Interesting meditation on the new peer socialities, in which Adrian Chan recognizes two major shifts. This is followed by a related meditation from Rob Horning (Generation Bubble blog), who wonders whether the new corporate-funded social networks are not designed to create ‘capital-friendly’ identity formation. Adrian Chan on the first shift “The way I see it… Continue reading
Should public services be mutualized?
Last week, we mentioned how the UK Labour Party is not only planning to embrace mutualism, but is thinking on how to apply the idea to public services. In the same article’s comments field, we find a challenge to that idea: “Mutualism and the co-operative movement have always had my respect and support as democratic,… Continue reading
Book: Property Outlaws: How Squatters, Pirates and Protesters Improve the Law of Ownership
Book: Property Outlaws: How Squatters, Pirates and Protesters Improve the Law of Ownership. By Sonia Katyal and Eduardo Penalver. Yale University Press, 2010 Author’s Intro by Sonia Katyal: “In a nutshell, the book argues that a degree of civil disobedience is essential to the health of both tangible property and intellectual property law. It explores… Continue reading
Riane Eisler’s Roadmap to a New Economy
Fernando Ibarra and Elifarley Cruz recommended the following article, by Riane Eisler: * Roadmap to a New Economics: Beyond Capitalism and Socialism It’s a call for a Caring Economics. Just a few excerpts to give you an idea of the scope and tonality of her contribution, we recommend reading the whole article. See especially the… Continue reading
Summary theses on the emergence of the peer to peer civilization and a new political economy
I wrote these summary theses about two years ago, but I believe they are still valid, food for thought, and show the specific approach I’m proposing to politics, state and governance issues: 1. Our current world system is marked by a profoundly counterproductive logic of social organization: a) it is based on a false concept… Continue reading
Opting for community-oriented free software business models
Bradley Kuhn starts his opinion piece with a analysis of the Open Core business model, and how it abuses GPL to lock in users to the larger proprietary versions. He concludes that the FS community should not only look at the license itself, but at the whole community dynamics, and choose the smaller companies that… Continue reading
Free software in embedded devices: protect your rights
An excerpt from an article by Lysandra Ohrstrom: “Free software has been embraced by commercial developers and is now powering a much wider range of embedded devices than any single proprietary program. Behind any one of the smartphones, eBook Readers, netbooks and LCD-televisions that debuted last week at CES is almost certainly a Free and… Continue reading
Peak Moment TV: guide to resilient communities
Great online series on local resilience initiatives, strongly recommended. Janaia Donaldson: “Peak Moment TV: Locally-Reliant Living for Challenging Times is an online video series showcasing stories about local self-reliance and perspectives that make sense of rapidly-changing economic, energy, and climate challenges. The half-hour biweekly programs feature host Janaia Donaldson’s conversations and tours with grassroots entrepreneurs… Continue reading
Toward a New Multilateralism of the Global Commons
David Bollier has summarized James Quilligan’s visionary essay, People Sharing Resources: Toward a New Multilateralism of the Global Commons. David Bollier: “Quilligan starts with a critique of the problem: We have begun to see that the benefits of perpetual economic growth are not compensating for the vast damages and risks they create — from energy… Continue reading
Facebook is evil, says Eben Moglen
How much would someone have to pay before you would let them read your diaries, find out what your religious beliefs, political leanings or sexual preferences were, or where your children go to school? What many of us are not aware of is that we are freely giving away exactly this kind of information to… Continue reading
The age of panspectric surveillance and its effects on dispersed subjectivity
Excerpts from an article by Karl Palmas in the Swedish magazine Arena: In the emergent “panspectric” order, human society is seen in terms of “information traffic”. It is not the actions of individuals that are observed, as in the Foulcauldian panopticon, rather those of the mass. Degrees of corporate and state surveillance are unprecedented; yet… Continue reading
Copyfarleft and Copyjustright
Challenges to traditional copyright resulting from peer-to-peer applications, free software, filesharing and appropriation art have caused a wide ranging debate on the future of copyright. Dmytri Kleiner brings existing critiques of material property from the left to bear upon the realm of copyleft artistic production and asks how, within the existing copyright regime, can artists… Continue reading
The Makers-again: or the need for keynesian management of abundance
Michel Bauwens asked me to clarify how my analysis differs from Kevin Carson’s wonderful review of Doctorow’s The Makers. Even though we are discussing a fictional example- the New Work boom of, approximately 2015-2020- this is, I think a useful exercise because it allows us to think about what kinds of economic regulation might or… Continue reading
Will big business privatise the monetary commons?
Michel Bauwens asked me to summarize a discussion that started with a question, posted by Richard Douthwaite, a UK-born economist and activist who lives in Ireland. Douthwaite posted on the Feasta forum, asking whether the alternative electronic payment system that is being readied for implementation in Dublin and Kilkenny, Ireland, is in danger of being… Continue reading
A hamster’s message to believers in infinite growth
Via Impossiblehamster.org:
The Politics of Design and p2p Democratization
A peer is not an equal — for there are no equals — the peer is the one who appears in the public square, and by virtue of the public square, be it the polis of the streets or of the nets, and who appears as one who contributes, contests, collaborates, has a stake in… Continue reading