Intriguing project, because it reveals an open source approach, but on closer inspection, hides an authoritarian practice: For the open source aspect, see the Transontology site, which states: “The traditional model for religious and spiritual technologies has been closed and proprietary. The most powerful technologies are kept secret, limited to an initiated priesthood or inner… Continue reading
Afther the green revolution, time for the ‘brown’ and ‘blue’ revolutions
Excerpted from a lecture by John Thackara, at the occasion of the Buckminster-Fuller Challenge and design award: “In addition to the million-plus grassroots projects of restorative economy; and in addition to community-scale networks like Transition Towns; a third zone of activity, also outside the design tent, is also amplifying the reach of systems thinking beyond… Continue reading
Open Hardware Summit 2011 – Call for Submissions
* * * Submission deadline extended until July 1st, 2011 * * * The Open Hardware Summit (OHS) invites submissions for the second annual summit, to be held onSeptember 15, 2011 in New York City (Venue TBA). The Open Hardware Summit is a venue to present, discuss, and learn about open hardware of all kinds…. Continue reading
Bernard E. Harcourt on the illusion of self-regulating ‘free markets’
* Book: The Illusion of Free Markets. Punishment and the Myth of Natural Order. By Bernard E. Harcourt. Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2011 From a review by Allan Engler: “In The Illusion of Free Markets: Punishment and the Myth of Natural Order, Harcourt holds that markets will be regulated by governments or by the rich… Continue reading
Jeff Jarvis on end to end journalism and the ‘death of the article’
“Abundance is unsettling. That is precisely why the internet is disruptive not only to business and government but to culture and cognition.” Watch this video: (for background see here) I think Jeff Jarvis is right in his analysis of changing journalism and the importance of direct witness to reader communication: Video streaming by Ustream
The problem with advertising
Advertising is one of the primary forces of evil in our world, stimulating the more base aspects of our nature, and essential to maintaining the growth economy and consumerism that are such a threat to our biosphere. This argument is made eloquently in the following piece. However, since it is such a huge industry, in… Continue reading
The argument for re-introducing Steeply Graduated Income Taxes
Excerpted from Allan Engler, whose full article also gives the historical evidence backing up the democratic, social justice and environmental arguments in favour of progressive taxation mechanisms: “If public deficits were the real problem—not just a pretext—military spending particularly in the U.S. would be drastically cut. Taxes would be raised. Of course, tax increases have… Continue reading
1848, 1968, 2011: the long term effect of the bottom-up revolution
Excerpted from an editorial by Paul Rosenberg, in Al Jazeera’s online opinion pages: “In mid-February, the week after Hosni Mubarak was driven from office by the Egyptian Revolution, unprecedented demonstrations erupted in the state of Wisconsin opposing the efforts of the newly elected Republican governor to destroy the organising power of public employee unions. Although… Continue reading
A cultural intelligence critique of Kurzweil and Lanier
Excerpted from a presentation by collective intelligence theorist Pierre Levy: “Kurzweil’s singularity is purely based on techno science and ignores almost completely the cultural and social evolution. This is his main flaw, in my opinion. By contrast, I think that the main revolution ahead is not bio-mechanical but cultural. It will be a transformation linked… Continue reading
Phillip Mueller on digital Neo-Machiavellism: Openness as strategy in a many-to-many world
Excerpted from Phillip Mueller, participant at OKCon 2011: “What (will) strategy look like in a many-to-many world: … „what would Machiavelli suggest to us in an open knowledge society?“ His talk is scheduled for June, 30th at 19:30, for details see: “Openness as Strategy: Leading Open Knowledge Communities“ Machiavelli was the earliest thinker that was… Continue reading
Former intelligence operative calls for p2p revolution
Robert David Steele is a former CIA operations officer and senior civilian responsible for creating the Marine Corps Intelligence Center. In 1988 he realized that the US Government was spending all of its intelligence money on secret technical collection and virtually nothing on open sources of information. He became the global proponent for Open Source… Continue reading
Democracy 4.0 #spanishrevolution
Democracy 4.0 An anonymous user has posted the following information online. The post proposes allowing citizens to directly vote in Congress should they deem it necessary. It is an innovative proposal and read currently being distributed via email and social media in Spain. This is a manually revised online translation of the original introductory text… Continue reading
Jane Jones on going through postmodernism to a p2p relationality
“Modernity…based on a autonomous self in a society which he himself creates through the social contract, has been changing in postmodernity. The individual is now seen as always-already part of various social fields, as a singular composite being….Atomistic individualism is rejected in favour of the view of a relational self, a new balance between individual… Continue reading
How a new type of social movement is transforming Detroit
What has developed through both conscious organizing drives and the actions of many individual residents is a significant urban agricultural movement in Detroit. All over the city there are now thousands of family gardens, more than two hundred community gardens, and dozens of school gardens. All over the city there are garden cluster centers that… Continue reading
Refuting the ideological warfare used to justify the invasion of Greece
First, thanks for reading this important quote, which doesn’t require absolutizing national sovereignty to see its essential truth: What is going on in Athens at the moment is resistance against an invasion — and this invasion is being justified with the extensive use of mythology. What is going on in Athens at the moment is… Continue reading
The First Social Cyberwar as the class warfare of the 21st cy: On the convergence of hacktivism with social movements
1. Make no mistake- this is not a minor struggle between state nerds and rogue geeks- this is the battlefield of the 21st Century, with the terms and conditions of war being configured before our very eyes. Given the significant economic disruption online activism and hacking can cause, and the power online tools have to… Continue reading