* Essay: Spectre of the commons: Spectrum regulation in the communism of capital. By Rachel O’Dwyer. From the Abstract: “The past decade has seen a growing emphasis on the social and juridical implications of peer production, commons-based property regimes and the nonrivalrous circulation of immaterial content in the online domain, leading some theorists to posit… Continue reading
Date archives "November 2014"
Sharing economy, direct economy, p2p production… what a mess!
The “sharing economy” is educating us for living in an economy with increasing non-market spaces, but it is the continuum of practices that today link up the “direct economy” and the “p2p mode of production” what will take us “beyond,” towards a new way of producing and sharing. First of all: this post is long,… Continue reading
Mobilising a counter-hegemonic climate movement
As concerned citizens mobilise for climate change demonstrations across the world, never has it been more important to embrace a collective demand for ‘system change’ as the surest way to limit global warming and ensure environmental sustainability. More than two decades after international climate change negotiations officially began, governments have made little progress towards implementing… Continue reading
Sharing as the new common sense in a post-growth world
We need to talk a lot more about sharing as a way to radically reframe the post-growth debate, argues a recent report from the Green House. If growthism is the substitute for a more just and equal society, then it’s time that we all start saying so – and embrace a new common sense for… Continue reading
Omega Institute Hosts First Major North American Conference of Commons Activists
It’s always been frustrating to me that Europeans and people in the global South appreciate the potential of the commons far more than most Americans, even among political progressives and activists. Happily, this past weekend saw a big shift. In Rhinebeck, New York, the Omega Center for Sustainable Living (OCSL) – part of the noted… Continue reading
Moving beyond mobilization: Hungary knows how to protest
By Ben Knight, co-founder, @Loomio @benjaminmknight Yesterday, 100,000 people mobilized in the streets of Budapest, in response to a proposed tax on Internet access. “The Internet tax is a symbol of the government’s authoritarianism – we not only need to defeat the Internet tax, we need to believe that we are capable of criticizing and… Continue reading
It’s time for a post-Piketty vision of shared wealth
The latest bestseller in economics has done a great deal of service to progressives in highlighting the imperative of shared wealth. But given the social and ecological limits to economic growth, this emerging conversation on global sharing has to get a lot more radical. There is no doubt that Thomas Piketty’s best-seller, Capital in the… Continue reading
Should we consider the new internet monopolies as public utilities ?
They became big through the free use of a public infrastructure and tax avoidance. It’s time to suggest anti-netarchical policies to break up these new monopolies, argues Richard Eskow: “The Big Tech mega-corporations have developed what Al Gore calls the “Stalker Economy,” manipulating and monitoring as they go. But consider: They were created with publicly… Continue reading
The re-awakening of the Irish people against the privatisation of water
Watch this amazing video about the protests against the privatization of water in Ireland and the re-emergence of popular power: This shows the creativity at play during the one-million march:
Book of the Day: The Black Box Society
* Book: Frank Pascuale. The Black Box Society: The Secret Algorithms That Control Money and Information. URL = http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674368279 Description ‘Every day, corporations are connecting the dots about our personal behavior—silently scrutinizing clues left behind by our work habits and Internet use. The data compiled and portraits created are incredibly detailed, to the point… Continue reading
Commonfare: Towards a Security and Opportunity Society
We have opened a new section in our p2p foundation wiki on ‘p2p’ solidarity mechanisms that are appropriate for networked workers and peer producers. Here’s an approach proposed by the New America Foundation: * Essay: The New Economic Insecurity — And What Can Be Done About It. Jacob S. Hacker. New America Foundation, The Summary:… Continue reading
Brazilian Hackerspaces as Spaces of Resistance and Free Education
* Article: Activism in Brazil: hacker spaces as spaces of resistance and free education. Raquel Renno. From th eAbstract: “Hackerspaces and medialabs in unusual and traditional cultural places seem to be the alternative to the educational and digital gap between rich and poor in Brazil. Raquel Renno analyses this gap and reconstructs the subversive potential… Continue reading
Video: The Gift Economy and the Commons
This is a (very interesting) conversation between International Economist, James Quilligan and Charles Eisenstein, author of Sacred Economics recorded at Immediacy Studio in Media, PA on June 27, 2012. See the video here at:
The emergence of a new kind of left politics in Europe
Excerpted from Juan Pablo Ferrero: “The left in Latin America has the advantage – and also the disadvantage – of being part of governing coalitions. In Europe, Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain are two of the newest and most prominent political fronts making inroads in national and regional elections. As in Latin America,… Continue reading
P2P History: The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century
* Essay: E.P.Thompson. The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century. A summary by provisionaluniversity: “Thompson identifies the many ways in which discontent and protest arose around the issue of food prices as the market economy came to displace the ‘moral economy’, one which was not based on the ‘invisible hand’ of… Continue reading
The netarchical strategy: First lure them in and establish your monopoly, then monetize
This strategy could be described as “serial monopoly” and “serial monopsony.” It enters a market, leverages an economic advantage (sales tax exemptions, revenues from other product lines) and then preys on competitors until it reaches something like a monopoly position. Serial monopolists are always thinking about the next market to be dominated. Today’s revenues are… Continue reading