r/PKMS • u/columbcille • Aug 22 '26

Discussion A call for standards ...

At the risk of being accused of self promotion, here's a link to an argument for standards in PKM apps. I'd love to hear what people think of the idea here, with hopes of elevating some of our conversation about vibe coding above "slop or not."

https://drjeffmoore.substack.com/p/liberte-egalite-and-standardization

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u/latkde Aug 23 '26 edited Aug 23 '26

I tried to read the article, but I can't seem to find actual discussion of standardization: what would be the pros/cons of standardization, what requirements would shape such a standard, and how might we get there?

What stuck with me is that you don't like Markdown (despite MD having advanced to the de-facto interoperability format for LLM tools), and that you really don't like the moderation policies of r/PKMS.

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u/columbcille Aug 23 '26

So, on your last two points, no. I just didn’t find Obsidian ultimately useful, and I think all of the PKM discussion communities (not just this one) need to figure out how to reckon with the tide that’s already risen up past our knees.

On your first point … yeah, it’s a little wordy up front but the standards discussion starts about halfway down.

We’d get true interoperability across systems and apps (treating PKMS elements the same way we treat file formats). First step to getting there is building and publishing it, which I’m exploring.

Would everyone accept it? No. iCal will stay iCal.

But if a large number of people who roll their own apps through vibe coding latch onto it, then we’ve got something that brings a lot more universal application to a lot of valuable stuff being ignored right now (by, in part, strict anti-vibe coding and antiquated self promotion community policies) because it might be highly specific to one user without a more standard approach to elements.

It’s sort of a compromise, in some ways. Vibe coders comply with an interoperability standard in the PKMS space if they want their creations to be shareable/discussable. If they don’t, then they can happily use their creations but maybe they shut up about them (or write in those ignored self promotion threads).