[p2p-research] Non digital commons a lot more complicated than Free Software

[Michel Bauwens]

HI Massimo,

thanks for raising these interesting question ... paradoxically, I feel I
could have written it myself, were it not for the stramman "Michel" who
appears to not talk about the crisis,

so let me get that out of the way:

you write:

<Michel does not want to talk about crisis (in the post below the crisis
faced by the communities enclosed because of the need of more resources many
of which extracted for intensifying the digital revolution also necessary
for cybercommoners ) but solutions (what do we do about it). But this
methodological separation between crisis and solution misses the point.
Commons can be a solution to the crisis for *both* the perspective of
capital and the perspective of commoners/labourers, and these solution do
not necessarily coincide. The ICC was silent on this very topical
"frontline" matter. And this is why I said in my intervention from the floor
that without talking about these issue the commons movement risks to become
a "mouse movement". >

So for the record, I absolutely want to talk about the crisis and do so
incessantly on the blog and the p2p research list and though the delicious
tagging ... phase transition is in fact the key issue I'm interested in,
i.e. how to go beyond capitalism and replace it with a human an sustainable
system.

Now, I can't remember why you were not selected in your strategic
contribution ... in  my opinion, this is neither a willfull decision to
exclude strategic analysis, nor an example of a bias .... the key for us was
to balance competing agendas from a multitude of proposals. Given what you
say here below, your talk should have been included, but it wasn't.

As for the linkage between traditional and immaterial that was in fact the
key topic and since it has never been done before in such a clear way, I
can't accept any accusation that we failed on that.

A different matter is the proposal of Jai Sen ... let me say that we were
keenly aware of the lack of total diversity and went to some effort to
balance this out, including specifically asking Jai about a list of people
we could have included .. the fact is, we don't know anybody, the fact that
it was held in Germany and funded by hbf, the fact that U.S. organisations
are well-funded, contributed to the bias, including our own personal roots
... but as indicated in communication with Jai Sen (who by the way also
insisted it would be problematic to invite the people he suggested, he can
better explain why himself), we want to improve this.

So, I can think I can speak for the four of us that:

1) though Berlin did not do enough about diversity, it made a significant
effort and CSG will continue to  improve this in future events

2) CSG is commited to strategic analysis of the commons and the capitalist
crisis and recognizes that the commons can be used to strengthen the present
system, as your own example indicates ...

3) CSG however, does favour approaches which link the analysis of the
crisis, to proposals, both of resistance and of construction, which can
advance the cause of the commons

While it is legimate to develop pure analysis and theory, I think there are
many places for that, but it is not what we want to do in this context, but
rather find practical ways to advance both the struggles and solution space
of commons-oriented movements ...

I think we may differ though in where we put the limit of whom we want to
work it, I think clearly CSG takes a very broad view, and is open to commons
movement that advance the material and spiritual situation of commoners
generally, without expecting ideological agreement about the nature of the
crisis, and seeking commonality across differences. Obviously, there is a
danger of dilution here, against we must guard, but I do think that is the
bias that we hold.

OK, I've been speaking here 'in the name' of CSG, based on what I know, and
could of course be wrong, so please Silke, Bea, David, correct me if you
disagree.

I think we must also guard though of the opposite danger, i..e. to fall for
a credo-based approach, in which virulent anticapitalist rhetoric becomes a
requirement for collaboration; I personally believe we should be able to
build movements that unite both anticapitalists and people who make for all
kinds of reasons, different root cause systemic analyses, and that dialogue
and deliberation amongst those differences should be both to highlight
differences, but also to look for common action ..

As for the very good suggestion of including sustenance commoners, I have
suggested to Jai, and am suggesting to you, let's start to map those people
so we know them and can invite them for the next round, at which we can also
make more room for strategic analysis, to the critique of the digital
commons, and other issues dear to the hearts of those people who thought
this was insufficiently handled in Berlin,

so in conclusion, for me, and perhaps for the 3 other musqueteers:

the ICC is  totally interested  in posing the question of the crisis of the
commons, and capitalism has indeed entered the library of the "commons
strategy group",

by the way, "Michel Bauwens" linked to capitalism, yields 20k+ references

add the word critique and it still yields more than 15,000 ..



Michel





On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 3:30 PM, Massimo De Angelis <commoning at gmail.com>wrote:

> Dear Michel, Dear Martin
>
> thanks for having shared with us this conversation. It is an important one.
> Let me intervene in this debate frankly and as constructively as possible by
> commenting on the recent important conference we held in Berlin, the ICC.
>
> In spite of all the good stuff (and please believe me when I say so), I
> felt two major absences in the ICC, which strategically are short-sighted
> and very dangerous.
>
> One is the absence of the sustenance commoners, the voices from the Global
> South, unmediated by mythological representations  of Western NGOs that
> want-to-do-good. Jai did a tremendous job in collecting several contacts of
> people across the world who could have been at the conference and are
> situated grassroots activists of the commons. Hence, in this case,  there
> was a constructive intervention there that for whatever reason (financial,
> last minute or selective/political I am not questioning here) did not find
> an outcome. But constructive engagement there was, an opportunity missed,
> among other things, to get in the same room digital commonists and
> sustenance  commonists and get them to talk and start answer the question of
> "what to do about" the relation between the tangible and intangible commons
> that you, Michel, are quite rightly keen to answer, and that you, Martin,
> are quite rightly keen to keep rising. This is a question that need
> motivated people to raise and a contexts within which to be discussed, and
> in both cases the ICC failed to deliver.
>
> The other is the absence of a critical perspective about the current phase
> of capitalism. I suggested I made a contribution on the matter of commons
> and crisis, and it was not accepted, while I was instead confined to a cosy
> talk about music-commons -- which I enjoyed, but it was not really the type
> of cutting edge strategic issue I wanted to discuss. Yes I know Silke, too
> many requests and all that. But this is true for everybody who spoke and any
> topic selected, and what in time of scarcity come out clearly are the *principles
> of selection* the self-proclaimed "strategists of the commons"  have
> adopted to choose who to speak and what to speak about given the limited
> time. Whoever made these decisions have effectively excluded from the broad
> problematic the current issues of  crisis and power and the role that
> commons MIGHT TODAY HAVE to solve the crisis in favour of capital and
> re-launch a new wave of accumulation. Hence I can only conclude that this
> issue for you is not as important as the others that have been selected for
> the main panels, while for me is a *key strategic issue necessary *to
> build an effective commons movement. And since  capitalism never solve its
> crisis without at the same time hurting somebody -- and this is not a
> religious-ideological statement, but there is plenty of historical evidence
> of this -- by excluding from the main panels those like me who would raise
> this issue and contextualise our support for commons within the current
> crisis, you have effectively sanitised the commons from its political edge.
>  David (Bollier), in your initial intervention, you made the point very
> clearly: something of the sort that (I quote by memory) "we do not want to
> talk about crisis  but solutions." Well, also Michel does not want to talk
> about crisis (in the post below the crisis faced by the communities enclosed
> because of the need of more resources many of which extracted for
> intensifying the digital revolution also necessary for cybercommoners ) but
> solutions (what do we do about it). But this methodological separation
> between crisis and solution misses the point. Commons can be a solution to
> the crisis for *both* the perspective of capital and the perspective of
> commoners/labourers, and these solution do not necessarily coincide. The ICC
> was silent on this very topical "frontline" matter. And this is why I said
> in my intervention from the floor that without talking about these issue the
> commons movement risks to become a "mouse movement".
>
> I give you an example. In my place of work, I had a chat with the new
> deputy vice-chancellor, i.e. the deputy boss. He is all into commons and
> gift exchange, fantastic! At the meeting about the staff crisis of my
> department -- which runs the most successful course in the school and cannot
> be accused of under recruiting students or under publishing research -- we
> were asking to replace two members of staff who have left, so as we can
> continue to run our programme and even make further innovation. Our vice
> boss was all impressed, and thanked us for the "gift" we were putting in
> while we were waiting for replacements of our colleagues, and he referred to
> p2p digital commons as being all based on the culture of the gift and that
> how we are doing things is the way of the future, and added that he will do
> whatever it is possible, but not until next year, leaving us with one other
> year to overwork (and who knows what is going to happen next year given the
> overall cuts in education)!!. And then he seized on some of our ideas for
> distance learning and asked us to commit to their development even before we
> get the resources back to run the *current* programme. Now, the p2p logic
> of  "contribution" and not "exchange" has definitively fascinated our
> vice-boss so much that he can sound innovative, understanding and
> progressive while at the same time do the same thing that all bosses in all
> phases of capitalism try to do: get more work out of people for less.
>
> Other examples of current capitalist use of the commons at different scales
> include: UK PM Cameron "big society" (using commons to buffer the largest
> post ww2 cuts in social spending); Nato (using commons to redesign global
> imperial  security); Chrysler (abolition of cleaning stuff on the assembly
> lines as well as abolition of workers canteen -- workers now clean up the
> assembly line in common and bring their lunch from home, i.e. coocked in
> their househld commons);  Global Business elites (using commons to reduce
> costs in logistics ad supply chains and thus further deepen  global capital
> territorial and social penetration and diffusion).
>
> Now, the commons are indeed solutions, but for whom they are solution is an
> open political question. In the famous 1970 movie on General Patton beating
> and outmanoeuvring Rommel, close to the moment of victory Patton says:
> "Rommel... you magnificent bastard, *I read your book*!" For those who have
> read the theoretical and historical books of capitalism, it is not difficult
> to understand why questions such as "the relation between tangible and
> intangible", sustenance commons and p2p cybercommons, or capitalist crisis
> and the commons are key strategic questions we need to keep posing in order
> to -- as Martin says -- promote a public debate in the search for some
> effective answers. But the ICC seemed  totally uninterested even in posing
> the questions, as if the book of capitalism had never entered the library of
> the "commons strategy group".
>
> all the best
>
> Massimo
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 4 Dec 2010, at 03:00, Michel Bauwens wrote:
>
> thanks a lot Martin for this extensive reply, I won't answer everything
> right now, just want to make a start,
>
> let's take the material basis of the digital commons,
>
> I recognize this, many others I know do, and I personally don't know many
> people who are not cognizant of this,
>
> that in my view is therefore a red herring,
>
> the more important point is, what can we do about it,
>
> I can only tell you what I try to do about it in the p2p foundation,
>
> first, talk about it and publish studies and contributions about this
> material basis, I do this whenever I  come across it and maintain a
> specialized tag on this
>
> second, focus on the solution space, how do we activiely diminish the
> digital footprint; again there is a special section of the p2p foundation
> wiki dedicated to this, covering proposals such as by Bill St. Arnaud and
> others,
>
> I'm not claiming I'm doing enough, nor that I give it enough of a
> centrality, but what I'm saying is, it's already beyond critique and
> complaint; it's about actually doing something about it.
>
> now, even if your claim were true, and free culture advocates are
> blissfully unware that they are using computers, energy, and raw materials;
> this general accusation is unproductive; what we need is concrete and real
> information and solutions; as you say yourself, not ideological, but
> technical
>
> as you insist yourself: " I am quite sure that most people understand very
> easily that
> energy and hardware don't just drop from the sky, but have to be
> generated and produced and that this production is environmentally and
> humanly costly"
>
> so, given this understanding is there, what is the next step??
>
> Another entirely different question is, how much of a place should this
> have strategically?
>
> In my case, my answer is clearly, the issue of the ecological footprint is
> subordinated to the overall struggle to change the system, in which the
> digital commons is one of the crucial affordances to actually win that
> struggle; failure to do so, i.e. creating strength to change the system,
> makes any discussion of ecological footprints moot
>
> The digital commons are not just a luxury for western knowledge workers;
> they are a crucial ingredient to move productive workers towards peer
> production modalities, i.e. combining digital empowerment and shared design,
> with the expressions of the social/solidarity economy; a crucial ingredient
> in workers struggle; and a crucial ingredient in the self-organization of
> the oppressed worldwide
>
> weapons kill, but if you have an enemy that is ready to shoot at you,
> considering their usage is legitimate (as is non-violence)
>
> what I see problematic in the  repetition about the materiality of the
> digital commons is the following:
>
> - creating a red herring of those that supposedly ignore this
>
> - repeating the claim with the unspoken assumption that everyone should say
> 'mea culpa, yes  you are right and we are wrong', but at the same time, not
> contributing in any concrete way to actually dealing with the  issue of the
> ecological footprint
>
> This is what I invite you to, to focus less on accusing others of 'not
> getting it', but simply contribute to the discourse and concrete solution
> space,
>
> now I fully understand that people disagree on the core importance of the
> digital commons as key affordance in social change, BUT, this doesn't mean
> there is not commonality in other things; unless you would stress in an
> absolute way, like say the Amish, that this type of technology should be
> forsaken altogether,
>
> I have a different reading of Berlin, since I have not seen any of the
> reactions you have seen,
>
> but here is the dynamic from my point of view,
>
> some people, like myself, are trying to build a coalition across of very
> wide divide of differences,
>
> typically, in such a conference, there will be a tug of war between two
> extremes,
>
> one the one side, people who compose with the system, accept capitalism, or
> even reject both but accept or support the market freedom to autonomously
> produce and exchange; on the other hand, people on the opposite side of the
> spectrum, who reject the system, capitalism, often do not differentiate
> between the market and capitalism, and typically, though they are themselves
> generally few in number in most meetings, claim to speak for the masses;
> this tension is unresolvable, but for people who are trying to maintain the
> common space, always problematic, as, given space to one over the other,
> generally creates hostility on the other side of the spectrum, always with
> the danger that one side will leave; merely insisting on the acceptability
> of capitalism or the market will typically enrage the other side; while the
> anti-capitalist rhetoric will also alienate the opposite side; the only
> solution is to keep looking for productive commonality: are there still
> things we can do together despite those differences; generally, there are,
> at least that is my opinion
>
> now you can say that your type of masses are in the overwhelming majority,
> but that is subject to debate; in the west, knowledge workers are the
> majority of the population; worldwide of course, this is not true, there is
> a massive presence of agricultural and industrial workers ... but from my
> own experience here in the South: they are just as motivated for digitally
> enhanced cooperation; and creating a false dichotomy between knowledge
> workers, who are digital commoners who are 'not aware' of the ecological
> footprint, and others, who are assumed to reject digital commons, is just
> not my experience, especially if one looks to the younger generations, the
> aspiration to communicate is very strong; the urge to use the new methods to
> keep in touch with their families (migrant workers in china and S-E asia),
> or to organize and inform themselves in social struggles (chinese workers
> using the internet to compare wages and organize strikes), just as important
>
> in the end, I'm not sure what your complaint is, you were part of the
> organising team, people had the freedom to propose and organize their own
> workshops and recruit sympathizers and interested people to attend them ...
> of course, some people disagree, and some people will shrug you off, as they
> do me and others, this is to be expected and I can't see that as a problem
>
>
>
> On Sat, Dec 4, 2010 at 2:29 AM, j.martin.pedersen <
> m.pedersen at lancaster.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>>
>> Michel,
>>
>> You are right to warn about "being stuck in critique" - or in any other
>> rhetoric, whether self-styled or based on established ideology - and I
>> shall be the first to lament conventional, unreflective leftist positions.
>>
>> As the subject line indicates, virtual commons are within free culture
>> commonly, in general, considered in isolation from the materiality that
>> makes them possible and which constitutes one of the fastest growing
>> environmental threats. This is not an ideological point, but a technical
>> point, and it continues to be a hidden aspect of free culture and
>> virtual commons, and will remain hidden until the philosophy and
>> language from within the movements recognise the material dependency and
>> enormous energy consumption that digital commons entail. That was and is
>> all I am saying: do not be in denial.
>>
>> Generally, on a personal note, I proceed from the principle that one
>> should not bother criticising something that one does not care for:
>> critique is an attempt to improve: preguntando caminamos - and the
>> questioning as we walk is of course also of our own footsteps and
>> direction (in fact, when building alternatives there is not much else to
>> question). Else, it would risk ending up like in some western New Age
>> community where everyone is smiling with joy, although they are furious
>> on the inside, with themselves and with each other - for the more
>> enlightened, the more happy, and so to admit to *not* be happy and *not*
>> on the verge of nirvana would signal a failure. So we smile. In short:
>> denial, repression and the danger of explosion.
>>
>> I don't understand what you mean with those who "just don't get it" -
>> for my part I am quite sure that most people understand very easily that
>> energy and hardware don't just drop from the sky, but have to be
>> generated and produced and that this production is environmentally and
>> humanly costly, *if* they are made aware of that - but you seem to
>> suggest that *I* just don't get "it" - "it" being your world view. Well,
>> what is it that I don't get?
>>
>> I have answered in more detail below - hoping that this can become
>> either a constructive exchange, or that we can just leave it here - with
>> a view to clearing up some of the misunderstandings that were reflected
>> in your responses (to what I was trying to say).
>>
>> On 29/11/10 01:09, Michel Bauwens wrote:
>> > hi martin,
>> >
>> > you say "berlin" was allergic to stances directly confronting capital,
>> can
>> > you give some concrete examples?
>>
>> I said we heard it time and again during the conference and in
>> meetings - even in pejorative terms with gestures and with overbearing
>> shrugs. I was actually rather shocked, not so much by the arrogance and
>> superiority of it, as the assumption that such denigrating statements
>> were OK to make and reflected a common(s) sense. This is no place for
>> specifics, as they are personal, - if you managed to _not_ notice I am
>> rather surprised - but in some sense it doesn't matter, while in others
>> it matters a lot:
>>
>> The movements of peasants, landless and indigenous - as well as urban
>> radical movements - I imagine, outnumber the digital commoners; and
>> without land and its resources there can be no cyberspace. After all,
>> half the population is still rural and many urban dwellers rely upon
>> their villages to feed them in the city, as anyone who has ever been
>> doing development work on the frontiers of capitalism will know all too
>> well.
>>
>> Since the expansion of cyberspace threatens the commoners of the land,
>> there needs to be some sort of mutual recognition of the this
>> inter-dependence. Every time the digital commons discourse ignores and
>> denies this material foundation, the problem is consolidated. If you see
>> yourself as a public intellectual, then you must realise - as Lessig,
>> Benkler et al. before you - that you to quite some extent have to take
>> on the responsibility as a central contributor to defining (refining?)
>> the discourse of those who follow. At this stage, the digital commons
>> discourse is saturated with politics that build on the misleading
>> (deliberately misleading! (I will document this on demand)) discourse
>> established by the Ivy League leaders who have defined the territory
>> intellectually - and done so in such a manner as to not only pose
>> minimal threat to capital interests, but indeed to be helpful for their
>> expansion.
>>
>> The movements for the defense of commons first had their de facto rights
>> articulated in the Charter of Forests (ca. 1215-1225), and apart from
>> various great uprisings - the last, in this part of the world, during
>> the Spanish Revolution in the 1930s - it has been a slow, but safe
>> decay: from having collective right of access to land for food, fuel and
>> building materials to abstract, individual rights that can be suspended
>> in a state of emergency, which have become permanent features in the
>> contemporary world.
>>
>>
>> > one thing worries me though, you say that we should wait "that we are
>> all on
>> > the same page", but surely, that cannot be a reason for inaction, until
>> the
>> > magical moment when that would happen? this stance, waiting for "once we
>> are
>> > all on the same page .. then let us move forward", is a guarantee for
>> > staying in the critical stage, with no movement towards concretely
>> building
>> > the alternatives ...
>>
>> I am not sure why you choose to (mis)understand what I said in this way,
>> but to clarify: You asked me for *specific* answers and I said that I do
>> not have any real answers at this stage. Why not? Because I consider the
>> development of answers, solutions and action plans as necessarily a
>> collective effort that has to come from within the movement(s) - we find
>> the answers as we walk on, asking each other, reflecting  critically,
>> avoiding gooey eyed denial - like moths staring into the virtual light.
>> At this stage, my contribution is merely a philosophical questioning of
>> the politics of free culture.
>>
>> When it comes to the way in which digital commons are embedded in
>> natural resource systems and what can be done about it, I said that an
>> important first step is towards *acknowledging* that problem. This means
>> in very simple terms that if you have not acknowledged and recognised a
>> problem, it is going to be difficult to solve it. Everytime the politics
>> and development of the digital commons rest on the false assumptions of
>> immateriality, the materiality is obscured further.
>>
>> I don't have the answers - and I don't think that anyone has The Answers
>> - but if any set of solutions are to be developed from within the
>> digital commons movement with respect to the problematic embedding in
>> and exploitation of natural resources (as carried out by mining and
>> nuclear etc etc.), then that embedding must be faced up to.
>>
>> "On the same page", then, refers to a collective recognition of the
>> problem, which should be seen as a prerequisite to collective solving of
>> the problem. You project ideology and negativity into that proposition -
>> I don't know why - and claim it is critique that is not constructive. I
>> think denial is much less constructive than trying to come to terms with
>> problems.
>>
>> However, without claiming this is an answer, I do regularly visit
>> communities where surfing is limited to a few hours a day, unless there
>> is a particularly strong wind or a lot of sunshine, because they are off
>> the grid. As such, one of the questions that one could ask, as we walk
>> and chew gum and whatever else you like to do, is where are our projects
>> hosted? What could we do to create (non-General Electric patent-based,
>> non-industrial scale) wind powered, communally owned hosting on recycled
>> hardware for digital commons?
>>
>>
>> > in any case, the pages of the p2p foundation blog are open to any news
>> and
>> > comments about the land issue, non-eurocentric visions of history, and
>> the
>> > material basis of the digital commons,
>>
>> Yes, that is good, and so is this list, and that is why I brought up the
>> point.
>>
>>
>> > the key for me is to go beyond the stage and stance of critique, that
>> others
>> > "just don't get it", towards actually injecting such perspectives in
>> > concrete discourse, and associated with constructive action,
>>
>>
>> I don't know where you get this from, but if it came from anything I
>> said, let me clarify: I never said that anyone "didn't get it" - I said
>> that as a culture - a cultural norm - the material embedding is not
>> recognised and in a variety of ways even obscured through philosophical
>> ideas and concepts of social organisation that - as the subject line
>> still reads, and which is how this exchange came about - "Non digital
>> commons a lot more complicated than Free Software". This is only true
>> insofar as you see Free Software and other digital commons as having no
>> material base. In fact, they are infinitely more complicated, since they
>> are a techno-virtual layer on top of ecosystems - or, as it were,
>> digital commons require a material, technostructural underpinning. In
>> other words, digital commons need to address their hardware and energy
>> use, as part of their organisational processes and they should have
>> support in doing so. This is not about rejecting digital commons that
>> are impure, but rather about a conscious move away from "impurity".
>> Purity we can leave to the religions, but that does not mean we should
>> deny certain problematic "impurities."
>>
>>
>> > I find it hard to imagine that the labour movement would have gotten
>> > anywhere without using print media to the full extent, which is what
>> they
>> > not only did, but was actually there central focus;  creating print
>> vehicle
>> > for agitprop was actually the core activity of the revolutionary
>> movements
>>
>> There are many readings of the labour movements - some of which argue
>> very well that social-democracy and later the welfare system spelled the
>> beginning of the end of the working class movements, particularly with
>> respect to local control over local infrastructure. Indeed, the very
>> notion of a "working class" expresses a defeat of commoners of the land
>> and, as noted by Colin Ward, the welfare system, after the crises of the
>> 1930s and in order to rebuild after the war, in many communities in
>> England shifted power from local communities to central government over
>> schools, libraries and so on. If print had helped the labour movements,
>> the centralised curriculum has long since subverted that advantage.
>>
>> I don't agree with what seems to be your take on history and I think
>> that the writing of the history of the commoners rendered working
>> classes has only just begun - there is a lot to discuss and I am very
>> wary of anyone claiming to see a full picture of those particular
>> histories with specific reference to the transformation of the field of
>> forces within which they operate.
>>
>> This is a very good place to start, by the way:
>>
>> Peter Linebaugh, The London Hanged, London: Allen Lane, 1991, Chapter
>> 11: "Ships and Chips: Technological Repression and the Origin of the
>> Wage."
>>
>> One could also consult the more philosophical:
>>
>> “Social Democracy thought fit to to assign to the working class the role
>> of the redeemer of future generations, in this way cutting the sinews of
>> its greatest strength. This training made the working class forget both
>> its hatred and its spirit of sacrifice, for both are nourished by the
>> image of enslaved ancestors rather than that of liberated grandchildren”
>> (Walter Benjamin 1940/1982: 262).
>>
>> Or the radically political (in the words of a critical liberal):
>>
>> “The representative of the working classes, Sorel observed, becomes an
>> excellent bourgeois very easily. The hideous examples are before our
>> eyes – Millerand, Briand, Viviani, the spellbinding demagogue Jean
>> Jaurès with his easily acquired popularity. Sorel had once hoped for
>> much from these men, but was disillusioned. They all turned out to be
>> squalid earthworms, rhetoricians, grafters and intriguers like the rest”
>> (Isaiah Berlin 1955/1979: 313)
>>
>> In any case, there is certainly substantial disagreements about whether
>> the working class has been successful, or whether it has been swallowed
>> up in a tide of non-principled stances of influence-seekers and
>> moderates, who smiled and said to just follow them.
>>
>> Also, your statement about print technology and labour movements - apart
>> from relying upon a quetionable history reading - is deeply problematic
>> (or somewhat empty rhetoric). Compare with this statement:
>>
>> "When the rains came, the small ponds of the poor people were filled."
>>
>> Yes, that is true, but it also rained in the park of the rich and their
>> ponds were much bigger, so they were, in absolute terms, filled even more.
>>
>> In that sense, you are mobilising the labour movements in a highly
>> questionable manner in defence and justification of your own position.
>>
>> Technology changed *every*thing, the entire context for all parties
>> involved in any struggle, but it likely empowered the already empowered
>> more than the less empowered......
>>
>> In a silly simplification:
>>
>> If the power of the working class was 1.2 power points before print, and
>> if print added 2 times power, then they ended at 2.4 power points. If
>> the power of the rich was 3.1 before print, and if print added 2 times
>> power, then they ended at 6.2 power points.
>>
>> Who gained most? Who gained most from the last twenty years of ICT
>> revolution? Wal-Mart, as they pioneered just-in-time and became the
>> fastest growing corporation in history since Ford (probably now dwarfed
>> by that commons enclosure operation called Facebook?). To realise the
>> potential power and emancipation for the oppressed that ICT might
>> deliver requires careful consideration, not mere promises based on a
>> dubious historical reading.
>>
>> Finally, while I think that technological determinism can be a useful
>> tool to ponder history and development, I would much rather, as a
>> precautionary principle, go with the exact opposite of you....
>>
>> ....Here with reference to the work of James C. Scott, surprisingly an
>> Ivy League professor, but he is also towards retirement age, which is
>> usually when you hear them say something of radical (or even subversive)
>> interest:
>>
>> ""
>> In his most speculative and contested claim, Scott argues that even the
>> lack of a written language in many Zomian societies is an adaptive
>> measure and a conscious societal choice. For peasants, writing was,
>> first and foremost, a tool of state control - it was the instrument the
>> elite used to extract money, labor, and military service from them. As a
>> result, Scott argues, when those peasants escaped into the hills they
>> discarded writing in an attempt to ensure that similar coercive
>> hierarchies didn’t arise in the new societies they formed.
>>
>> “I’ve studied peasant rebellions, and one of first things that early
>> peasant rebellions always do is to attack the records office,” says
>> Scott. “They associate writing with their oppression.”
>>
>> The 20th century, with its arsenal of distance-devouring technologies
>> from the airplane to the Internet, has made it easier for states to
>> smooth the friction of landscape, and recent decades have also seen a
>> determined campaign among Asian states to bring their highland regions
>> into the fold, often by settling them with lowland people more loyal to
>> the national government. As a result, since World War II, Zomia has lost
>> much of its distinctive wildness.
>> "" --- from:
>>
>>
>> http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/12/06/the_mystery_of_zomia/
>>
>> See also "Zomia, A Zone of Resistance: The Last Great Enclosure Movement
>> and Stateless Peoples in Southeast Asia":
>> http://www.forcedmigration.org/events/2008/colsonlecture/
>>
>> From that perspective, your position is somewhat old school marxist,
>> insofar as I know and understand any of all that: we just have to keep
>> on pushing through capitalism and we will get to the promised land in
>> the end. It doesn't resonate with me. I would much rather ask critically
>> while we walk and use lessons from history written not by winners.
>>
>>
>> > I see more and more clearly that certain individuals and social  forces,
>> > instead of focusing their critical gaze on the system of infinite growth
>> > that is destroying the biosphere, are focusing their critical gaze on
>> those
>> > who are actually closer to them; and seeking division instead of
>> > commonality; complaining about the imperfections and relative blindness
>> of
>> > the free culture movement; rather than to see alignment between social
>> > forces that would have the greatest potential uniting.
>>
>>
>> Is this based on something I said? You have managed to turn the
>> whole thing around?!?! The current growth paradigm thrives on "renewable
>> technology" (wind turbines, hybrid cars), and digital commons  - these
>> are central to the growth vision. The expansion of digital commons is
>> destroying the biosphere. The critical gaze that focuses on the
>> materiality of cyberspace and thus the ecological problems of the
>> digital commons is precisely addressing the problem of infinite growth
>> in a non-simplistic manner - trying to negotiate an ambiguous problem:
>> how can we have digital networks without destroying the environment?
>>
>>
>> > To compare say the digital commons of appropedia, and its efforts to
>> create
>> > sustainable and appropriate technology for local communities worldwide,
>> with
>> > the multinational owners of a supermarket chain, is in my eyes, a
>> perverse
>> > equation, and shows that a certain sense of priorities has been lost,
>> ("Digital
>> > commons are parasites on natural resources and territories
>> > of people elsewhere in the world in much the same way as supermarkets
>> are.")
>>
>> It is not very helpful to shift from the general to the particular in
>> the middle of a conceptual discussion. I spoke of digital commons in
>> general - and pointed to a factual general problem - and you respond
>> with a specific example..... perhaps an exemption to prove the rule?
>>
>> For what it is worth: It is not perverse, but a simple fact: the energy
>> use of a supermarket - from electricity use in the store to the fossil
>> fuel fertilisers used in the production of the commodities for sale - is
>> very comparable to the energy and resource use that digital commons
>> entail, if you see it from the perspective of the oppressed, landless or
>> through the eyes of the children disassembling hardware when it is
>> recycled. The supermarket helps some of the poor, some of the time - for
>> instance a single mother or the career, short-of-time feminist on her
>> way to a meeting about resisting the cuts - indeed, supermarkets can
>> help many people, including those who work for it, who would otherwise
>> be unemployed, but it comes with a tremendous cost for others, which is
>> "hidden".
>>
>> The shareholders of Carrefour and Wal-Mart cheer on supermarkets, just
>> as the shareholders of IBM and Google cheer on Open Source, Open Access
>> and other areas of economic growth.
>>
>>
>> > the truth is, every living being and system is (inter)dependent on
>> others
>> > and in that sense, a parasite ... what matters is to create sustainable
>> > flows between the various living systems, and to generate collective
>> > intelligence between autonomous individuals and communities, in order to
>> > achieve that, for which digital commons are not parasites, but essential
>> > enablers,
>>
>> But they are also exploitors - through mining, heavy metal pollution,
>> sweatshop labour and so on - and this is not an ideological point, but
>> a simple fact.
>>
>> However, all that said, I agree, let us break some eggs to make the
>> omelette. I never wanted to argue that the internet should be torn down
>> - what would I be doing here? - but it should be used consciously and in
>> recognition and full admittance of its costs. There is no such thing as
>> marginal reproduction cost, except in Wonderland, perhaps, where
>> perpetual motion machines are possible and where gravity can be defied
>> by will alone.
>>
>> The immateriality argument about the relation between cost and
>> reproduction of digital goods, is really comparable to, say, the
>> relation between light in your house, on the one hand, and electricity
>> and the continued upkeep of the electrical infrastructure (nuclear power
>> plants, cables, wires, pylons, switches and so on) on the other: It
>> doesn't *seem to* cost anything when I flick the switch and the light
>> comes on in "my" house, so why isn't it just free? Would anyone take me
>> serious if I said that?
>>
>>
>> > as hard as it may be to do and understand, we need to chew gum and walk
>> at
>> > the same time, using digital commons to organize, while working at the
>> same
>> > time to lighten the physical footprint of digital commons, and using
>> global
>> > open design communities to build open and 'light' infrastructures to
>> achieve
>> > sustainability,
>>
>> Yes, and I never said anything different - but how do you propose to
>> "lighten the footprint", as collective action, when the collective is in
>> denial about that footprint and when its leaders and consequently the
>> followers perpetuate the denial?
>>
>> With the best of wishes,
>> martin
>>
>
>
>
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>
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