Dear Nicolas, thanks for the comment and link, I think you are right in your global assessment, but perhaps a tad to pessimistic, while it is true that peer production yields few non-capitalist entities, but see http://p2pfoundation.net/Free_Software_Cooperatives for some who do in the software field: I think we can approach the issue from the other side, i.e. there is already a thriving alternative and cooperative economy out there, who could come to open and shared innovation commons from their already existing sustainability practices .. once the linkage between the two is obviously successful, it will be more easy for those on the other side to 'imagine' the realism of undertaking the same journey, there is also much more that can be done to augment the autonomy of the commons even within a ecology of shareholder-based enterpreneurs ... (just as the workers had to insure their own autonomy within the factory environment) Michel Michel On Mon, Oct 10, 2011 at 3:55 AM, Nicholas Roberts < [email protected]> wrote:

hi michel

this is my commentary below, and I've done a little collation

http://permaculture.tv/u-s-occupy-movement-grows-as-protests-reported-in-847...

there is a place for spontaneous, self-organizing, bottom-up organizing, and these occupations are a space for democracy, something that most people really never experience (voting is very different to consensus or participation-based democracy)

the Adam Curtis documentaries, and much of the critique here in the US, has been of the "what is the single demand", or "they are so disorganized" which is confusing the public relations media campaign with the democratic assembly.. actually, my own experience of these types of events has its been extremely efficient, far more efficient than government or large corporate technocracies ... however, I do agree with Curtis, after the mobilization, the assembly, there needs to be a kind of organization that sustains and continues once the passions have dissipated and its back to the hard slog of routine day-to-day work, activism etc

as to the self-sustaining peer-to-peer production, I agree with Michel, its nearly always being subsidized by state-capitalism, and is almost never internally self-supporting. There is a proposal in the Drupal community for a Drupal worker cooperative, also we discussed it really briefly with Prof Fred Freundlich at Mondragon University, i.e. New Economy worker coops, i.e. why are open source projects only ever corporation sponsored communities ?

-- Nicholas Roberts US 510-684-8264 http://Permaculture.TV http://permaculture.coop

* <in fact all peer production projects *are* self-sustaining. That

...

is part of their positive feedback cycle. Probably you are talking of something else.>

Peer production projects can be collectively sustainable by relying on a continuous stream on voluntary contributions, but they do presently not sustain their members, who are usually paid by for-profit companies or as freelancers on a marketplace ... i.e. the commons is not independently sustainable for its members; this is why I propose that commoners/peer producers create their own structures for a more autonomous cycle of reproduction.

hi nicolas, perhaps you could embed this with some commentary of yours?

you will like it: http://www.vimeo.com/30078496

From: Nicholas Roberts <[email protected]>

there is plenty of nihilist Leftist critique out there also

especially from the dinosaur vertical Marxists who have a big problem with the anarchic inspired bottom up processes common to these anti-capialist/alter-globalization movements

in Europe there is a lot more big tent solidarity then on display in the US...

too many old Marxists, who should just shut up and send food parcels, instead whinge about discipline and have created a mini industry critiquing the publications of the movements

the old, crusty, seedy Marxists, always say, "There is No Left in the USA". Now its obviously not true, they say "There is no Real, Rigorous, Dialectically Sophisticated, Disciplined Left in the USA"

Occupying Occupy Together [image: Reply]Reply [image: More] Nicholas Roberts via< http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&ctx=mail&answer=1311182

...

gmail.com to lbo-talk show details 12:29 PM (25 minutes ago) can I just make a general swing at the keyboard intellectuals.

get of your arses and get down the places where people are gathering and get involved in the process

its real easy to sit at home and read the amatuer, naive, often foolish media that comes out of these media events and spectacles

even easier to type-up scathing nihilist critiques about the failure of the Left, the faults of the young, the weakness of the institutions etc etc etc etc etc

there is plenty of material, and its been done, too much

now is a time, to actually do something, and its time to be an organic intellectual and participate in the messy, smelly, noisy, uncomfortable realities of these kinds of democratic actions

soon enough it will dissipate, and you can go back to eating the shit sandwhich of Amercian life

but today, and for the next few days, there is something happening worth participating in

take your intellect, your knowledge, your experience and GO HELP

...

Today's Topics:

1. Re: Fw: Cheap "Jibe" at Protestors.... (robert searle)

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