Tag: OuiShare

When round and round the same circle is good

Posted on by philipdodson

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Often we think when we go round and round the same circle that it is a bad thing. Like we are stuck and in the normal way we think about this, then it is true.

Doing the same thing again, and again, gives us the same outcome which does not enable improvement.

However, on day 2 of the OuiShare Fest 16, I listened to a talk about the circular economy given by Luisa of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

Cabaret Sauvage, Paris - OuiShare Fest 16 by Philip Dodson
Cabaret Sauvage, Paris – OuiShare Fest 16 by Philip Dodson

Over the last few hundred years during the industrialised age, we have become increasingly conditioned to the linear process of taking raw materials from the planet and industrially processing them into stuff for us to consume and then throw away into an incinerator or landfill.

This process has lead to the complete depletion of resources, destruction and poisoning of the planet in which the 7 billion of us live.

The circular economy is a process of regenerating and restoring by re-using and by cutting out waste. Essentially don’t take new resources when you can use what is already there.

This is a challenge to our culture of throwing everything away and this is a threat to the industrial economy that has created the throwaway culture. For example, ‘use by’ date codes on food that has made many throw away perfectly good food due to believing the myth that we are all going to die from deadly bacteria lurking.

We have been sold this myth of throwing away rather than properly recycling or reusing or repairing something. Why because it makes money and that is what has driven us throughout the industrial age.

Thankfully the industrial age is dying and this means that we now have to look at what will replace it and how will we live, work and govern ourselves beyond this age.

Going round and round the same circle with our resources is a truly essential process for the future of the human race.

Sustainability, openness, collaboration, sharing, self-governance, cooperation, and many more themes are coming out from this OuiShare Fest.

This is hope and this is the circle to be going round.

Who is ready for real democracy?

Posted on by philipdodson

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So this week I am at the Ouishare Fest 16 at the fabulous Cabaret Sauvage in Paris. My mate Bernie has been telling me to come to this for 4 years. Now I am finally here, I wonder why I never came before, it’s not like I need much of an excuse to visit Paris.

This morning I was listening to various chats on Block Chain, which I did a podcast on recently and blogged about. I am now starting really understand the potential of this technology. I am not suggesting now that I have become some expert, far from it, but I can see a glimpse of how this technology can allow complete decentralisation and can effective bypass or replace the needs for governments.

If you are regular reader of my blog, then you will know that I am not a big fan of the current world operating system, I am not a fan of the establishment, I am not a fan of all the ‘isms’, party politics and the industrialised system that has enabled a tiny few to hoard all the wealth and power. Where the majority of the 7 billion + of us are mainly replaceable and interchangeable cogs in their ‘machine’.

So seeing a technology like Block Chain, which is effectively a giant ledger that the many own rather than the few. So we can have a truly global democracy that the many can own and run. So we can have control of governance, rather than be in no control of the governments that currently govern us.

The thing about all of this is, when the majority of the 7 billion who have been stolen from by the colonial and industrialised system, that the Western countries have mainly controlled, demand reparations for this and a return of the stolen wealth and resources, which clearly they would vote for in a truly global democracy that every citizen would have a valid vote in, then the all of us in the West will have to get comfortable with redistribution of resources, especially the uber-wealthy of the world.

True global democracy will come as Block Chain will inevitably enable this revolution, but like any big change, it will come with a price and we have all to be aware and sure we are ready.

The fact is, there is already more than enough wealth in the world so that we can all live comfortably. I blogged before that if we started with a blank sheet of paper and designed the world, we would not create what we currently have. We would not give virtually all the money/power/resources/political control to less than 1% of the population.

Block Chain could enable us to reverse that and bypass that system rather than having to destroy it. For me, bring on the revolution, let’s create true global democracy.