One of the canards about open source is that it only produces hardcore hacker programs - dev tools, infrastructural stuff etc. - that have little to offer the general, non-technical, *normal* user. While that may have been true ten years ago, things have moved on. For example, here's MakeHuman, an amazing program that lets you create photorealistic 3D humanoid characters:MakeHuman is an open source (so it's completely free), innovative and professional software for the modelling of … [Read more...]
The Diagonal Economy 2: The Impact of Energy Descent
I’ve wondered how to best explain the advantages of the Diagonal Economy in confronting energy descent. I think that reference to an old post addressing “anti-economies ” is perhaps the best framework. There, I discussed the classical sources of economic efficiency: economy of scale and economy of place. Both economies of place and scale will be impacted by the phenomenon of energy descent—the idea that there will be increasingly less surplus energy available to society going forward. While … [Read more...]
City Repair LA
Mark Lakeman stares down the new Bimini Street salamander.Portland architect and activist Mark Lakeman, founder of the City Repair movement, is in Los Angeles for a week of lectures and activities. Lakeman believes in actions that correct what he believes is our disassociation from nature and our alienation from each other. He's a passionate opponent of the grid, the imposition of street networks and regimented thinking that he traces back to Roman imperialism. He's probably most famous for … [Read more...]
so when you say collapse…
This funny thing used to happen when my friend Todd and I discussed peak oil and energy descent back when we were just coming to grips with all of that. One of us would begin to explain a particular future scenario or perhaps a strategy to address that scenario. All of these conversations could be loosely described as plans to addresses to collapse of modern civilization. We were both a little more Doomer than we are today but even back then we recognized that “collapse” wouldn’t necessarily … [Read more...]
Jeff Vail on the Diagonal Economy and the Rhizome Organisation
Jeff Vail is starting his long-awaited series on the next step for our post-meltdown political economies (see ToC for full project description): An excerpt on how this change may come about in the core country of the present system. Jeff Vail: “The diagonal economy might rise amidst the decline of our current system—the “Legacy System.” Using America as an example (but certainly translatable to other regions and cultures), more and more people will gradually realize that there the “plausible … [Read more...]
Stroud Pound to be Launched in Threadneedle Street
The official unveiling of the exquisitely designed Stroud Pound will take place on Threadneedle Street, outside the offices of the Stroud Valleys Project and opposite Stroud’s very own Old Lady (Teashop) on Saturday 12th September at 10 am. Four denominations of Stroud Pound vouchers will then be available to exchange for sterling on a 1-to-1 basis.The notes, designed by local artist Ronan Schoemaker and produced by local currency collector Steve Charlwood, are like miniature histories of the … [Read more...]
We need a p2p architecture for money too!
How to best transcend the current economic mess? Put Jeff Bezos, Pierre Omidyar, Elon Musk, Tim O’Reilly, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Nathan Myhrvold, and Danny Hillis in a room somewhere and don’t let them out until they have framed a new, massively-distributed financial system, founded on sound, open, peer-to-peer principles, from the start. And don’t call it a bank. Launch a new financial medium that is as open, scale-free, universally accessible, self-improving, and non-proprietary as the … [Read more...]
Squat Freeshop on Commercial Road
Swap shops, Freeshops, give away shops, they all aim to go against the capitalist framework, and often people can't quite get their heads around the idea, that, yes it is free and you can take it! Illustrations by Thereza Rowe When I dropped by the free shop near Brick Lane, I received firsthand experience of this when a woman asked the way to the ‘trendy’ Shoreditch area and when invited to look around the Freeshop declined with a shrug of the shoulders. It appears it just wasn’t hip enough, … [Read more...]
Capitalism – A love story
Go Michael! Michael Moore does it again. He’s like the little boy who dares to tell us “the emperor is wearing no clothes”. “It’s a crime story. But it’s also a war story about class warfare. And a vampire movie, with the upper 1 percent feeding off the rest of us. And, of course, it’s also a love story. Only it’s about an abusive relationship. “It’s not about an individual, like Roger Smith, or a corporation, or even an issue, like health care. This is the big enchilada. This is about the … [Read more...]
Guest Post by David Cohn: Lessons in Crowdfunding
Photo by ThinkPanama Almost ten months ago I launched Spot.Us via a Knight Foundation grant which is trying to pioneer “community funded reporting,” the act of distributing the cost of hiring an investigative journalist. In short: I fundraise for independent reporters but not through foundations or grant writing. Spot.Us fundraises by making the argument to the public that this reporting will benefit us all. If we can get 30-50 people to donate $20 each around a specific topic – we are in … [Read more...]
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