Live together to increase our productivity

I see that you are passionate about this idea and you do make this feel exciting and very worthwhile. In principle, I would be willing to join such an effort, if

  1. There was a really good plan
  2. The people were into character development and had excellent social skills (which excludes the majority of people I know)
  3. People mainly joined for the common vision, not out of desperation about their own problems or the problems of the world
  4. The participants would be willing to work hard and to compromise in order to establish common projects that actually do something, instead of focusing on their own private passions (which is something that is quite challenging for me)
  5. The community has something which creates cohesion, for example shared values

I suppose it’s difficult to find enough people who satisfy all, or even most of these criteria to a sufficient degree.

The difficulty of turning such concepts into a reality, is why people still join boring companies just to get a day job that allows then to have a moderately convenient life. A company binds people together through the common necessity of having to make money. This is not a pleasant force binding people together, but it works to some degree, and makes things get done, even under adverse circumstances. Therefore, it is quite understandable that people want to avoid such situations and desire a way of life that is less determined by economic constraints. For example, by spontaneously becoming rich, which explains the attractiveness of lotteries.

Anyway, I don’t see how a bunch of not-really-rich people could avoid the necessity to have day-jobs (without the deus ex machine of a sufficient unconditional basic income). What may be achieved under the right circumstances, is a minimization of the time people have to deal with unpleasant work. That can be done by reducing the time people work overall, or it can be achieved by managing work in optimal ways, so that it becomes pleasant almost all the time.

However, even that is not what I would find most appealing right now. What I have in mind is making as much of a positive impact on the world as I am able to – even if that means doing a lot of unpleasant things. I just want to become more effective and efficient. If I could dedicate my full time to the areas in which my impact is maximal, this would be awesome, although it would also be very demanding and challenging.

I think the most positive future lies not in doing less work, but in doing more work that is more meaningful and fulfilling!

What needs to be reduced is the time we do work for the purpose of getting money. Science has proven that money is a quite problematic motivator. Nevertheless, we still require money in order to be able to do high quality work. This means, we should find ways that enable us to get the most money with the lest time and energy invested into thinking about how to make money from our work. If getting money was a pure side effect of work, that would be pretty ideal!

My reputation economy framework Quantified Prestige is supposed to make that much more feasible. Money would be created by people appreciating works born out of passion, not by selling goods and services out of uninspiring economic necessity. So, a reasonable approach would be to create some kind of community that works on establishing a reputation economy together, to bootstrap towards a situation that enables everyone to focus on their strengths and passions, which would maximize their effectiveness, impact, and fulfilment.

Does that sound like a good plan to you?

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This is precisely what should be established, defined and set in stone before advertising existence (or even idea) of community. Otherwise there will be a lot of very surprised people coming to you for drugs and sex :smile:

I wish I could say there is hope, but the longer I live the longer it seems “it won’t end up with what you want” anyway. 99.99% guaranteed.

Also… the advantage of a company is that you get to go home after work. Even if the “work” is what you love, you will get at some point bored and want to get away.

And yet another thing that crossed my mind, I find the idea of “nests” (Stranger in a Strange Land) much more appealing. You don’t need to live there (unless you want to), but you know there is a place that you belong to. Many places. Distributed community :smile:

And last but not least,

Definitely, and virtual community should use all available comms, text being an option, but mainly video conferences… that’s level up from convenient text-based anonimity. Say, if there was a weekly video chat just to see if it makes sense… :smile: Evening, like 8PM GMT, middle of the week, like thursday? Technology to be determined, google hangaout I used in the past and it worked. Or join.me, or… something?

M.

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The reason I think we don’t have to plan all the politics in detail before starting is:
I think we can get away with only a few general abstract ideas/‘rules’ to start with. As long as everyone is on roughly the same ‘wavelength’. People can quickly get a decent idea about the type of community just by reading a bit about it and/or chatting to a member. Small groups like this can easily function efficiently with anarchy/do-ocracy.

Deciding everything in detail will take a lot of time/energy, so if it doesn’t need to be done yet, we should use the time on other things.
I imagine the need for more detailed rules/political systems will only start to arise when the community starts to grow larger (at least greater than 10?). I also suspect that it may be a bad idea to make too many decisions about politics before they are really needed. I think we should be flexible about things and work things out by trial and error. I’d be against setting anything in stone (well, probably setting ‘Be excellent to each other’ in stone would be OK (and maybe ‘One should not treat others in ways that one would not like to be treated.’)

Just because you live around the people you ‘work’ with doesn’t mean you can’t take breaks from work. Go for a walk alone. Go out and socialise with other groups. Have a boardgame/movie night. Sit in your box alone. etc. Even in the ‘normal’ world, where the home box is usually separated from the work box by a few miles air gap, many people still have trouble separating and escaping ‘work’ stuff.

Yeah. I was gonna suggest that for the fractals (can I call them/you/us the fractals? heh). If people don’t feel the desire to do it on a regular basis we should at least do a one off. (In my experience Google hangouts is the best tech for this)

I like that. Calling us “fractals” does sound stylish and cute at the same time! :blush:

And yes, let’s do Google Hangouts, unless someone comes up with a good alternative. Best time for me would be Saturday, but other days are acceptable, too. What are your preferences?

Nobody called me a fractal before :wink: But that’s what we are, one way of looking at us. So no problem :smile:

Day: Saturday is ok. I can’t do Mondays and Wednesdays, and generally prefer evenings.

So, Saturdays seem to be ok. Now we still need to find a specific time. What about Google Hangouts at 18:00 GMT?

feature from vox.com

I don’t really think community living is a matter of productivity or creativity but that of love, understanding, conflict, exposure to different cultures and personalities and personal growth. I can’t imagine a future where this kind of living isn’t more common.

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That seems to be an interesting trend. It reminds me of the Hypercube @ SOHOland project, see

To me personally, productivity and creativity are quite important. Your other points

sound more like a crazy adventure. Sure, crazy adventures are awesome, but I’m not sure I’d want them every day. Perhaps I’m still too cautiious about such things, because I still suffer from complicated health issues. Being able to live in my own reality, and eat my own food are kinda important to me. I see the need to become more outgoing and adventurous, but I still live with the fear that this will end in a total catastrophe. It’s easier to survive a constant moderate catastrophe than a single total catastrophe.

If we somehow manage to find a way to live together, we might well do it in style. Creating our own living spaces might be a very fun project, indeed with the many possibilities already available:

And what about 3d printing houses? That should become kinda affordable in a not too distant future.

Edit (2015-12-10): Perhaps it might be possible to 3d print houses with a really interesting architecture like this one:

https://vimeo.com/143852024

But then, with 3d printing, there are almost no limits to artistic creativity. No matter if it’s about architecture, product design, or anything else.

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I skimmed the following article about new forms of organizations:

Reminds me of

What do you think?

Wow, amazing way of looking at it and way of saying it.[quote=“Radivis, post:14, topic:547”]
Where’s the border between an “evil” and a “non-evil” government?
[/quote]
Choice / consent at each and every stage. This renders people non-evil.
Permission needed, transparency instant and people can come out of contracts / stop services as quick as signing up for them. We’ll soon see who operates the world.

###Growing food is definitely problematic, but not impossible (some experience too)
For sure food is a problem with current habits. The triangulation of land, laws, cost (or any other things that stop people having / using land) means finding someone or some place to quietly do our own thing. It is possible to live on vegetables and perhaps have a few animals that give other values / materials. I’m testing this currently. So far I have enough and jarred a lot. Jam, food ready for putting with an egg, pickled, puree, what you can convert to long term… Onions could be the base of a lot of dinners. Onion soup though I mix with other stuff but you get the idea. Oats are still cheap, apples raining down for those that can collect or have trees, really lots also puree or keep for the whole of winter… Just finishing the last crate of apples.

###Population = Pressure
People would have to accept population decrease and overall service decrease to be able to lessen the grip or pressure (at least in my mind). It all needs to allow people space to think without too many voices and existing equations by allowing / focusing on existing people and manageability, and not paying people (incentive) to have more babies. People living unhealthy or beyond the collective means can be help a lot.

##Living it
I can say I’ve been living somewhat on buying minimally. Having some land to use is essential of course. Neighbourhood has a local cow which gives ample milk (needs milking a few times a day whether you like it or not!), vegetables (from own greenhouse) even in one year you avoid buying from shop but need to water it almost every evening (25mins).

###what worked
Growing Brocolli / tomatoes / peppers / beans - all kept me going and still is… bread of course too but that’s not so local… I plan for more myself this year (needs bulk-buy ingredients and wood to bake).
A 2 x 3 greenhouse I think one person can manage quite well, need initial planting but after isn’t and not much weeding etc. Seems absolutely amazing. I am eating the whole parts of plants (bits that can be boiled, chopped / shredding) so traditionally I think many throw all that away (no idea why!)
###Local meat source
Rabbits, chicken, pork, geese almost all locally - though some not locally and it’s beyond me to calculate right now or say if it can work without this. Grandmas are great work-horses, more die-hards fixed in their skill needed - they do around here animals, cakes, goose feathers for duvets, a whole heep of stuff before I’ve opened my eyes. Taking care of children too. But I wonder if the generations will be so focused like them or want to and rather pass on responsibility. I’m trying anyway and I know I’m using the existed advances (based on debt in mind) to find these ways. Pallets for example as a supplement to heating / burning… you know collecting all these things and minimising spend until things become clearer.

To work the old way isn’t great but to populate with a type of borrowing / debt-based calculation means false growth and eventually death in many ways anyway. I like the idea of working and dying leaving something clear and not saving everyone with flawed foundations of technology, for-mass-profit skills, company’s in the mix etc… Suicide seems really respectable as a way of solving all this and make the change as of… now. Not suggesting anyone does it but I can see why the previous stuff before us force us to ultimately choose.

Passing by Czech Republic? It’s getting warmer now… and we could try what you like outside - any ideas what you would do? (theory is ok for now). Greenhouse is up so is the natural house, heater, cover & cooking fire sorted… what else should I build even if you don’t come? (question open to all) check webpage +check sidebar for projects.

I’m getting personally getting too stuck to the screen by all the info and data (downloading) so would be good to manage someone (a little) instead. I think I have a nice enough place to live and work a bit and focus IRL (sounds good?) Even a week test - why not. About money - Everything is cheap here and I think I could cover 1 or 2 people if they needed. Place to stay in nature and everything all sorted. People pay big bucks for that… check webpage +check sidebar for more info.

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some discussion on EdgeRyders site from 2 years ago that is relevant:

https://edgeryders.eu/en/blog/the-unmonastery-admits-the-first-unmonasterians-and-is-accepting-new-ones

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We are doing this. Soon. This year. I’ve decided. Be there or be square.

I know now that it will work. (it’s easier than you think)

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