Blogs

I was talking with a friend of mine earlier in a coffeeshop. Outside the coffeeshop in fact, while he smoked, cars drove by lazily and a little recklessly, and the shop played Charlie Parker lightly overhead.

We started talking about direct action in relation to a book coming out from a very interesting anarchist anthropologist named Graeber.

I'm not going to talk about him though, I'm about to pass out for the night and I just wanted to record something sort of peculiar.

It seems that the most effective radical political actions have a major component of direct action that is then legitimized by the existing power structure to some degree. That this is the means of actually "moving" things.

Virtue in peer production (3): P2P and the social doctrine of the Catholic Church

P2P, or peer-to-peer, production and distribution is exactly what it sounds like- cooperating and sharing content among peers directly, without the mediation of a central apparatus (like a central server). It's currently most well known for P2P distribution systems like BitTorrent and direct content production systems like Wikipedia.

They're pretty much one of the most amazing things around these days, and every aspect of their functioning draws out radical implications.

Anyway, I'm too sleepy to be be very smart about this on my own, but let me paste the section of the entry I linked above just to give y'all an idea of what sort of thing is going on these days:

Austin Energy Electric Vehicle Conversion Rebate

Very cool. Austin Energy will give you money to convert your car to electric.

I really look forward to the day when Austin has a nice, smoothly integrated transportation grid, based primarily in public transit, pedestrian-friendly density, and bike/scooter transportation. But there will always be cars, and cars fueled off of West Texas wind turbines and homegrown solar power ain't so bad.

Also, there are rebates available for purchase of all-electric bikes, scooters and motorcycles, from between $100-$500. Check em out.

City Rebates for Electric Bikes and Vehicles

Since the big telecom companies seem deadset on smothering the utterly sane concept of municipal wireless in its crib, I decided to post a few links on building very cheap wireless antennae and suggestions of where you might point them to in Austin. Don't download anything big unless the place is closed, because you'll get it shut down.

Municipal wireless is the elegant and inspired proposition to provide broadband wireless internet for an entire metropolitan region as a public utility, paid for out of tax revenues. Oh god, more taxes! Some say. But back when Philadelphia was seriously considering it, before it got mangled into a corporate boondoggle, the cost estimate per person would have been $6 per person for the first year and $1-1.50 per person EVERY YEAR AFTER for maintenance. So instead of paying $50 a month, $6 the first YEAR and $1 afterwards.

Berkeley Public Library Tool Lending Library

I just wanted to post a link about this program offered by the Berkeley Public Library system. It's also offered by the libraries of Oakland and San Francisco. You can check out tools of all types (from hammers to cement mixers) with a valid library card and proof of residence. Amazing. I personally think this sort of program would be very popular in the Austin area as well.

Another great example of a tool library is the independent nonprofit Atlanta Tool Bank, which loans out tools to community groups for repairing homes and civic buildings, building theaters and play sets, etc. They live by donation, so check 'em out.

Kiva

Kiva is a remarkable application of the peer-to-peer possibilities of the internet. If you've paid attention to the Democratic presidential primaries this season or the last, you know that the big shift in campaign financing is the enormous about of money raised from small donors via the internet. That technique allowed Howard Dean to threaten the party establishment a little last time around, and it has allowed Barack Obama to wage an unprecedented campaign against a candidate considered a sure bet in the early days of the race.

Earth's Clouds Alive with Bacteria

Long story short, bacteria in the atmosphere act as special particles for the formation of ice crystals that lead to clouds. Unlike other particles, the bacteria raise the temperature at which those ice crystals can form. Meaning they can make clouds when it's otherwise too warm, essentially.

I'm really impressed with this sort of thing. If you've ever read the work of the brilliant microbiologist Lynn Margulis, you've learned that the living world as we know it is pretty much conditioned by the kingdom Monera, which functions as a giant, hyper-evolving sort of superorganism because of its enormous rate of gene transfer.

Just thought I'd write a rough list of current projects focused in America organized along anarchist lines, either deliberately or by, I don't know what you'd call it, convergent evolution? This isn't meant to be exclusionary, so add on or critique this list as much as you want.

*Wikipedia
*P2P filesharing in general
*Food Not Bombs
*Food Not Lawns
*Yellow Bike Project
*Critical Mass
*Permaculture
*IWW
*Urban/guerrilla gardening
*Micropower and/or cooperative radio stations
*Ithaca Health Fund
*ACT UP
*Copwatch
*Anti-Racist Action
*Earth First!
*Infoshops and collective bookstores
*Freeschools and skillshares
*Cooperatives

Getting Connected: Why sharing electrons, local produce and Radiohead makes for better communities.

Kevin Phillips has a great piece in the current Harpers about how the economy is much shakier than is painted by official stats. Essentially, they've been tweaking the meaning of the Consumer Price Index, unemployment, etc. for decades, and if we used the older standards our rates wold be far more worrisome. Our unemployment rates would be close to those in Europe, etc.

Here's a telling line:
'"All in all," Williams points out, "if you were to peel back changes that were made in the CPI going back to the Carter years, you'd see that the CPI would now be 3.5 percent to 4 percent higher"—meaning that, because of lost CPI increases, Social Security checks would be 70 percent greater than they currently are.'