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Re: [ox-en] New economic model for free technology?



Hi Franz, my comments are in between

--- Franz Nahrada <f.nahrada reflex.at> wrote:



Michael B wrote
28. September 2005 um 12:58 +0100:
Sorry, the previous message was sent before I was
finished.



To preserve 'peer production' as such, the basic
income is the only solution I see to create the
independence of the producers, but it will probably
never cover the full needs.

Maybe not even that. Maybe the situation is as such
that the
nature of value and business does not provide  the
degree
of freedom necessary to create basic income.

I'm not sure what you mean by that. A full basic
income  seems unlikely at present, but may be the
result of a major crisis (just as the universal
suffrage and the welfare state had to wait major
wars). According to the people at bien.org however,
there is a real push for back-door implementation in
countries that have already minimum income schemes.
But this of course means very low basic incomes.


But this needs lot of discussions. The situation has
been well 
outlined by Uli Weiss in Berlin: All attempts to
show the
realistic nature of basic income are based on the
material
and use-value wealth of society. But we know from
critical
theory that the problem is not material capacity,
but increasing
*value* scarcity - the "global de-valuation".

Do you have any textual material on this? I agree with
the statement that 

<There is
too much 
of everything which cannot "realize" value any
more.>

but this is precisely why we have peer to peer
realising use value, and why the basic income is
needed. In the western countries, there seems to be no
fundamental funding problem.

<In reality the worlds
monetary system 
is short before breakdown,

Basic income theory does mostly not reflect on
that!!



- for market pricing, I think that a form of
'distributed capitalism', where producers are not
dependent on scarce money managed by monopolies,
such
a  scheme will still be useful
How do you imagine that?

I use distributed capitalism in two senses. One is the
growth of the sector of free agents/minipreneurs, very
strong in the knowledge sector. These people are
creating their own support networks, et... Next to the
open systems they can use, most platforms are enabled
by a new breed of 'netarchical capitalists', who
neither thrive on IP nor control of the vectors of
information (Wark), but on their control of the new
participative platforms. Many of the new technological
meshworks, i.e. viral communicators in general, are
bottom-up, distributed and infrastructureless, i.e.
fixed capital is already distributed. And financially,
new methods such as Zopa may grow and establish
themselves as alternatives to centralised banks.



- finally, the state, as representative of the
authoritarian principle, can play a role by
providing
funding for collaborative projects (say ,fund
solutions for clean cars or whatever).

But the state is only a power by monetary means.
(taxes etc.)  It is an
institution which acts on the political monopoly to
create debts other
people have to use as money.

Yes, I do not foresee a disappearance of this monopoly
of violence and taxation in the near term. And a
crisis of the financial system may lead to the quicker
adoption of complementary currencies.



For peer production to succeed or expand, I think
we
need:


Stefan and I refer often to the "Street performer
protocol" as an
archetypical solution to support free production.
Stefan dislikes it, I
like it. But not as a model for good, simply as a
point of "getting the
thing started".

You mean relying on voluntary donations?


The only other alternative that I know (and the one
I really prefer) is
that we create "mutual cycles of support" where
increasingly free products
fill the void created by lack of money. This seems
largely a problem of
good design and conviction. Free products must soon
include basic human
needs (the "bread") and that is in the long run the
strongest base and
tool that we have:

This is what I call the gift economy as it is based on
reciprocity and exchange.


1) have a material base of raw materials and energy 
   ---  best is
self-reproducing / biomass based production, thats
why I favor rural areas
as birthplace of seed forms of Free Life

This requires an enormous amount of voluntaristic
action and goodwill, resulting in productive processes
which are in all likelyhood less competitive, unlike
peer production.


in the short run itv is important to bring about all
necessary
technologies. It is more important that they exist
than how they come
about. I think we should be more creative on that.
Even basic income would
do, but only as a temporary solution.



Thanks. I think we can all agree on that.

Michel

--- Franz Nahrada <f.nahrada reflex.at> wrote:



Michael B wrote
28. September 2005 um 12:58 +0100:
Sorry, the previous message was sent before I was
finished.

Has there be any discussion on the basic income, as
a
necessary precondition for the development of Peer
production? What has been the discussion?

There is a lot of discussion going on "across the
scenes".
I think this discussion is inevitable now. Its the
main area 
of discussion currently....

To preserve 'peer production' as such, the basic
income is the only solution I see to create the
independence of the producers, but it will probably
never cover the full needs.

Maybe not even that. Maybe the situation is as such
that the
nature of value and business does not provide  the
degree
of freedom necessary to create basic income.

But this needs lot of discussions. The situation has
been well 
outlined by Uli Weiss in Berlin: All attempts to
show the
realistic nature of basic income are based on the
material
and use-value wealth of society. But we know from
critical
theory that the problem is not material capacity,
but increasing
*value* scarcity - the "global de-valuation".

Value is the driving force of business, but business
works
on *marginalizing values *by competition. There is
too much 
of everything which cannot "realize" value any more.

And that bis why basic income models will fail.

Money is a form of value - it is based on succesful
business
and not on simulation of growth. Growth of money is
simulated
and we are aware of that. In reality the worlds
monetary system 
is short before breakdown,

Basic income theory does mostly not reflect on
that!!


Therefore, following Fiske's fourfold
intersubjective
typology, i.e. the modes that have always existed
across time and space, we still need solutions for
the
other 3 spheres:

- for reciprocity-based relations, we need
complementary currencies

or simple agreements. We might try both.


- for market pricing, I think that a form of
'distributed capitalism', where producers are not
dependent on scarce money managed by monopolies,
such
a  scheme will still be useful

How do you imagine that?

- finally, the state, as representative of the
authoritarian principle, can play a role by
providing
funding for collaborative projects (say ,fund
solutions for clean cars or whatever).

But the state is only a power by monetary means.
(taxes etc.)  It is an
institution which acts on the political monopoly to
create debts other
people have to use as money.

For peer production to succeed or expand, I think
we
need:

1) the basic income for pure P2P in the immaterial
sphere

2) to split immaterial design from material
production
through funding by the state or distributed capital

3) for pure material production, the existence of
distributed capital pools seem even more necessary.

Don't misunderstand me, we do need a sphere for
pure
non-reciprocal production to exist, through the
universal basic income (or what are the other
alternatives?), but if we want to expand
cooperative
production generally (not necessarily
non-reciprocal),
the other schemes will be necessary.

Stefan and I refer often to the "Street performer
protocol" as an
archetypical solution to support free production.
Stefan dislikes it, I
like it. But not as a model for good, simply as a
point of "getting the
thing started".

The only other alternative that I know (and the one
I really prefer) is
that we create "mutual cycles of support" where
increasingly free products
fill the void created by lack of money. This seems
largely a problem of
good design and conviction. Free products must soon
include basic human
needs (the "bread") and that is in the long run the
strongest base and
tool that we have:

1) have a material base of raw materials and energy 
   ---  best is
self-reproducing / biomass based production, thats
why I favor rural areas
as birthplace of seed forms of Free Life
2) make the output of each process "feed" another
process, so you are glad
something is using your "waste"  --- that is a
question of systems design
3) integrate processes by agreement, not by market
--- market is not a
good coordinator if you want to achieve goals 1 and
2

in the short run itv is important to bring about all
necessary
technologies. It is more important that they exist
than how they come
about. I think we should be more creative on that.
Even basic income would
do, but only as a temporary solution.

Franz



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