Here is one concern about a book award contest -- or, alternatively,
consider this as a book nomination for the contest: :-)
"No Contest: The Case Against Competition"
http://www.amazon.com/No-Contest-Case-Against-Competition/dp/0395631254
"Contending that competition in all areas -- school, family, sports and
business -- is destructive, and that success so achieved is at the expense
of another's failure, Kohn, a correspondent for USA Today, advocates a
restructuring of our institutions to replace competition with cooperation.
He persuasively demonstrates how the ingrained American myth that
competition is the only normal and desirable way of life -- from Little
Leagues to the presidency -- is counterproductive, personally and for the
national economy, and how psychologically it poisons relationships, fosters
anxiety and takes the fun out of work and play. He charges that competition
is a learned phenomenon and denies that it builds character and self-esteem.
Kohn's measures to encourage cooperation in lieu of competition include
promoting noncompetitive games, eliminating scholastic grades and
substitution of mutual security for national security."
So, if there must be a contest, how about a "contest" where people can
nominate any book that is vaguely p2p (maybe have a filtering process of
yes/no that it includes p2p themes) and then pick a winner randomly from the
list of entries? :-)
Anyway, what exactly is the point of this award and this contest? Is it to
promote p2p cooperation on making books? :-) Or to promote individual
authors? Or to promote people writing new books? What are we trying to
accomplish here?
People also have various abilities that are strengths and weaknesses in
different situations, so even encouraging an author after-the-fact may not
be a success, as I wrote here: :-)
"Post-Scarcity Princeton, or, Reading between the lines of PAW for
prospective Princeton students, or, the Health Risks of Heart Disease "
http://www.pdfernhout.net/reading-between-the-lines.html
"""
Plus, the very skills I use to write this essay are the very height of the
old "Princeton" in some ways: alienation (elitism?), destructiveness
(competitiveness?), dissatisfaction (excellence?), and so on. These are not
the things Princeton most needs most going forward, but rather
inclusiveness, cooperation, and effectiveness. Often our greatest strengths
are also our greatest weaknesses, depending on the context. For another
example, the same habits of mind that help me be a great programmer in some
contexts -- perfectionism (great code), paranoia (useful for debugging),
isolation (great for concentrating) and so on -- are also often huge
weaknesses in dealing with people, where acceptance, trust, and
gregariousness are usually key. So, being able to write this essay may prove
my incompetence to do anything with the ideas in it. :-)
"""
(I'm not nominating that book unless the prize is selected randomly. :-)
Also related:
"Towards a free matter economy (Part 1): Information as matter, matter as
information
http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/free_matter_economy?page=0%2C1
"""
Prizes have been proposed as a much better solution than grants, and it’s
not hard to see why: With a prize, the donor does not have to try to predict
in advance who can achieve the proposed goal, nor how it will be achieved.
Likewise, applicants don’t have to prove anything to the donor about their
past performance—they just have to step up to the task at hand and do it.
That means there’s no “artificial” barrier to entry. The success of the
Ansari X-Prize, recently won by Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites with Space
Ship One is a good example of how well prizes can work.[10, 11]
Except for one problem, of course: money. Winning prizes is usually only
an option for people already rich enough to fund their own research. Prizes
do not provide money when it is most needed—during the development process,
so they do little for people with ideas but no money. True, you can look for
investors, but you still have to convince them in advance that you can do
the job. It’s no coincidence that so many entrepreneurs started out in
marketing!
It’s also instructive to note some less-appealing details of the X-prize
competition: once Space Ship One emerged as the clear leader, some
competitors began to slack off, because there was no second place to strive
for. Prizes fundamentally encourage competition and discourage cooperation,
and they have all the benefits and dangers of competition as a result. In a
field where effective cooperation seems to be essential to produce real
quality, they can be seriously detrimental, as can be seen by the problems
encountered by both Source Exchange and Co-Source -- the two “reverse
auction” funding sites Raymond mentions in “The Magic Cauldron”, which are
now long dead.
"""
Two related Google searches:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=cooperative+games
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=making+games+cooperative
Example result, and it is another book to nominate:
"Guide to Cooperative Games for Social Change"
http://www.freechild.org/gamesguide.htm
"""
Everyday in communities around the world, youth activists, youth workers
and educators are looking for powerful, purposeful activities that can
change the world. At the same time, young people want to connect with adults
in powerful relationships where they can actually change the world. The
Guide to Cooperative Games for Social Change provides a resource for people
who want more from youth activities.
The Guide features a powerful introduction to cooperative games,
carefully detailing their relevance for activists and educators. It
continues to provide clear, concise summaries of more than two dozen
activities, including icebreakers, "funners," and closers. Each description
details exactly how the activity can be facilitated, as well as the
equipment, time, and space needed.
Since 2003 this document has been downloaded more than 10,000 times from
The Freechild Project website. This revision features a clean, crisp layout
and a fast download. Also, for the first time Freechild's parent
organization offers print versions of this booklet for practitioners.
http://www.commonaction.org/gamesguide.pdf
"""
An example from that book:
"""
Human Scissors, Paper, Rock
Props: None
Purpose: Fun, energy-building
Procedure: This is the human-size version of scissors/paper/rock. The end
zones need to be clearly defined. To begin, each team huddles and decides
on which play to run- either rock, paper or scissors. Then the two teams
meet in the playing area. If your team’s symbol wins, you chase the other
team back into its end zone, trying to tag the team members before they get
there. If your team’s symbol loses, you must dash back to your own end zone
before you’re caught. Those people who get caught change to the other team.
The game ends when everyone is on the same team.
"""
So, Tomas' idea is already a big success as we cooperate in building on it.
:-) I had never seen that book before. Or that game. I'm learning something
already. :-)
Here is a small company in Canada that makes and sells cooperative board
games, BTW, which I will nominate as they have a book:
http://www.familypastimes.com/
http://www.familypastimes.com/together.html
"""
Play as friends, not as enemies! Our games foster the spirit of
co-operation. Players help each other climb a mountain, make a community,
bring in the harvest, complete a space exploration... They are never against
each other.
After all, the initial impulse to play a game is social; that is, we
bring out a game because we want to do something together. How ironic then
that in most games, we spend all our efforts trying to bankrupt someone,
destroy their armies — in other words, to get rid of one another! We soon
learn how to pick on the other person's weaknesses in order to win the game.
"""
Their book:
"Co-op Games Manual"
http://www.familypastimes.com/Books/gamesmanual.html
"This softcover book includes over 170 co-op games and activities for ages 3
to 12+. Little or no equipment is required. For small and large groups, from
pre-schoolers through primary ages and also junior high level. Play these
games in open spaces such as a farm, park or street, or the indoor spaces of
a home living room, a school classroom, gym, etc. Try a co-op birthday
party, co-op recess time, even a co-op play day."
A book co-written by someone with a "Humor Project" based near me:
"Playfair: A sampling of cooperative games" by Matt Weinstein & Joel Goodman
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC13/Playfair.htm
"THE POSSIBILITIES FOR COOPERATIVE PLAY ARE VAST. In our book, we describe
over sixty different games and activities we use in our PLAYFAIRS, and those
sixty are just a small corner of a very large field. We don't have space for
anything like that here, but we would like to share six of these games to
give you a flavor for what is possible."
Although it is true that some of the books above are not available for free
online. :-( So, maybe three categories of nominations (maybe with
sub-categories like Tomas said of fiction/non-fiction)? Free to change, free
to copy, and proprietary, with a random pick from each list? :-)
--Paul Fernhout
http://www.pdfernhout.net/
Michel Bauwens wrote:
> great idea ... though without money award, it may be difficult to get
> traction,
>
> also: very time intensive ...
>
> we could also have some form of collective voting, with people sending via
> email, the list of preferred p2p books ....
>
> worth pursuing!!
>
> On Fri, Oct 2, 2009 at 5:25 PM, Tomas Rawlings <tom at fluffylogic.net> wrote:
>
>> There are lots of book awards, the Booker springs to mind - so I was
>> thinking how would a p2p book award work (and if this is a good idea, I'll
>> turn the discussion into a post...)
>> I guess from a starting point we could have an award for a book about p2p
>> As a second there is the selection and judging process - which naturally
>> would be done by p2p...
>>
>> So here's an idea;
>>
>> Criteria - fiction and non-fiction; any format ebook, PDF (though how do we
>> judge difference between a long article and a book - and does it matter?),
>> comics must be published or re-issued within last 12 months.
>>
>> Selection - people propose books for the first round. To pass into the
>> second we'd take the book that are 'seconded' by the most number of people
>> in the group. This would give us say 5 books in each category that go
>> forward.
>>
>> Judging - then other people who have not proposed, seconded or read the
>> finalists get a copy of the book and read them then come to a consensuses of
>> the winner...
>>
>> What do people think?
>>
>> --
>> Tomas
>>
>> -----------------------
>> Tomas Rawlings
>> Development Director, FluffyLogic Development Ltd.
>> web: www.fluffylogic.net
>> tel: 0117 9442233 -
>> Also see:
>> blog on film & interweb: www.plugincinema.com
>> blog on p2p, media ecology & evolution: blog.catbot.org
>> tweet: www.twitter.com/arclightfire