The use of Web-based collaborative communities and tools can use labour, intelligence and interest to develop policy collaboratively, allowing the interests of the public to be better represented and engaged. Three of our friends, Mark Elliott, Darren Sharp and Matt Cooperrider, have published a great case study on participative policy making, describing the experience of… Continue reading
From sustainability to thrivability
Thrivability emerges from the persistent intention to create more value than you consume. When practiced over time this builds a world of ever increasing possibilities. Interesting interview with Digital Renaissance Woman Jean Russell at Worldchanging: “Jon Lebkowsky: Let’s start with the definition of thrivability I found at http://thrivable.wagn.org/wagn/Nurture, that it’s “our path out of unsustainable… Continue reading
The balance of forces: why are popular movements so weak?
Stanley Aronowitz, a U.S.-based left thinker, has a very stimulating analysis of the political effects of the crisis, and on what to think of the Obama administration. Unfortunately though, this essay, Facing the Economic Crisis, seems to have no inkling of the peer to peer movements that are profoundly transforming social practices and structures. Stanley… Continue reading
Pre vs. post-web content economics
I met Gerd Leonhard in Bangkok 2 weeks ago and we had a great conversation. Here’s a useful distinction he makes between pre-web content economics and post-web content economics: * “Pre-Web Content Economics: Consumers. Scarcity. Centralized. Computer = Internet Access. Professionals only. Everyone watching the same thing. Friction generates a nice flow of $. Total… Continue reading
Case studies of Co-creative Labour
Special Journal issue: International Journal of Cultural Studies Table of Contents for SPECIAL ISSUE: CO-CREATIVE LABOUR: 1 September 2009; Vol. 12, No. 5. John Banks and Mark Deuze have edited this special issue, which contains the following articles: * Amateur experts: International fan labour in Swedish independent music, by Nancy K. Baym and Robert Burnett… Continue reading
The unitary democracy of peer governance, vs. the adversary democracy of representation
The subversive effect of adversary procedure on unitary feeling makes it essential that the necessary dominance of adversary democracy in national politics not set the pattern of behavior for the nation as a whole. The effort to maintain unitary elements in the nation in turn depends on widespread rejection both of the cynical doctrine that… Continue reading
The ethical cultivation of peer producers through norms, dialogue, and conflict
Essay: Coleman, E. Gabriella, Three Ethical Moments in Debian. Abstract: This article is a detailed examination of ethical cultivation as it occurs in the Debian project, whose volunteers produce a non-commercial distribution of the GNU/Linux OS. Thus far, much of the literature on free and open source software (F/OSS) production has been heavily focused on… Continue reading
Climate Change: from burden sharing to benefit sharing
An emissions-trading system based on “benefit-sharing” would offer enormous opportunities to developing countries and provide the key to a new low-carbon global order. These are excerpts from a quite technical and complex essay and proposal, but relevant to commons-oriented policy-making. The essay: Claus Leggewie. From carbon insolvency to climate dividends. How observing the 2° target… Continue reading
Reviewing is the new advertising
businesses have to understand and accept that consumers’ decision making processes, which ultimately come down to whether they will buy from you or from someone else, have truly shifted to a new, powerful peer-to-peer arena. The always excellent Trendwatching, which relies on a network of thousands of watchers, has a special briefing (September) on the… Continue reading
A cautionary tale on catch share fishing
Proponents often exaggerate the importance of ITQs in sustainable fisheries. Setting a scientifically defensible TAC (Total Allowable Catch) and establishing an inclusive and transparent co-management process are by far the most important aspects of fisheries conservation. No fishery, ITQ or otherwise, will be sustainable in the long run without these two key measures. We reported… Continue reading
Online activism and environmental change in Africa
Juliana Rotich reports on the Cloud and environmental change in Africa: (links in the original article) Excerpts: “The good news is that we’re starting to see strong linkages between environmental activists and online communities. She mentions Corneille Ewango, a former poacher, turned conservationist in the Ituri rain forest, who’s personally responsible for identifying 200 species… Continue reading
Civilisational competition, social change, and P2P
The evolution of civilization can be seen as dialectic between the systematic selection for power and the human striving for a humane world, between the necessities imposed upon humankind regardless of their wishes and their efforts to be able to choose the cultural environment in which they will live. Book: The Parable Of The Tribes…. Continue reading
Open Everything Mindmap and visualization
This mindmap could certainly be more beautifully designed and presented, but I can’t refrain from already sharing, as it presents such a condensation of the 3 years of research we’ve undertaken at the P2P Foundation. A special thanks to Ben Dagan of Creative Commons Austria, who prodded me to undertake this visualization effort, and added… Continue reading
The re-emergence of cooperatives worldwide
Gandhi said: “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.” Hazel Corcoran, Executive Director of the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation reports on a press controversy around coops: “Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis, Canadians who made the film ‘The Take’ in 2004 about worker takeovers in Argentina, are at… Continue reading
The End of Economic Growth
I developed some of the themes of an earlier post here, “The Cultural Pseudomorph and Its Decay,” into a recent paper for Center for a Stateless Society: “The Decline and Fall of Sloanism.” This article is a condensed version of some of the same ideas, along with some other recent discussions on the P2P Research… Continue reading
The transition towards renewable energy
Book: Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization. by Lester R. Brown. Earth Policy Institute, 2008 This is one of the most important policy books available for the moment, with an integrated, well researched and well-thought out transition plan. The excerpts were compiled by Paul D. Fernhout: 1. Our current use of fossil fuels represent… Continue reading