“No economic interest, under no circumstance, can be above the reverence of life.” – Manfred Max-Neef, Chilean economist, 1932 -2019 A national conversation has begun which is alarming, yet also familiar. It talks about costs and trade-offs, losses and accounts. It is a conversation about human lives framed in the language of economics. A recent… Continue reading
Dear Readers, Before the Corona outbreak, and with the help of Jose Ramos, the lead editor of an upcoming book about cosmo-local production, I had been reviewing the literature on historical rhythms and cycles to set the stage for the current ‘chaotic transition’ and ‘what comes next’. In short, I have come to two important conclusions: society moves… Continue reading
The Internet Archive has taken the brave step to release 1.4 million books online, arguing that public libraries are now closed. Unsurprisingly, the reactions from the publishing industry haven’t been too charitable. The following is republished from the Internet Archive. Last Tuesday we launched a National Emergency Library—1.4M digitized books available to users without a waitlist—in… Continue reading
The pandemic now sweeping the planet is one of those historic events that will change many basic premises of modern life. Let us act swiftly to deal with the emergencies, but let us also seize the opportunity to think about long-term system change. If there is one thing that the pandemic confirms (in tandem with… Continue reading
“May you live in interesting times“. A curse once assigned Chinese origin, now thought to be apocryphal, it’s deceptively mild until you realize you have no resistance to a novel, viral load of interestingness. We feel like we can’t blink, yet our eyelids are getting very heavy. We’re anxious, grateful, bewildered, hopeful, overwhelmed, empathetic, angry,… Continue reading
Is there a way to go beyond open source, and have ethical, fair software in a cloud-first world? This is what some people in the open source community think. In the 20 years since its inception, open source has turned out to be the most successful model for building software. The world today runs on open-source software… Continue reading
About Common Wealth Just like you, there are others frustrated by “business-as-usual”. They are frustrated by the “lip service” provided to stakeholders. Like when a company says “employees are our greatest asset” but means the opposite. By contrast, there are organisations where stakeholders have an actual stake. These include: Companies using equity crowdfunding Co-operatives, where members are owners… Continue reading
Towards a sustainable world: 3 Paradigm shifts. By Bernard Lietaer. Edited by Helga Preuss, Marek Hudon, Kristof de Spiegeleer et al. Delta Institute – Dieter Legat, 2019 Description Bernard Lietaer calls for three paradigm shifts – With specific actions by individuals and leaders With unsuitable means we half-heartedly try to repair the complicated clockwork of our… Continue reading
A spectre is haunting the world – the spectre of peer-to-peer. All the powers of the old-world have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: liberal States and dictators, banks and FANG, regulators and speculators. Where is the State that hasn’t attempted to muzzle freedom of communication and information, or to expand surveillance… Continue reading
BY ALEX PAZAITIS | JUNIOR RESEARCH FELLOW, TALLINN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY CORE MEMBER, P2P LAB It has been roughly a decade after the days that people first discussed Open Design. It has hitherto evolved from a concept, to a movement, to a viable business choice. The RepRap 3D printer has been one of the first and… Continue reading