Open Source Ecology: Difference between revisions

From P2P Foundation
Jump to navigation Jump to search
No edit summary
Line 33: Line 33:
==Discussion==
==Discussion==


taken from http://openfarmtech.org/weblog:
 
===Strategy===
 
 
Marcin:
 
"Here is the strategy in a nutshell: Full product release of tractor, power unit, and soil pulverizer – to add to the CEB press – by year-end 2011. Build the living and working infrastructure by year-end 2011 – showcasing and shaking down our machines. Produce professional quality documentation for these four machines by the same time. This in itself is a huge goal – paving our way for rapid parallel development starting January 1, 2012 – as we will have built up our infrastructure and team – and more importantly – track record of delivering solid and replicable results. With all the distractions coming at us, we commit to not getting waylaid from producing solid results.
 
It is one thing to build the prototypes – but a much more difficult task to shake down and document the prototypes to the level required for viral replicability. We want to sow the seeds of viral replicability by this year’s end – by brute force simplicity of design, clarity of instructionals, and robustness of the equipment. We have demonstrated the economic feasibility and performance of our machines. The next milestone is replicability.
 
Then, 2012 is rapid parallel development. If our 6 month plan is infrastructure building/4 product releases/documentation – how does work on the 2012 plan fit? The 6 month plan is the foundation for the parallel development of 2012. A solid core infrastructure for project management is the core of the next 6 months. This is our commitment with the resources that we currently have – and new resources can change this at any time.
 
The greater global effort beyond FeF could help tremendously by identifying a large team of qualified, remote developers. Success on the overall 50 machines requires that we recruit a team of bidders/designers/prototypers for each machine – as each machine goes through a multi-step development process from concept to field testing and iteration. This enables us to access large sources of funding. Without a deployment team, we cannot take in money. Thus, if we have a solid team of bidders/designers/prototypers – and their capacities are clear – then we are in a position to move rapidly.
 
In principle, it would be good to have 10 bids per project – or close to 500 bids. Recruiting this talent and bid proposals is a full time job for many people, so if you are eager to jump into the project remotely, this is the most valuable task that you could take on. With the team in place, resources can be tapped, and risk can be minimized if we have a number of bids to choose from. From my experience, the key is having options, so our chance of success on each project is maximized.
 
In the meantime, there is also a number of more-or-less active projects in the background: steam engine, solar concentrator, industrial robot, sawmill, car, CNC multimachine, laser cutter, torch table, ironworker machine, 3D scanner, CNC circuit mill, 3D printer, and universal power supply.
 
Strategically speaking, I think we can find all of the bids/designers/prototypers by leveraging global collaboration of the crowds. To act on the resulting information – I think the best strategy is 2-3 full-time project managers at FeF, working with me. Then I predict a fast-and-furious parallel technology rollout process that sets new standards for open source economic development. At the same time, if we have design sourced from remote developers, then our local FeF fabrication team can prototype these as soon as they are created. Prototyping can be rapid when the designs are available – so a team of 2-3 experienced fabricators could do this on-demand. This reqiures our 3000 square foot workshop to be ready, and to be populated with about 3 times more fabrication equipment than we already have.
 
My next steps are getting the fabrication manager and construction manager onsite. If my time is freed up, I will proceed to defining a strategic roll-out sequence and budget. This can help us to align the overall effort to a more direct path. With additional resources, we will proceed beyond a machine design to the open-sourcing of the individual components – such as stepper motor fabrication and oxyhydrogen generator production for the CNC torch table – for reducing the cost of the different machines.
 
In our tactical approach, we still focus on volunteers. We think that the identification of bids/designers/fabricators can easily be sourced from the crowds. We are intending that the 2-3 on-site project managers are also volunteers – as that is the filter that pretty much guarantees that the motivation and intention of our team remains uncompromised. With our on-site fabrication team, we can build the prototypes at the cost of materials. We will pay for whatever design we cannot get for free. That is our current plan – and note that it can and does changes dramatically – but this is our present plan with existing resources.
 
As a final note – the above is the development plan. Developing the tools is not the same as using the tools. The developers are primarily multidisciplinary engineers, but the users can include everybody. We are creating a human interface to technology which allows the user to be in full control over the technology. We are just providing the tools at this stage – and we are not discussing the profound societal implications at this point. It is our hope that transcendence of material constraints (artificial scarcity and related ills) is just one of the positive effects, but the greater hope is nothing less than evolving to freedom as the human species."
(http://blog.opensourceecology.org/2011/07/towards-50-gvcs-tools-by-2013/)
 
 


==='''How it all (could) work'''===
==='''How it all (could) work'''===
taken from http://openfarmtech.org/weblog:


February 12th, 2008 by Brittany
February 12th, 2008 by Brittany
Line 56: Line 85:


We look forward to hearing from you."
We look forward to hearing from you."


==Franz Nahrada of [[GIVE]] in dialogue with Marcin Jakubowsky==
==Franz Nahrada of [[GIVE]] in dialogue with Marcin Jakubowsky==

Revision as of 06:59, 20 July 2011

URL = http://openfarmtech.org/

Open Source Ecology develops open source technology for sustainable living. See Appropedia description for a concise overview of work.

The OSE experiment takes place at Factor E Farm.


Description

"The goal of OSE is to engage people in a sustainable lifestyle as a means to addressing pressing world issues. We do this by providing the opportunity to live sustainably at our land-based facility. This facility is an intentional communy known as Open Source Enterprise Learning Community. In this community, a sustainable lifestyle involves providing many of the basic needs from on-site resources - food, housing, energy, transportation, and culture. We engage in what we call neo-subsistence, or technologically advanced subsistence that blends ancient wisdom and new technology to provide a high quality of life. The lifestyle includes meaningful work, service to the greater global community, and leisure to pursue one's true interests. Neo-subsistence involves wise utilization of resources and best practices that keeps overhead low and helps us to focus on our mission. To advance the goals of neo-subsistence, we engage in research aimed at developing goods and services to outside markets. These goods and services aim at the highest level of ecological integrity and quality that contributes to local prosperity in a global setting" (Marcin Jakubowski)

What is Open Source Economics?

"Our mission is to extend the Open Source model to the provision any goods and services- Open Source Economics. This means opening access to the information and technology which enables a different economic system to be realized, one based on the integration of natural ecology, social ecology, and industrial ecology. This economic system is based on open access- based on widely accessible information and associated access to productive capital- distributed into the hands of an increased number of people. We believe that a highly distributed, increasingly participatory model of production is the core of a democratic society, where stability is established naturally by the balance of human activity with sustainable extraction of natural resources. This is the opposite of the current mainstream of centralized economies, which have a structurally built-in tendency towards of overproduction."

Methodology Open Source Product Development

The collaboration cycle includes:

  • Feedback throughout
  • Fabrication, potentially in distributed locations
  • Resource donations
  • Quality markup
    • technical drawings
    • 3D computer models
    • economic analysis
  • Further design
  • Worknet workspace as initial development, ending in dedicated wiki webspace
  • Technology administrator: for each product

(http://www.worknets.org/wiki.cgi?OpenSourceEcology)

Discussion

Strategy

Marcin:

"Here is the strategy in a nutshell: Full product release of tractor, power unit, and soil pulverizer – to add to the CEB press – by year-end 2011. Build the living and working infrastructure by year-end 2011 – showcasing and shaking down our machines. Produce professional quality documentation for these four machines by the same time. This in itself is a huge goal – paving our way for rapid parallel development starting January 1, 2012 – as we will have built up our infrastructure and team – and more importantly – track record of delivering solid and replicable results. With all the distractions coming at us, we commit to not getting waylaid from producing solid results.

It is one thing to build the prototypes – but a much more difficult task to shake down and document the prototypes to the level required for viral replicability. We want to sow the seeds of viral replicability by this year’s end – by brute force simplicity of design, clarity of instructionals, and robustness of the equipment. We have demonstrated the economic feasibility and performance of our machines. The next milestone is replicability.

Then, 2012 is rapid parallel development. If our 6 month plan is infrastructure building/4 product releases/documentation – how does work on the 2012 plan fit? The 6 month plan is the foundation for the parallel development of 2012. A solid core infrastructure for project management is the core of the next 6 months. This is our commitment with the resources that we currently have – and new resources can change this at any time.

The greater global effort beyond FeF could help tremendously by identifying a large team of qualified, remote developers. Success on the overall 50 machines requires that we recruit a team of bidders/designers/prototypers for each machine – as each machine goes through a multi-step development process from concept to field testing and iteration. This enables us to access large sources of funding. Without a deployment team, we cannot take in money. Thus, if we have a solid team of bidders/designers/prototypers – and their capacities are clear – then we are in a position to move rapidly.

In principle, it would be good to have 10 bids per project – or close to 500 bids. Recruiting this talent and bid proposals is a full time job for many people, so if you are eager to jump into the project remotely, this is the most valuable task that you could take on. With the team in place, resources can be tapped, and risk can be minimized if we have a number of bids to choose from. From my experience, the key is having options, so our chance of success on each project is maximized.

In the meantime, there is also a number of more-or-less active projects in the background: steam engine, solar concentrator, industrial robot, sawmill, car, CNC multimachine, laser cutter, torch table, ironworker machine, 3D scanner, CNC circuit mill, 3D printer, and universal power supply.

Strategically speaking, I think we can find all of the bids/designers/prototypers by leveraging global collaboration of the crowds. To act on the resulting information – I think the best strategy is 2-3 full-time project managers at FeF, working with me. Then I predict a fast-and-furious parallel technology rollout process that sets new standards for open source economic development. At the same time, if we have design sourced from remote developers, then our local FeF fabrication team can prototype these as soon as they are created. Prototyping can be rapid when the designs are available – so a team of 2-3 experienced fabricators could do this on-demand. This reqiures our 3000 square foot workshop to be ready, and to be populated with about 3 times more fabrication equipment than we already have.

My next steps are getting the fabrication manager and construction manager onsite. If my time is freed up, I will proceed to defining a strategic roll-out sequence and budget. This can help us to align the overall effort to a more direct path. With additional resources, we will proceed beyond a machine design to the open-sourcing of the individual components – such as stepper motor fabrication and oxyhydrogen generator production for the CNC torch table – for reducing the cost of the different machines.

In our tactical approach, we still focus on volunteers. We think that the identification of bids/designers/fabricators can easily be sourced from the crowds. We are intending that the 2-3 on-site project managers are also volunteers – as that is the filter that pretty much guarantees that the motivation and intention of our team remains uncompromised. With our on-site fabrication team, we can build the prototypes at the cost of materials. We will pay for whatever design we cannot get for free. That is our current plan – and note that it can and does changes dramatically – but this is our present plan with existing resources.

As a final note – the above is the development plan. Developing the tools is not the same as using the tools. The developers are primarily multidisciplinary engineers, but the users can include everybody. We are creating a human interface to technology which allows the user to be in full control over the technology. We are just providing the tools at this stage – and we are not discussing the profound societal implications at this point. It is our hope that transcendence of material constraints (artificial scarcity and related ills) is just one of the positive effects, but the greater hope is nothing less than evolving to freedom as the human species." (http://blog.opensourceecology.org/2011/07/towards-50-gvcs-tools-by-2013/)


How it all (could) work

taken from http://openfarmtech.org/weblog:

February 12th, 2008 by Brittany

“When solar cell companies develop cheaper panels, then we’ll switch to solar power.”

Did you ever hear someone say this?

Instead of waiting around for solar panels to become affordable, why don’t we collaborate and make them ourselves.

By we, I mean anyone who’s interested in affordable, ecological energy production. We all have some kind of skill. What if we collaborated: networkers, designers, fundraisers, engineers from all walks of life, and came up with optimal, user-friendly, durable, inexpensive, and cheap to produce solar cells (or an even better alternative)?

And while we’re at it, why not optimize all the tools for sustainable and just living, while keeping them at an affordable price? Imagine if every town grew its own fuel, made its own bricks for building, and gathered energy from the sun for heat and power. These technologies do not have to be controlled by large, centralized entities. With a little collaboration, these tools can be at the fingertips of the world.

At Open Source Ecology we already started the process. Materials for the world’s first open source compressed earth block (soil brick) press prototype cost under $1500. Comparable machine cost over $25,000.

Real world-impacting products through world collaboration. People from Iceland, the Canary Islands, India, and elsewhere are working with us: Networking, designing reviewing designs, fund-raising, and field testing. People contribute because they know that everyone benefits when technologies and science are in the public domain. Furthermore, when everyone contributes, designs reflect the needs of people, rather than of corporate headquarters.

Drop us an email, let us know what you think. Check out our website (openfarmtech.org) and pass along our information to interested networks, family, and friends.

We look forward to hearing from you."

Franz Nahrada of GIVE in dialogue with Marcin Jakubowsky

1.

"Marcin: FeF is an experiment. It is a development laboratory for tools, technologies, and techniques that lead to post-scarcity by means of optimal production techniques. (optimal is a loaded word. It includes all principles of OSE)

Franz: Production Techniques alone cannot be key to the design of Global Villages. From the very beginning a Global Village is equally experimenting with consensus - building technologies that allow a commununity to really take care of its metabolism. The commons will be the liveblood of future societies again. Maternal values will become important for the introduction of flow economies.


2.

Marcin: Its presently technocentric approach is only a step for developing resilient economies. FeF is dedicated to becoming a first, living example of such a resilient community. This is on top of being a development laboratory for the required tools and techniques. We are interested in forming a foundation for replicable, post-scarcity, resilient communities.

Franz: Is it more important to maintain small steel furnaces in every village or will there be still urban centers? We dont know. All we know is that each and every technolgy is shaped by social preferences. It is merely impossible to discern positive social preferences from the drawing board. Without having a society of users from the beginning, the designers view might be extremely flawed. Thats the structural limit of FeF and I do not see it met by the step model.


3.

Marcin: Its approach is radical, in that we're developing an integrated toolset for creating resilient communities, which make no compromise related to global geopolitics.

Franz: I do not know what you exactly mean by geopolitical, but there is a factual necessity to run along with powers-to-be and not be atacked by them. The art of a true revolutionary is to grow the new form of society like a seed within the old, make it convincing, appealing and attractive, both in terms of structural leverage for the dominant classes as well as in terms of expanding freedom for the supressed. That requires compromises, skills, negociations and communication, social and polit-economical insight and knowledge - and also dedication and clear vision. Its deplorable that almost nowhere you find these qualities unified. A myth of mere "resistance" has successfully crippled our emancipatory potential for decades, which was mainly, but not only forming on the political left.


4.

Marcin: We believe that complete, post-scarcity economies can be created on a scale as small as individual land parcels of village scale, by using modern technology and ancient wisdom.

Franz: That is counter to my belief. Even Mao did need a larger regional area for a peoples commune, the renmin gongshe would encompass about 5000 single households. Thats also the number Claude Lewenz estimates for village town to develop a local economy, that supports a decent level of life with a sophisticated level of technicalities and culture. Even if we take away the 94% of professions that are more or less deeply affected by monetary dominated society, we need many new professions to facilitate the complex function of a resilient and sustaiunable microcosm. - Even that said, the total optimum distribution of population will never be 100% villages. There will be enough remaining endavours where economy of scale remains. The rough formula for global villages is 80% villages, 20% cities. there will be renaiscance of the Small Towns as well. The total economy will adjust to that base, and cities will perform hub functions by means of telecommunication, like telemedicine, but also physical functions, like hospitals.


5.

Marcin: We understand that a prerequisite to such communities is personal and political growth and transformation on part of the individuals taking part in this experiment.

Franz: the meaning of growth and transformation is manyfold. In fact the ultimate purpose of global villages is health; its the total enjoyment of our physical side, which carries a spiritual core within connecting us with heaven (our aspirations) and earth (our nature) and all beings. Our purpose now is to bring these different side in harmony, rediscover and enable with the help of technology the healing power within us. Health is another world of becoming whole. Global Villages will allow us to choose and enjoy among all possibilities that human cultures have created; they will be diverse in approach and also resonate to different sides of the human being. They will also be social experiments. This is not just about replicating - its about evolving." (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/globalvillages/message/4419)

More Information

Essay by at http://www.oekonux-conference.org/documentation/texts/Jakubowski.html

Open Source Technology Pattern Language work begun - [1]


  • Overview of Projects - here.
Retrieved from "https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/index.php?title=Open_Source_Ecology&oldid=51468"