[p2p-research] Capital Club

[Patrick Anderson]

> "I hypothesize that the most effective means to efficient production is some
> organizational form where the consumer owns the means of production. A
> particular case of this is when the consumer is able to, effortlessly,
> produce the goods by oneself. In order to test whether this means of
> production is feasible, and optimal, we will build a personal fab lab,
> fueled by open source design, that is capable of producing 10 items of huge
> economic significance. To test the optimality, we will check the bottom
> line, in terms of the real costs of production."

Ok, here's my version:
"I hypothesize that any production is more efficient when the consumer
owns the means of that production.

A particular case of this is when the consumer is able to, with some
effort, produce the goods with the help of others, hopefully with
people located physically close by to reduce transportation and
communication costs.

In order to test whether this mode of production is feasible, and
optimal, we will buy a small farm and normal farm tools that is
capable of producing 100s of different spices, fruits and nuts of huge
tastyness.  To test the optimality, we will check the bottom line, in
terms of the real costs of production, and compare those costs with
the price consumers usually pay.

Since consumer price is equal to owner costs when the consumers ARE
the owners, the savings for the investors in their grocery bill should
be approximately the summation of all reported profits for all
industry needed in the chain of production for any particular good
(such as pine-nuts from China)."


>
> This is phrased in the form of a real, testable, hypothesis.
>
> Something to this effect.
>
> This means, you have to define your terms. Such as what 'consumer ownership'
> means. In practice, that could take many forms, so you need to make clear
> what you are talking about.

Well, I was trying to concentrate on proving that consumers already
use individual ownership (and rarely joint ownership) to increase
efficiency, and the name of that difference is 'profit', but I can see
it is difficult for us to concentrate on that simple goal.  I will try
again later, probably in another thread.

> >
> >
> > > This will help clarify and motivate your set
> > > of concepts, and provide a springboard for practical critique, relevant
> to
> > > the underpinnings of society. If what you are proposing cannot be
> tested,
> > > then for the purpose of my work, it would have limited use. Please
> expand on
> > > your motives and scope.
> > >
> > > Marcin
> > >
> >
> > My motive is to design some kind of scheduling algorithm - analogous
> > to what the kernel of a computer Operating System does - for the
> > cooperative sharing of physical resources, and to begin new businesses
>
> It seems you are building scarcity as a premise in your model.

Is the physical world not composed of scarce (finite) resources?

> If access is
> availlable to GENERATIVE goods, the scheduling argument is largely
> irrelevant, or at least irrelevant in the type of a community that I would
> like to build.

The genetics of apples have theoretically infinite potential, but are
constrained by Space, Time, Mass and Energy.

> For example, if  you have a nursery, you don't have to worry
> about  how many apple trees you will have access to.

I need precisely as many apple trees as I need the output of.  Are you
pretending that one apple tree can feed the entire population of the
planet?

> If you have solar
> collectors at negligible cost, you can produce items that would otherwise be
> scarce. Etc. If you have sand, you can have semiconductors. Etc.
>
> The bottom line constraints are those of natural limits. That in itself is
> the bottom line of governance models.

I'm not completely sure what you are saying here unless I already
answered it above.

Try to keep the rug-doctor in mind.  A single machine can be shared
among a finite number of people.  As the number of consumers
attempting to utilize the machine increases, at some point it will be
impossible to fullfill those requests with a single machine.  If the
collective owners have the time-sharing of that machine setup so that
anyone wanting to rent it are bidding against each other, then more
time slots will be filled.  People that want to rent close to 'cost',
and are willing to lose some sleep will rent at 2am, while other
people will be willing to "fight it out" for a slot at 12 noon in a
bid war.  As the deuling bidders raise their own price for that time
slot, they are *proving* that the current number of machines cannot
fill peak demand, and - since that "price above cost" will be invested
for the winning bidder toward buying ANOTHER machine, the 'system'
should be self-stablizing.

Thanks for the questions.  I hope my answers are sensible.

Patrick