[p2p-research] User Freedom and the Purpose of Profit

[Samuel Rose]

Hey Patrick,

On Wed, Jan 13, 2010 at 11:47 PM, Patrick Anderson <agnucius at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ryan Lanham wrote:
>> I am not against profits.  But I am against profits for the sake of
>> profits.  We simply don't understand the world yet where they don't exist in
>> a dominant way.   It is coming fairly quickly, however.
>
> I hope this is true, but if so, then why would anyone invest?
>
> My answer to that is: Let's get the end-user (or consumer) to invest
> for "at cost" product (think of it as a pre-payment plan) since he
> would then receive those outputs without paying profit while also
> gaining the control he has for so long been without.
>
> On a related note: What would you say is the 'origin' of profit?  Why
> does the consumer consent to paying a price above cost, and what is
> the 'correct' treatment of that value in the better system?
>
> My answer is to treat that overpayment as though the consumer were
> making a tiny investment - so he slowly gains ownership in the Means
> of Production for the purpose of solidifying his ability to receive
> product "at cost" while also helping him gain the control he needs to
> finally be able to claim "User Freedom" in the physical realm.
>
> Treating profit as a payer's investment allows growth to occur, but
> causes the ownership in that growth is 'distributed' to those who are
> willing to pay for it.
>
>
> Thanks,
> Patrick Anderson
> Social Sufficiency Coalition
> http://SourceFreedom.BlogSpot.com
> http://patware.FreeShell.org
>
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>



Patrick, let's talk a bit more about this in the context of the
problem of "access" to materials in open manufactruing projects.

Example: if you look at projects like http://makerbeam.com/ which used
"kickstarter" to raise funds so that they would make and release
technology, this is one step away from "pre-purchase".

One problem in the real world is that of trust. How do project
participants know they are not pre-purchasing "vaporware"? This factor
could sometimes sink some efforts that cannot convince people to
pre-purchase.

In the case of what I am talking about, if all of these people pool
and pre-purchase materials, while sharing the IP, there is really
nothing for them to "own" (there is no company or entity which they
are buying into).

I suppose that in your model, the material suppliers would have to
agree to sell partial ownership in their companies with every purchase
by open manufacturing project participants, etc. But since those
supplier companies likely won't do it, and there may be no other
useful supplier, I don't see how to fully exercise your model in the
real world in the context of open manufacturing. Maybe you can help me
understand?



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Sam Rose
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