Kategorie: English

Open Letter to Commoners from the FLOK Society, Ecuador

[Es gibt eine deutsche Version dieses Textes]

Dear Global Co-operators and Commoners,

In a speech on Sept. 19, 2012, President Correa of Ecuador appealed to the young people of his country to fight for and realize a vision of “good living” based on a commons-based and open knowledge society. The FLOK Society project (Free/Libre Open Knowledge) has been created to propose a transition plan and a policy framework to achieve this unique vision. In accordance with Ecuador’s National Plan, there can be no ‚good living‘ policy that is not inspired by, and rooted in, free and open knowledge and a thriving commons.

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The Free Software Song

Der Free Software Song von Richard Stallman (hier selbst gesungen) hat unzählige Remixes und Versionen erfahren. Unten gibt’s eine lange Liste, hier mal eine Version herausgepickt:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwG8aXBIG8A

Lyrics: (mehr …)

Von reCAPTCHA zu Duolingo

Jedes Jahr werden 2,5 Millionen Bücher mit reCAPTCHA übersetzt. CAPTCHA-Miterfinder Luis von Ahn erklärt wie das geht. Und er stellt ein neues Projekt vor Duolingo — Sprachen lernen und das Web übersetzen (Englischer Vortrag mit deutschen Untertiteln).

Open Hardware Round Table

Interview conducted by Michel Bauwens (P2P-Foundation) with Joe Justice (Wikispeed), Smàri Mc Carthy (IMMI), Jaromil Rojo (dyne.org), Anna Seravalli (Researcher on Makerspaces) and Chris Watkins (Appropedia). The interview took place at the Economics and the Commons Conference in Berlin, 22 to 24 May 2013.

Ten Theses on Open Source Economy

[Reposted from Elevate-Website]

by David Charles

Stefan Meretz strode onto the stage, eyes blazing, promising fire and brimstone. Channelling the revolutionary power of his medieval countryman, Martin Luther, Stefan proceeded to nail his iconoclastic theses to the door of the Elevate church.

Except that he was using PowerPoint*. And there were only ten. And they were all in German and all about the economy of which I know nothing. But I imagine that medieval journalists in Britain had a similar problem with good old Martin Luthur and his Catholic nonsense, so I’ll press on regardless. (mehr …)

Four Scenarios for the Collaborative Economy

bauwens-matrixA talk of Michel Bauwens at QuiShare Conference on four Scenarios for P2P developments. Click on the small righthand image, to view the table Michel is showing in his talk, which you cannot read very well in the movie.

Free Sources or Why Production No Longer Worries Us (Part 2)

Cover of the book containing the German version of this text[Part 1 / Diesen Artikel gibt es auch auf Deutsch.]

Meshes and Routes

Re/production used to be a burden which kept countless people busy for most of their lives. No longer. It has become a relatively easy and mostly pleasant affair, not least because of our reliance on mesh networks. Decentralized mesh networks allow everyone to participate. They are organized in ways that avoid asymmetric dependencies and ensure that nobody can acquire a specifically privileged position.

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Free Sources or Why Production No Longer Worries Us (Part 1)

Cover of the book containing the German version of this text[Diesen Artikel gibt es auch auf Deutsch.]

[This text was first published in German in a collection on utopian thinking and social emancipation edited by the Berlin jour fixe initiative. “The most tangible utopia of this volume,” the editors write. “Christian Siefkes gives his voice to somebody who lives in a not-too-distant future, where the ideas of commons-based peer production have spread beyond the Internet to re-organize production and reproduction in all areas of life on the basis of decentralized, non-hierarchical, voluntary self-organization.” Technologically, not much utopian thinking was needed – all the technologies I describe already exist today, if sometimes in more basic forms. The social changes, however, are radical. License: CC-BY-SA. You can also read the complete article as PDF or EPUB.]

Kitchen Fabrication

We produce in the kitchen or in the bathroom. Most people have some fabrication bots at home. The popular 3D printer/mill combines a 3D printer with a computer-controlled milling machine. 3D printers produce three-dimensional objects by printing multiple layers of bioplastics, metal, or ceramic on top of each other, until the desired object is complete. Within several hours, typical home 3D printers can print objects up to 50 by 40 by 30 centimeters large. That’s big enough to print most durable households items, whether crockery, cutlery, games and toys, or tools. Electrical and electronic appliances are made in the same way, except for the actual electric or lighting elements. It’s also common to print replacement parts if something breaks down or doesn’t fit.

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The question of societal mediation

It is always fun to watch and listen to Slavoj Žižek. But more than that, in the following snippet he addresses the important question of the potential to generalize self-organization. Watch it:

Some remarks (mehr …)

The Limits of P2P

world-and-us[Repost with permission (ask here) from a series of articles on P2P & Marxism: part 3, also read part 1 and part 2]

By Jonathan Clyne

In the previous parts of this article, peer-to-peer production was presented as a radical new way of organising production and different from other forms of collaboration. Instead of following the instructions of a top-down hierarchy working in a competitive environment, which is the norm in most businesses, people who felt passionately about a particular project got together on a voluntary basis to create something that was available for anybody who wishes to use it, as long as they did not turn it into private property. That is, it remains in the commons.

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