Someone new to the project asked me what is TROM about, and I tried to explain it as such (is a bit long, but maybe worth sharing here):

This is a project started in 2011. We have more info here tromsite.com but it grew a lot in terms of materials for the past several years. So we have many books, videos, and all kinds of tools.

If I were to describe the project in a few paragraphs (sorry this is a bit long), I'd say that the project is about showcasing how our world-wide society is, at its core, a trade-based society (from China to US, from Cuba to Europe, from socialism, communism, or other isms that were ever implement); And this trade-based society gives rise to most of the problems we see in the world today: climate change, waste, slavery, bad products, corruption, and so on.

What are the world's biggest problems? Climate change, corruption, destruction of the environment, waste, pollution, slavery, and so on. What creates these problems? Humans. What makes humans do these bad things? The environment. What part of this environment? Mostly the trade-based society we all live under.

More:

Humans wake up in the morning to go to some places and do something there (we call those "jobs"), in order to receive something else in return (food, a shelter, access to goods and services, etc.). They do that for most of their lives. Basically they trade their energy, time, skills and so on, to get food, shelter, internet, healthcare, etc. We use money to represent these trades, but that's arbitrary. Could be bictoin, tokens, gold coins or whatever.

Now, if you look at pretty much everything humans do, it revolves around trades. Jobs take some 8h or more a day, 5 days a week. So, most of people's lives. The internet is a place where humans also trade their data, currency, and attention to websites that mine their data, put ads into their faces, or hide features or content behind paywalls.

In other words, if I am a human on this planet, I wake up every morning, go to my job for 8h, and do that for 5 days a week. I traded 8h of my life to get access to my needs and wants, out of 24h (with 8h sleeping). I have 8h as my free time. In between and after I am done with my job, I use my computer/smartphone to read the news, "socialize", talk to others, watch stuff, listen to stuff (movies, podcasts, articles, websites, netflix, facebook, youtube and the like). All of this time I am giving them my data, attention and at times currency to be able to access these. So, 8h at a job, 8h sleep, and a bunch of other hours online trading for entertainment, information, services. Plus spending time in traffic and dealing with bills and stuff, all because of the trade-based society's rules.

Job + Internet + societal duties = most of my day I trade.

Yes, I also enjoy those videos, talking to friends at work, learn and so forth, but they are all like flowers growing from the soil of trade. Meaning: when I use Facebook, since this is a platform I trade with, the contents I see, the people I follow, are driven by Facebook's algorithm and all they want is me spending more time there watching those ads, producing data that they collect, or buying the stuff they promote. It's like a supermarket that pretends to be a library.

So basically pretty much all that I (human on this planet) consume and do, is directed by trades and people I am trading with. Like a movie director directing my life. Therefore my wishes, my dreams, what excites me or triggers me, are all emerged from this trade-based society that I fed my brain with on a daily basis.

And the same way that we see Facebook's practices as bad, trapping people into an endless stream of nonsense content for the purpose of mining their data/currency/attention, pretty much all business practices are as bad, since they always want something from you and that makes them lie, exaggerate, deceive in order to make you their customer and keep you their customer.

Airline companies, taxi companies, pharmaceutical companies, food producing companies, you name it; all probably are corrupt and as good as "facebook", and if some are not, they will probably become.

So, we are showcasing how in the end this trade-based society makes human beings behave really bad and how it consumes them, and how it creates most of the problems we see in the world today. And our approach is to provide trade-free goods/services as much as possible, so that we remove this environment form people's life, little by little.

Sorry that was long. But this is a big project. I recommend you this book of ours, where we explain all of this in detail tromsite.com/books/#flipbook-d…

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