Forem: Bogomil Shopov - Бого

The AI church with no Christ

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Fri, 01 May 2026 13:47:23 +0000

A note before we start: What follows is fiction. A thought experiment set in an alternate world that only looks like ours by accident. Any resemblance to real labs, real bosses, or real workplace policies is the reader’s imagination doing the heavy lifting. With that out of the way.

We’ve seen this movie before

In this imagined world, strip the hype off AI (artificial intelligence, software that learns from huge amounts of data to answer questions, write text, and so on) and you’re looking at a religion:
A new priesthood (the AI labs) telling us the details are too complex for normal people to question. Just trust them. Sacred texts nobody is allowed to check. Closed code, secret training data, “trust us, we tested it.

“Personal stories used as proof. “It changed my life” is not evidence. It’s a church testimony. End-times talk dressed up as forecasting.

Either heaven (an AGI utopia, where AGI means artificial general intelligence, a hypothetical future AI as smart or smarter than humans at almost everything) or hell (AI doom, the idea that AI wipes us out).

Notice how both endings need you to fund the church now: Pay-to-be-saved. Buy the Pro plan and your sins of being slow are forgiven. Heretics already getting punished, quietly. Critics mocked, artists ignored, workers fired for saying no.

The push from above, and where the money is really coming from

Here is the part nobody can fully explain. Every company, every government, every school suddenly has to adopt AI. Right now. Faster. The pressure does not match the actual results yet. Real productivity gains are mixed. Real profits at most AI companies are negative.

And still the orders come down from the top: roll it out, train everyone, make it mandatory.Why? Maybe it is silver dollars. Maybe it is investor money chasing the next big thing. Maybe it is governments quietly pushing because whoever controls AI controls the next century.

Maybe it is something simpler and uglier, like bosses who finally have an excuse to cut headcount. We do not really know. The order comes from somewhere above, and it does not get questioned out loud.

Christianity had the same moment. In the year 312, the Roman Emperor Constantine had a vision before a battle, won, and made Christianity the favored religion of the empire.

Almost overnight, a small persecuted sect became the official faith of the most powerful state on earth. Bishops got palaces. Pagans got pushed out of public jobs. Was it because Constantine truly believed?

Because it was politically useful to unite a fracturing empire under one faith? Because the church had become too big to fight, so better to ride it? Historians still argue.

The point is the conversion came from the top, the reasons stayed murky, and once it started, refusing was no longer a neutral choice. It was a career-ending one. That is where we are now.

The Constantine moment for AI has already happened. We just do not know whose vision it was, or what they really saw.

But who is the Jesus in this story?

Here is the strange part. We don’t have one yet. Christianity had a founder, a life, a death, and then the church came after. AI has the church first, and is still waiting for its messiah to show up. Right now there are only candidates. AGI itself is the most popular pick, a savior that has been “two years away” for about ten years now.

Some treat Sam Altman or other lab bosses as prophets, but nobody really believes they are the chosen one, including them. Others point at the next unreleased model, always the next one, never this one.That is what makes this moment odd.

The faith is huge.

The followers are everywhere.

The money is real.

But the figure at the center of it all is still missing. People are praying toward an empty chair and calling it inevitable.

The Inquisition is already here.

Forced AI use at work.

Teachers told to “embrace the tools” or lose their jobs. Writers called Luddites (a name for people in the 1800s who smashed factory machines because the machines took their jobs, now used as an insult for anyone who criticizes new tech) for refusing.

Whole jobs told to retrain or die, by bosses who keep their human staff.

The punishment is the layoff. The confession is your usage report.

A counter-movement is already forming, and they’ll be called backwards.

Parents who keep kids off screens. Musicians who stamp “100% human” on the album.

Lawyers who write by hand. Teachers going back to paper exams. They’ll be mocked as old-fashioned, anti-progress, snobs. Every insult the winning side throws at the losing one.

Christianity took 300 years to take over an empire. The empire took over AI in about 30 months. That is not a sign the tech is good.

That is a sign nobody got to vote. The real question is whether enough people will still know how to read, think, and write on their own to notice what was lost, before the tools that used to do those things for them get too expensive to live without.

Again, fiction. Any similarity to the world outside your window is between you and your window.

This post was initially created here

FOSDEM and me: OSM, Translation, decentralization and art

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Wed, 11 Feb 2026 10:34:22 +0000

Well, FOSDEM is over and I am sad. This year for the first time I had four talks in 4 different rooms.

Geospatial room

🎥Lessons from teaching 100+ beginners to use the OpenStreetMap with the main message: When you map your world, you change it.

Decentralization room

🎥 We d-build it, but they didn’t come with the main message: No users, No decentralization.

Translations room

🎥 What translating Thunderbird taught me with the main message: Free software only becomes truly free when people can use it in their own language.

There are videos and slides for each one of them!

This is getting traction now :)

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Mon, 02 Jun 2025 15:00:54 +0000

Bogomil Shopov - Бого

Nov 16 '23

H(a)nAI

#ai

Comments 1

1 min read

DevOpsDays Prague 2025

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Wed, 28 May 2025 06:45:35 +0000

DevOpsDays Prague 2025 is over, and I sit on my chair today to write something special about it. Not because someone asked me, but because I liked the event so much. Two years ago, I was a media partner, but this year, I visited as a freelancer, which has shaped my experience a bit.

Tomas Kubica - (No) Future of coding and scripting in the AI era

Tomas covered some exciting areas on how AI will soon shape the roles of programmers. His talk was practical, a bit scary, but full of great ideas. The first part covered how to utilize Copilot to create comprehensive documentation about your services. The leading consumer of this documentation will be an AI agent, after all. I recommend watching his recording if available.

The TL;DR was that if you are a junior developer, AI can help you learn faster, and if you are a senior developer, you have the tools to focus not on writing code itself but on realizing your vision.

Victoria Shutenko - Adventures in Cloud Security: What DevOps Can Learn from a Security Engineer

The introductory talk about secure SDLC was spot on. She covered some key steps that we can all take to produce more secure code and provided examples and tool proposals. It was for beginners, so I didn't find anything new for myself, but the audience benefited from it, given that they knew very little about security. :) Oops, I said it.

Daniel Afonso - Full Service Ownership & The Lifecycle of a Service

Daniel had a great overview talk about the service ownership model. He explained the theory and the challenges well. Sometimes, the idea of you, as a team and individual developer, being responsible for supporting what you develop might be scary, but it's the right thing to do. I know some teams that start cursing when they hear the word "PagerDuty" because that means on-call and constant stress. If you misdesign it, you can't blame the concept or the tools.

Timur Bublik - The irony of cloud cost-cutting: when saving money leads to losing money

That was the talk that was less interesting to me at first, but then Timur made me think about how we can optimize the cost of cloud services and not mess it up. The examples he gave were spot on, and I recommend that every PM or person concerned about cloud costs watch it first before making any inefficient decision.

Soham Chakraborty - Running Kubernetes on small scale - lessons learned on operating 'small scale' clusters

That was a hands-on practical talk that brought tons of knowledge based on real use cases from a team that runs k8s on a small scale. How small, you might ask - well, you will have to watch the recording to unravel the mystery. I love it when someone talks not just about theory but shares the problems they had and how they solved them.

Peter Janečko - Security Culture: Why it's important?

Getting the Security Champions program right is a very challenging mission. Peter showed their experience in doing that in a large enterprise, which adds extra complexity to the task. I found the talk and the information to be scattered, so if you're not familiar with the topic, you might get confused at first. Read between the lines. The one thing I learned from this is that it can take a lot of time and resources to start an initiative like this, and you need to explain it well to the business in terms they will understand.

Is there more?

Some other important points that might be helpful for you if you want to visit the next time:

I've met many people I knew and formed some new connections.
My yaml-shaped "hire me" poster on the job board was the only one in the "looking for a job" section.
The food was terrific. I suspect that some people came just for it.
Sometimes, when you're thirsty, Budvar is a good beer.
It's not a for-profit event, so the value for money was extraordinary.
The open spaces were better than in 2023, but there is still work to be done on them. There was a slot when even the person who suggested the topic didn't show up. An initial vote on the issues would be beneficial and then focus on the topics with the most votes rather than every single one.
The organizing team was terrific. I've attended many events, so that I can tell :)
The audience was not engaged, and they didn't have many questions. That could be a good area to explore for the next event.

Thanks for reading this. Visit the event next year to learn more, meet friendly people, and enjoy the pancakes...

What about...

If you're interested in hiring me, you can visit my website here. In the modern VUCA world, I save you ⌛ time, 😤 frustration, and 🤑 money! I make your teams 💯 better and more secure.

Have a great day,
Bogo

The future of passwords is bright

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Fri, 23 May 2025 13:05:07 +0000

I see the future. I see it so clearly that you will receive this in a few years.

<-start->

Dear Customer,

The BlahBlah monitoring system has noticed suspicious attempts to log in to multiple users’ accounts (an AI brute-force technique). Your account has been recognized with potentially weak security settings.

Therefore, to prevent unauthorized access, your account password has been regenerated automatically.

To restore access and ensure the security of your account, please complete the following step:

Reset a new strong password(At least 58 characters, including at least 3 uppercase, 7 lowercase letters, 9 numbers, and at least 7 special characters, e.g., ! @ # ? ])

Your future BlahBlah security team

<-end->

I like this feature.

Why? People are lazy, and we tend to learn less and less and watch TV every day instead of reading books, solving math problems, thinking about space, dreaming big.

Imagine how your brain will work if you need to remember your new 58 characters password for your fresh 588 new services you will subscribe to deliver food to your home.

The future is bright! Embrace it.

Please change your password to 58 characters now, and don’t write them down. Train your brain!

Photo by Shruti Parthasarathy on Unsplash

OpenFest festival will provoke your senses and mind with open art.

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Tue, 08 Oct 2024 12:53:09 +0000

OpenFest, is a free-to-attend festival that will take place on 2 and 3 November 2024 at the John Atanasoff Forum in Sofia Tech Park in Bulgaria.

Apart from the strictly technical topics, this year they will also focus on the open art.

Art is designed to provoke. The Open art is even more compelling because it allows you to create and release your work for use by another artist through a free license, such as Creative Commons.

What will you be able to experience, you asked? Here it is:

Workshops

Artists from Bulgaria will present their vision and help you get involved in their creative world.

Hacker Zdravko Zdravkov's workshop will encourage and show you how to create app icons that align with the freedesktop.org rules. If you have made such content for closed-source apps, this will help you reach a freer audience and millions of users.

Ivan Kavaldzhiev will provide hands-on guidance on creating free content with a large-format camera, and Miguel DnB will take you on a journey from the turntables to the digital console from the DJ's perspective.

Art Lectures

Free art is legal and guaranteed by legal norms and laws. Ana Lazarova and Sianna Lilova from the Digital Republic will clarify quite a few critical points of the most current trends around the right of artificial intelligence to use content under an open license and how far the freedoms reach.

Kiril Yanev from folk-rock formation Balkandji will lead you on a musical walk around music under open license. They were the first band in Bulgaria to publish under an open license.

Experimental Theater

In addition to all that, there will be a small experimental theater that aims to get people fighting for their rights through art, heavy metal, and the values of the Cypherpunk movement. Yes, I will be the speaker. 🎉 😋 😄 🌞

For the two days of the event, you will have the opportunity to see and participate in many actions, exhibitions, and installations that will provoke and make you think in the other direction of art - the open one.

Entrance is free. The entire program will be soon on the event website, openfest.org, and social media, so you can see exactly when and what's happening.

The picture is under CC license. Author Peter Penchev.

Thunderbird Council, #ChatControl, and me.

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Wed, 28 Aug 2024 08:00:28 +0000

Some might know I represented the FOSS community within the Thunderbird Council for 2024. As of the beginning of August, I am no longer taking on that role.

What did I do in the meantime?

I spoke to many people about Thunderbird at events in Europe and via other mediums.
I tried to find out what happened with last year's Community Survey results. I was unsuccessful, and I hope the current council will take the initiative and continue sharing information on that topic when they decide.
One of my key initiatives was advocating for a community budget to support your remarkable work. I received support from the community, my fellow council members, and MZLA. Please show your support here if you're interested in contributing or learning more.

Why am I leaving?

I have limited free time, and spending time on procedural matters within the council is not a good use of my time. The impact I want to make on Thunderbird is independent of that governing body.

I will keep my community work for Thunderbird —doing what I do best—talking to user groups and gathering feedback, triaging bugs, supporting people and robots, and ensuring my locale is current.

#ChatControl

I am focusing my free, limited time on fighting the "#chatcontrol" legislation in my country, Bulgaria, and on a few more citizen initiatives that cannot run without me.

The #ChatControl proposal aims to end the end-to-end encryption of the majority of the chat services currently used in Europe, such as Whatsapp, Signal, Viber, and even Telegram (if enabled, of course). The challenge is to work with local NGOs, governmental bodies, members of the Parliament, and others to explain what they are about to accept and the consequences of their decision.

The other challenge is to encourage people to fight for their digital rights the same way they look at their phones for a picture of a kitten—with a focused effort and a smile. *We as humans have lost our will to fight for our freedoms, and my mission is to find those who still care. *

This takes a lot of time.

Photo by Tim Marshall on Unsplash

Какво е #Chatcontrol и защо трябва да го спрем?

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Tue, 23 Jul 2024 07:08:32 +0000

Материята във всяко европейско законодателство е толкова сложна, че много трудно може да се разбере от човек, който не е наясно с терминологията в Интернет, технологичните ограничения или законовите механизми. Интернет се използва от почти всички в България и затова ще се опитаме да обясним какво е на път на подкрепим като нация в следващите няколко месеца и защо е важно да изпразим мнението си сега.

Да си представим

Нека си представим, че сте си изкарали супер ваканция с децата на море, планина или където ви е вашето специално място за почивка.

Направили сте си и много снимки, а после сте ги отпечатали в албумче и искате да ги покажете на приятели, за да споделите тези моменти, които се случват все по рядко.

Седнали сте около масата за кафе (или бира) и започвате да отгръщате албума.

Чичко полицай 2.0

Преди приятелите ви да се насладят, всяка ваша снимка трябва да се види се прегледа на „чичко полицай“, който се оказва точно до вас, за да се разбере, дали случайно на нея няма материал, които може да бъде определен като “сексуално посегателство срещу деца”. Ако пък не желете това да се случи, няма да можете да ги покажете.

Връзките с приятели и семейство за толкова специални. Има изградена връзка между вас, която издържа години. Има разбирателство, доверие и в повечето случаи стабилност. Този „чичко“ ще иска да се включи във вашия кръг от приятели „съвсем за малко“, за да може да види какво си разменяте или дори нещо повече, защото не знаете какво точно иска и каква е целта му.

Обратно в реалността

За да има „чичко полицай“ на всяко албумче ви трябва много добра организация от хора, които да могат да се намират нявсякъде по всяко време, което е трудно да се случи (не искам да правя паралел с ДС, но така се получи). В Интернет обаче, услугите, които ползвате за размяна на снимки и видео, като Whatsapp, Viber, Signal, Telegram и друго подобни са лесни за контрол.

Във тях също има и вградена технология, която гарантира, че доверието, което е в основа на приятелството, е защитено от ушите и очите на всеки друг. Това се нарича щифриране от край-до-край и позволява на съдържанието, което изпращате да се маскира по начин, че никой друг да не може да го види, освен получателя, на който имате доверие.

Тази технология, е единствената в момента за защита на тайната на кореспонденцията и на данните, която човечеството е успяла да изобрети и да работи. Тя се използва за пазене на фирмени, военни, търговски тайни и за какво ли още не.

Какво точно е chatControl (чатконтрол)

Сигурно се сещате на къде отиват нещата. Да! ЕС със съгласието и на България, се опитва да задължи всички доставчици на такива услуги, да въведат механизъм, чрез който специални програми и в последствие хора, да могат да преглеждат всяка снимка, която изпращате на приятелите си и да търсят такива, които биха били определени като нарушаващи правата на деца.

Защо е опасно и защо не работи

Повечето хора биха казали, „ами децата да са защитени“, това е важното. Голяма работа, че някой ще ми гледа снимките. Че някой ще гледа всички снимки. На всички хора в Европа! Това освен, че нарушава повечето закони и харти за правата на човека е и неетична мярка, която се опитва да реши проблема по най-грубия начин. Нека да сложим камера във всеки дом, за да може да хванем някого, ако реши да прави престъпления. Готови ли сме като общество за това?

Проблемът е сериозен. Спор няма! Но решението не е това, дори и според правоприлагащи органи.

За да бъде решен обаче трябва вместо да се следи всеки гражданин на Европа трябва да се работи за превенция на престъпленията:

Въвеждане на механизъм за докладване на такива опити във приложенията, вместо масово следене и ограничаване.
Подкрепа на програми и организации, които се занимават с обучение на децата как да се пазят в Интернет – нещо, което много се неглижира напоследък.
Въвеждане на обучение и от страна на услугите, как да се разпознават такива опити и както да се прави!
Жертвите на такива престъпления имат нужда от сигурен начин за връзка със адвокати, психолози и други специалисти. Такава мярка би отнела тази възможност!

Като бяхме малки, ни учеха, да не говорим с непознати, камо ли да вземаме бонбонки/снимки от такива хора. Къде отиде този начин на мислене. Защо се опитваме да компенсиране нежеланието да обучаваме новото поколение с мерки, които не са ефективни и биха довели да мечтата на една лоша, тоталитарна власт – да чува и вижда всичко, което си говорим и споделяме.

Трябва повече диалог. Истината е някъде там и решение може да се намери и ние апелираме за това!

В момента се опитваме да накараме МВР да преразгледа българската позиция, която е „за“ премахване на доверието – на шифрирането на край до край и за преглед на всяка снимка.

Подкрепете ни, като подпишете апела и споделите всякаква информация, която намерите по темата с приятели и познати!

Още информация по темата има и тук.

Благодаря за вниманието!

Two more events about free and opensource software worth visiting in 2024

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Thu, 28 Mar 2024 08:29:55 +0000

I hit 10k reads (posted on three platforms) on my article about the three events you should visit in Bulgaria focused on Free and open-source software (FOSS). I decided to expand your knowledge with two more that I can recommend.

I know that 10k hits are nothing, but I am proud of the results for such a niche topic.

Here are my next two proposals:

Dors/Cluc

Zagreb, Croatia
15-19 May, 2024

Let me start by introducing you to a great event that has been organized for over 30 years—yes, 30! The organizers are proud that this is Europe's oldest conference on Gnu/Linux and free software.

It's held in Zagreb, Croatia, and offers many ways to learn new stuff - Sessions, workshops, small mini-events on a particular topic, and many ways to network and meet people.

Why don't you combine your thirst for knowledge with a trip to Zagreb where, apart from the food, drinks, and history, you will understand why there are chandeliers from a Las Vegas Casino in a Cathedral?

The team is running a 30% discount campaign for the next few days.

DevConf

Brno, Czechia
13-15 June, 2024

When I started living in the Czech Republic, the people from Prague tried to convince me that the city of Brno was a hoax and that it didn't exist. I am still not convinced, and I plan to go and visit the DevConf this year to change my mind :)

Apart from the obvious joke, the DevConf in Brno has been held almost every year since 2009. The topics might vary throughout the years, but the hero is always the open source. The primary sponsor is Redhat, and you might see more focus on technologies and principles related to the software company, but this is usually okay.

This year's conference will last three days and include ten different themes, including the good ol' AI.

Attendance is free of charge, and no registration is required. Visit Brno, ensure it's real, meet many new people, and learn something new.

---
P.S. I am not associated with any of the events; I just want to support their enormous effort

What good can you do for $3000?

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Mon, 18 Mar 2024 15:41:10 +0000

If you have a donation/stipend of $500/ a month for 6 months what good can you do in your local community with your skills?

This is a serious question that most probably will end up in me supporting you with the mentioned amount.

If you are tired to use your time into answering silly questions like "what is your goal" for the week and want to do actually something, share some proposals.

What challenges did I have when I included a local version of my name in social media?

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 11:06:37 +0000

Hi, I come from Bulgaria, a country in the Balkans.

Looking back on history, apart from how it shaped my short-fuze Balkan DNA, I feel proud of my nation's adoption of the Cyrillic alphabet. I embraced that and changed my public profile name to almost every online platform to include a Cyrillic version of my nickname. So I became Bogomil Shopov—Бого.

Then, challenges arose. Here is a list of some of them if you want to follow my lead or learn how to be more inclusive.

Pi%s off, b&^%oody Russian.

The situation with the war in Ukraine brought hate to all people using the Cyrillic alphabet. This statement usually comes from people with low education unable to understand that not only people in Russia use this alphabet but also other 125 million people.

Fonts mismatch

Some websites use fonts that do not support Cyrillic encoding, and you see the vast visual difference between the name in English and Bulgarian. No maker expects a string to use two different encodings, and sometimes, we misdesign our systems, expecting specific encoding. The good thing is that it only happens sometimes.

What does "Бого" mean?

I made a mistake when I added the name. I needed to explain how to read it to people. Some websites allow me to add something to my profile description.

Embrace who you are and find your unique way to say it to the world.

Photo by Dragos Gontariu on Unsplash

Three heavy metal songs that will teach you about privacy.

Bogomil Shopov - Бого — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 12:53:02 +0000

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights enshrines the right to privacy or private life. Often, we pay with it for stuff like being important on social sites or accessing useless content that makes us falsely happy or even more like a false sense of security by installing a camera in your garage. We easily give our privacy away, and it's not renewable.

I want to share three heavy metal songs with you that might make you think about how important is your privacy.

Listen to them with an open mind. I can guarantee that what's inside is not science fiction. It happens to millions of people today and maybe to you or someone you know.

You are nothing more than a folder on my hard disk.

Abusing the privacy of someone by sharing their pictures online can harm a person in many ways - starting from mental health issues to much worse scenarios.

Your content is never protected. Do not try to convince yourself that this can't happen to you because it will. Are you ready to take the risk?

Browse the lyrics and happy listening!

Is Anyone Up by ** Electric Callboy**
(Explicit content if you listen to the whole song)

And I tell you I'm sorry girl
It was nothing personal
Is anyone up?
Is anyone up?
Your p$$$y
Your b$$$ies
On the World Wide Web

Privacy and intimacy as we know it will be a memory

Humanity tends to solve its problems with the fastest solution. In most cases, it's the stupidest thing you can do, but we are proud that we did something to fix this issue, even if it's gaining no benefits.

Someone parks on my spot in the garage - let's put a camera and bring the revenge to them. My kid is late from school; let's give them a new smartwatch to track them.

We are watched by more than 1000 eyes every day, and we usually bring some of them with us voluntarily.

1,000 Eyes by Death

Crossing the line into the other side
Emerging as prisoners
To the emptiness of time
To the left and to the right
From behind - they're out of sight
Plunging into a new found
Age of advanced observeillance
A worldwide, foolproof cage
Privacy and intimacy as we know it
Will be a memory
Among many to be passed down
To those who never knew

Electric Eye by Judas Priest

Up here in space
I'm looking down on you
My lasers trace
Everything you do
You think you've private lives, think nothing of the kind
There is no true escape, I'm watching all the time

We easily give our privacy away, and it's not renewable. Think before you do something to harm your privacy! I hope those three heavy metal classics can paint you a picture of a possible reality with you as a main character!

Photo by Tobias Tullius on Unsplash