The MetaCurrency Project

You thought money was real... It's just a game!
So why not having our own?


The MetaCurrency Project from alan rosenblith on Vimeo.

Visit the MetaCurrency Project

By AllOfUs

The Discovery Network Back Office Catalog

A new component was added to the Discovery Network concept, the The Back Office Catalog. To participate, go to the FORUM.  

Click to open document 

Visit Multitude Innovation

By AllOfUs

The Wind of Change

Listen to The Wind of Change, narrated by Tibi

See the section The Balance of Power

By AllOfUs

Economic systems thinking (About the New Economy)

A Presentation by Chris Cook, Glasgow

Economic systems thinking_23_07_10

View more presentations from ChrisJCook.

Clay Shirky - Hierarchy & Leadership

"Many of the relative advantages of hierarchy are now reduced." 

The informational advantage of hierarchies is reduced. 

Institutions have lost their monopoly on tight management of information and thigh coordination of action. Now large distributed groups can share information and coordinate through social networking. 

This increases individual power and group power! This is the Multitude social movement!

By AllOfUs

Clay Shirky: Institutions vs. collaboration

Important concept

• coordination costs. 
• power law distribution, 80-20 curve, or long-tail distribution. 

The classic answer to getting a group to do something was the institution (centralized organization based on power relations). Today, the costs of communication, which is fundamental for coordination, has fallen. It is now possible to put the coordination into the infrastructure and to reduce the need for planning.  

The institution asks for:

• explicit goals 
• management, 
• enforcement of goals (carrots and sticks) 
• structure (economic, legal, physical, etc) 
• exclusion (cannot higher anyone) --> professional class 

Collaboration infrastructure: moving the problem to the people instead of moving the people to the problem, shedding institutional costs, adding flexibility. Decentralization, openness, inclusiveness. 

Tension between the institution as an enabler and institution as an obstacle. "Many of the relative advantages of hierarchy are now reduced."

It's all abut value! Open collaborative networks are mostly value-based organizations, and are increasingly replacing institutions (power-based organizations) on different arenas. 

By AllOfUs

New Tactics in Human Rights

The Multitude answer to tyranny!

Visit the Balance of Power

By AllOfUs

What is Ushahidi?

The Multitude answer to crisis management

Visit the Balance of Power

By AllOfUs

Rachel Botsman: The case for collaborative consumption

The Multitude Social Movement seen from the consumption point of view.

Visit Economical Alternatives

By AllOfUs

Production & distribution of agricultural products

Source of this photo

At the core of a healthy economical system resides the relationship between producers and consumers. In a large economy deprived of efficient communication systems a third entity appears between the producer and the consumer, the distributor. In this context, the producer is disconnected from the beneficiaries of its products, and the distributor bridges this gap, not only by establishing a distribution channel, offering producers access to a market, to a group of consumers, but also by giving feedback to producers about market demands. History shows that in almost all such systems the power of the distributor increases in excessive proportions, to become a nuisance for the overall economy.


The distributor controls the flow of goods for a profit. There are different ways to increase profits:

• Increasing efficiency
• Increase the flow by
• inciting consumers to buy more
• increasing the market by adding more consumers
• diversification
• etc. 
• Force the producer to sell at lower costs

The best example is the Wal-Mart network, which is rightfully criticized for chocking producers and for spreading consumerism.

In a healthy economy the financier and the distributor have secondary roles. They are service providers between producers and consumers, they MUST NOT control/rule the economy. Economy is about production and exchange of value. If too much power is granted to distributors and financiers they will inevitably suffocate production forces and reduce society to agents of consumption. Evidence of the second effect lies within official reports that talk about consumers and tax-payers instead of citizens.

The multitude movement restores the role of the producer. This is a natural process as the new technology becomes ubiquitous. It is possible now for the producer to maintain direct relations with the consumers. The role of the distributor within the exchange mechanism is greatly reduced. We are heading toward a more healthy economy!

Visit Economical Alternatives See The Food Basket

By AllOfUs