open source is a metaphor for the internet- and in the way that a metaphor hits upon strange, reified pieces of two disparate things and fuses them to produce an idealized version, open source makes the best meaning of all the possible connectedness of the internet.

Similarly money is a metaphor for the material world. it is synthesized evidence. it is the scuffling of our layered exchanges leaving a mark we invented to mean value. when it becomes unbalanced- with an overfocus on the present of the self, the “agency”- then it has lost perspective of the structure it is a part of and needs to want to help maintain. Over focus on structure is the opposite imbalance of money and it results in almost the exact same spectrum of unhealthy behaviors.
open source is not the internet in miniature because its not a place or size, its a process.

Both programming and essay writing are about the ways you get to what you need. Both build connections into strings of ideas. When you read this you will be the one who sees what of it works or where the bugs are. And over time we are, or can be, electrified into new selves by the accumulated power of ideas.