Eudea is a wikitown that aspires to help form an open source appropriate technology ecovillage: a technecovillage. They explain: ‘A testing ground for biomimetic design and fabrication, unified by pursuits of social and biological benefit, developing decentralization, automation and accessibility. Educational, innovational and land-tending cooperatives can generate vital solutions and inspirations in this time of… Continue reading
Video of the Day: Ann Pendleton Jullian on Power and Ecosystems of Change
In her talk at TEDxGeorgetown ‘Power and Ecosystems of Change’, Ann Pendleton Jullian discusses changes in the distribution of power as societies move into a more networked era. She uses David Ronfelt’s TIMN(Tribes,Institutions,Markets,Networks) framework to discuss the challenges of transitioning from a Triformist Era to a networked Quadriformist Era. In the Triformist era the guiding… Continue reading
Video of the Day: Marcin Jakubowski – The Open Source Economy
An inspiring talk by Marcin Jakubowski from http://opensourceecology.org “MARCIN JAKUBOWSKI – “Growing up in Poland, and having a grandparent in the concentration camps, I was aware even at an early age what happens when materials are scarce, and people ?ght over opportunity.” “It’s what drove me to identify the 50 machines that are necessary to… Continue reading
Trend of the Day: Peer-to-Peer Bikesharing
“While fleet share systems operate per-hour, peer-to-peer systems lend themselves to daily, or longer, rentals. That’s ideal for tourists and renters more interested in casual exploration than point-to-point commuting.” Excerpted from Thibault Worth: “Liquid owns neither bikes, nor racks, but instead cultivates a network of private bike owners and borrowers to create a system of… Continue reading
Pasting the Web – Why subtle changes in usage could skew the internet
Twitter just started its own link-shortening service. Nancy Scola, in an article on The American Prospect explains how such subtle changes could be of great import to the future of the internet. We should pay attention, even to seemingly small changes in internet use… Excerpt: “Short-linking—that act of repackaging ungainly, often ugly strings of letters,… Continue reading
Book of the Day: Economic Democracy in Action
Book: After Capitalism: Economic Democracy in Action. Dada Maheshvarananda. Innerworld Publications, 2012 General descriptions A grassroots movement for economic democracy based on cooperatives and local economies is quickly growing throughout the planet. After Capitalism, inspired by P.R. Sarkar’s Progressive Utilization Theory, offers a compelling vision of an equitable, sustainable model which economically empowers individuals and… Continue reading
Project of the Day: Friendsurance
TrustCloud Community Manager Francesca Pick talked to Tim Kunde, the founder and Co-CEO: “Friendsurance has a very unique and revolutionary approach to insurance. By using the power of social networks, your service is able to offer liability, legal and household insurance at a very low rate. Tim, how would you describe your business model in… Continue reading
Occupied Greek Factory Begins Production Under Workers Control
From the Greek streets: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 is the official first day of production under workers control in the factory of Viomichaniki Metalleutiki (Vio.Me) in Thessaloniki, Greece. This means production organized without bosses and hierarchy, and instead planned with directly democratic assemblies of the workers. The workers assemblies have declared an end to unequal… Continue reading
From a Green New Deal to a Green Economy
Excerpted from Atlee McFellin : “Green New Deal policies are a massive shift from the neoliberal orthodoxy of the last few decades. Just like the Republican Party’s almost unanimous support for destructive trade agreements, most Republicans oppose Green New Deal types of policies as well. It doesn’t matter that their opposition is based on flawed… Continue reading
Project of the Day: Mechanical MOOC
Mechanical MOOC is an experiment to find out how to automatically support peer-learning in small groups for very large courses. P2PU explains: “The Mechanical MOOC is a perfect example for a P2PU Labs project. It offers users a way to learn Python, and it’s a great experiment to find out how to automatically support peer-learning… Continue reading