The Ingenesist Project

The Next Economic Paradigm

Author: Admin Page 4 of 23

Future Of Money Part 2

By

On November 27, 2014

In General Information

In 1801, Eli Whitney went before the US Congress with 10 working muskets. He proceeded to disassemble each of them, mix and scramble all the parts, then reassemble 10 muskets – all of them worked.  Prior to that day, most things were custom made by craftsmen using hand tools. Then, in a flash of geological time, the idea of interchangeable parts was released to the world – it would be impossible to put the idea back in its cage. Extraordinary levels of innovation followed as the industrial revolution was born.

In the murky world of crypto-currencies, the financial instruments of tomorrow may not necessarily be assembled like they are today. The new applications of decentralized currency are modeled more like “energy” flows rather than individual units of account. Energy exists in many forms such as electrical energy, chemical energy, thermodynamic energy, kinetic energy, nuclear energy, etc., but the objective is always the same, to move something in the physical world – to create change. The value of crypto-currency is proportional to the magnitude of change it can induce.

Future Of Money Part 2

A generalized theory is emerging to define and specify decentralized applications (DApps). This makes them easier to identify, measure, and replicate. If ignored, these innovations have the potential to be extremely disruptive to the insurance industry. If adapted, they can greatly increase the efficiency, variety, precision, and granularity for insurance products of tomorrow.

Not unlike the dawn of the industrial revolution, there is an extraordinary level of innovation in crypto-currencies since the inception of Bitcoin. The objective of these efforts is to move something in computational space such as flipping a switch, verifying a data set, securing identity, establishing order, establishing ownership, verifying capacity, etc.   This may seem somewhat obscure until you realize that these “energies” can convert and combine in immeasurable combinations to form autonomous logic circuits – i.e. complex contracts.

Since all businesses are based on contracts that act upon some physical space, it is only a matter of time before crypto-contracts jump to the physical space as well. As David Johnson, CEO of DApps Fund (a venture capital firm for decentralized innovation) says; “Everything that can be decentralized will be decentralized”. Eli Whitney was said to have uttered similar sentiments.

The early manifestations of this phenomenon are called Decentralized Application (DApps); these are little computational engines that operate autonomously and whose output is determined by an algorithm. The resulting decisions are binary and final. There are three characteristics that an application must have in order to be classified as a DApps. As you read these conditions, note how different they are from a traditional corporate structure.

  1. The application must be completely open-source, it must operate Autonomously, with no entity controlling the majority of its tokens, and its data and records of operation must be cryptographically stored in a public, decentralized block chain.
  2. The application must generate tokens according to a standard algorithm or set of criteria. These tokens must be necessary for the use of the application and any contribution from users should be rewarded by payment in the application’s tokens.
  3. The application may adapt its protocol in response to proposed improvements and market feedback but all changes must be decided by majority consensus of its users.

Next, there are three classes of Decentralized Applications that align loosely to a familiar computer analogy:

  • A Type I DApp is analogous to a computer operating system such as Windows or the Mac OS X, etc.
  • A Type II DApp is analogous to a general-purpose software program such as Word, Excel, or iPhoto.
  • A Type III DApp is analogous to a specialized software solution like a mail merge, or an expense macro, or a blogging platform.

As such, we can expect that there will be a fewest type I DApps, more type II DApps and even more type III DApps.

The more direct definition of these three classes is as follows: 

  • Type I decentralized applications has its own block chain. Bitcoin is the most famous example of a type I decentralized application but there are others. 
  • Type II decentralized applications use the block chain of a type I decentralized application. Type II decentralized applications are protocols and have tokens that are necessary for their function. 
  • Type III decentralized applications use the protocol of a type II decentralized application. For example: A hypothetical Cloud Protocol that uses a type II DApp to issue ‘cloudcoins’ that can be used to buy cloud computing services would be an example of a type III decentralized application.

Taken together we have most, if not all, of the familiar components of governance and interdependencies without the layers of management that are associated with traditional corporations. As you absorb the analogy and definitions, consider how DApps can be nested, combined, and integrated with other DApps to emulate complex contracts.

One particularly interesting DApp that recently launched is called Counterparty . Counterparty is a Type II DApp that performs one single task extremely well.

Counterparty is a betting platform; or we can put it politely and call it an escrow platform. Two parties may enter into an agreement about the outcome of a future event such as a horse race or football game. Each player puts his or her money into an escrow account that is sealed prior to the race. After the results are registered, the DApp autonomously transfers the money from the combined account to the winner.

Now imagine 500 bettors putting their money into the escrow account prior to the contract event. Upon completion of the event, the money is automatically assigned by algorithm to the winners in pre-assigned proportions. It does not take too much imagination to see this as an insurance product, except without agents, executives, managers, office towers or cute little geckos.

Soon, marathon runners can pool health insurance more towards sprains and falls, and less toward heart disease. Mini-van moms can pool auto insurance for number of passengers rather than miles driven. Professionals can pool E&O insurance by peer review. In fact, any affinity group can accurately price the perils that they are also most capable to manage.  DApps are massively scalable; one application can serve infinite users.

The market size of binary betting (sports, insurance, coin toss, etc.) combined with complex betting (contracts for difference, hedging, options, etc.) is in the trillions of dollars. So while Counterparty has only one use case, the use case is massive.  Now imagine 100,000 DApps operating autonomously, combining and integrating into complex relationships – not unlike building a jigsaw puzzle.

There was once a time when craftsmen guilds were the most powerful organization in the republic. Many of us remember the days when labor was increasingly replaced by machinery. The time may be arriving where machinery can also replace management. The insurance industry must become familiar with this environment and have the wherewithal to reorganize itself, before someone else does it for them.

***

Come Join us At The Future of Money and Technology Summit in San Francisco, December 2, 2014 for my panel discussion on Fueling the Decentralization Movement.

Speakers:

Paige Peterson – Maidsafe

Sam Onat Yilmaz – Dapps Fund

Joel Dietz – Swarm.co

Christian Peel – Ethereum

Moderator: Dan Robles, The Ingenesist Project

Share this:

Future Of Money – Not What You Think

By

On November 23, 2014

In General Information

Never underestimate the ability of the human species to adapt to changes in its environment.

All humans are engineers. If there is too much friction in a system, they will fix it, or they will replace it. When banks add overdraft penalties, incur service fees, constrain capital, restrict mobility or compromise the public trust in any way, all those engineers will make a “correction.” Money, after all, is a social agreement.

Today, young people are encountering a financial game that they cannot win playing by the rules that are presented to them. The result should surprise no one – they will either not play the game, or they will change the rules. In fact, innovation in banking is happening at an astonishing rate; unfortunately, bankers are not necessarily doing it.

Because banking touches every part of our lives, so, too, will any innovation that occurs in the domain of banking.

Look at Bitcoin. It is more than just a cute new social app like Facebook or Twitter – it is a new idea called decentralization. If it is possible to decentralize banking, it would also be possible to decentralize everything; insurance, engineering, education, production (i.e., corporations), education, legislation and even governance. Nothing is immune from the next wave of Internet innovation that is bearing down — and right now, not tomorrow.

Because this is an insurance audience, allow me to mention that, the easiest (technically) and likely the first big innovation that will arise from the decentralization movement will be decentralization of insurance. With the advent of smart contract platforms such as Ethereum and Ripple Labs, people can form their own risk-sharing pools to cover a whole suite of perils now in the domain of insurance. (For the lawyers and politicians out there, it is also nearly trivial to set up voting, escrow, contract enforcement, etc., via the sort of block chain protocol that is the basis for Bitcoin.)

Last year, I published an article called “What if everyone was a BitCoin”? The core idea was that there are several problems with Bitcoin:

  • Concentration of wealth is worse than the dollar.
  • The proof of work that creates coin is trivial except for the fact that it is difficult.
  • The valuation was speculative.

Future Of Money – Not What You Think

Today, there are hundreds of companies forming, and being funded in the millions of dollars, that are investing in innovations that would create thousands, if not millions, of alt-coins with characteristics of Bitcoin, except iterated without the impracticalities of Bitcoin.

For example, MaidSafe was able to introduce a currency called Safecoin that provides a way to take unused computational capacity that members are willing to contribute and build a decentralized server network. This network encrypts data flowing through it, creating a secure and anonymous Internet. What happens to big data when people stop sharing the streams of information available on today’s Internet?

Further, innovations such as Curiosumé (by this author) could have wide-ranging implications on everything from education to corporate HR and factors of production – Curiosumé is an open-source development project designed to replace the resume as a means for describing one’s interests, skills and abilities; the tag line is, “Because the resume must die.”

Swarm.co allows individuals to invest time and money in decentralized innovations without banks, insurance, corporations, etc. A new generation of venture capitalists such as DApps Fund is already funding new startups in crypto-currencies and demonstrating high convertibility and liquidity.

Every month, thousands of people are coming together at Meet-up  (itself an earlier social innovation) to learn, teach and collaborate on open-source platforms such as Ethereum, Bitcoin, Ripple and many others. Every day, with each article warning of the dangers of Bitcoin, there is another article of an ex-CEO banker coming out strongly in favor of the financial innovation in the crypto space. What is certain is that every impression placed on the public regarding these new technologies is bad for the status quo for banking and insurance.

Resistance predictably comes from the public voice of banks and governments, which have the most invested in the way things are. This is not to say that they are bad and wrong, just that they have the greatest infrastructure in place to support the existing system. Changing their minds is like pushing electric cars against the tide of Big Oil; lines have been drawn in concrete.

What we are seeing is not a “revolution” with a central army in a field of battle; there is simply a natural progression happening fueled by rational efficiency and nothing else. But change is inevitable.

As with previous financial innovations, my guess is that some trader may discover that the true risk associated with a particular crypto-asset is less than what the risk-adjusted market valuation indicates it is. Then, a financial instrument will be developed to exploit the risk-arbitrage. Some readers may recall the saga of Michael Milken, who correctly observed that companies with low credit scores were in some cases less likely to fail than their risk valuations indicated. This led to the creation of junk bonds and, ultimately, the idea that risk valuations can be skirted. To Milken’s credit, the assumption held until greed set in (which is not the fault of the asset).

I believe something similar may or must happen in finance to spawn internal innovation. For example: the insurance industry does not necessarily care about risk per se; the industry cares mostly that the risk is priced correctly. Soon, the insurance industry may realize that the risk of assets backed in crypto-currencies is lessened because of increased liquidity, fewer restrictions and regulations and rapid convertibility and because they are underwritten by better fundamental assets than the dollar. The industry will develop financial instruments that exploit this risk arbitrage and profit considerably.

But if the insurance company does not innovate in this future form of value, then people will build their own instruments. These new ideas and the technologies will enables millions of entrepreneurs and billions of engineers to print their own money one social agreement at a time. My advice to the insurance industry is to get in, help out and adapt before your customers leave you behind.

(Editors note: You are invited to join the author at The Future of Money and Technology Summit in San Francisco, Dec. 2, 2014, for his panel: Everything that Can Be Decentralized Will Be Decentralized.

The description is:

Much of our society today is based on centralized organizations that allocate our land, labor and money to create the things that we need. Today, we have an opportunity to specify and design any number of decentralized applications that also can produce all the things that society needs — except with stunning efficiency. This is a conversation about what is not only possible but is becoming increasingly probable. This group of speakers represent innovations that decentralize: data, venture capital, productivity, currency, contracts and knowledge — and that’s just the beginning.

The speakers are:

Paige Peterson – Maidsafe

Sam Onat Yilmaz – DApps Fund

Joel Dietz – Swarm.co

Christian Peel – Ethereum

Moderator: Dan Robles, The Ingenesist Project)

Share this:

Proof of Work vs Proof of Performance

By

On October 25, 2014

In General Information

Proof-of-work (PoW) is a cryptographic technique introduced to a transaction which solves problems of fairness or abuse.  For example, a PoW would require a computer program to solve a simple puzzle before it can pass an email from sender to a receiver.  Someone who sends spam emails would be burdened with an computational costs greater than the possible benefit of sending spam.  A legitimate email from a single sender to a small packet of recipients would pass easily.

Proof-of-performance (PoP) refers to a condition where two parties enter into an agreement and a third party judges whether the conditions of the agreement are met.  Like an escrow account, the buyer puts the money into an account and the seller puts the title into an account.  If the conditions of the contract are met, a judge (adjudicator) flips the switch that completes the transfer.  If conditions are not met, the switch returns the money to the buyer and the title to the seller.

Proof of Work vs Proof of Performance

PoW and PoP are substantially different in many important ways.  For example, for POW the adjudicator is a computer program.  For PoP, the adjudicator is a person.  Ideally, the PoW is perfectly unbiased and cannot be corrupted for personal gain.  The PoP however, resembles the business model of most Brokers who can be biased, if not corruptible for individual gain.  Herein lies the promise of crypto currencies and so-called smart contracts that can be executed by computational algorithm rather than untrusted human agents.

On the other hand, PoW and PoP are conceptually similar is some ways as well.  In the Bitcoin protocol, for example, completing a PoW results in the issuance of a new coin.  Similarly PoP adjudicator is payed a fee or commission for validating the conditions of a contract.  The mother of all PoPs happens in the Banking System which literally issues new dollars into existence in the form of debt as a consequence of an adjudicated contract between a buyer and seller.

While the puzzles and context may differ, the consequence is the same – money is conjured into existence as a result of a humanly intensional transaction.  There really is nothing, except perhaps the deep training of an oppressed population, that says that a decentralized POP adjudicated by qualified and unbiased persona (disaggregated from the transaction) could not also result in the creation of new money.  This is exactly what Curiosumé proposes can be accomplished.

In the prior post; The Conjuring of Intangible Values,  The tangible value of a bridge connecting two cities and the intangible value of that same bridge are vastly different quantities.  Likewise, the tangible value of Bitcoin and the intangible value of Bitcoin are also vastly different different values for the same reason as the bridge between two cities.  If PoW = PoP could be assimilated in a single currency, we could build an economy whose currency is underwritten by the intangible value of infrastructure.

Ultimately, our planet would be the apex of infrastructure preservation, i.e., Humanity’s New Central Bank.

Share this:

The Conjuring of Intangible Values

By

On October 22, 2014

In General Information

My prior post “The Tale of Two Cities” demonstrates that the intangible social value conjured into existence by the bridge that connects two fair cities far exceeds the ‘tangible’ value of that bridge.  Yet, only the tangible value of the bridge is accounted for on a balance sheet such as GDP.

The Conjuring of Intangible Values

This may seem trivial until you observe that people are paid for their intangible assets (knowledge, creativity, and engineering calculations) as a percentage of the far lower number while the bankers, government, and corporate interests compensate themselves as a percentage of the far higher number.  The difference appears to be unaccounted for.

The Tail of Two Cities article concludes that the value that is conjured into existence by both the bridge and the fractional reserve system must be equal, by definition; otherwise the metaphorical breezeway that connects the two worlds would fall.

Bitcoin suffers from a similar curse as The Tail of Two Cities.  The prevailing argument against the crypto-currency is that it has no intrinsic value.  I have personally argued that a currency must represent human productivity intrinsically or else no other human would be willing to work (be productive) in exchange for it.  An article by Paul Bohm “The Value Of Bitcoin is Decentralization” makes a good point that the intrinsic value of Bitcoin is based on the value conjured into existence by increased productivity to society by what can be accomplished with Bitcoin that otherwise would be impossible without Bitcoin.

So if the valuation of a bridge crossing the river and the valuation of Bitcoin crossing the broker both suffer the same curse that there is no accounting system for intangibles, wouldn’t it make sense to solve that problem first  – i.e., measure into existence the intangible value of the Ingenesist – and then release those millions of human intentions (bridges and Crypto-currencies, not withstanding), into the system of trade?  This is the problem that Curiosumé proposes to resolve.

I believe that we first need to solve the under-mining problem that there is no accounting system for intangible assets.  Only then can there be intrinsic value in the conservation of those assets

… then maybe none of this would seem so mysterious.

Share this:

A Tale of Two Cities

By

On October 15, 2014

In General Information

Suppose two cities are separated by a river. Every day 100 people pile into a boat for the 1 hour journey to the other side two times per day. Crossing the river costs 200 person-hours per day. Then civil society decides to spend 1 million dollars to build a bridge to carry 10,000 people across the river every day in negligible travel time = 10,000 person-hours of productivity are added and redistributed to the communities every single day.

These people go on their merry way expressing themselves as intangible assets to create art, raise families, and transfer new ideas to enterprise according to classical Schumpeterian design.  They are doctors, nurses, and engineers.  They are teachers and students, collaborators and Capitalists.

If the bridge has a service life of 50 years, it will conjure into existence 178 million hours of human productivity. If the average income is 25 dollars per hour, a simple $1M bridge is amplified to a stunning 4.5 Billion “dollars” worth of productive community value. This value never appears on any accounting statement because market capitalism measures value into existence at the tail end, not at the palette. The economy is measured as the stuff that intangible entities (people) are told to produce, not what they actually want to produce.

This 4.5 Billion dollars is uncounted value that is expressed in fiat currency which, through the miracles of the fractional reserve, corporations, and a litany of exotic financial instruments also amplifies 1 million dollars of Real Value into billions of dollars of paper value.  In fact, the ONLY reason that the tangible financial system does not yet collapse is that it is being propped up by this “invisible” intangible asset value that never appears on any accounting statement.

Many new money theorists claim that 70 Trillion dollars in debt can never be paid back because the “interest” on that debt does not exist.  I believe it does exist, it must exist otherwise the system would collapse.  The real problem is that the debt exists in a form of uncounted currency.  All we need to do is measure intangible value into existence and trade it directly as a financial instrument – nothing will change and everything will change.

From Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities :

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”

Share this:

Introduction To Curiosumé

By

On September 13, 2014

In General Information

(Editors note:  We are publishing the documentation and tutorial for the Curiosumé application for review and comment)

Introduction To Curiosumé

Curiosumé is an open source specification for the analog-to-digital conversion of knowledge asset objects.  Designed as a system to replace the résumé as a means for describing the interests, skills, and abilities of people, things, and ideas —  it functions as a personal digital API for the trade and exchange of actionable knowledge.

Since semantic knowledge assets are machine-readable, they generate matches, proximity measurements, relevance and importance rankings, and predicted probabilities of various outcomes.  As such, the economics of “intangibles” becomes computable and meaningful.

By activating knowledge assets within an economic system, social entrepreneurs may readily trade and exchange intangible assets much as they do with tangible assets.   Curiosumé facilitates trade of intangibles through a unique distributed network of objects and assigned attributes.

  • Ownership of one’s Personal API
  • Anonymity until point of transaction
  • Deploying multiple personas
  • Combining multiple personae
  • Imaginary personae
  • Measuring proxies for economic output, matching, assessing, scenario testing
  • Anonymity and privacy

Use Cases:

The use cases for Curiosumé will be a numerous as the number of entrepreneurs who can articulate the protocol in a market.  Since Curiosumé eliminates “Competition” from the onset,  there is little or no economic incentive to lie, deceive, or cheat.  This allows the market an opportunity to defer vetting mechanisms to downstream applications that can compare (for example) a submitted persona against a control personal as a cryptographic key to unlock a transaction or block chain, etc.  In essence, making cheating too expensive to sustain.

  • Individuals may overlay their own persona on any dataset to visualize and discover adjacencies, paths, and connections.
  • Individuals may interact with the web using a Personal API
  • Protegé and Mentors may find each other in close proximity in community or within an organization.
  • People with special skills can find worthy and productive collaborations in communities or within the organization.
  • Trade in knowledge assets is facilitated through “anonymous until point of transaction” protocol.  People will provide better data knowing that they have complete control over their personal identities.
  • Build Social Currency; multiple personas may combine Curiosumés to establish the knowledge inventory for a team or to discover the probability that a group of friends may produce any mutual affinity efficiently together.
  • Any product or service may be described in Curiosumé format and compared to a community listing to discover customers, partners, and employees.
  • Curiosume data is pre-normalized allowing any user to make predictive assessments about any collection of personas relative to a project, product, event, itinerary,  or interaction with any physical asset.
  • Cryptographic; a personal API may be used as a private key in unlocking smart contracts on the block chain protocol
  • Toll Booth on Big Data; marketers, employers, or data aggregators would pay individuals for access to their persona.
  • Instead of advertising to a demographic, marketers may identify specific knowledge assets and may offset prices based on the social values or proclivities of the persona.
  • Economic development agencies can take a knowledge asset survey of a region to identify what institutions or industries they have a strategic advantage.  Or, they may retrain or import specific knowledge assets in order to grow into new industries – with great precision.
  • Philanthropic  institutions can assess need and impact prior to committing to directed giving by assembling strategic knowledge assets around a specific philanthropic goal.
  • Corporations may assess their ability to enter a develop a new products or enter a new market based on a Curiosumé survey
  • Competitors may assess the ability, and cost to defend against their competition disrupting a new product initiative.
  • Corporations can better tailor their products to what customers actually want to buy rather than trying to “market” what the company already knows how to produce.
  • Corporations can make hiring vs training decisions with better clarity based on a Curiosumé survey.
  • The college “degree” system may evolve in favor of boutique personas designed for innovation in an industry.
  • The financial industry (from the NYSE, Banks to VC) can determine the probability that a company may be able to execute a business plan given their Curiosumé survey
  • The Insurance industry can mitigate risk exposures by assuring that the right collection of knowledge assets are deployed to, say, a construction project.
Share this:

Time to Kill Social Media

By

On September 9, 2014

In General Information

Social Media is dying and it needs to be put out of its misery ASAP.  I have been in the social media space for many years and while much has happened, much has been lost.

There was a dream we all had in the earlier days that ‘user-generated content’ would evolve to ‘user-generated productivity’ and social priorities would change. The funny thing about economics is that nothing economic can happen until two or more people physically get together in time and space and make something valuable for each other.

I have seen this over and over in my own businesses. The Ingenesist Project (TIP) has global reach, high the engagement of important people, and a fair amount of notoriety – but after nearly 10 years, 500 blog posts, 60 videos and dozens of conference appearances, TIP has not generated a single penny of revenue.  But I’ve met hundreds of wonderful people many who have become close friends.

On the other hand, Coengineers is only a few years on and gets twice as many website views, we’ve toppled shady contractors, and publish an extensive catalog of engineering means and methods, and saved many shared asset communities from financial peril. But it is not until I physically walk into society and ask people face to face and ask “How can we help you?” that Coengineers generates revenue…. and, then we do generate revenue.  And I’ve met hundreds of people many of whom have become close friends.

Linkedin is worthless. Facebook is criminal. Google is downright creepy.

Again, nothing economic happens until two or more people get together in physical space and time to make something useful for each other. Yes, I know that software can be produced oceans apart, but what is that software about? It is always about something that happens in the physical space. It MUST eventually touch the ground somewhere in order to have an economic outcome to convert back downstream.  Big Data wants those relationships, they want them badly, they think that they should own them.  That is where the value is and Big Data wants to scale it.

ROI Rage

Nobody has ever been able to produce a reliable ROI on social media. It’s easy to get people to talk about something, but it is difficult to get people to buy something. Enter Big Data. According to Josh Sinell, VP at Merkle, “It’s [now] about determining what data we need to make something measurable and valuable happen, and then using that data to craft a strong offer, and delivering that offer when and where that customer is most ready to receive and act on it”.

The implications of this statement are horrific (“Shock and Awe” comes to mind). But we can also look at it as a business opportunity – marketers are willing to pay dearly for clean data from anyone who can harness it. So what if we the people could harness our own data and place a big yellow tollbooth on the Big Data Superhighway?

Turning out the lights 

Curiosumé creates a public key inventory of all the things that people need. Then you create your decentralized private key representing your relationships, which you control. By looking at either key, some global data may be attainable; mostly the the stuff that serves society in general. However, your personal data is encrypted until you – and only you – combine your private key with the public key, then the secrets within are revealed.   This would effectively shut the lights out on Big Data. If they want to see your data, they will need to pay you directly for it.

The famous prophet Mitt Romney once proclaimed, “Corporations are people, my friend” But little do many of us realize that people are corporations too. So go ahead, kill Social Media.  Society may simply reorganize into something else, the sooner the better in my opinion.

 

 

Share this:

The New Definition Of Social Capitalism

By

On July 22, 2014

In General Information

About 3 months ago, I received a cryptic email from what sounded like a war-weary Wikipedia Editor pinned down in the trenches by enemy cross-fire.  His message was stark;  Wikipedia will delete “Social Capitalism”, you are in the best position to save it”.

Since the dawn of Social Media, many people in the Social Capital domain, including myself, had been contributing references, material, ideas, and theoretical constructs to the doomed Wikipedia article in naive optimism that Social Capitalism may indeed be a new form of social organization.  So, upon receiving the desperate plea from the front lines of Wikipedia D-day, I jumped in and submitted argument after argument to an already formidable defense deploring the powerful Wikipedia Editors to preserve the article, the idea, the possibility…

But alas, we failed.  Perhaps we did not have proper academic credentials. Maybe we were not widely cited by important people. Our oppressors eventually provided a weak explanation related to social systems and economics, etc., but in retrospect, I think the real problem was that we were trying to define something that did not yet exist despite nearly 30 million Google search returns.

I have to admit that I agree with the Wikipedia editors. In reviewing that experience recently, I turned to the definition for “Capitalism (disambiguation)” in Wikipedia:

Wikipedia defines Capitalism as an “economic and social system in which the means of production are privately controlled”. 

Factors of Production (from classical economics) are presumed to be something like “land, labor, and capital”.  Now, consider that modern day factors of production are increasingly cited as: “Social Capital, Intellectual Capital, and Creative Capital” of people and their relationships.  After all, these are the assets that are deployed in order to produce the proverbial “basket of goods” upon which most global currencies are compared.  

This is not trivial. Since these modern factors of production exist between the ears of each individual person, they are, by definition “privately controlled” and readily exchanged for economic outcomes among people in social networks.

If the US Supreme Court agrees that corporations are people, then it is equally valid that people are corporations too. Taken together:

Social Capitalism refers to the economic and social system in which the means of production are social, creative, and intellectual assets.  

However, (and a big however), in order for Social Capitalism to become the dominant form of social organization, quite literally, society must reorganize itself to account for exchange and trade of intangibles. Then, all the decentralized innovations that we call the “Social Capital Domain” can integrate, unify, and dominate. Everything will change.

SEE: Reorganizing For The Era Of Social Capitalism

Perhaps then we’ll finally have a Wikipedia article for Social Capitalism like those clear, present, and magnificently organized warriors behind such economic facts as  Corporate Personhood.

 

Share this:

Reorganizing In The Era Of Social Capitalism

By

On July 8, 2014

In General Information

apitalism is evolving. Society needs to reorganize itself to trade “abundant intangibles instead of scarce tangibles”.  Then, all the decentralized innovations currently coming online can truly integrate.….and, everything will change.

Reorganizing In The Era Of Social Capitalism:

This 16 minute video describes a method for intangible assets to be made tangible in an accounting system for the purpose of storage, exchange, and creation of new value in communities.

The next step is to create a series of similar videos specifically tailored to each major industry in our economy specifying how Curiosumé would benefit them. That is described in the following document:

Video Proposal

We also seek to reach the community of entrepreneurs who will build the next generation of data visualization tools that will facilitate matching algorithms for communities.

Finally, we will introduce The Value Game and the WIKiD Tools Algorithm with which we may form a new cryptographic currency backed by abundant intangibles rather than scarce disposable tangible assets.

 That is Reorganizing In The Era Of Social Capitalism

Share this:

The Mother of All Hedge Funds

By

On May 9, 2014

In General Information

Money is supposed to represent human productivity; otherwise nobody would work for it (think about that for a second).

Today, money is created from future productivity in the form of debt;  when you take a loan, money is created out of thin air and posted as an asset on the banks ledger.  Unfortunately, the money required to pay interest is never created at all, which drives eternal scarcity.

What Happens Next:

Through the miracles of the fractional reserve system and high finance; money gets thrown into a blender where it is then divorced from the productivity of those who create it, and is converted to exotic financial instruments that bet for or against the future productivity of the future productivity of the future productivity, etc – in both Calculus and Finance, these are called derivatives.

Why does it still work?

So the question becomes; if money does not represent productivity, then why do people still work for it? Well, there is no other alternative to money as we know it.

Then came … and went … Bitcoin;

Bitcoin is all the rage because it behaved sort of like a currency – it had many of the desirable characteristics for the storage, exchange, and unit of account for value. But something about it didn’t sit right with society in general – most people aren’t willing to work in exchange for it.

Bitcoin has 3 fatal flaws:

  1. Bitcoin does not represent human productivity.
  2. The total available Bitcoins were highly concentrated among a very few people.
  3. Bitcoin are speculative in value.

Many words have been committed to these topics so I’ll leave a deeper understanding to the reader to research on their own.  However, we can now ask the question;

What if a virtual currency could be designed that does represent human productivity, is widely distributed among the users, and empowered by those who interact with it?

 

Consider an Engineering Backed Currency:

Let’s consider an engineering backed currency and the existing institution of the National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE)

 Condition 1: Engineering works increase human productivity in the form of roads, bridges, machinery, energy, clean water, sanitation, and generalized problem solving.  A currency backed by engineering would invariably be backed by human productivity thereby satisfying condition #1.

Condition 2:  Suppose that upon paying their 300 dollar dues to the National Society of Professional Engineers, the NSPE Knowledge Bank issues 3000 NSPE Bucks, a virtual currency, to the member so that any member can trade with any other member for the purposes of learning, teaching, and collaboration (don’t worry yet about the technical challenges of doing this).

If any member gets stuck on a project, or they need to understand new technologies, or are looking for complementary knowledge, they can compensate another engineer in the NSPE Technical Network using NSPE Bucks.  Young engineers can teach seniors about new tech, social media, hot mobile apps, and seniors can teach young engineers about nuances of engineering practice, etc., all in exchange for NSPE-Bucks.  NSPE bucks will become evenly distributed thereby satisfying condition #2.

 Condition 3: The NSPE Bucks act as a form of insurance.  If an engineer gets stuck on a project or needs a review of their work or intersects another discipline, they can get rapid and effective support across a vast network of knowledge assets in the profession.  An engineer may be empowered to interact with their peers and innovate in their careers knowing that the wisdom and experience of their peers is mutually accessible.  As such, condition number 3 is met.

Hold on to your seat – this last point will blow you away:

Innovation is the domain of engineering – the two words are synonymous.  People innovate today for the purpose of increasing productivity in the future.  Remember, debt is also a currency backed by future productivity.  Therefore, when you have two currencies that are backed by the EXACT same underlying asset, they are fully convertible on an open exchange.  So NSPE bucks can be easily converted back to dollars or simply traded broadly in a market.

The Mother of All Hedge Funds

As the dollar weakens in scarcity, the NSPE Buck will strengthen in abundance, value will be preserved in the works of engineering that are created. In fact, an engineering backed currency would hedge the dollar as it weaken in it’s ability to maintain infrastructure, build schools, solve climate problems, and provide for the safety health and welfare of people and property.

There is no shortage of work to do and there is no shortage of innovation – there is only a shortage of money.  If Banks can print money out of thin air, why can’t engineers?

 

 

 

 

Share this:

Shutting OFF The Lights On Big Data

By

On May 2, 2014

In General Information

Big Data, Bigger Data, Not Neutrality, Mega-Mergers, Election Deform – BIG (fill in the blank)  spells BIG trouble for LITTLE (rest of us).  We don’t stand a chance against the tsunami of surveillance that is barreling our way.  Big Data is becoming it’s own feedback loop and, like shoving a microphone into a stack of tweeters, the noise is deafening.

Nature tells us many things about how an organism responds to externalities.  For example, when a stand of trees encounters an insect infestation, they work in symbiosis with fungi and micro-organisms to amazingly communicate signals across distance and across species to develop compounds to arrest the attack.  Nature collaborates in magnificent ways with often astonishing results – survival of the collaborators.

The entire human organism is in this position today, we cannot attack our own do-loop without also attacking ourselves.  We must adapt a new one.   We must address the perils ahead by organizing ourselves in a radically different manner.  When threatened by inundation, we must also become fluid, mix with the tide, and change its composition from within.

The following presentation was delivered at Seattle University in April 2014.  This presentation demonstrates why – and most importantly –  how we need to re-visualize society, especially our own place in it.  We need to reorganize ourselves as a species to face these powerful new forces that ultimately threaten to smother the knowledge, creativity, and wisdom from our one and only planet.

Our objective with this video is to communicate to all other New Value Movement applications that there is a new form of organization that we can all adapt in order to integrate ourselves in collaboration outside of BIG Data.

Only 20 minutes – be prepared for a mind bender!

Share this:

What EVERY Engineer Must Know About Bitcoin

By

On April 24, 2014

In General Information

A bitcoin (lowercase b), as a currency, has several flaws that will continue to limit its ability to replace money as we know it.  There are millions of words published on the subject, so I’ll leave it to the reader to assess arguments on both sides.  However, Bitcoin (upper case B) as a “protocol” for the transfer of value is an extremely important innovation that engineers must not ignore.  

The opportunities for the profession are sweeping and vast, but only if they take action and build this ecosystem their selves – it is so powerful, that others will gladly do it for them.   I will try to explain this opportunity in this short 1125 word article, but please feel free to contact me with in-depth questions.

The Block Chain Protocol

The Bitcoin protocol is a brilliant innovation that cannot be un-invented – it is here to stay and it will appear in many forms long after it sheds the “bitcoin” moniker.   Formally called the Block Chain protocol,  Bitcoin was designed to solve an age old problem of double spending a currency, specifically, a virtual currency.   A currency created on a computer can be easily copied by a computer and thus negates the real productivity that a currency is supposed to represent.   The same is still true for money – paper currency is becoming increasingly complex so that it cannot be easily copied, etc.

Today, there are vast institutions from banks, corporations, a legal system, prison system, and unfathomable volumes of legislation (all imposing respective brokerage fees) acting on the behalf of sanctifying the dollar.  However, volatility in these very institutions is what threatens the value of the dollar and all currencies upon which the World depends for very basic needs.  How well is this working, really?

So, What’s the big deal?

The stakes are high.  To invent a new secure and resilient means to rapidly transmit value can in one fell swoop eliminate the friction of the massive institutions on our economy, while also decreasing the volatility and economic friction imposed on society.   This is the reason behind the media hype, congressional hearings, declarations of nations, billionaire press conferences, etc.  They are all scared to death of the disruptive potential of this little beast.  Unfortunately, bitcoin has fallen victim to many of the same deficiencies that it proposes to correct.  But these will likely be corrected in the next iterations.   

The Train Leaves The Station

The backbone of the Bitcoin protocol is called the Block Chain.  There are now hundreds if not thousands of Block Chains in existence independent of Bitcoin.  Consider the Block Chain like going down to the train station.  At some predetermined time, a train arrives and the doors open.  Everyone piles into the train and after a predetermined amount of time, the doors close.  The corollary is that the doors cannot be opened for a predetermined amount of time and no changes, copies, or corruption can take place within that time stamp, no matter what.  Only when the train reaches the next location, the doors will open. Once the doors close for a second time, they never open again and a new block is formed.  Also, there is no way to retract this process, except by repeating it forward in a reverse transaction.     

The protocol has a few more features that I’ll leave to the reader to research including a public ledger where all transactions are open for everyone to see; and the train gets infinitely long with each new opening.  The transactions are opened and sealed cryptograpically and incentives are in place that compensates exchanges (the station masters) and well as those who solve a cryptographic puzzle that creates and maintains the integrity of the public ledger (miners).  

Smart Contracts

Everyone knows that money and contracts are intimately related.  In fact, money is a contract.  A contract is defined as a meeting of the minds.  As such, where the Block Chain protocol can efficiently transmit “currency”, so too can it transmit contracts.  In fact, it is so effective for articulating contracts that it’s potential to do so far eclipses its ability to replace the existing fiat currencies.  But again, money and contracts are so closely related that even this becomes a grey area – both can exist within the Block Chain.  This is hugely significant.     

So what’s in it for the Engineering profession? 

There is a special type of contract that engineering societies such as the NSPE, ASME, IEEE, etc., should have a laser focus.  These are called Oracle Contracts; also known as adjudicated contracts, (except subject to scientific judgement rather than necessarily a judgement of law).  For example, a client would retain a contractor to build a structure or machinery.  They would deposit funds into an escrow account managed by “smart contract” in a block chain.  This means that the computer will flip the switches instead of an accountant, banker, or attorney.  At certain points in contract and “oracle” – a third party vetting mechanism – will verify that the conditions or performance of the agreement have been met, then they would flip a switch that releases the funds to the contractor or back to the client (or through a predetermined decision tree), depending on objective observation.  

It’s All About Efficiency

This is efficient for the contractor because they don’t have to worry about getting paid as long as they meet the conditions of the contract. The client does not need to worry about getting ripped off because they are assured that the conditions of their agreement will be met.  The system is efficient because high integrity is rewarded and there is little incentive to cheat which minimizes lawyers,  accountants, social dysfunction, and all manners of corruption in a public ledger that provides extraordinary analytics available for societal learning in the public domain. 

For the vast majority of projects, products, or policies in the United States and the world, a licensed professional engineer and related scientific bodies are the ONLY qualified Oracles that can be deployed to vet an astonishing variety of Smart Contracts.

Smart Contracts can be written for almost any transaction, but it is inherently an intangible transaction since a “meeting of the minds” is the true nature of the value that they articulate.  The implications of an abundant intangible economy vs. a scarce tangible economy are vast.  Silicon Valley is pumping millions of dollars into virtual currency start-ups like Ripple Labs while companies such as Ethereum  promise to make smart contracts on public ledger block chains as easy to build as dragging and dropping puzzle pieces into a web page.  This is here today – it is not a theory.

Banks, insurance companies, and attorneys will be the first to adopt smart contracts because they stand the most to lose by not doing so.  Meanwhile, engineers in the US and indeed the World are relegated to the contractor sweatshops or smothered under the weight of towering hierarchies. Tragedies such as the Oso landslide and global warming remind us of the absence of engineering oracles advocating for society and our planet.  It is imperative, now, that engineers embrace Block Chain Protocol Technologies and the deployment of Smart Contracts to elevate the profession to the top of the proverbial food chain before there someone else does it for them.       

Share this:

Operation Cosmic Dawn

By

On April 8, 2014

In General Information

Constellations Of Knowledge Assets:

The inspiration for this post comes from the April 2014 issue of National Geographic Magazine and the story of Cosmic Dawn; The Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA).  ALMA is a constellation of dozens of separate telescopes working together to cancel cosmic noise so that a clear and focused vision of the deepest darkness of space can emerge.   The clinical term is: Astronomical Interferometer Radio Telescope.  

The analogy to the emergent world of cryptography, alternate currencies, intangible asset valuation, and predictive innovation may not be clear at first glance, even to me.  However, I suspect that the lack of clarity may lie in with insurmountable noise surrounding these new social innovations.  It is simply impossible to see a clear path toward how all the pieces are supposed to fit together.  As a result, the solution to the human condition continues to evade humanity.

Maybe we are going about things incorrectly; instead of creating more noise, we should find ways to cancel out any specific frequency of noise at any given time. Even better, we should be able to “move the sliders” around to focus on a particular signal and separate the noise that surrounds it.

As the open source community continues to develop Curiosumé, we are faced with structural challenges related to how we would induce a completely decentralized community.  For example, Curiosumé could not exist on our servers because that would be too centralized; merely duplicating the function of corporations and government.  On the other hand, Curiosumé cannot simply exist on everyones mobile device, because the noise would amplify rather than be reduced.  Further, computational responsibilities for creating matches and visualizations of the data would be impossible; much like the current state.

There needs to be a way to cancel out the noise in the past in order to see the future.  Isn’t that what astronomic telescopes do?  They look into the past to seek clarity of the future.

We are trying to deploy Curiosumé as a WordPress Plug-in of sorts. As such, any WordPress site can become an aggregator of knowledge assets relative to the context of that site and its relative position to other “antennae”.

Each site would pass or filter curiosumé objects for itself, and for others interacting with it.  The resulting combination of sites would measure into existence a vision of a variety of past position, the corresponding dynamic present, and accelerative future of a community.

Therefore; we announce Operation Cosmic Dawn to help build this community knowledge array.  We are seeking developers from all over the world to add to this open source project.  The incentive for the global developer is to become an Aggregator Galaxy in the Constellation of Knowledge Assets.  In other words, you’ll be building your own Ark. 

 Images courtesy of National Geographic Magazine and Wikipedia.  Please buy the April 14 edition and read up on this amazing telescope project

 

 

Share this:

Community Organization On The Block Chain

By

On January 2, 2014

In General Information

The potential for articulating smart contracts between local business entities using the Block Chain Protocol (BCP) is truly staggering. While the BCP may not be ready for general population and would be largely unnecessary within a corporation, certain contract types and certain business structures may offer an excellent environment for widespread development. 

Cooperative businesses (Co-ops) may be the “more able” organization structure to introduce smart contracts because of specialized governance that allows for the pre-sale of goods and services for the purpose of general financing.  The pre-sale agreement may take the form of products, services, cash, or shares of future production.  For the purpose of this discussion, let’s consider “shares” as a community commercial currency between co-ops.

Community Currency

The objective would be to circulate shares between co-ops as widespread and comprehensively as possible only converting back to dollars when necessary.  The incentive would be that shares, in many cases, may be exchanged tax-free as long as certain conditions are met.  Further, by eliminating transaction costs, speed and efficiency may be achieved without banks or double entry account reconciliation, until necessary for interacting with the end user.     

Most people are familiar with Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) contracts from observing services such as Amazon.com, WalMart, or Zappos.com.  Electronic Data Exchange can be formally defined as the transfer of structured data, by agreed message standards, from one computer system to another without human intervention. Companies have used EDI since the mid-1990s to execute orders, renew inventory, warehousing, tracking, and even merchant banking.  The EDI acts primarily within the structure of the corporation and their contracted suppliers. 

The trick now, would be to use EDI protocols outside the construct of the corporation. The Block Chain protocol provides an important set of tools, which may allow organizations to interact with each other in a secure form of EDI that can be articulated among a community of integrated cooperatives. 

The 3 Building Blocks of Smart Contracts

There are 3 basic types of contract protocols that may be deployed through the Block Chain; these form the basis of smart contracts:

  1.  “Self-enforcing” protocol, which is like an electronic P2P handshake agreement that is fully activated between two parties.
  2.  “Mediated” contract that would include a third part intermediary such as an escrow or an oracle that would verify compliance with the agreement and pass the transaction between parties (or not).
  3. “Adjudicated contract” which places the oracle either in front of or behind the electronic handshake to filter or check transactions based on certain conditions.

An example given by Nick Szabo (reference article) would be that of, say, keys to an automobile where the owner could selectively allow access to family members but exclude other third parties.  There would be a backdoor to let in a creditor that is algorithmically switched on upon non-payment during a specific time (for repossession), or permanently switched off after the final payment is cleared.

The 3 Fundamental Particles of Cryptography:

Cryptographic keys that act in a variety of ways may activate each of these smart contract protocols.

  1. “Secret key” encryption, which is loosely analogous to common passwords that most people use.
  2. “Public key” encryption device acts like a one-way trap door that moves an agreement in only one direction.
  3. “— bit key generators” create keys that unlock transactions after a task is completed.

Controls: 

In order to duplicate the controls that large corporations hold over EDI processes, smart contract protocols should be structured in such a way as to make agreements:

  1. Robust against naive vandalism such as accounting errors,
  2. Robust against sophisticated, rational attack such as intentional fraud.

Cooperatives are quite adept at deciding how “shares” (thus, smart contracts) are activated using different types of authentication devices such as digital stamp, public signature, blind signatures, etc.  Likewise, “Privy Authentication” means that certain persons have the privilege of interacting with the contract.  Additionally, quorum control refers to a condition where a group of people may interact with the contract by election, threshold (like a kickstarter) or almost any quantitative function such as algorithm or time function.

Common electronic contracts (EDI’s) include the following (1): 

Administrative functions:

  • Product code and price catalogs
  • Catalog updates
  • Forecasts and plans
  • Deals and promotions
  • Statements

Pre-purchasing:

  • Requests for quote (& response)
  • Inventory inquiry/advice Purchasing
  • Purchase order & acknowledgment
  • Purchase order change & acknowledgment of change
  • Material release
  • Point of sale/inventory on hand Shipping and Receiving
  • Shipment status inquiry & response
  • Advance shipment notification
  • Bill of Lading
  • Freight bill Warehouse
  • Inventory inquiry & status
  • Shipping notice
  • Receipt confirmation
  • Shipment order
  • Shipment confirmation

Customs

  • Declaration
  • Release Billing and Paying
  • Invoice
  • Payment remittance
  • Credit and debit memos
  • Receipts

Conclusion:

The Boogie man of the Co-op movement is Big Box Corporate America such as WalMart and their digital siblings such as Amazon who provide consumption value often at the cost of community resilience.  Corporations have the resources to automate internal processes, suppliers, and labor.  Co-operatives, and localized producers in general, are at a severe disadvantage every time they must cross the transaction gap.  Large corporations can easily trade value within their systems paying taxes only when necessary.    

The knowledge and technology exists today for Cooperatives to accomplish the same thing using smart contracts and the Block Chain protocol.  To do so would create similar economies of scale with the added benefit of improving the distribution of wealth, manufacturing social capital, and storing value in resilient communities.  Further, crypto-currencies in general still suffer from that fatal flaw where they are not backed by any form of productivity.  To give the crypto-currencies a place to store value backed by community productivity would benefit all who anticipate such technologies.    

Primary reference for this article is from: Formalizing and Securing Relationships on Public Networks – Nick Szabo

 

 

 

 

Share this:

The NWO On The Block Chain

By

On December 27, 2013

In General Information

The first line of Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper reads as follows: “A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.”  The goal is achieved quite simply by removing three frictions to the exchange of value among people.  

The First Friction:

The Bitcoin protocol goes to great effort to foil the bad players and reward the good kids with game based incentives.  The probable cost of an attack is greater than the likely benefit of attempting to do so.  This wipes out the massive and hugely expensive vetting apparatus of verification, fraud investigators, audits, charge backs, legal claims, and courts. 

The Second Friction:

With the judicial use of cryptography, the BCP wipes out a colossal industry of third party brokerage activity that withholds information about transactions ostensibly in the name of trust, fairness, and privacy.

The Bitcoin Protocol Analogy

The most obvious Bitcoin analog is to Gold; everyone gets this.  Due to the economics of scarcity, miners have an incentive to expend resources in order to add more gold to circulation.  However, as the scarce resource becomes more expensive to extract, the incentive shifts to transaction fees as reward for participating in the digital value exchange.  

Transactions are abundant. There is potentially no limit to the amount of transactions that can take place.  Participating in a transaction today does not remove future transactions from the account balance.  In fact, transactions can be created by anyone at any time, and combined or subdivided in any number or ways.  

The Third Friction:

The social analogy should be crystal clear, if not prophetic.  As Consumption Capital becomes unsustainable, Abundance Capital will emerge as the primary generator of value creation between people.  As such, the strategy for success in the BCP era, is not in the domain of tangible consumption, it is in the domain of intangible transactions.  In other words, everything that we call “intangible” in the Era of Scarcity, becomes “tangible” in the Era of Abundance, and vice versa.  

The New Tangibles:

The tangibles assets of the post BCP era are knowledge, innovation, and wisdom of people and communities of people as an abundant and recurring resource.  The business methods of the post BCP era will require the promotion, exchange, and manifestation of knowledge, innovation, and wisdom among communities of people.

New Factors of Production:

Productivity is in the old economy meant increasing the amount of stuff that can be made a certain amount of time.  In the new, productivity will involve maximizing the interaction of people within a certain amount of time, where the largest denomination is a natural lifetime.  The World According to the BCP is the world that was meant to be, not the world that exists today.

Share this:

What if Everyone Was a Bitcoin?

By

On December 19, 2013

In General Information

There is no shortage of articles waxing aloof about how Bitcoin is just another example of a very few people controlling a very large percentage of an impossibly scarce object.  Others argue that the carbon footprint of Bitcoin mining is so excessive that the last coin will require all the energy of the Sun to finally extract.  Finally, Bitcoin are not backed by real form of productivity, instead, they are backed by the “the full faith and credit of the issuing algorithm”…. and, we all know how that goes.

What if all three of these problems could be solved quickly, cheaply, and permanently?  Suppose then that every person was represented by his or her own colored coin?  As such, each person owns all 21 million shares.  Proof of work is, in fact, a real proof of having created something through thoughts or actions managed through smart contracts in the block chain protocol. 

You don’t need to understand the mechanics, except that your currency is backed by your true net productivity.  Simple.

But the plot thickens.  A person with 21 million shares can give those shares to another person in exchange for something valuable.  The holder of the shares now has it in their best interest that the issuer is successful in life so that holder may enjoy increased valuation as the issuer’s coin become scarcer.  Of course it would be wise to diversify one’s holdings so an investor would try to hold as many different coins representing as many different people as possible, you know, in case one of them gets hit by a bus.

Talking about busses, it would be in the best interest of society to make sure that public transportation is safe and efficient because at any given time, they carry a valuable collection of social agreements to their collective proof-of-work event – an social analogy to a block chain itself.   

Now if we were all issuing currencies to each other and it was in all of our best interest that the other is successful, then a “generalized reciprocity” of favors, exchanges, and values would emerge in society.  The value of one’s community would reflect on the value of one’s personal coinage and vice versa.  The incentive to innovate new ways to create value in a community would be staggering having an impact on everything from governance to medical care.  The highest impact humans would become wealthy as everyone invests in their coinage.  Volatility would be reduced as everyone learns to be high impact as well. 

Not unlike any talented actress or gifted athlete, a form of human agency would emerge where some people specialize in the support and representation of high impact persons.   Teachers for example, would forego tuition in exchange for a dividend in their student’s future productivity.  Mentors would “cash in” their world experience by teaching people how to be successful instead of competing to the death (literally and figuratively). The things that people would build and create will reflect things that are useful to their stockholders.   

So as we look at the Block Chain Protocol for social utility far beyond Bitcoin, consider that the current flaws may be the future cures in disguise for some of our own deepest societal failures.   Do not overlook the implications of an economy where the intangibles become tangible.  This fact alone will measure into existence trillions of “units” of invisible value that are nowhere to be found in current accounting balance sheets.   That may be the fastest and most practical way to pay off the debt we owe to ourselves and our planet.

Share this:

Occupy BitCoin

By

On December 14, 2013

In General Information

Occupy Wall Street had the effect of “measuring into existence” the 99% of people who subsidize the economic liberty of the top 1%. Now, with the BitCoin Protocol, the financial information gap between the 99% and the 1% is about to disappear. This is a fleeting moment in history and an opportunity that we must take for all it’s worth.

BitCoin, used as a currency, is a sideshow in comparison to the possibilities in the Block Chain Protocol (BCP) for frictionless transfer of ALL forms of value.  The best description that I’ve heard is that BitCoin is a “protocol for the synchronization of information”.   This feature alone – not the digital currency itself – is what will eventually doom brokers to a life of actually producing something of value for society.

The Block Chain Protocol can eliminate trillions of dollars in unnecessary friction from ANY transfer of value – not just money. But most importantly, the BCP provides a way to “measure into existence” human value attributes such as knowledge, innovation, and wisdom in a digital format and public repository.  Speculators are clearly not counting on 7 billion virtual currencies representing each individual contributor in an economy.  

People are Corporations

A well know politician once said “Corporations are people, my friend”. What he failed to realize, is that people could also be corporations.  The BCP allows everyone to equally access the right to become their own economic entity responding to real supply and demand for useful goods and services; raising money in a public stock market; holding individual IPOs; combining knowledge assets with others of their choosing; affixing contracts; time stamping tranactions; and issuing “BitShares” against future productivity as currency – all without any financial friction or corporate barriers whatsoever.   

The post-Dollar economy

Anyone with basic understanding of high-school mathematics can demonstrate how 50 Trillion Dollars in global debt, at compounding interest, can never be paid back.  This is an economic reality.  The question becomes, what kind of world do we want after the expiration of fiat currencies?  Will BitCoin, as a storage of value, amount to a convenient placeholder while the old financial system reboots anew in digital form, or is there a greater opportunity for humanity in mining BitShares?

When a currency enters hyperinflation, the results are characterized by the rapid and chaotic transfer of government (public) property to private holders – or vice versa. However, things could be very different with a third option that could actually advance civilization to a higher order.

In its nascent state, we describe this third option with terms like; The Commons, Open Source, Crowd Source, Crowd Fund, Social Capital, P2P, etc.  There are hundreds of thousands of start-ups and co-operatives (formal and informal) separately aiming down this path.  They need tools that help them integrate so that the output of one application becomes the input of the next application. The longer that they can operate outside of the fiat system (without reconversion to dollars), the greater they will fortify the next economic paradigm against unsecured currencies.

The End Game

Politicians have demonstrated their willingness and ability to bring the economy, and everyone’s associated assets, to the brink of collapse. This game survives only because the extractive 1% cannot build walls high enough to protect them against a complete financial meltdown. They still need food, clean water, electricity, medical care, education, civil services, transportation, and renewable energy … all the stuff produced by the 99%!

Suppose that the world were given the choice between a BitCoin, backed by nothing, and a BitShare backed by community productivity of all useful things?  The choice would be obvious thus creating the mother of all hedge funds resulting in the decentralization of value and power to the “The Commons” regulated by the open source technology of the Block Chain Protocol.    

Call to Action

We have a great opportunity ahead of us and only a few years to accomplish it before the BCP is compromised by decentralize money without also decentralizing all factors of production.  We simply can’t afford to let this go unanswered.   

We need to build the interfaces, the structures, application, and governance that will allow human “Intangibles” to become digital “tangibles”.  Only this will enable human flourishing over human extinguishing.  We need to turn our collective intelligence and computational horsepower to the epic task of mining BitShares, not necessarily BitCoins.

References:

How The Bitcoin Protocol Actually Works

Bitcoin Wiki – Contracts

True Value of Bitcoin – Stefan Molyneux

 

Share this:

Factors Of Production For The Crypto Economy

By

On December 7, 2013

In General Information

One of the more interesting definitions and implications of BitCoin comes from Stephan Molyneux in this video.  His key points include:

1. Definition of BitCoin: a protocol for the synchronization of information.

2. The BitCoin block chain ledger can contain ANY information such as contracts, user agreements, DNA sequence, Patents, time stamps, contingency claims, even other crypto-currencies, etc, etc, … via scripts.

3. The greatest innovations will be in the development of these scripts as society re-organizes itself displacing banks, lawyers, conflict, and poverty to more productive enterprise.

With the reinvention of money comes the reinvention of productivity.  Each and every person now has the ability to become their own “corporation” by creating scripts that embed knowledge in the form of a tangible asset.   

The Ingenesist Project has been working in this area for a long time and we will unveil Curiosumé at the Future of Money and Technology Summit in San Francisco on December 9, 2013. The following images explain the Curiosumé protocol.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share this:

Curiosumé; Because The Résumé Must Die

By

On October 14, 2013

In General Information

Curiosumé is an open source development project designed to replace the résumé as a means for describing one’s interests, skills, and abilities

Private / Anonymous / Cryptographic / Mobile / Personal API

 Demo Video and Specifications,

Video Introduction; Collaboration Nation

Original Specifications for Curiosumé (was called Zertify)

Discussion:

Curiosumé is an analog to digital converter for knowledge asset objects. By moving away from a semantic résumé and moving toward a personal digital API, the trade and exchange of knowledge assets may be machine enabled for matches, proximity, relevance, weight, and probabilities of achieving various outcomes.  As such, economics of “intangibles” will become more efficient.

By making knowledge assets visible in an economic system, social entrepreneurs may readily trade and exchange intangible assets much as they do with tangible assets.   Curiosumé will facilitate trade of intangibles through a unique distributed structure of objects and assigned attributes.  Results can then be anonymized and processed in a machine enabled and mobile environment.

Key Features

There are several very specific features that must be integrated in the application in order for Curiosumé to perform its relatively small but important task.  These include:

1. Transportability and “Ownership” of the personal API

2. Anonymity until point of transaction

3. Deploying multiple personas

4. Combining multiple personae

5. Measuring proxies for economic output, matching, assessing, scenario testing, etc.

 

Use Cases:

The use cases for Curiosumé will be a numerous as the number of entrepreneurs who can articulate the protocol in a market.  Since Curiosumé eliminates “Competition” from the onset,  there is little or no economic incentive to lie, deceive, or cheat.  This allows the market an opportunity to defer vetting mechanisms to downstream applications that can compare (for example) a submitted persona against a control personal as a cryptographic key to unlock a transaction or block chain, etc.  In essence, making cheating too expensive to sustain.

  • Individuals may overlay their own persona on any dataset to visualize and discover adjacencies, paths, and connections.
  • Individuals may interact with the web using a Personal API
  • Protegé and Mentors may find each other in close proximity in community or within an organization.
  • People with special skills can find worthy and productive collaborations in communities or within the organization.
  • Trade in knowledge assets is facilitated through “anonymous until point of transaction” protocol.  People will provide better data knowing that they have complete control over their personal identities.
  • Build Social Currency; multiple personas may combine Curiosumés to establish the knowledge inventory for a team or to discover the probability that a group of friends may produce any mutual affinity efficiently together.
  • Any product or service may be described in Curiosumé format and compared to a community listing to discover customers, partners, and employees.
  • Curiosume data is pre-normalized allowing any user to make predictive assessments about any collection of personas relative to a project, product, event, itinerary,  or interaction with any physical asset.
  • Cryptographic; a personal API may be used as a private key in unlocking smart contracts on the block chain protocol
  •  Toll Booth on Big Data; marketers, employers, or data aggregators would pay individuals for access to their persona.
  • Instead of advertising to a demographic, marketers may identify specific knowledge assets and may offset prices based on the social values or proclivities of the persona.
  • Economic development agencies can take a knowledge asset survey of a region to identify what institutions or industries they have a strategic advantage.  Or, they may retrain or import specific knowledge assets in order to grow into new industries – with great precision.
  • Philanthropic  institutions can assess need and impact prior to committing to directed giving by assembling strategic knowledge assets around a specific philanthropic goal.
  • Corporations may assess their ability to enter a develop a new products or enter a new market based on a Curiosumé survey
  • Competitors may assess the ability, and cost to defend against their competition disrupting a new product initiative.
  • Corporations can better tailor their products to what customers actually want to buy rather than trying to “market” what the company already knows how to produce.
  • Corporations can make hiring vs training decisions with better clarity based on a Curiosumé survey.
  • The college “degree” system may evolve in favor of boutique personas designed for innovation in an industry.
  • The financial industry (from the NYSE, Banks to VC) can determine the probability that a company may be able to execute a business plan given their Curiosumé survey
  • The Insurance industry can mitigate risk exposures by assuring that the right collection of knowledge assets are deployed to, say, a construction project.

Share this:

The Scaffolding of the New Economy

By

On October 14, 2013

In General Information

Nobody cares if the congress implodes. People care about the institutions that keep the water clean, lights on, food fresh, streets safe, children educated,  medical services delivered, etc.

Institutions are run by people and there is no practical benefit of government when their primary role is to abolish the institutions that people depend on.  In effect, they abolish themselves.

For the last 5 years, since the 2008 train wreck, tens of thousands of start-ups and social media ventures have arisen in direct response to institutional failures.

  • When people don’t like where their taxes are spent, they reallocate their contributions elsewhere 
  • When education funding gets slashed, new forms of education emerge.  
  • When a currency inflates too fast, new forms on non-inflatable currency are deployed.  
  • When corporation reject their social charter, new forms of production systems are created. 
  • When jobs disappear, people reallocate their knowledge assets elsewhere 
  • When the law favors the few, new justice emerge

…and it goes on and on…

Today, we have constructed a scaffolding and everyone is laying their innovations and social apps and collaboration tools on he scaffolding.  When the output of one app becomes the input of another app, and so on, the new economy will integrate sufficiently to effectively bypass the governmental institution that is failing within it.  At that point, a new economy will emerge.

The following list of social platforms was compiled by Bert-Ola Bergstrand from Social Capital Forum in this document. From my experience and observation – there must be millions of people across the globe thinking along these lines.  People who would respond to a new way of organizing if a complete system were to emerge – or if the old system were to slowly evaporate.

TRY THIS: Please take a look through his list and visit several sites randomly and see what pops up. Now, try to envision the integration that I described above where the output of one platform becomes the input of the next platform, and so on.  This is how the future will arrive.  This is the next step that we must take together – integrate.

http://www.ogunte.com (women focused)
http://www.socentix.com
http://www.volans.com/volans/
http://www.tallbergfoundation.org/
http://solabs.org/
http://www.hubbayarea.com
http://www.ideasproject.com/index.jspa
http://www.unconvention.co.in/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Social-Bancorp/183421055082853
http://groaction.com/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/GroAction/215195255184778?sk=app_208195102528120
http://www.joyliving.net
http://www.biomen.org
http://the-hub.net/
http://www.williamjamesfoundation.org
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Call-to-Change/159881987362799
http://www.sitawi.com.br
http://www.globalgiving.org/projects/sitawi-loan-fund-for-social-enterprises-in-brazil
http://www.socialcapitalmarkets.net
http://w1sd0m.net
http://www.globalsustainabilityjam.org/
http://www.globalservicejam.org/
http://www.openworld.com/
http://factory.makesense.org/comingsoon
http://www.mygoodact.com/
http://www.makinglocalfoodwork.co.uk
http://thefinancelab.ning.com/
http://mindtimemaps.com
http://mindtime.com
http://www.wecreate.cc/
http://collabcafewelly.tumblr.com
http://nationbuilder.com/
http://wwww.socialenterpriseeurope.co.uk/
http://techaloo.com/
http://www.socialenterprise-chicago.org
http://www.facebook.com/ecoNVERGE
http://www.facebook.com/CAPix-Asia
www.relayfoundation.org
www.opencsr.com
http://www.goodfornothing.com/about/
http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Social-business-Benefit-corporations-80184?gid=80184&trk=hb_side_g
http://www.opportunejobs.com
http://www.p-ced.com
http://www.seeditproject.com/
http://www.facebook.com/BluePlanetLife
http://www.youtube.com/TheRationalFuture
http://www.i-open.org/
http://2le.ad/
http://www.co-society.com/about/our-story/
http://www.kennisland.nl/en/
http://bundlr.com/b/education3
http://incentivize.us/
http://p2pfoundation.net/
http://www.sensorica.co/
https://www.facebook.com/YouthOpportunitiesNews
http://www.facebook.com/Nationalyoungwomenscouncil1/info
http://www.jci.cc/guests/
http://www.harva.co.in/
http://www.gramweb.net/
http://solucionesverdes.co/
http://www.dreamacademia.at/
http://www.collectiveself.com/frequently-asked-questions/what-is-a-friendship-incubator/
http://www.blue-planet-life.org/en/welcome
http://www.facebook.com/AfricaIZWI
http://globalimpactcollective.org/
http://www.leadersinstitute.com.au/aspx/home.aspx
http://www.rehan.com/
http://www.idec2013.org/ (International Democratic Education Conference)
http://www.mediapoint.md/
http://greensmyles.com/
http://www.bagosphere.com/
http://shapeshifters.net/
http://portal.educar.org/
http://www.coffeeshopgurus.com/ (Social Enterprise promoting Youth & Women Entrepreneurship. Franchise/ License Available)
http://www.communityled.co.za/
http://www.lgtvp.com/
http://www.azimpremjifoundation.org/ http://www.facebook.com/groups/smallisgreat/ http://www.facebook.com/groups/sosialentreprenor/
http://dreamups.org/
http://producism.org/
http://metacurrency.org/
https://ingenesist.com/
http://p2pfoundation.net/
http://www.arthaplatform.com/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Common-Unity-Project/407636092606114?sk=info
http://www.eq-cap.com/
http://www.livingmandala.com/Living_Mandala/Living_Mandala
http://maximpact.com/
http://www.mindmeister.com/190131707/living-bridges-planet
http://reconomy.net/
http://www.akhuwat.org.pk/
https://www.coursera.org/
http://www.iachievegroup.com/
http://pashafund.com/
http://dreamups.org/
http://www.innovativepeople.eu/
http://www.fsg.org/
http://www.giftingprosperity.com/
http://trap.it/2cLMAE
http://about.me/reachscale.com
http://www.thecitizensmedia.com/
http://wechangeworlds.com/
http://www.coolmeia.org/
http://www.molequedeideias.net/
http://www.silo.is/3×11/
http://www.cloud9startups.com/
http://www.facebook.com/SliceBiz
http://iluvmyplanet.com/press
http://www.buckybox.com/
http://www.societal-innovation.org/
http://createachangenow.org/
http://defindia.net/
http://thealternative.in/
http://www.dreamitventures.com/
http://www.svx.ca/
http://www.techpear.com/

Movements/Social Change
http://jellyweek.tumblr.com/
http://funkybusinessberlin.de/index_en
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Call-to-Change/159881987362799
http://www.uterus-myomatosus.net
http://www.WishesWell.com/invite
http://www.bankofideas.org.uk/
http://beyondsustainabilitymag.net/
http://socialforesight.net
http://thesociallab.dk/
http://www.jci.cc/guests/
http://scwf12.wordpress.com/activities/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/219724974712886/ (presente! – education)
http://www.yesworld.org/
http://seedfreedom.in/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/YUVA-Foundation/159965244127954
http://www.partnershipforchange.net/
http://www.icaf.org/ (the arts for the development of creativity and empathy)http://www.facebook.com/ICAF.org
http://www.thinkimpact.com/
http://changeinc.tigweb.org/
http://www.sekem.com/
http://www.peers.org/
http://www.greenpag.es/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zS1WCyEJV3U&feature=youtu.be

 

Social Ventures/Social Enterprise/Social Business/

Here is a list of 200+ that the William James Foundation has worked with:

http://williamjamesfoundation.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Page.viewPage&pageId=607
http://www.youcancook.org.uk/
http://www.solucionesverdes.org/
http://backpackfarm.com/
http://www.openworldcafe.com/
http://www.joyliving.no/
http://www.biomen.no/
http://www.wessociety.com/
http://www.idea.com.gr/ and http://www.idea.com.gr/i_landing_page
http://openworldvillages.ning.com/
http://globaler-wandel.blogspot.com/2011/11/barcamp-how-internet-changes-our
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Call-to-Change/159881987362799
http://www.betterworldbooks.com
http://www.makechange.tv/
http://w1sd0m.net
https://www.facebook.com/pages/W1SD0M/170262242214
http://www.treeswaterpeople.org/
http://www.intolife.no/
http://www.terracycle.net/en-US/
http://www.socentlab.com/
http://www.buckybox.com/
http://www.firstpowercanada.ca/
http://www.enspiral.com
http://www.purpose.com
http://www.luontoportti.com/suomi/en/
http://www.facebook.com/eco-sTrEAMs (@ eco-sTrEAMs)
http://www.facebook.com/eco.ViVaCity (@ eco-ViVaCity)
http://www.facebook.com/eco.Nable (@ eco-Nable)
http://www.facebook.com/groups/econologics/ (@ ECONOLOGICS – Incisive
http://www.digitalgreen.org/farmerbook/
 

Knowledge Converged!)

http://www.veggbox.appspot.com/
http://ideasociety.com/
http://www.tryggapengarimobilen.se/
http://www.advancednrgsolutions.com/
http://www.p-ced.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Aangan/176857645688413
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mwi4d4mCUNk&feature=youtu.be http://www.mothercourage.no/
http://www.openideo.com/
http://www.laplandvuollerim.se/

 

Funds/Financing

http://www.goodcap.net/
http://www.bonventure.de/en/home (only German speaking regions)
http://www.vilcap.com village capital seed funding network for socent
http://www.toniic.com global impact investment angel network
http://hubventures.hubbayarea.com/ seed funding for socent in the SF Bay area
http://w1sd0m.net search 400 institutional impact investors
http://www.slowmoney.com
http://inventure.no/
http://www.fordfoundation.org/Grants/
http://www.soros.org
http://www.asef.org Asia-Europe FOundation

 

Inspiration/Strategy etc.

http://www.blueoceanstrategy.com/ making competition irrelevant
http://foundups.com/ FOUNDUPS® Open Startup – Changing the World Together.
http://100startup.com/tour/ Build a Startup with 100$, keep it lean
http://steveblank.com/ – Steve Blank is a teacher for entrepreneurship
http://projectofhow.com/ – Open library of creative methods.
http://www.cultural-entrepreneurship-institute.de/en/ – Theoretical Wisdom for the Global Society
http://www.respectserendipity.com – Serendipity as the ultimate source of inspiration
http://www.differentworkbook.com – Stories of people who deeply love their work & changing what work looks and feels like
http://www.differentoffice.com – Stories of self-created, soul-satisfying work spaces

 

Inspirational blogs

http://www.sadanamkaur.es/en/programs/excellence-in-learning
http://goodgeneration.org/
http://www.asmundseip.com/
http://truemaisha.blogspot.se/?spref=fb
http://hildygottlieb.com/
http://vicdesotelle.com/blog/
http://sharedtracks.wordpress.com/

 

Text/Knowledge/Books

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_investing
http://www.facebook.com/piceberlin – spreading knowledge for cultural return
http://apps.americanbar.org/abastore/index.cfm?pid=1620439&section=main&fm=Product.AddToCart – Social Enterprise: Empowering Mission-Driven Entrepreneurs

Share this:

A Practical Guide to The Big Flip

By

On October 4, 2013

In General Information

We have an opportunity to propose a panel for one of the most important futurist financial summits in America, if not the World.  The Future Of Money and Technology Summit IV, brings together the brightest minds in financial technology innovation at the beautiful Hotel Kabuki in San Francisco.  This year’s event will be held December 9, 2013

***

Anyone can imagine the worst case scenario for economic collapse.  But we are interested in understanding the best case scenario for the diversification from fiat currency.  TIP loosely envisions a Big Flip; when so-called “intangibles” become the new “tangible”.

The Ingenesist Project is proposing the following panel for FOM&T

A Practical Guide to the Big Flip

The specter of economic calamity is rearing it’s ugly head once again, but for many, the end game came in 2008.  Innovators have spent the last 5 years developing new systems and methods to survive in a collaborative economy.  While community currencies are an excellent representation of material productivity, they are not readily convertible beyond small groups.  On the other hand, innovations such as Bitcoin are readily convertible globally, but are not necessarily backed by material human productivity. What if alternate economic systems used current or future generations of crypto currency to articulate community productivity? Could this combination finally solve the riddle of capitalization in non-fiat money?  Could this combination become the mother of all hedge funds during the Big Flip?  This panel will explore such frameworks for collaborative capitalism in the years to come. 

But We Need Your Help!!!

Please send us ideas about what new innovations have occurred since 2008 in response to the economic crisis – I’d like to mention them in the discussion.

Please send us ideas about what parts are still missing in order for an integrated alternate economy to emerge.

Please send us what innovations – if combined or in some way integrated – would serve a greater good than the sum of their parts.

Looking for fireworks.

There would be four panelists and myself as moderator. While we already have several people in mind, no commitments have been extended, so please also do let us know if you have anyone to suggest for this panel. We are looking for a MOST diverse group specifically targeting as many corners of the ideological spectrum as possible – in just 4 people. 

An amazing summiting experience

I have had the extraordinary opportunity of being invited to speak at FOM&T several times.  As a result, I have met some truly amazing people.  I have seen magnificent careers launched, international speaking opportunities arise, and we have found missing pieces in our own project – all at this magnificent event.  Many of my most trusted tech friends came from this conference. Of course, one relationship leads to another….and that is what is the Bg Flip is really all about.

THANK YOU!!

Please contact me through this site, or Twitter handle @ingenesist

 

Share this:

Collaboration Nation

By

On August 19, 2013

In General Information

The Resumé Must Die

What if there were an accounting system that was built on collaboration rather than competition?  What if “semantics” could be largely eliminated by public agreement, so that we all knew what everyone else knew?  How would this change what, when, where, how, and why we produce and consume things?  

With the help of many amazing, intelligent, passionate, and committed people from across the world, I am profoundly honored to bring this work forward to the Ingenesist Blog.  Please watch these two short videos about Curiosume.org; the Curiosity Resumé

Consider how much it costs just to “sustain” the great basketball game of Market Capitalism where the gross domestic product is precisely 99 losers for every winner, and growing.

First, we’ll need to include the cost of the referees; judges, lawyers, and a vast legal system that keeps the game fair.  Second;  we need to account for the dedicated civil servants who keep the peace in the stadium and a vigilant military to stem any outside disruption of the game.  Afterwards, we need to manage the humanitarian elements of feeding, educating, and housing the retired and vanquished players.

Again, I am not passing judgement – at the end of the day, I’m just a lowly engineer riffing on relatively obscure blog.  However, on the basis of a very simple calculation of dividing total output of the system by total input to the system, the numbers just don’t seem to crunch like they may have in the past.  

There does not appear to be anything wrong with the players. Everyone I know is really nice. Everyone that I encounter seems quite content to collaborate at Trader Joe’s or driving on the freeway, or helping out in the schools. We even live in a kinder and more tolerant society than when I grew up. Not even the majority of people that we blame for winning the game can be directly faulted.

The problem seems to arise from the fact that we compete rather than collaborate. And, perhaps collaboration is more efficient than competition. That observation does simplify the solution a great deal, I’d think.

What if there was an accounting system that was built on collaboration rather than competition?

Share this:

The Knowledge Inventory Rev 3

By

On May 25, 2013

In General Information

 

Here is a link to the demo and instructions for use.  Seems to work best in Firefox. Please provide feedback directly to me or through comments.

KnowledgeInventory-Instructions

 Demo site

Share this:

Global Knowledge Asset Inventory

By

On May 24, 2013

In General Information

Before I write this blog post, what does this image mean to you?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share this:

The Everlasting Endowment of Social Capital

By

On April 28, 2013

In General Information

Big social changes are always controversial; industrial revolution, voting rights, woman’s rights, civil rights, etc – each were truly radical ideas in their time.  Social scientists suggest that such changes have three oppositional features;   

  1. They had advantages and disadvantages
  2. They were good for some people and bad for others
  3. They impart some initial costs before providing substantial benefits
For example;
The industrial revolution was dirty and dangerous and exploitive.  This was the initial social cost which drew the attention of academics who studied the movement.  This drew the ire of activists who pushed the politicians into regulations regarding workplace safety, collective bargaining, and child labor laws.  In the end of the cycle, the benefits of the industrial revolution included both better means of production and positive shifts in cultural norms.  In addition, many new disciplines are born which improve and accelerate future social changes paying dividends to an everlasting endowment of social capital.

Social Capital; a label for many different things.

We are all familiar with physical capital such as a tool into which we invest our energy in order to fix things better.  We are also familiar with the idea of human capital; the investment in education and training so that people can use the physical capital to become more productive.   Likewise, Social Capital includes those features in our community that make us more (or less) productive.  

There is nothing strange or different about this type of capital and there is no less of a need to invest in developing high social capital environments.  In Fact, may very familiar ideals have social capital as their foundation, such as collaboration, teamwork, resilience, communication, connections and generalized reciprocity of favors, empathy, and mutual best interests.

Social Capital In the Construction Industry

So when we introduce an innovation to a market, such as we are doing with The Value Game in the condominium reconstruction market – physical capital and human capital are obvious requirements of engineers and tradesmen.  However, the explicit introduction of social capital to the construction industry may have significant consequences as outlined in steps 1 through 3 above.  What are the advantages and the disadvantages to introducing this social change to the construction market?  To whom is it beneficial and/or detrimental – the resident or the contractor?  What are the initial costs and what are the expected future benefits?  

Case Study:

Our current case study involves the repiping of a 25+ floor high rise condominium.  The trick is to replace the potable water system while the building is fully occupied maximizing the uptime for all residents and absolutely NO overnight shut downs for anyone.

Our solution is to build a parallel water system right next to the old one, and then switch them over condo by condo.  In order to accomplish this, the contractors need to pass through the structure floor by floor at least 3 times.  First to install access doors; second, to replace the risers; and third, to plumb each individual unit, etc.  Now, try to imagine the permutations of connectivity required to minimize disturbance to affected units – as well as the non-affected units!!!

Capital accounting;

Obviously the physical capital includes a lot of plumbing tools and fixtures.  Indeed, human capital is intact where all the plumbers are certified and all the engineers are licensed.  However, this problem is still 90% social capital.  That is, those features in our community that make us more (or less) productive.

Bringing social change to a construction project will be controversial as people will need to collaborate with their neighbors and several crews of plumbers.  Some people will take easily to the requirements, others will not.  Initially, there may be a significant amount of discomfort.  However, when this project is complete, the community will be own something as important as life water itself;  new discipline will be born which improve and accelerate future collaboration thus paying dividends to an everlasting endowment of social capital. 

Share this:

Page 4 of 23

Previous

Next

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén

css.php