We continue the presentation of the landmark study of peer governance, i.e. Book: Cyberchiefs. Autonomy and Authority in Online Tribes. Mathieu O’Neil. Macmillan/Pluto Press, 2009. This excerpt makes for a little more complex reading, but show the interpretative scheme used by the author, to understand various subtypes of peer governance. Mathieu O’Neill, from chapter 4:… Continue reading
Date archives "May 2009"
Social background to the events in Swat Valley
Humeira Iqtidar has an excellent background article in Open Democracy about the social background to the misnamed “Taliban” in the Swat Valley in Pakistan, and the underlying class dynamics. See: Who are the “Taliban” in Swat?, for the full article. Excerpt below. There are much more insights in the original article. Humeira Iqtidar: “A recent… Continue reading
A circulation charge against the meltdown
Using the concept of demurrage to explain monetary reform is practically unexplainable to a mainstream audience, but a circulation charge makes eminent sense. A brilliant policy proposal by Jordan Bruce MacLeod, the author of the book: New Currency: How Money Changes the World as We Know It. The proposal appeared in Kosmos Journal, the following… Continue reading
Kevin Carson calls for an Open Kindle
Via the C4SS blog. Kevin Carson: “When someone buys a book, they are also buying the right to resell that book, to loan it out, or to even give it away if they want. Everyone understands this.” –Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, 2002. “You may not sell, rent, lease, distribute, broadcast, sublicense or otherwise assign any rights… Continue reading
The P2P Foundation: time for a turn towards the political?
The P2P Foundation has never been an explicitely political project, despite the world-changing ambitions that are already evident in our founding statement. I/we see ourselves as a pluralist organization, seeking various constructive ways to build and strengthen alternative patterns for organizing social life in more equitable ways, as well as being a platform of interconnection… Continue reading
The Shame in Spain
Glyn Moody recently posted this: The Shame in Spain I’ve written a number of times about Spain’s use of free software, notably at the provincial level. There’s even a handy – if rather out-dated – map that shows the extent of Penguin love there. Sadly, it looks like Microsoft is making the Spanish government an… Continue reading
InnovaCamp Mediterrane@
InnovaCamp Mediterrane@ is a BarCamp to explore innovation, especially within the Mediterranean region. It is a participatory space where the atendees share experiences, ideas & networking and will take place in Citilab-Cornellà, Barcelona from 22-24th of May. The event is free and everybody is welcome to attend and participate. You can present your project at… Continue reading
Cyberchiefs: book of the week and second classic on Peer Governance
Book: Cyberchiefs. Autonomy and Authority in Online Tribes. Mathieu O’Neil. Macmillan/Pluto Press, 2009. Peer production is by now a very accepted term and concept and it has its classic study, i.e. The Wealth of Networks by Yochai Benkler. But I can’t really say that the second concept of the P2P Theory trilogy, i.e. peer governance,… Continue reading
Reporting on Obama’s flawed IP Report
The two documents have opposing aims: ours is to reveal how well countries respect the interests of consumers in their copyright laws and enforcement practices, whereas the 301 Report is only concerned with the interests of IP owners. Via Celia Blanco: The IP consumers’ report that Consumers International prepared to “combat” the 301 US report… Continue reading
The P2P epistemological shift towards undisciplinarity
On April 27, Mark Taylor wrote a much remarked editorial, The End of the University as We Know It, criticising the traditional university approach to learning, proposing a set of seven inter-related reforms. He wrote amongst other things that: “GRADUATE education is the Detroit of higher learning. Most graduate programs in American universities produce a… Continue reading
Sam Rose on opening up the school system
I’m upgrading Sam Rose’s contribution to our previous debate about unschooling, as it exemplifies the transformation of our school system through open and free modes. Sam Rose: “John Taylor Gatto explains the history of forced schooling, and the attitudes that extend into Universities, in The Underground History of American Education where he argues that education… Continue reading
Can large corporations make money with a commons?
This post was written on April 22 by Dhananjay Nene, on the occasion of the takeover of Sun by Oracle. Confirming Sam Rose’s predictions about the robustness of small business networks over large corporates (the business version of the Peak Hierarchy meme, which, I recently found out, is also supported by Umair Haque). The author’s… Continue reading
German Pirate Party banned from social network
Via Torrentfreak: “Just a few days ago it was announced that German political parties would be allowed to campaign and engage the public via the social networking site StudiVZ. Not all parties will be allowed to participate though, since the German Pirate Party has been undemocratically banned from StudiVZ. The other political parties were allowed… Continue reading
The unbearable heavyness of the information economy
We mistake the lightness of electrons and the vaporous nature of the information that rides on them for the lightness of the entire economy behind them. Every person who works in the so-called information sector of the economy must be housed, clothed, schooled, provided transportation, provisioned with household goods, given opportunities for entertainment and recreation,… Continue reading
6 minute introduction to the Open Money and Metacurrency Project
Georg Pleger: “Why we need multiple open currencies explained in 6 minutes: Fernanda Ibarra interviewing Arthur Brock and Eric Harris-Braun. Music by kid 606, video by Alan Rosenblith.” Video at http://vimeo.com/4448209: The MetaCurrency Project from alan rosenblith on Vimeo.
Neotraditional economics (3): Clean Slate Edicts
Here’s another example into how an insight into past ‘spiritual’ economics, can influence contempary policy-making, also from Alanna Hartzok’s Earth Rights Institute. We end the presentation with a review of her new book, The Earth Belongs to Everyone. Alanna Hartzok on Clean Slate Edicts: “In ancient times, failure to repay loans could cost farmers their… Continue reading