OPEN 2019 Community Gathering – Decentralised Collaboration

The OPEN 2019 Community Gathering is an open space event designed to strengthen the network of communities and organisations that are working on building a collaborative, regenerative economy. When: Thursday, 27 June – Friday, 28 June9:00 am – 8:00 pm Where: University of London, Malet Street, London In previous years, we’ve promoted platform co-ops in a traditional conference format. This… Continue reading

Primavera De Filippi on Blockchain Technology and the Future of Work

Primavera De Filippi, researcher at CNRS and faculty associate at the Berkman Center, Harvard Law School, is investigating emergent decentralized technologies to design new governance models. In this final talk of the session Blockchain Technology Beyond Bitcoin at Lift16, Primavera De Filippi explored the possibilities that live at the intersection between the blockchain and art,… Continue reading

The Key Themes of Collaboration

Cross-posted from The Open Coop and written by Oliver Sylvester-Bradley. Having re-watched the webinar on Catalysing Collaboration at Scale I wondered if it might be possible to identify some of the key themes of collaboration. Truly effective, synergistic, collaboration is an elusive beast at the best of times and the idea of making it work at scale,… Continue reading

Catalysing collaboration at scale

The video above is a recording of a webinar exploring how to catalyse collaboration at scale. This first event of OPEN 2019 covers the ideas behind The DNA of Collaboration and Harmonious Working Patterns to explore ideas which might help all the people, communities and organisations working on creating a new, decentralised, regenerative economy collaborate better to produce more impact. Panelists:… Continue reading

Co-ops Need Leaders, Too

I frequently encounter a notion, among those drawn to cooperatives, that a cooperative should be an amorphous, faceless collective in which old-world skills and norms of leadership can be discarded. How does this work out for them? Not well. Usually one of two entirely predictable things happens as a result — and generally both. One is a tyranny… Continue reading

Call for abstracts: The Network Society Today

The Network Society Today: (Revisiting) the Information Age Trilogy “Manuel Castells The Information Age Trilogy has been one of the most influential works to understand the societal change in the awake of the digital revolution of the last decades. It is, as Frank Webster (2002: 97) points out, one of “the most illuminating, imaginative and intellectually rigorous account of the… Continue reading

David Harvey on Primitive Accumulation and the Enclosure of the Commons

Originally available via Democracy at Work as part of the “Anti-Capitalist Chronicles” series. This episode: ‘Primitive or Original Accumulation’. From Democracy at Work To our Patreon community: thank you for supporting David Harvey’s Anti-Capitalist Chronicles on Patreon! Your support helps us compensate the staff and additional workers it takes to put an episode together. Thank… Continue reading

Open-source licensing war: Commons Clause

A new open-source license addendum, Commons Clause, has lawyers, developers, businesses, and open-source supporters fighting with each other. Written Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols for Linux and Open Source, originally posted on ZDNet on August 28, 2018 Most people wouldn’t know an open-source license from their driver’s license. For those who work with open-source software, it’s a different story. Open-source license fights… Continue reading

Book of the Day: A Movement of Movements

A Movement of MovementsIs Another World Really Possible?Edited by Tom Mertes Charts the strategic thinking behind the movements challenging neoliberal globalization. A Movement of Movements charts the strategic thinking behind the mosaic of movements currently challenging neoliberal globalization. Leading theorists and activists—the Zapatistas’ Subcomandante Marcos, Chittaroopa Palit from the Indian Narmada Valley dam protests, Soweto anti-privatization campaigner… Continue reading