones….Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, Youtube…..Netflix….Amazon….shop, take photos, consume, like, share, chit-chat.

Honestly, does anyone nowadays have inner thoughts? Because even when you sit in your bed, before going to sleep, probably most humans are on their phones. They wake up with their phones in their faces too.

I was amusing myself thinking that in the near future people would go to a psychologist and be like…

Patient: I hear voices in my head!
Psychologist: What do they say?
Patient: idk….like words at times…
Psychologist: Do you hear them loud?
Patient: At times yes….
Psychologist: How often and when mostly?
Patient: Not that often, and usually when I do not do anything for some reason…
Psychologist: Ok, you may suffer from ITD.
Patient IDT?
Psychologist: Inner Thoughts Disorder. A lack of outside stimulation of the brain can cause the brain to shoot random thoughts. It is nothing to worry about. Back in the days people managed to deal with that on a daily basis. I recommend you these apps to keep your brain more engaged, and take one of these sleeping pills an hour before you want to go to bed.

😀

That’s how I was amusing myself.

You know, I used to spend at least 2-3 hours in bed before going to sleep, thinking about stuff. And it is damn fun. At times I would spend 5-6 hours or more, staying in bed, thinking. Actually this thinking time allowed me to create TROM, the documentary. The many books I wrote and projects I created. Heck yeah, this article was created last night while I was sitting in bed, in darkness, just with my brain. Now I too have reduced the night thinking to say 1-2 hours for some reason, but I still think every single night before I go to bed. 😀

These moments of you inside your brain are, I think, essential to get to know yourself and the world around you. To plan ahead, to talk to yourself, understand yourself and your relationships. And the world that is out there. Without it you are like a Rumba cleaning robot. Or other sorts of robots. You observe and are pushed by the stuff you are observing. But have no time for self-reflection. Your brain is a read only software by you, and read and write for the big companies that are keeping you busy.

People have become robots. And there is a good reason why. An explanation that have predicted that. TRADE.

The same way that humans became physical robots for the past centuries, working 8 to 12 hours a day, same way today their minds are being trading assets. Facebook, Google, Netflix, TikTok and the like, they NEED your mind to trade. Your attention and data are so valuable today. So they do all they can to transform you into a livestock animal, milked daily, because that’s all they want.

It is a very ugly society we live in. Driven by the same force of trade.

When the printing press was invented some said that humans won’t even think because they will spend time reading other people’s thoughts. Wasn’t true really. Newspapers and the invention of the TV, others said, will make people dumber by keeping them glued to those media outlets. Not entirely true, but to some degree truer than before. The “smartphone” and the internet era is on a different level tho. They do keep people busy most of the time, because it is run by a cancerous invasion of companies and individuals who want BRAINS. Mindless consuming BRAINS. And you carry that consumption device with you non stop, and rely on it.

I too rely on a phone….to keep in touch with my parents and because they require one when you have a bank account, go to the hospital, the dentist, and so on. But I decided to only use the phone for that. And for the weather at times. Plus GPS. The rest I do not care. Although I spend a ton of time online, I do so only on my laptop. On my phone I rarely even have credit. And on my laptop I do a lot of work for TROM. Besides that I do scroll through reddit at times, but mostly I use our own tools like TROMnews, I watch documentaries and so forth.

But man…..this is a scary world for me. I see most humans as zombies who are not alive, but simply are automatons that are fed and milked non stop for an endless trade society.

And I genuinely wonder if people still have inner thoughts nowadays….what do they dream at night about….what do they think when they are not C’s….? Are they L’s, I’s anymore? idk….

One thing I am 100% sure is that if I did not spend a lot of time with myself, in my head, I would have been lost today. It is what allowed me to get rid of my suicidal and depressive behavior, what allowed me to change, what made me make TROM, write books, make videos, and so forth. Without these, there is no me.

It’s been almost a year since the war started. Here are my condensed thoughts.

1. It is only Russia’s fault.

And by that I mean a few who control Russia.

A bunch of talking heads say that US pushed Russia to invade, NATO bla bla bla. Does not matter if that’s true, it is Russia who invaded Ukraine. They are dropping the bombs, they threw the first punch and keep on throwing more.

2. Russia has no excuses.

Russia is a nuclear weapons collector. They have the most numerous nuclear weapons in the world. Even if Ukraine joined NATO, even if Ukraine hosted some American nuclear weapons, it made 0 difference for Russia. No one is suicidal to ever attack Russia. For fucks-sake no one dares to attack North Korea because they have one and a half nuclear weapons…

So when Russia or others are blabbing about how they had no choices, that it is the Americans’ fault for this, then this is pure nonsense of course.

3. The situation is very complicated.

Some say the world should keep on providing arms to Ukraine, some say this is terrible and only prolongs this war so more people will die, some say they should defeat Russia (now is the moment), some say Ukraine should accept some compromises and negotiate some peace talks….

But now that this war has created a lot of damage already it is hard to say wtf anyone should do next. Allowing Russia to take those Ukrainian territories seems like an invitation to grab more from Ukraine in the future. And it just feels wrong to let them do that…like terribly wrong.

4. The others are also big bullshitters.

On the other hand “the rest” are also complete idiots by thinking that Russia wants to take Ukraine, then the other tribes. Same way that no one dares to directly attack Russia, Russia cannot dare to attack any NATO members. It is pure suicide for both sides.

5. The profiteers.

Lots of people take advantage of this war. The ones selling weapons, the ones hosting the refugees, and lots of others who deal with the tons of money transfers for aid purposes or other purposes. Many people are getting rich because of this war.

6. USA and the rest are the opposite of saints.

USA; France, Germany and others, are supplying weapons to all sorts of dictatorial tribes around the world. They have killed, tortured, and destroyed a lot over the past decades. They are charlatans who pretend to care about Ukraine. Some might, but very likely they only follow their own interests. So fuck off with your superheroes attitude. You are not here to defeat the evil, you are here to prioritize only your own interests while sitting on the shoulders of dead and enslaved people.

7. The damaged ones.

Like with all wars, the ones suffering are not the ones who started the war. Are the ones that do not want any of this. Some are dead, many are refugees now.

8. I don’t trust Ukraine.

The image of Ukraine, the heroes, I do not buy. I am sure there is some truth about what is being negatively said about them. Like them being influenced by the US, being engulfed in corruption, abusing in the past the areas that Russia occupied, that a bunch of people from those regions wanted to be part of Russia, especially in Crimea, and so forth.

9. Putin has failed.

Let’s be naive and take Putin’s words as true. If he wanted for the Russian people in those occupied regions to not be persecuted and treated badly, he achieved the opposite. He destroyed those areas, those lives. And made most of the world hate Russia and Russians.

If he was scared of Ukraine and how it was becoming a US puppet, and how they were getting new weapons and such, well…now Ukraine is even more a US puppet and has more weapons than they ever had. And they will get more. So, another failure.

If he wanted to push NATO further, then he achieved the opposite. NATO is closer and has more weapons now.

If he wanted to flex his muscles, he showcased that Russia has none.

All he achieved is dead people from both sides, destroyed homes and families, a worldwide hate on Russia; he isolated Russia in all regards, he showcased how badly prepared his army is, and made everyone look good and “come together” in this fakish fashion but one that made USA and Europe produce more arms, and ally against Russia.

10. The future is a constant suffering.

After all I am seeing, this war will drag for a long time. At best they get tired, exhausted, and will seek for a “peace deal” that may last for a bit of time, to then fight over those bordering regions again. Russia would love to destroy Ukraine, USA would love to drag Russia into a prolonged war.

It is an insane game that should not have existed in the first place.

I’ll leave you with this image:

The nearest galaxy to us. Billions upon billions of stars. Even more planets. We are in this vast Universe….on a small round rock. Why aren’t we helping each other, create a wonderful life for us all, and go explore the rest of the Universe? Why do we fight…?

We know who we are, from a scientific perspective. But almost no one understands….humans, despite the vast amount of knowledge about the universe and us, are still living like “citizens”. Patriots, workers, statuses….Zombies.

In 2011 after I released the TROM documentary someone who was helping me proofread parts of it suggested that I should run a donation campaign to buy a new computer that I desperately needed in order to redo the documentary with a proofread script and voice overs instead of the text-to-speech I had used.

Seemed like a crazy idea to me to ask for so much money. But I did. And I raised over 1.000 Dollars. I was shocked. I was sleeping in a bunkbed in the same room with my sister. I woke her up to tell her. I was so happy.

I had a super shitty computer but then I managed to buy a fantastic one. I remade the TROM documentary and released in 2012.

Even before this, from 2007 to 2010 I had a blog in the romanian language that had a decent traffic. I asked for little support to help me pay for the hosting, but only got a 1 dollar donation one time, despite so many considering my blog very interesting and useful. I did some video series like today’s Daily Dose of Internet and such, that had thousands of views per episode, and was recommending movies, documentaries and more on my blog. So it was not simply a personal blog. Regardless no one helped me financially despite being broke as hell.

After I released the “remastered” version of the documentary I created the TVP Magazine. Monthly issues, digital, well made. I wrote for it, designed, all that. Did it 8 months for free then I had to go for a massive donation campaign to help me work for a full year. By that time I was so broke, yet I was doing a bunch of online projects that thousands enjoyed. I had to survive in this trade bullshit society.

The golden age of donations.

It was a period of time when websites like Indiegogo or Patreon started to emerge. Platforms where people were mainly asking for donations to support their projects. Looked genuine. Honest. Real. Not many were using them, I was one of the first to create an account with Patreon.

So we did an 18.000 Euros Indiegogo donation campaign for TVP Magazine:

To my shock we raised the amount. It was exciting.

It felt like a genuine help. We were doing THIS and to keep on doing THIS we needed THAT. There were no “perks”, no bullshit, no special clubs for those donating. That’s how donations should be. If you donate because you want a tshirt, or be mentioned on some page, or whatever other crap, then you are not genuine. You are not there to just support a project, you want a handjob too. A scratch on your back, a thank you so that you can feel a bit more special. It is about you, at least a bit. And that’s awful.

We got support for some 3 years but in that meantime websites like Indiegogo, Kickstarter or Patreon started to become more and more scammy and full of prostitutes. The notion of “donation” morphed into pay-me-and-you’ll-get-to-see-my-tits sort of thing. Plus the so many scams…so many “cool new tech” that will become reality, you just have to chip-in a bit and you’ll also get a piece of the pie when we bake that cake. Then these projects disappeared. And people were angry.

But what angered me was the complete and utter rape of the action of donating. How can you call it a “donation” when you get something out of that? If I give you some money and then you’ll give me something, but you’ll only give me that something if I give you that amount of money, then that’s a TRADE my friends. THAT is NOT a DONATION. So Patreon transformed into a marketplace where people were buying access to special clubs, merch, and all sort of “perks”. Pretending to “support” the “creators”. In fact they were buying shit from merchants.

SciShow, who joined later on than we did with our projects on Patreon, relies on subscriptions rather than support:

For 500$ a month you can have sex with one of their staff members.

Look at this:




Are you telling me that these are “creators” that others “support”? Fuck off, these are merchants like everyone else, and they sell shit. And people pay to access that shit. The same ol’ trade game.

These are some of the most popular merchants on Patreon.

Hell yeah, even Mastodon sells shit:

Access to their select club and ads on their joinmastodon website for your “company”.

This is a very very sad world.

Of course it does not work for me to rely on donations when I do not engage into these marketing tactics. If it weren’t for 3-4 close friends who helped the project/me over the years, I don’t know what I would have done. To give you an example I am trying to raise 250 Euros to pay for the backups for some 30 websites: like our Friendica instance, Nextcloud, Peertube, Matrix, SearX, Cryptpad, VideoNeat.com, TROMsite.com, TROMjaro.com and so much more. Currently only 35€ was donated.

At least hundreds of people are using these websites/services, if not several thousands. If only 100 of them would donate 3€ a year we could over the backup costs. But they don’t and they won’t.

In general a small fraction of people donate to the projects that they use. A few years ago when I looked into this, it was like 0,1% of those subscribed to some youtube channels who also donated to these “creators”. Even when these “creators” (merchants) sell shit, the support is relatively small. But probably there are more such people supporting you if you also give them shit in return. After all, humans are used to this “I give you but you also give me” mentality. So now that TROM provides nothing but the TROM project, probably it is not as exciting to “support” as the other projects are.

Fuck me The Moneyless Society who are blabbing about how this monetary system is the cancer, has this on their front page:

The link leads to here:

The irony is astonishing.
Their Patreon is equally as bad:

You see I wanted to walk that talk. If I say this bullshit trade-based society is awful, then I won’t play by its rules when it comes to TROM. Never sold anything, never inserted ads, collected data, provided special access to those who provided financial support for the project. That’s the real way of doing this sort of work. I prefer that over selling shit. I’d rather see the TROM project dying than transforming into yet another trading practice, marketing nonsense, influencer-on-patreon whore.

TROM is not a popular project, maybe in part because of our content that’s at times lenghty and upsetting for some. Maybe in part because we don’t play by the marketing rules. I had the dignity to move from facebook, twitter and youtube, to the fediverse entirely, despite “losing followers”. I had the courage to write/publish some 40 books and never sold any. I had the guts to provide 20+ services over trom.tf and treat everyone as equal. To me that’s priceless, and I am so thankful to a handful of humans who still see that value in what I do, and follow the work, and some support it financially in order to keep this boat afloat.

Humans nowadays trade nonstop. For games, in games purchases, netflix, entertianment, crypto-investments, buying special access from the people they follow, and generally being consumed non-stop. Even if TROM gets more popular, it may not be exciting for these consumers since TROM gives you nothing but TROM. And they may want a hanjob or some other stuff like that.

TROM is not a whore and never will be. It will stay honest, decent, humble, and non bullshitter. We are walking the talk until we cannot.

If I do not raise the money for the backups I will pay for them myself. If I cannot sustain some of the TROM.tf project I will discontinue them. As simple as that. To rely on donations, the real ones, is the only way to stay unbiased in this trade-based society. But it sucks that donations have transformed into purchases.

BUT:

I need to remind you that all of these whores and charlatans that I’ve been talking about, are like that because of the trade based society we live in. We are forced to be like that. At the end of the day I am NOT accusing any of them. Just pointing them out, as they are victims, nothing more.