June 2015 - P2P-Foundation - lists.ourproject.org

Fwd: [NetworkedLabour] study circle #6, "Appropriating Technology for Societal Change"
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Örsan Şenalp <orsan1234(a)hotmail.com> Date: Fri, Jun 12, 2015 at 2:16 AM Subject: [NetworkedLabour] study circle #6, "Appropriating Technology for Societal Change" To: "<networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org>" < networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org>, Post WSFDiscuss < WorldSocialForum-Discuss(a)openspaceforum.net> Via Johan Soderberg: The study circle #6, "Appropriating Technology for Societal Change" with the subtheme "Surveillance, Cryptography and Alternative Internets", is held under the auspice of Nordic Summer University (NSU), a nomadic university that can most quickly be described as a hybrid between a summer camp, a travelers commune, and an academic conference. The aim is to bring together scholars and students from different disciplinary backgrounds, activists and practitioners for extended discussions under relaxed forms. NSU takes place in Druskinikai, Lithuania, 18^th-25^th July. Deadline for payment and registration: Wednesday 10^th June. Accommodation all inclusive for a week costs 280 euro. (scholarships/grants available under certain conditions, price: 100/150 euro) NSU is not a summer school for PhDs, but attending PhDs are entitled 2/5 ECTS for attending/presenting a paper). Please contact one of the coordinators for circle #6 at the same time as you register and pay: johan.soderberg {AT} sts.gu.se or gustav.eek {AT} fripost.org For information about the NSU summer session: http://w2015.nsuweb.org/ Information about the study circle "Appropriating Technology": http://www.nsuweb.net/wb/studiekretsar/?q=dz15JmFtcDtlPWYmYW1wO2FjdG lvbj1mdWxsbmV3cyZhbXA7a3JldHM9S3JldHMrNisyMDE1LTIwMTcmYW1wO2lkPTU4MCZhb XA7Y2F0aWQ9NzAmYW1wO2U9ZiZhbXA7Y2F0bmFtZT1Tb21tYXJzZXNzaW9uJTNBK0NhbGwr Rm9yK1BhcGVycyZhbXA7dGl0bGU9QXBwcm9wcmlhdGluZyBzY2llbmNlIGFuZCB0ZWNobm9 sb2d5IGZvciBzb2NpZXRhbCBjaGFuZ2U. Information on grants for students and low-income participants. http://w2015.nsuweb.org/?page_id=310 To register, visit this page http://nsuweb.org/w2014/registration For payments, visit this page http://nsuweb.org/w2014/shop/page/2 Please pass this on if you know anyone that might be interested and not on this list. Johan _______________________________________________ NetworkedLabour mailing list NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: MoCC: Data Derby Day - Sat 13 June
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Furtherfield <info(a)furtherfield.org> Date: Fri, Jun 12, 2015 at 4:02 PM Subject: MoCC: Data Derby Day - Sat 13 June To: michelsub2004(a)gmail.com View e-mail in browser <http://crm.furtherfield.org/civicrm/mailing/view?reset=1&id=59> <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=317&…> <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=326&…> You are invited to the Museum of Contemporary Commodities - Data Derby Day Who is tracking who in Finsbury Park? ------------------------------ Saturday 13 June 2015, 10.30am - 4.30pm ------------------------------ *Walkshop, Making Session and Drop-In Day Open to everyone. Suggested donation £3 half day/ £5 full day. Or drop-in any time for tea, cake and conversation about the project.* *11am-1pm - Data Walkshop with data activist Dr Alison Powell <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=319&…> (LSE) * Explore and discuss the data surveillance processes at play in Finsbury Park through a process of rapid group ethnography. Arrive at 10.30am at Furtherfield Commons for a short introduction to the project. We will leave at 11am for a 60 minute walk around the area followed by snacks and discussion. Please bring: - appropriate dress for the weather. - a camera or smart phone for documentation. BOOK HERE <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=327&…> (places limited to 12 on a first come first served basis) *2pm-4.30pm - LEGO Re-Creations & Making Session* Work with Cultural Geographer Dr Ian Cook to turn your commodity stories into activist LEGO re-creations. Inspired by Nathaniel Stern's hacked scanner, artist Carlos Armendariz will help you translate your data findings into visual events. Produce arresting images for an interactive poster for public display, then track and count its impact. (Feel free to bring your own laptops or smartphones along) BOOK HERE <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=328&…> (drop-in event) ------------------------------ More information ------------------------------ DOWNLOAD PRESS RELEASE <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=334&…> *Data Derby Day* is part of the research and development for Museum of Contemporary Commodities <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=330&…>, an art and social project led by artist Paula Crutchlow (Blind Ditch) and cultural geographer Ian Cook (Univeristy of Exeter) ------------------------------ Location ------------------------------ Furtherfield Commons Finsbury Gate - Finsbury Park +44 (0)20 8802 1301 MAP <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=323&…> ------------------------------ Transport ------------------------------ Tube: Manor House, Finsbury Park Buses: 141, 341, 153, 253, 254, 259, 29, 4, N253, N279, N29 Train: Finsbury Park, Harringay, Harringay Green Lanes stations ------------------------------ About Furtherfield ------------------------------ Furtherfield <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=324&…> is the UK's leading organisation for arts, technology and social change. Since 1997 Furtherfield has created online and physical spaces and places for people to come together to develop and create critical experimental art and digital technologies on their own terms. Furtherfield Gallery and Commons are based in the heart of London's Finsbury Park. This serves as a hub to connect and activate local and international communities of artists, technologists, thinkers and doers. ------------------------------ *Furtherfield is supported by Haringey Council and Arts Council England through the National Portfolio funding programme.* ------------------------------ <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=325&…> Furtherfield <http://crm.furtherfield.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=324&…> - A living, breathing, thriving network for art, technology and social change since 1997 Click here <http://crm.furtherfield.org/civicrm/mailing/optout?reset=1&jid=318&qid=4121…> if you no longer wish to receive this newsletter. McKenzie Pavilion Finsbury Park London, N4 2NQ -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: [commoning] EU Research Project on Digital DIY Commons
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: M. Fioretti <mfioretti(a)nexaima.net> Date: Sat, Jun 13, 2015 at 12:09 AM Subject: [commoning] EU Research Project on Digital DIY Commons To: commoning(a)lists.commons-institut.org Greetings, I am a member of an EU H2020 Research Project on "Digital DIY" (DiDIY, www.didiy.eu) We are studying how this phenomenon (which heavily relies on collaborative production and maintenance of knowledge, software and hardware) will impact every area of society, from work to ethics, resilience, arts and environmental sustainability. The project outcomes will include guidelines to support both education and policy making on Digital DIY. We think that sharing mindsets and activities, as well as the creation of Commons of designs, documentation and design practices, are an important component of DIY. For the same reason, we also assume, and want to study thoroughly, if and how (digital) DIY is relevant for all communities interested in sharing of all sorts, from collaborative writing to distributed manufacturing, sustainable urban development and social organization: the DiDIY project can help to spread awareness and support for these practices, from all levels of society. To know more, you may read our "About" [1] and "Objectives" pages [3], or our Project blog [2]. I am writing because, among other things, we are very interested in knowing what all supporters of the Commons, in Europe and elsewhere, are already doing, in their LOCAL communities, thanks to Digital DIY of any kind, or to teach and promote it. The primary way to let us know is by entering such activities in our "Didiy Resources form" [4], but of course we also welcome direct contact at didiy(a)didiy.eu, and are at your disposal for any question about the Project. Thank you in advance for your time, and for passing around this invitation as much as you see fit! Best Regards, Marco Fioretti [1] http://www.didiy.eu/project/about-digital-diy [2] http://www.didiy.eu/project/objectives [3] http://www.didiy.eu/blog [4] http://www.didiy.eu/node/add/didiy-case -- http://mfioretti.com _______________________________________________ Commoning mailing list Commons-Institut e.V. Germany Commoning(a)lists.commons-institut.org https://lists.schokokeks.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/commoning -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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biolabor, via orsan
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

*Tissue Donors and Research Subjects in the Global Bioeconomy <http://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/sow/38113-clinical-labor.html>* *Catherine** Waldby & Melinda Cooper* "At last! A paradigm-shifting theorizing of biolabor—largely invisibled, underpaid or donated work that produces invaluable human materials for highly lucrative pharmaceutical and assisted reproductive technology industries. Cooper and Waldby brilliantly analyze such labor as continuous with low-waged distributed piece work characteristic of 21st century post-Fordist bioeconomies, including venture labor (high risk/no pay). These highly gendered and racialized divisions of labor are eerily bioethics approved as they outsource risk to individual worker 'entrepreneurs' and put 'life itself' to work for biocapital. Brava!!"—Adele E. Clarke, coeditor of *Biomedicalization: Technoscience, Health, and Illness in the U.S.* Forms of embodied labor, such as surrogacy and participation in clinical trials, are central to biomedical innovation, but they are rarely considered as labor. Melinda Cooper and Catherine Waldby take on that project, analyzing what they call clinical labor, and asking what such an analysis might indicate about the organization of the bioeconomy and the broader organization of labor and value today. At the same time, they reflect on the challenges that clinical labor might pose to some of the founding assumptions of classical, Marxist, and post-Fordist theories of labor. Cooper and Waldby examine the rapidly expanding transnational labor markets surrounding assisted reproduction and experimental drug trials. As they discuss, the pharmaceutical industry demands ever greater numbers of trial subjects to meet its innovation imperatives. The assisted reproductive market grows as more and more households look to third-party providers for fertility services and sectors of the biomedical industry seek reproductive tissues rich in stem cells. Cooper and Waldby trace the historical conditions, political economy, and contemporary trajectory of clinical labor. Ultimately, they reveal clinical labor to be emblematic of labor in twenty-first-century neoliberal economies. Duke University Press -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: [NetworkedLabour] A major contribution to the dialectical-systemic analysis of transnational revolutions
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Orsan <orsan1234(a)gmail.com> Date: Tue, Jun 16, 2015 at 3:36 AM Subject: [NetworkedLabour] A major contribution to the dialectical-systemic analysis of transnational revolutions To: "<networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org>" < networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org> Another must read from Kees van der Pijl:A theory of transnational revolution: universal history according to Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and its implications ... Rosenstock's perspective can perhaps be best classified as neo- Hegelian, and there are elements of teleology and a neglect of social structure and productive forces which readers should be aware of. His aim, as stated at the beginning of the book, is to transcend 'the purely theoretical dialectic of the Marxists by a true dialectic of peoples and parts of the world' (Rosenstock-Huessy, 1961:xii, quoted hereafter as RH). Marxism, according to Rosenstock, tends to reflect the capitalist order in that it ignores the organic side of society, and like capital itself, annihilates social time by imposing an inexorable logic of equations (RH 484-5). Certainly the dialectic of the productive forces and the relations of production which Marxists self-confidently applied to explain the progression from 1789 to 1917 and beyond, in the 1970s as in the 1930s failed to take into account the clash between capitalist 'efficiency' and the rhythms of organic social life (day and night, the seasons, childbirth and parenthood, youth and old age) which Rosenstock considers the fundamental contradiction and limit of a capitalist order (rather than actual exploitation (RH 405, 474; cf. Polanyi, 1957)). The effects, material and ideological, on societies radically exposed to this clash accordingly have been underrated; but so was the degree to which Soviet-type socialism represented an effort to catch up with the capitalist west rather than establish a society beyond it. Since the poten- tial for a resumption of capital's revolutionary dynamic was not recognized either (as testified by terms such as 'state monopoly capi- talism' and 'late capitalism' (cf. Funke, 1978)), the march of history was too easily taken for granted. What Rosenstock in his turn fails to acknowledge is that capital, too, projects a spiritual totality, to which its 'subjects' orient their particular expectations and actions. He therefore cannot account for the power of capital to drive forward global unification through processes of class formation on a world scale; instead, a bipolar state structure is consid- ered the end state of world revolution. But, as we will argue below, the teleology and finality of Rosenstock's theory can be transcended precisely by reintroducing this dimension of capitalist globalization. This article is built up as follows. First, we will present a short summary of Rosenstock's theory of transnationally connected revolu- tions. Next, we will argue that Rosenstock's theory is an elaboration of Hegel's philosophy of history but, unlike other 'universal histories' of an intended or unintentional idealiststripe (i.e. projecting back into history what appears self-evident today), the teleological and rational- izing aspects with Rosenstock are more in the nature of unacknowledged residues, since his professed aim is to analyse the cumulative effects of unique historical combinations; the concrete real in other words includes the rational rather than the other way around. In the final part, we will argue that if we assign capital its proper place as a transnational force, we need to divide Rosenstock's national/universal revolutions into those which paved the way for the rise of commerce and capital and to some extent coincided with it, and those which faced an already existing universalism of capital centring on the English-speaking coun- tries. If amended in this way, Rosenstock's theory remains important as an explanation of national/transnational revolutions in an apparently unified, 'closed' capitalist world. ... https://www.academia.edu/12976734/A_theory_of_transnational_revolution_univ… _______________________________________________ NetworkedLabour mailing list NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: [members] Podcast up
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Chris P2Pvalue <chris(a)p2pvalue.eu> Date: Tue, Jun 16, 2015 at 2:33 PM Subject: [members] Podcast up To: P2PValue Project Members List <members(a)lists.p2pvalue.eu> Hi all, after some great work by the mighty David Rozas, the podcast page is fully functioning. A podcast is up - Marco recorded during the hangouts at the Havens Center at the University of Wisconsin, discussing the research carried out by IGOP in the first phase of the project You can listen to it on the P2PF site at https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/p2pvalue-podcast-001-marco-berlinguer-how-to… or on P2Pv at http://p2pvalue.eu/podcast/podcast-001-marco-berlinguer-how-asses-value-cbpp Cheers, Chris -- *Chris Pinchen * P2Pvalue <http://p2pvalue.eu/> -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: [Aide-audit-grece] The PACD will be informing about the debt audit process in Greece.
by Michel Bauwens 16 Jun '15

16 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Jérémie Cravatte <jeremie(a)cadtm.org> Date: Tue, Jun 16, 2015 at 2:45 PM Subject: Fwd: [Aide-audit-grece] The PACD will be informing about the debt audit process in Greece. To: "solidaritegrece-belgium(a)googlegroups.com" < solidaritegrece-belgium(a)googlegroups.com> Pour info, une vidéo inspirante de l'audit citoyen espagnol: https://youtu.be/GPOUGIYzoj8 -------- Message transféré -------- Sujet : [Aide-audit-grece] The PACD will be informing about the debt audit process in Greece. Date : Mon, 15 Jun 2015 15:52:13 +0200 De : Emma AT <emma.av.th(a)gmail.com> <emma.av.th(a)gmail.com> Pour : aide-audit-grece(a)cadtm.domainepublic.net Dear all, *The PACD will be informing about the debt audit process in Greece.* The Spanish Citizen Debt Audit Platform (PACD) stands with the Greek people and supports the debt audit process in Greece, developed by the “Truth Committee about the Greek Public Debt”. A message from the Spanish squares to the Greek people: https://youtu.be/GPOUGIYzoj8 To inform Spanish and European citizens and bring them close to the reality the Hellenic country is going through; the PACD has *launched a blog (AuditamosGrecia.org) <http://www.auditamosgrecia.org/en/auditing-greece/>* which will provide - both in Spanish and English - updated information on the work of the "Truth Committee about the Greek Public Debt", interviews with relevant personalities in the audit process, messages to the Greek people and even a book-game to discover how it feels to live in Greece. Similarities and differences between the case of Greece and Spain will also be assessed. In early July, two events will be held in Madrid and Barcelona with participants from the Greek audit process. *The blog AuditamosGrecia.org <http://www.auditamosgrecia.org/en/> will be publishing in Spanish and English the Executive Summary of the Official Greek Debt Audit Report, to be presented in the Greek Parliament on June 18th.* Follow @ICANetwork_ <https://twitter.com/ICANetwork_> & @AuditCiudadana <https://twitter.com/auditciudadana> Warm regards, Emma. *PS. Sorry for cross posting* -- Vous recevez ce message, car vous êtes abonné au groupe Google Groupes "Platforme Solidarite Grece-Belgique". Pour vous désabonner de ce groupe et ne plus recevoir d'e-mails le concernant, envoyez un e-mail à l'adresse solidaritegrece-belgium+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. Pour envoyer un message à ce groupe, envoyez un e-mail à l'adresse solidaritegrece-belgium(a)googlegroups.com. Cette discussion peut être lue sur le Web à l'adresse https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/solidaritegrece-belgium/557FD425.3060203%… <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/solidaritegrece-belgium/557FD425.3060203%…> . Pour obtenir davantage d'options, consultez la page https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: Save the Date: Ankündigung zum 4. FoLD-Jahrestreffen
by Michel Bauwens 15 Jun '15

15 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Volker Grassmuck <volker.grassmuck(a)inkubator.leuphana.de> Date: 2015-06-08 23:04 GMT+07:00 Subject: Fwd: Save the Date: Ankündigung zum 4. FoLD-Jahrestreffen er weitergeleiteten Nachricht: > > Von: Nils Altland <nils.altland(a)liqd.de> > Betreff: Save the Date: Ankündigung zum 4. FoLD-Jahrestreffen > Datum: 8. Juni 2015 16:24:46 MESZ > An: nils.altland(a)liqd.de > Kopie: Rouven Brües <rouven.brues(a)liqd.de> > > > Liebe Mitglieder des Forschungsnetzwerks Liquid Democracy, > > wir freuen uns sehr, Ihnen den Termin zum diesjährigen 4. FoLD-Treffen anzukündigen. Das Treffen wird am 9. und 10. Oktober 2015 in Berlin stattfinden. > > Unsere Planung sieht vor, die Anmeldung am Freitag, den 9.10. ab 9 Uhr zu öffnen, um noch am Vormittag mit dem inhaltlichen Teil zu beginnen. Am Samstag wird das Treffen voraussichtlich am frühen Abend enden. > > Das Programm ist derzeit noch offen. Wir freuen uns auf Ihre Vorschläge zu Programmbeiträgen. Bitte teilen Sie uns diese bis zum 5. Juli mit. Sie erleichtern uns zudem die Planung, wenn Sie uns bald mitteilen, ob Sie am Treffen teilnehmen können. Vielen Dank. > > Wir freuen uns auf Ihre Teilnahme und einen spannenden Austausch! Für weitere Rückfragen stehen wir Ihnen selbstverständlich zur Verfügung. > > Herzliche Grüße, > > Nils Altland & Rouven Brües > > Projektmanagement > > __________________ > nils.altland(a)liqd.de > rouven.brues(a)liqd.de > > +49 (0) 30 6298 4840 > > Liquid Democracy e.V. > Isarstr. 11 > 12053 Berlin -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: Recent BALTA commentary and new IMF report
by Michel Bauwens 15 Jun '15

15 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Stuart Wulff <stuartwulff(a)shaw.ca> Date: Mon, Jun 15, 2015 at 11:48 PM Subject: Recent BALTA commentary and new IMF report To: Angela Espinosa Salazar <A.Espinosa(a)hull.ac.uk>, Angela Espinosa Salazar <angela.espinosa.salazar(a)gmail.com>, Brent Mansfield < brentmansfield(a)gmail.com>, Byron Miller Hello everyone, Thanks for your many email comments related to the SSHRC decision on our funding application. We do appreciate the support. Once we receive SSHRC’s explanation for its decision, i.e. the adjudication committee evaluation, we will circulate that to you and will also as co-leads be considering our options. The IMF has issued a new report today which analyzes the development and economic growth implications of income inequality and increasing the income of the lowest 20% of income recipients versus increasing the income of the highest 20%. Contrary to the neo-liberal economic policy being followed by most governments these days, they find that increasing the income of the lowest 20% has the most positive effect on economic growth. Further, they suggest that increases in income inequality and stagnant to dropping income for the middle and lower income classes may actually contribute to economic crises such as that experienced in 2008. They specifically suggest that ‘trickle down’ economics doesn’t work. Their policy prescriptions include “raising the income share of the poor, and ensuring there is no hollowing out of the middle class. To tackle inequality, financial inclusion is imperative in emerging and developing countries while in advanced economies, policies should focus on raising human capital and skills and making tax systems more progressive.” Echoes of Thomas Piketty. One wonders how the IMF report squares with what is being demanded of Greece by its creditors…. Though in some fairness to the IMF, it is the one member of the troika that has agreed the Greek debt load is unmanageable and that debt relief must be a part of any solution. However, even discussion of debt relief has been adamantly stymied by the European parties in the troika. The report is available free (pdf) at: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=42986.0 Stuart

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Fwd: [NetworkedLabour] Digital-media workers of the world, unite!
by Michel Bauwens 15 Jun '15

15 Jun '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Steve Zeltzer <lvpsf(a)igc.org> Date: Mon, Jun 15, 2015 at 7:27 PM Subject: [NetworkedLabour] Digital-media workers of the world, unite! To: "<networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org>" < networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org> The organization of workers globally through the internet has greater potential obviously than at any time in history. Workers are linked up through multi-nationals and face global struggles for their lives that can only be resolved throughout organizing as a class internationally. The idea by the the tech billionaires that they could disrupt the economic structure including social conditions of the working class to multiply their profits and exploitation obviously has a backlash and that is the organization of these workers internationally. We will be discussing these issues at the upcoming LaborTech conference in Stanford on the 26th of July and we will also be streaming it. In Solidarity, Steve Zeltzer LaborTech KPFA WorkWeek Radio Labor Video Project www.laborvideo.org Digital-media workers of the world, unite! http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/6/digital-media-workers-of-the-w… OPINIONJOHN VASKO / FLICKR Digital-media workers of the world, unite! E-lancing your way through micro-careers is no way to live June 14, 2015 2:00AM ET by Chris Lehmann @lehmannchris The sanctums of online journalism, which have disrupted everything from the business models of the publishing world to the basic definition of original editorial content, are now facing an unwelcome new disruption of their own. Earlier this month, the employees of Gawker Media, one of the earliest and most successful Web-publishing networks, voted to unionize, and create one of the first digital locals for the Writers Guild of America. Seeking to capitalize on this high-profile victory, a group of union activists and labor reporters announced a national organizing push for digital media workers, to be launched at a conference in Louisville, Kentucky, in October. Longtime observers of yon digital-media revolution know that things weren’t supposed to play out this way. The online media gold rush, like every other form of digital commerce, was supposed to gleefully overturn the old workplace hierarchies of the fast-expiring industrial age. Where fusty, backward notions like group healthcare benefits, retirement plans, and workplace solidarity once reigned, flattened hierarchies, IPO stock options, and casualized free-agent work regimes were now going to take irresistible, spontaneous hold. Let a thousand entrepreneurs — and millions upon millions of sassy listicles and uproarious cat videos — bloom! So what exactly went wrong? Like most collateral victims of misdirected ambition dating back to ancient Greece, the barons of are falling to their own staggering hubris. Consider the curious, amply instructive case of Medium.com. The online blogging platform began its publishing life at the behest of Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, who was determined to preserve the perennially beleaguered “long form” model of Web-based journalism. Medium would not pander to the listicle-addled business models of BuzzFeed or mimic the voyeuristic piffle slapped on the front page of the Huffington Post. In short order, though, Medium’s investors found that journalistic ambition produced disappointing market returns. So the cherished longform ideal was quietly mothballed, and the site began in short order pandering to each and every played-out market-libertarian cliché in the well-worn Silicon Valley playbook. The site has become shorter, snappier—and robustly sycophantic in its portrayals of the prerogatives, whims and general largesse of corporate America. A near-perfect specimen of the genre appeared this month on Backchannel, the Medium subsite founded by former Wired writer Steven Levy — a practiced courtier of Silicon Valley’s callow-yet-swaggering info elite, and author of the ain’t-Google-grand corporate hagiography “In the Plex.” In his liberationist manifesto, “The Full-Time Job Is Dead,” Kevin Maney, a Levy epigone and budding Web prophet, is here to tell you just how very excellent your future as a free-agent impresario of serial — or better yet, simultaneous! — “micro-careers” is going to be. “Technology is now changing the nature of work,” Maney enthuses — and then we’re docented through a Tomorrowland-style survey of the relevant trends. A new era is upon us, he writes, in which most of us will work in multiple ‘micro-careers’ at the same time, leaving the traditional full-time job behind. ‘Work’ is likely to turn into a marketplace in the cloud rather than a desk and a chair at a traditional corporation. A free agent workforce will be able to make a good living layering a number of professional relationships, entrepreneurial passions and other money-making pursuits on top of each other. The great disruption is already under way in the American labor market, Maney contends, in sectors “mostly focused on simple, hands-on work.” Ride-sharing apps Lyft and Sidecar have transformed mere car owners into enviably layered proprietors of their own cabs. AirBnB allows you to turn your domestic domicile into a robust revenue stream. The cloying hipster-crafts portal Etsy “is a market for the handmade skirts you sew while watching ‘Game of Thrones,’” Maney writes in a revealing aside that displays zero knowledge of actual textile work or cable binge-viewing. No one said disruption would be painless now, did they? This same willful obtuseness colors Maney’s account of how this spontaneous self-reinvention of our work routines has crept up the socioeconomic ladder, so that our credentialed professional class will undergo its own free-agent makeover. Health benefits? Retirement plans? Job security and seniority? Those are all the drab, uncreative emollients reserved for the square. Be daring and layered, Daddy-O! Instead of having a boring regular job with a boring regular pay check, you can continually apply for gig after gig, as the managers setting your wage rates all compete with each other to see how little they can get away with paying you! Hey, no one said disruption would be painless now, did they? And you don’t want to be one of those time-serving sheeple whose dreary way is already earmarked for the dustbin of history, now, do you? After all, Maney writes with ill-concealed self-congratulatory glee, the upcoming generation of workers have already briskly adapted to the terminal precarity of the working life as just the natural (read: “pure market”) order of things: While this kind of dynamic, entrepreneurial life may horrify an older generation, we already know that younger workers tend to prefer their work to be more ephemeral. … A recent Future Workplace survey found that 91 percent of millennials expect to stay in a job for less than three years, and that flexible hours and location-independent policies are more desirable than salary. In other words, HR directors the world over have a brave new axiom to bring to the challenges of post-industrial labor relations: Pay your workers less, and fire them more often! Of course, it’s not exactly true that workers who expect to have a job for less than three years, and privilege more footloose outlets for their labor, are professing an active and freely chosen preference for such things. And it’s even less manifestly the case that they’re carrying out an entirely healthy and overdue generational smashing of the outworn labor idols of an “older generation.” It’s far more likely, in fact, that millennials are adopting such postures out of weary fatalism than “dynamic” and “entrepreneurial” elan. Federal Reserve estimates in 2012 found that 44 percent of recent American college graduates were working fewer hours than they wanted — or needed, in order to make ends meet. Another high-profile study of recent college grads reported that, two years after matriculating, fully 74 percent required ongoing financial assistance from their parents, while just 47 percent of those who were working full-time had landed positions paying $30,000 or more annually. (This, mind you, at time when the average student loan burden for successful college graduates stands at $29,400.) In other words, what strikes breathless New Economy sloganeers like Maney as a tidal upsurge in militant entrepreneurial self-reinvention actually resembles, on closer inspection, something much more like the bleak conditions of tenant farming — right down to the ominous state of debt peonage engineered by the student-loan-provider/company store. It’s no surprise, then, to learn that Maney’s assault on full-time work is yet more whorish sponsored content — a disclaimer at the end of his outburst announces that it was “launched in partnership with Upwork, the world’s largest freelance talent marketplace.” But lest that tagline prove too subtle, Maney also thoughtfully supplied this, um, authentic testimonial to his microcareer employer of the moment in his own sponsored copy: “Upwork … is a pure market for free agent work, letting any entity find and hire professionals for almost any type of knowledge-based work.” Thus is the great liberated circle closed: From betokening a welcome and unprecedented revolution in the powers of the self-propelled worker, Kevin Maney and Medium are only plying a sad new-media variation on the world’s oldest profession. So, all together now, digital journalists: Which side are you on? Chris Lehmann is an editor for BookForum and The Baffler and a columnist for In These Times. He was the deputy editor of The Washington Post Book World from 2000 to 2004. _______________________________________________ NetworkedLabour mailing list NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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