As we near the end of 2021, year of giddy #SpaceBillionaires, it is a good time to think about our current situation in the world where #WealthInequality has taken on absolutely insane proportions, especially with the pandemic and all.
Just let's all reflect for ourselves what we can we do in 2022 to improve this situation.
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=uWSxzjyMNpU
Source: https://therules.org/global-economic-inequality-video/
Factsheet: https://therules.org/inequality-video-fact-sheet/
This was in 2013 !!!
(Thanks @JohnJClimateMarcher for passing the video link)
Just let's all reflect for ourselves what we can we do in 2022 to improve this situation.
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=uWSxzjyMNpU
Source: https://therules.org/global-economic-inequality-video/
Factsheet: https://therules.org/inequality-video-fact-sheet/
This was in 2013 !!!
(Thanks @JohnJClimateMarcher for passing the video link)
Global Wealth Inequality - What you never knew you never knew (See description for 2017 updates)
NOTE: Firstly, we know about and apologise for the incorrect map in this version of the video, there is an update version in the playlist with a corrected map. PLEASE HELP US UPDATE THIS VIDEO: We recognise that this video is now, in 2017, outdated.Invidious
Tio
in reply to smallcircles (Humane Tech Now) • •like this
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muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Current game is broken because it is focused on the goal of gathering more and more capital but the game itself is with us since the beginning and it constantly evolves. Fixing the end goal could be some form of solution but that requires change in the whole global society which is an utopia... show more
Current game is broken because it is focused on the goal of gathering more and more capital but the game itself is with us since the beginning and it constantly evolves. Fixing the end goal could be some form of solution but that requires change in the whole global society which is an utopia in itself unfortunately. Hopefully nature will show humanity it’s place and perhaps people will realize that exploiting resources has it’s price too and nature does not give a damn about invisible money.
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Tio
in reply to muppeth • •You are confusing this with the general meaning of trade. And that will make things beyond confusing. Here's a simple example:
- I write a book. I am putting it on my website for 15.99 Euros. You can only access it if you trade your currency with me. else you can't.
- I write a book. I put it on my website but I add ads on the website. Ads are a mean of getting you to watch them and click them. I get something out of this. I clearly want your attention. That's how ads work, else there is no purpose of having them. So you trade your attention in order to read my book. You do not have any othe
... show moreYou are confusing this with the general meaning of trade. And that will make things beyond confusing. Here's a simple example:
- I write a book. I am putting it on my website for 15.99 Euros. You can only access it if you trade your currency with me. else you can't.
- I write a book. I put it on my website but I add ads on the website. Ads are a mean of getting you to watch them and click them. I get something out of this. I clearly want your attention. That's how ads work, else there is no purpose of having them. So you trade your attention in order to read my book. You do not have any other option.
- I write a book. O put it on my website and I want nothing in return for that. I do not want your currency, I do not want your attention (ads), or data. It is free to read. Or what we call as trade-free.
Example 1 and 2 are clear examples of today's market system (trade system). Example 3 is very different since you give me nothing for that book. If you think that you have to spend time to read the book, and you see that as a "trade", then this is a very weird concept since everything in this universe can be labeled as such, including peeing - you trade your energy and time to empty your bladder. But of course we do not talk about this. We talk about trade between at least 2 humans, not between you and yourself and what you may understand by that.So we talk about such trade-free services. We have a directory where we list such services https://www.directory.trade-free.org/ as an example.
We've also discussed these notions in length in 3 TROMcasts:
48. Trade-Free Directory https://videos.trom.tf/w/p/n5dfTv4yDdVwQhjqHhXPfT?playlistPosition=48&resume=true
26. Trade vs Scarcity https://videos.trom.tf/w/p/n5dfTv4yDdVwQhjqHhXPfT?playlistPosition=26&resume=true
25. Trade-free.org! https://videos.trom.tf/w/p/n5dfTv4yDdVwQhjqHhXPfT?playlistPosition=25&resume=true
And our main book https://www.tromsite.com/books/#flipbook-df_6562/1/
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muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •In your example, you look at your end product. But to build your end product (book) there is an entire chain that had to happen to make it possible. Someone had to mine metals and minerals to build your computer, someone had to build it, assemble it, transport it, making it possible for you to get it etc. Software on your computer had to be created (and as much as floss could be considered to be trade-free dont overlook the fact it actually exists largely because of the insane amount of money pomped by trade into it). Energy to power your computer had to be produced and delivered. Website you are using for your book hosting had to go thorough the same process and as long as it is online uses energy too. Everyone who could potentially read your book, has to posses computer, energy, internet connection etc. As much as your end product you could consider to be trade-free (although imo if you used non-trade free components in the process then it isn’t), if noone would donate... show more
In your example, you look at your end product. But to build your end product (book) there is an entire chain that had to happen to make it possible. Someone had to mine metals and minerals to build your computer, someone had to build it, assemble it, transport it, making it possible for you to get it etc. Software on your computer had to be created (and as much as floss could be considered to be trade-free dont overlook the fact it actually exists largely because of the insane amount of money pomped by trade into it). Energy to power your computer had to be produced and delivered. Website you are using for your book hosting had to go thorough the same process and as long as it is online uses energy too. Everyone who could potentially read your book, has to posses computer, energy, internet connection etc. As much as your end product you could consider to be trade-free (although imo if you used non-trade free components in the process then it isn’t), if noone would donate to you at all for the book, you would not be able to survive (Do you think anyone would care about the miner?). And that especially applies to all the people involved in the chain that made your book possible in the first place. The world is so complex at this moment, that trade (“ a market system where we give in order to receive.”), makes all that possible by simplifying the process of getting and receiving payment for someone else’s work. Trade made your book possible in the first place. Sure it’s not immune from abuse and it’s not perfect but without it lots of things we enjoy these days would not be possible.
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Tio
in reply to muppeth • •I look at the end product because there is no other way to move from this trade society into something else. You can't start a new society somewhere detached from this one. So the end product is what I am interested in, yes. That's realistic. Take FOSS. It was built with proprietary software and hardware, yet FOSS is still a "thing" and it is great. Helps a lot of people to migrate from proprietary software to "free" software. We still call it "free and open source" although it is not always made with "free and open source" software. You know what I mean?
Same way a recycled object should not be made with recycled machinery in order for us to see it as a recycled object and to see value in that.
So trade-free is for the end user. It cannot be otherwise. And the more such trade-free goods/services humans have access to, the less they have to trade, the more time they will have to possibly... show more
I look at the end product because there is no other way to move from this trade society into something else. You can't start a new society somewhere detached from this one. So the end product is what I am interested in, yes. That's realistic. Take FOSS. It was built with proprietary software and hardware, yet FOSS is still a "thing" and it is great. Helps a lot of people to migrate from proprietary software to "free" software. We still call it "free and open source" although it is not always made with "free and open source" software. You know what I mean?
Same way a recycled object should not be made with recycled machinery in order for us to see it as a recycled object and to see value in that.
So trade-free is for the end user. It cannot be otherwise. And the more such trade-free goods/services humans have access to, the less they have to trade, the more time they will have to possibly create more such trade-free goods/services.
Example:
I live in Spain. I have trade-free access to the healthcare system here. Trade-free access to a place to stay (for now). Trade-free access to all of my software needs (from the media I consume, to the programs I use). My trade in this system is lower in terms of time and power, since I only need to trade for food, internet, and a few more things. So my "spendings" are more minimal. This allows me to create a ton of digital trade-free services and to keep myself sane (not to grow a consumerist mind by watching so many ads and such).
So I am quite sure that if we are to free up humans from many of the trades they have to engage into, they can create more of those like a positive feedback loop.
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muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •The example of FLOSS is also not really trade-free in my opinion. Surely for you it is as end user but looking at it this way is deceptive. Is facebook trade-free? For end user it surely is (they don’t pay for it) and many would argue just like you did with healthcare. Same with software. It’s largely paid by tech companies or other investors to further develop and evolve it. Those software projects that do not have this privilege very often rely on donations from users to keep it going and in many cases they unfortunately cannot even achieve that and end up abandoned or in the realm of hobby project despite the possible potential for revolutionary software. In most cases (which is the most fucked up thing of them all) it forces developers to live two life’s where one is to make money to survive and other to make free software.
The fact you don... show more
The example of FLOSS is also not really trade-free in my opinion. Surely for you it is as end user but looking at it this way is deceptive. Is facebook trade-free? For end user it surely is (they don’t pay for it) and many would argue just like you did with healthcare. Same with software. It’s largely paid by tech companies or other investors to further develop and evolve it. Those software projects that do not have this privilege very often rely on donations from users to keep it going and in many cases they unfortunately cannot even achieve that and end up abandoned or in the realm of hobby project despite the possible potential for revolutionary software. In most cases (which is the most fucked up thing of them all) it forces developers to live two life’s where one is to make money to survive and other to make free software.
The fact you don’t pay directly for certain things does not mean no trade is involved to make that happen. In some cases this ‘trade-free’ apeal is created specially to lure you into a product that is meant to exploit you, your data, or in some form make money. Even in the example you specified, you do rely on dontations which are made by people who do engage in trade to make living and have enough to spare some for you. I am not bashing your lifestyle, I’ve been a freegan squatter for the most part of my adult life. But I do see that my lifestyle was made possible by the fact trade exist and I see that applying it widely is not going to succeed because it removes very important aspects of the equation.
The consumerism is very bad direction we as society have taken and I hope people realize this, but the foundation of trade is not to be blamed here. It’s is that foundation that allows your ‘trade-free’ life in Spain IMO.
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Tio
in reply to muppeth • •it is for me. If you are using Wikipedia it is free for you. Yeah they pay for the servers but as explained, that's besides the point if we are to be realistic.
That's where confusion arises in today's world. of course facebook is not trade free. They ask you something in return to use their service. What? You attention (see ads), and your data. And then money to promote your posts. Take Friendica. That's trade free. Our instance does not want anything form you.
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Tio
in reply to muppeth • •We can't have a perfect chain of trade-free production and distribution. At least not as of yet. But we have to start somewhere. Wikipedia, FOSS, doctors without borders, the many million of volunteers and projects out there, are extraordinarily important and necessary. The more, the better. They are not perfect and they still rely on the foundation of this trade-system. But the more we have, the less reliance on trade to acquire the abundance of stuff we have today.
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muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to muppeth • •If we agree that trade-free means trade-free for the ones using these goods/services then it does hold at scale. Wikipedia serves billions of users; doctors without borders take care of 10 million people; and so on. We have a directory of these as said before.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •The problem about trade is that it only fulfills that role under specific conditions, and those who are strongest have an incentive to break those conditions.
In short: https://www.draketo.de/politik/market-fallacies
Judging from the start of your book, you’re mixing up trade and capital.
The Three Fallacies of Markets
www.draketo.deTio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •Example: tomatoes from spain may very well end up in USA, instead of USA growing them there. Resource wise this is a lot more consuming to grow them in spain and send to USA, but if the labor is cheaper in Spain and the transport overall, then that's how it is done.
muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to muppeth • •muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Value of energy is pretty much equivalent of energy or how much a society/country is able to produce comparing to others. Sure it became more virtual when decoupled from gold standard and its surely abused as hell by powers. Still monetary system you refer to isnt the trade you are attacking in the first place.
I think it is ok to ask stuff in return because it enables us to focus on production of goods we want to produce (can produce) and exchange them for goods we need.
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •What is money if not a way to trade?
And also get trapped into that endless game. You then will want more, you will lie more, try to sell your stuff more. It is quite simple and the same mistake we are chocking on for the past 10k years or so :) .
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •That is a good thing — would you want someone far away to decide how valuable every kind of work is that you could do?
Someone who might not even know the kind of work you enjoy doing.
That said, this only works while all people have similar amounts of resources available. The end-game of unregulated trade is that someone far away decides all value. Trade needs regulation to be useful.
Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •We end up with a bunch of "nothing shit stuff" being valuable, from phones to clothes, ornaments to paintings, or whatever else. While we ignore human health, the state of the planet, the creatures and places around us, our free time, and so forth.
And yah, speaking of price tags who do you think "controls" and influences those? big corporations ofc. We made a massive search engine to showcase just how 175 companies own our world https://www.tromsite.com/tbf/
To "regulate" this trade-world is a nice idea on paper, and it does not work in practice as we've seen for the past thousands of years. Lenin hanged the billionaires and yet Russia is still full o them. Talk about "regulating" the market.... :D
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Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •But that’s not the point. To get closer to the point, answer the question: Who should decide, and how, what someone has to do to get resources for a project that needs more than their own hands and brain?
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Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •My answer to that is Wikipedia, Doctors without borders, or say RNLI. How are these people providing a trade-free service that educate billions and save millions?
We can't imagine a society where everything is trade-free. But we can point with the finger to the trade as the originator of most problems, and then create more and more trade-free goods and services (and there are a lot already but we need a lot more). This way, maybe, things will change for the better since it won't incentivize humans to decide "what someone has to do to get resources for a project that needs more than their own hands and brain" via the profit lane.
muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Trade is essential form of exchanging goods and labor. Thats it. I produce one thing and can trade it for another. Trade is also barter and exists since ever. At some point barter became too much of a hassle as our civilisation and goods we have been creating became more and more complex, needing bigger variety of matrials and so currencies (or before vouchers) became a thing. To replace the need to barter every single thing and make the process of manufacturing more complex goods easier and faster. That idea is the one that powers pretty much everything. The fact that financial systems, economic systems (to some degree), tend to exploit and in capitalism greed seems to be promoted the most it does not mean the trade itself is to blame. I think you are pointing fingers in wrong direction here. Your critique seem to be directed more towards economic and financial systems then the trade itself. Trade exists as long a human kind, way before any syst... show more
Trade is essential form of exchanging goods and labor. Thats it. I produce one thing and can trade it for another. Trade is also barter and exists since ever. At some point barter became too much of a hassle as our civilisation and goods we have been creating became more and more complex, needing bigger variety of matrials and so currencies (or before vouchers) became a thing. To replace the need to barter every single thing and make the process of manufacturing more complex goods easier and faster. That idea is the one that powers pretty much everything. The fact that financial systems, economic systems (to some degree), tend to exploit and in capitalism greed seems to be promoted the most it does not mean the trade itself is to blame. I think you are pointing fingers in wrong direction here. Your critique seem to be directed more towards economic and financial systems then the trade itself. Trade exists as long a human kind, way before any systems have been invented (you can even observe it in nature). Wikipedia and doctors without borders as you mention them, would not exist without donations from people involved in a form of trade giving their surplus to those projects. If noone would do that, those projects would simply not exist. They are as you call it ‘trade-free’ but thats because they are simply charity projects so not within the trade, but IMO well in the trade concept. Their model is just differently based. They offer services hoping enough people would donate back or in any form support the project so that they can survive. Although they have no pricetag attached, they very well depend on donation flow. You can see it especially with wikipedia with their rather aggressive fundraising. If the percentage or people receiving but not giving back would tip over, those projects would have to simply fold. And those are in service sector. What about project within goods sector. Could a system of ‘ask nothing in return’ be possible at scale?
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •Capitalism, communism, socialism, any such ism implement so far and from my knowledge, were trade systems at their core. Sell, buy, price tags, resource distribution, etc.. I wrote about these systems too in the same book.
When you say trade is an essential way of exchanging goods and labor, you are right in today's society we do it as such. And we think it is essential because we don't know any better. But now the production of stuff is so high that we could provide for everyone on earth. We throw 40% of all edible food. We have more homes than homeless people. Mountains of waste. And destroy the biodiversity and human potential at astonishing... show more
Capitalism, communism, socialism, any such ism implement so far and from my knowledge, were trade systems at their core. Sell, buy, price tags, resource distribution, etc.. I wrote about these systems too in the same book.
When you say trade is an essential way of exchanging goods and labor, you are right in today's society we do it as such. And we think it is essential because we don't know any better. But now the production of stuff is so high that we could provide for everyone on earth. We throw 40% of all edible food. We have more homes than homeless people. Mountains of waste. And destroy the biodiversity and human potential at astonishing rates. What if we can simply provide for people without asking anything in return, little by little. Same as RNLI, Doctors Without Borders, Wikipedia and the like do... that's my point. They prove that trade-free services and goods scale up pretty well even in this trade-based system.
For one, capitalism is not really anything tangible. China and USA are a lot more alike than different, yet one names itself a capitalist tribe another a communist tribe. Second, why is "greed" promoted? Give me some examples? Isn't it because humans are "trained" to play this trade game and want more and more and more?
Yes I agree. But they also get free human labor. If they can get that, they could eventually get free server space. I think Internet Archive does it like that. So little by little you decouple yourself from trades.
At the end of the day our entire world is not any "ism" it is some billions of humans doing something. Building bridges, doing research, fixing human health issues, create websites, you name it. Now the question is how to make these humans do these things in an organized fashion. Today we force them. If they do not engage in such activities they are basically fucked. And this entire situation gives rise to some humans that are greedy, they want more for themselves, they pollute, lie, waste, and so forth. I would say we should create a society where humans are not forced to engage in such activities, but they do them voluntarily. It is to an extreme sadness that I should even mention the last phrase....it should be the norm by now.
And if you think: but it cannot work unless you force people to do these things. Then I disagree and provide countless examples in our TROM materials about millions of humans doing tons of such activities for free, without asking anything in return.
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Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Otherwise all you can say is that trade has problems, but it could be solving more problems than it causes.
Capitalism has meaning, and China has become capitalist to boot (to the point that the government is now starting to fight Chinese tech companies because they rival its power). It means that those who have capital decide what happens.
muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Thanks a lot for the discussion and Happy New Year everyone!
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Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to muppeth • • •1: Trade itself as a concept is only good if there is regulation. That is necessary, because physical processes are usually more efficient if done at larger scale. That causes concentration of power if it is subject to unregulated trade: The first movers can build an effective monopoly, because they are cheaper than everyone else.
Regulation can limit that.
…
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •Progressive taxes on wealth and income can counteract that.
That’s why trade systems need regulation and taxes to actually work.
One good step forward: There’s now a global minimum tax on income of 15%. It didn’t make much headlines, but it might be a huge improvement for the future (compared to the alternate dystopia without it).
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Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •if you guys think you can make trade better by regulating, rules and laws, then I have to disagree with that with countless examples of failures and very little if any success stories. You have no argument when 1% of the world owns as much as the rest. When there are monoppolies in pretty much any sector in the world. Where pretty much all govs are corrupted. I link to hundreds of documentaries in these books, documentaries made by reputable sources from BBC, ABC Four Corners, AlJazeera, VPro, DW and more. I wish you guys were right, but the reality dismantles your views.
And if you think that we need better regulation/rules/laws then you are not the first ones to think that. I simply cannot trust this at all. The force of trade is too huge to resist the temptation of corruption.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Can we make trade perfect? I don’t think so.
Can we make trade good for everything? I don’t think so.
Can we make trade better as a system for *parts* of society than any other system would be? I do think so.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •The idea of unregulated trade is a pretty new one, and in my opinion many free-trade agreements are driven by power and ideology, not by mutual benefit.
Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •See how Apple Google and the like avoid paying taxes by opening their official offices in tribes where they don't have to pay taxes. Unfortunately the examples are endless.
If you wanna make players play more nice, then you have to decouple them from the powers that make them NOT play nice. It is like trying to tell people not to steal, when they are poor or incentivized to steal. Not gonna work.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •To find an alternative, you’ll have to find something that works for all people. That’s why the pure systems (pure capitalism, pure state-planning, …) do not work: They only cater to some people.
Here’s a handy list of core-drivers, if you want to check whether a concept works for most people: https://www.1w6.org/english/tables#org4edffdc
Useful prep-stuff from the one die system for Nanowrimo | 1w6
www.1w6.orgTio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •For many it is not dominant, but for some it is.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •The “Self-esteem/Recognition/Achievement” is where having more than others comes in. It’s where people define themselves in comparison and competition to others.
psychological feature or underlying reason for people's actions, willingness and goals
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •So you observed how humans for the past thousands of years lets say, wanted more and more. And you concluded it must be in our "nature"? This is a big conclusion to make, especially when you have millions upon millions of humans who do not want more. That, in a society that tells us to want more and more, nonstop.
I think a more educated conclusion is that the environment makes us want more and more. If I do not want more and more, based on your reasoning, it means my "nature" (biology) is different? Or that my environment is different?
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •https://www.tromsite.com/books/
https://www.tromsite.com/documentary/
https://www.videoneat.com/category/documentaries/society/
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Useful prep-stuff from the one die system for Nanowrimo | 1w6
www.1w6.orgArne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •https://www.tromsite.com/books/#flipbook-df_6560/1/
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •But yes, that being called poem and horoscope does offend me.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •Let’s end it here. You did not convince me. Rather the opposite.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • • •Basic reciprocity is missing.
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •Nothing is natural to humans. Actually for the most part, it is understood, that humans had little to no trade. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter-gatherer
It is not neutral when you always have to give this to get that. It is as fair as the Monopoly board game. And you try to blame the players, while I am saying the game is to blame.
I asked you for some examples :) I am curious.
Cheers!
muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •As for examples, there is plenty around you if you look for them. There is all kind of “community supported agriculture” projects where you trade money or your time to grow food others can harvest. Local food stores selling products from local farmers within 100km range. Ton of small businesses around you using local material to produce goods and services. Not sure what kind of list of examples you are looking for, but I assure you in your neighbourhood you could pretty much find all you need from fair and ethical sources supporting your local economy and help building better community, exactly thanks to ability to trade with one another. Maybe you wanted to see a bigger company running on multinational level. Sure, those exist too. For example Fairphone (presen... show more
As for examples, there is plenty around you if you look for them. There is all kind of “community supported agriculture” projects where you trade money or your time to grow food others can harvest. Local food stores selling products from local farmers within 100km range. Ton of small businesses around you using local material to produce goods and services. Not sure what kind of list of examples you are looking for, but I assure you in your neighbourhood you could pretty much find all you need from fair and ethical sources supporting your local economy and help building better community, exactly thanks to ability to trade with one another. Maybe you wanted to see a bigger company running on multinational level. Sure, those exist too. For example Fairphone (present on fedi btw) is a good example of the company that took upon not just being another phone manufacturer but creating user oriented, sustainable, ecological and most important ethical and fairtrade smart phones. They go as far as trying to use only living-wage/fairtrade minerals to produce their phones. Pretty remarkable and inspirational in our times if you ask me.
Monopoly is a game about capitalism not about trade itself.
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •Regardless, saying this is "natural" to humans makes no sense. The internet and the way we communicate today is not natural to humans based on that thinking. Not helping your tribe members unless they give you something in return, is also probably very unnatural. And so on. We humans grow and become something else. Trade is something we had to do, but today we have an abundance so why trade for it?
As for "ethical" companies, for one how do you know they are "ethical"? Second, they clearly do not scale, right? Show me a large one that is ethical. The larger you become the more powerful the force of trade. Here's a documentary about Fairphone https://www.videoneat.com/documentaries/4872/producing-the-fairphone/ made by VPRO... show more
Regardless, saying this is "natural" to humans makes no sense. The internet and the way we communicate today is not natural to humans based on that thinking. Not helping your tribe members unless they give you something in return, is also probably very unnatural. And so on. We humans grow and become something else. Trade is something we had to do, but today we have an abundance so why trade for it?
As for "ethical" companies, for one how do you know they are "ethical"? Second, they clearly do not scale, right? Show me a large one that is ethical. The larger you become the more powerful the force of trade. Here's a documentary about Fairphone https://www.videoneat.com/documentaries/4872/producing-the-fairphone/ made by VPRO. They are not that "fair". As for "fair" trade from my knowledge it is a joke. Here's one example of it on a more global scale https://www.videoneat.com/documentaries/4872/producing-the-fairphone/ - the examples are endless how this is used as a scheme to sell the new "natural" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_trade#Criticism . I kinda bet is the same with these "sustainable" and "ethical" businesses.
Now, again, regardless of all of this. A company MUST produce whatever it produces, else it goes bankrupt. You can't simply produce a great phone and stop at that. You have to pay your employees, your rented offices, etc.. This is a force that is impossible to deny. So this trade system will, more likely, gravitate towards "unethical" companies because they are always forced to sell sell sell. Regardless if you find me a few "ethical" companies.
If Disroot provides Nextcloud accounts for 5 bucks a month and for 10 you get more GB, then that's a tricky entanglement with the "users" that are now your "customers". Next month when the Disroot boss needs to pay the rent and has not much money, he/she may be able to push the levers of this trade situation making the subscription higher, or the "basic" accounts more shittier, so you go for the "pro" one. That's a slippery slope.
We also provide Nextcloud accounts but refuse to accept any trades. We treat everyone equally and rely on donations. This is far better, not perfect. But if I can't pay my rent next month I can't manipulate "our users", that are basically our "friends", to donate me more, since I have no power over them.
Your model may scale better at first, since you can afford to buy better servers because people pay you, but it has a lot more chances to morph into a "normal" business. This is the story of pretty much all business out there. You can't convince me that you will be a "good guy" and not do the bad that the others did, because I've heard this story countless times.
That's what I'm trying to get at.
Capitalism is a trade-system, you want to accept it or not, that's what it is. That's why some 4B people wake up at 7am in the morning, 5 days a week, all around the planet. Not because they want to see a beautiful sunrise, but because they have to trade themselves in order to have a roof over their heads, or a meal on their plate.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Example: Take a universal basic income where all money you get decays within 3 months. You can still trade, but you cannot accumulate wealth.
That’s no capitalism, but it is trade.
Tio
in reply to Arne Babenhauserheide • •https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism
Capitalism without trade, is like a cat without its internal organs. Not a cat.
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •"Yes but then you visit websites with that open source OS and browser, and they are not using open source software..." they say. "And that makes it non-open-source, or not relevant". But this is a philosophical discussion that will lead to nowhere. :)
So yah our operating system in our society is trade-based, and yeah we can use it to create a trade-free operating system. Many orders of magnitude more difficult than in the software world, but we exemplify that it is possible via countless examples.
;)
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muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
in reply to muppeth • •muppeth
in reply to Tio • • •Also I think you are missing my point somehow. FLOSS can be built without use of proprietary software. In fact most FLOSS licensing requires that.
When looking at it in bigger scale (which is something you should look at IMO), software can be made free (as in freedom) because that does not disqualify it from making money which means put food on your table. Giving those freedoms does not restrict the authors nor anyone in the chain from enjoying all the freedoms at the same time does not prohibit paying for work. Trade-free when looking in scale does not work because it prohibits getting (or asking for) payment for your work. As much as it can work for things you have listed, most of the carriers out there or work that needs to be done cannot be achieved in trade-free way and as a result the listed jobs (book writer online) can’t be achieved neither because the dependencies cannot happen.
So yeah, sure,... show more
Also I think you are missing my point somehow. FLOSS can be built without use of proprietary software. In fact most FLOSS licensing requires that.
When looking at it in bigger scale (which is something you should look at IMO), software can be made free (as in freedom) because that does not disqualify it from making money which means put food on your table. Giving those freedoms does not restrict the authors nor anyone in the chain from enjoying all the freedoms at the same time does not prohibit paying for work. Trade-free when looking in scale does not work because it prohibits getting (or asking for) payment for your work. As much as it can work for things you have listed, most of the carriers out there or work that needs to be done cannot be achieved in trade-free way and as a result the listed jobs (book writer online) can’t be achieved neither because the dependencies cannot happen.
So yeah, sure, in some cases idea of providing stuff free of charge (been doing it for most of my life, including running internet cafes, restaurants, bike repair shops etc) is working well and it is something every society needs and should have. There is plenty of things that can be offered on volounteer basis. It has not only good social aspect of providing services to those who can’t afford it but also brings people together. However claiming that this is the way and trade itself is somehow bad is just wrong statement. Most of the volunteer stuff existing because of trade and ability of others to either donate their surplus money or their time to offer to others.
This is my only remark. We share similar ideas and do similar things. It’s great to have people doing it in all aspects of life. However the difference is, that claiming that that’s how everything should work and that trade is here to blame is misconception in what made the volounteer work/service possible in the first place.
Trade is good. It makes things simpler which allows us to spend more time to do more things and more complex things. What is making it bad is greed, and the cult of money, competition instead of cooperation. Just like GPL does not prohibit selling your product (as long as all the software freedoms are given to users), I think ethical buisinesses (or trade) is something that could move the society back on good track. And there is plenty of such examples, and I hope lots more will follow.
Tio
in reply to muppeth • •Trade-free does not prohibit financial or other kind of support. Wikipedia gets millions in donations + so many other such orgs. But they keep their services as trade-free by not asking a... show more Yes wiki is not claiming that, however the idea of trade-free is just to create some awareness about "trade as the origin of most problems" as we argue in detail in over 1k pages in this book
Trade-free does not prohibit financial or other kind of support. Wikipedia gets millions in donations + so many other such orgs. But they keep their services as trade-free by not asking anyone anything in return for what they offer.
Trade is inherently bad because it creates competition and inequality. If I sell tomatoes I cannot afford to say "Go to the neighbor, he has better and cheaper tomatoes." I cannot pay my rent if I do that. But if I were to offer the tomatoes for free, I can very much recommend better tomatoes from someone else. Trade makes us lie, deceive, corrupt or be corrupted, enslave, exaggerate, and so forth. Especially when it is the only way to survive in this world. This is insanity.
Most open source software exist because of proprietary software that kick-started all of this and on the backs of who it has developed. So what? We need to move away from both. This is not an excuse.
It does make things simple. Here's an example: in Spain where I live my parents worked like slaves for a bunch of years, and still kinda do here and there. It is very simple for the owners of businesses to find these slaves coming from poorer countries, that work for nearly nothing. Also very simple to blame my parents and the like for not getting better jobs. Also they should find a way in this society. Easy! Also, it is so simple when we throw away 350 cruise ships of electronics and 500 or textiles every single year. Create climate change, because it is very simple to trade carbon credits or your way into politics. And endless such examples that I have been pointing towards for the past 10+ years.
Greed doesn't come from God Al Mighty :). Greed is a product of the environment. Humans are not born like this or like that. And money is nothing more than a tool to trade, but all such tools are as infectious and deadly as money. Look at crypto, tokens, gold, whatever. Same shit, different shapes. :)
Ethical business is almost like dry water. Very rare if even possible. Give me some of such examples, out of curiosity.
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Tio
in reply to muppeth • •I think the same in regards to trade-free vs trade-based. Make more trade-free goods/services that will grow inside this trade-based universe of ours, to eventually dominate the landscape. I am fully aware this is very difficult if not impossible, but I see no other way around it.
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Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •Tio
Unknown parent • •A "tip-jar" is a voluntary help, but not necessary. Ads are in your face so you if you don't have a choice to turn them off, then that is a clear form of trade. Same as data trading.
Bob Mottram
Unknown parent • • •Aaron
in reply to Tio • • •I offer some trade-free online services to people as well via using the awesome @YunoHost operating system on my server (tromdienste.de). Yes I pay a monthly fee for the server, but I am happy to work in the trade system to pay for that myself and offer honest services that don't spy on people rather than offer something that incentivizes me to make more money. So many projects started with good intentions, but they relied on a business model of todays trade-based system and look what happened to them (Google's motto was "Don't be evil" for example).
If I stay away from that trade business model (I want something in return for offering my services) then it is likely that I keep my services honest and void of other trades. And because it is the online world, it is not only me who has access to clean services but also others (a sea... show more
I offer some trade-free online services to people as well via using the awesome @YunoHost operating system on my server (tromdienste.de). Yes I pay a monthly fee for the server, but I am happy to work in the trade system to pay for that myself and offer honest services that don't spy on people rather than offer something that incentivizes me to make more money. So many projects started with good intentions, but they relied on a business model of todays trade-based system and look what happened to them (Google's motto was "Don't be evil" for example).
If I stay away from that trade business model (I want something in return for offering my services) then it is likely that I keep my services honest and void of other trades. And because it is the online world, it is not only me who has access to clean services but also others (a search engine that doesn't spy on me, a trade-free notes application, a trade-free social network etc.).
Yes if suddenly millions of people would join my friendica node, then I would be overwhelmed, but then people could run their own node which is going to be easier and easier via yunohost. Plus I am donating regularly to yunohost so they can focus on their work and do not have to engage in so many trades.
Imagine the potential of humanity if more and more humans would not have to engage into making money, but rather focus on things that are important (science, technology, improving people's life, restoring ecosystem etc.).
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Tio
Unknown parent • •You sent me a link to a website that looks like a horoscope or the like, with topics such as "Answers to the three questions for Fantasy" "Answers to the three questions for Modern" "Answers to the three questions for Mystery/Horror" and so forth. I am interested in human behavior from a scientific standpoint, from genes to anthropology. And after raeding a ton on the subject, and I will write a big book about it as soon as I am done with the documentary am working on, our behavior is either 100% created by the environment, or close to that. From sexuality to wishes and fears, you name it.
I apologize if I offended you, maybe my internal stress after ha... show more
You sent me a link to a website that looks like a horoscope or the like, with topics such as "Answers to the three questions for Fantasy" "Answers to the three questions for Modern" "Answers to the three questions for Mystery/Horror" and so forth. I am interested in human behavior from a scientific standpoint, from genes to anthropology. And after raeding a ton on the subject, and I will write a big book about it as soon as I am done with the documentary am working on, our behavior is either 100% created by the environment, or close to that. From sexuality to wishes and fears, you name it.
I apologize if I offended you, maybe my internal stress after having the same exact discussions over the pas 10 years, make me less patient.
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Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •The list on the site is also the result of trying to understand humans — but it is not written to create a new description of humanity, but as a working tool to make it easy for writers to create plausible characters.
I’m currently trying to get the source again — it might take some days because I had to ask the psychologist named in the source I learned it from for the actual publications.
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •(I’d be happy with a link on that topic, it’s a question I’ve wrangled with a lot)
Arne Babenhauserheide
in reply to Tio • • •There seems to be a 2014 re-release: https://books.google.de/books?hl=de&lr=&id=qQbKAwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA1914&dq=10.4324/9781315865836&ots=RojQjYyIKU&sig=DW1etGMOHWnRpBAEcl4D_RkoRSo&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false
Motivation and Culture
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