[Open Design + Hardware] Infrastructuring the Commons

Fri Nov 8 09:22:17 UTC 2013

Hey Cindy,

thanks for your notes! Was good to read them,

Attila in Budapest

On Fri, Nov 8, 2013 at 8:01 AM, Kohtala Cindy <cindy.kohtala at aalto.fi>
wrote:

> Hi all, 
> I attended such an interesting seminar yesterday in our university: 
> Infrastructuring the Commons, organized by ARKI research group in MediaLab (Aalto Uni). 
> See 
> co-p2p.mlog.taik.fi/2013/10/07/charlotte-hess-on-crafting-new-commons/
> and 
> www.facebook.com/events/169643733237618
> It was livestreamed so presumably the webcast should be available - though I can't find the link now on Bambuser. (If you're interested, remind me later and I'll check it.) 
> If I had thought of it earlier I could have posted the livestream link. Next time!
>  
> I finally met Anna Seravalli there too after all these email exchanges! Hope you had a pleasant trip back to Mälmö, Anna! 
> There were a few things that I found important to remember - things I think we all know but sometimes they seem to get lost in the discussion - in our need to promote certain values that are marginalized in the dominant paradigm. 
> In our workshop session on Cultural Commons, for example, we were discussing the keywords OPEN and COMMONS - and I was reminded that 'open' is more complex and nuanced than just always open for everyone all the time. Open for whom and when? P2P communities are still opt-in communities, members make a conscious choice to join, and we don't ALWAYS need to lower the threshold for entry. 
> Tied in with that was the point a friend keeps emphasizing to me - that participatory processes do not need to mean that professional judgment, robust evaluation and quality need to go out the window.  
> Finally, also in our workshop session, we were talking about the differences between two significant types of commons as described by Charlotte Hess in her presentation: 
> Global Commons (natural resources) 		Knowledge Commons
> -depletable								-generative, regenerative
> --> scarcity								--> abundance
> … and because we were especially talking about material culture related issues, Erling asked if we can actually consider a practice as contributing to a 'cultural commons' or knowledge commons if it clearly threatens environmental sustainability and the 'global commons'.
> Food for thought for the weekend. 
> Cheers
> Cindy in Helsinki 
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