I’m referring to xkcd 2347, the case where a small and oftentimes hobbyist project end up being fundamental to an entire sector

This obviously happens a lot in FOSS, but I’m wondering if this happens to, say, your personal hobbies or things that matter to you?

Asking because this has just happened to one of my hobbies two days ago. The maintainer of a very important web server for the entire community suddenly announced on X that they would shut down the server on May 31 Japanese time. Since the web server was so important, the community has already organized and nearly completed an organized web scrape of the entire server, less than 36 hours from when the news was announced (and 1-2 days before it would have been shut down)

  • Tar_Alcaran@sh.itjust.works
    1·
    2 hours ago

    For larp, no. It’s a hobby pretty much defined by everyone reinventing the wheel constantly.

    For reenactment/experimental archeology? There are definitely authoritative works, but those are mostly by professional, traditional historians. There are remarkably few books on how to, say, bend an early medieval hedge, or how thick your daub needs to be or how old Madder should be to get the best colours.