MEETING MINUTES:
Sil; There’s only 3 of us here, should we conitnue?
G: Sure
Sh: Yes
Sil: There’s only a few of us
Sil: Should we look at seeing if we can using Loomio
Sh: I have used before. I can look into this
Sh: Some people have said the online instructions are difficult
Sil: I don’t think we should discard but start rebuilding from smaller sections
Sh: Also start consolidating it. If it’s confusing people, we need to address it… I’ll look into Loomio before the next call. We also need to remind people to write a short statement of their vision. Gien also suggested we have a short list of projects and feature those. We are the ones giving our time.
Sil: Maybe fall back into Google drive. It’s difficult to summarize things from the forum. It’s a good means of exchange but not a good means of information collection. I have to check with Jose. At some point, he was going to create a list on Google Share. If not, I’ll just open a new spreadsheet and open the link. It’s difficult to organize data using even projects.
Sh: I’m happy using it.
Sil: So it would be a project name, description and people working on it. I’ll see if Jose did anything and if not, I’ll create it. Then decide how to open it up with everyone. Or we can ask people who is interested in working with us and share the access.
Sh: Only other thing left open from last call: a workshop to work on the strategic framework
Sil: I myself would love that, but of course if we get a quorum so we don’t get sidetracked by other topics. How about we organize that workshop after we take that decision on Loomio so we have one step down. Some people can meet physically and pull the rest of us in.
Sh: Yes, like myself and Segio can meet. I don’t know if Erika can meet.
Sil: It would be very good if Erika can meet with us. She has been a founding member. I"m just sad we lost others and hope they come back especially if we have a clear vision.
Sh: I totally agree. Best way for people to get inovlved is to see some progress.
SIl: It’s not problem if we agree to be a convergent point for others… aplace where you can launch events, like a facilitator. However, if we are that, we must show results. The main object is to show it works better than the current model. For some people, there’s an expectation of their work, but maybe it’s not possible. And second, a way to sustain ourselves. As Lars was saying, at the risk of not having money to pay for hosting the forum, that’s a major risk, everything goes under.
Sh: Absolutely.
Sil: Even for that tiny amount we must succeed there.
Sh: I’ll get loomio going to ask about their vision and we schedule an online session. Aug is a quiet month. Maybe the next call.
Sil: I still think we need more time and should have the foundation down. This is who we are, then build around that…how we do it, who does it, etc…I can make a list of different structures that we can choose from under the strategic framework topic. Once it’s good enough, we can move into Loomio.
Sh: I don’t know enough - in terms of organizational structure, I don’t feel I have as many insights as other people but I can take the lead.
Sil: I’ve seen other things that have been tried before…the idea of a foundation,…so clearly, from the beginning, you’ve been thinking about what we want to be. Clearly people had been thinking of a structure. Jose had also put together a proposal. We are not going to be a corporation. Not a million choices that will paralyze people.
G: I agree.
Sil: I know you’ve been talking a lot and asking to do this so it’s time to go beyond and take an actionable step.
G: What happened after event?
Sil: Unfortunately, I didn’t get enough participation but have one for October. Despite my effort to get others to organize, nothing has panned out so far. There is a lot of work and talk about OS and CE but people still don’t understand enough the value of merging them. I think there is also a lot of confusion with the other concepts, solidatory, shared, social enterprise…Thing s aren’t moving fast enough or deep enough. We were only two cities in US again. The others didin’t catch up. And yes, I’m very disaapointed that students don’t get it. I also don’t want to be the only organizer or pusher of this. My intent is to create a larger group, to pass the torch to others. I’ll continue to do everything I can. If things don’t work locally, I’m more than happy to work on the other projects happening around the world. I’m not giving up on anything.
Sh: It’s disappointing definitely but maybe things will pickup in the year.
G: A great event. We worked with the Cape Town science centre. I thought it was a good location, they are very interested in us hosting a citizen, Science and Tech event related to our eco-house. The eco-house is a great platform for this because ten people participated and about 12-15 showed up over the two days. The cool think was the talks from around the World, Lena, a stop-reset-go member, was able to help out with the IT and the Youtubes and all that. That freed me up to do all that stuff. I helped to coordinate bringing international speakers. She did the interviews. We have some really great guest speakers talking about different aspects of digital collaborations, kind of what we have here, a platform for OSCE platform. I was taking quite a scientific approach, with Dr Jose Ramos, and another scientist from Stellenbosch University. Then we had another fellow from Hungary, speaking about the digital collaboration platform that he’s building. Prof Lorenso Fioromonti, who just launched his book. All of this is aligned. How do we creat a wellbeing economy? Dr Ramos’ idea is cosmo-localisation. That is also my vision for the platform. We could turn that into a reality. We’re having another workshop online. He’s got his group in Melbourne, Au, who has been thinking about this for a while. The Perth group are running the event again next month. They might join us aswell, and also some people from Edinburgh, Scotland. We’re going to introduce ourselves to each other and talk about how to make this a reality, to make local economies. The people were super enthusiastic. We had another workshop, one of the people volunteered her board room as a place to meet, as they actually get the vision of how this could be transformative. So many ideas came out, so many themes that can uplift society. The thing with what we are doing is to engage the cosmo-localisation concept to get people to collaborate on ideas together. Opportunities to introduce new people to the OSCE / Stop Reset Go communities, Gien met the chief who represents 10million people. Could I help with them to develop a framework, to uplift them from the systemic poverty that they have faced over the last ten years. Looking to us for a vision / plan to create a local economy at the community scale. Now, all the ideas for eco-home can be transfered there, many ideas and network resources, getting people really excited. They really are excited. Our colleague Fairial, is doing a crowd-fund to get a web-television station launched for access to any community in the World. It could be a media channel to share across the globe. She hasn’t been involved so much, but is certainly interested. I am coorganising another event with Lorenzo Fioromonti, he went to Scotland and they liked his model. There is another woman, who also works there, he told me that they have a lot of money to fund CE projects. They are total reliant on the EU for their food supply so are quite nervous about food systems. Looking at creating autonomous food systems. I met another colleague from SERI to co-author a paper on open source and circular economy in context of agriculture. Prof Lorenzo has also asked me to co-author another paper, that he wants to feature us in as part of a new journal that he is an Editor of.
Sil: Do we just tell you that we’re interested?
G: I’ll copy a link. The opportunity, Sinai, the paper is to put together an opportunity to put together a government proposal for Scotland to put forward a concrete project.
Sil: It addresses a real an eminent problem. It’s not small, it’s not too big. The EU is too big, the EU project is too big.
G: The opportunity is great, the solutions also suits indigienous peoples, they are stewards of the land, for centuries.
Sil: They have been living this model for centuries, there was nothing proprietary.
G: The OSCE community hasn’t really thought about it this way.
Sil: Putting boundaries to knowledge is a very recent development. Especially in agriculture, there was nothing hidden prior to the industrial revolution
G: I just made this connection. Nobody has actually pointed this out much in the media. We should promote articles like this. It would help us to promote this at the moment.
Sil: I would love to.
G: Let’s leverage what we have. Of course, we can write about them.
S: I’m planning to do some research on the forum to capture the knowledge produced with a view to writing it up.
G: What’s happening in the wellbeing economy is that we are coordinating cities. Farial in Scotland is coordinating some cities for the wellbeing economy festival.
Sik: Is it in SA:
G: Yes
Sil: I’ll also post it under our events:
G: That’s going to be held at the Science Centre. One of the orgs is Dr. Alan Brent , centre for sustainable and renewable energy. He is co-hosting this event: http://www.inno4sd.net/
They have done most of their work in the EU. Their work is to bring sustainable technologies into SA. There is a lot of potential for technology transfer. I would like to brainstorm with you how we might connect the two events. I’ll show you Lorenzo’s book there. This is the book: https://lorenzofioramonti.org/2017/05/07/serving-society-rather-than-growth-business-in-a-wellbeing-economy/
G: There are thought leaders that have cited us, such as Michel Bauwens. He is the founder of hte P2P foundation, it’s in the top websites visited in the World. Jose Ramos is an active member of peer-to-peer foundations.
Sil: We must get ourselves known within these other networks
G: You guys should connect
Sil: CE is not just another nice term for the same-old-same-old. From what I see a nicer look of the same thing.
We must get ahead of them, before it fails to catch up or it fails to deliver, which mean we would also be viewed with skepticism. I’m glad that you mentioned the wellbeing economy. It’s too little about people. It’s tii techie. It’s not language that appeals to normal human-beings. Do people want it organically?
G: Michel Bauwens, gave a talk on the day before the first OSCE. Watch the convergence of OSCE, he said. We should be getting in touch with him and reaching out to him.
SP: We have had intermittent contact over the years.
G: We should approach him and make a formal relationship with him. I’ll send you the link to commons transitions website, Jose also beliefs in cosmo-localisation. They have done extensive research over the last years, they have case studies over the last years. He went to Ecuador and worked with the government of Ecuador, to see if they could transition to an OS society. The entire plan to transition to an OS society. They generated a lot of research output. There is a lot of research that would be useful for us to align with. He has vast networks. For wellbeing economy, there is an interesting possibility to bring on board. There is also indigenous communities who is involved in an event. Here is the web-page: http://www.consejodevisiones.org/ It’s a meeting of the 50 indigenous groups of Mexice to see if we can bring them on board to work with us to co-participate, if they are open to that then we could bring other cities on board. We could use OSCE to educated communities. That’s it.
Sil: It’s a lot, we must be anchored and connected to the right people and places. Before we get lost in the myriad of options, this is a barrier to change, different solutions, new terms, nothing major is happening, constantly new things, same down-trend.
G: MY experience, my focus was on the impacts, the big picture, these terms are used in service within the societal impact. Because we always feel disempowered. It’s a framework for a certain objectives.
Sil: The aim is the wellbeing is the good life for all.
G: Within the boundaries of the planet. Couching it in the big terms, a reference system that they already understand. We’ve been getting too lost in the details, rather than the big human impact vision.
Sil: It depends. If you look back at the beginning it was quite well framed. From this framework we can rephrase the past statements and update them. And look more into the future. Long-term. Have a clear vision, with all our work we will see the world looking like that in 5-10 years.
G: With Stop-Reset-Go, we are writing a research paper, how can we play a significant role to drive the change. We’re becoming a very active component of the change. A practical concrete framework to drive the change. People want change but they don’t know how to in a meaningful way. How do we tap into that? They need the right story to participate.
Sil: They need space to operate with humanity…there is a lot of existing knowledge that is not made known by anybody as it’s not got a big name behind it. We need to tap into this knowledge. I think we should go back to the immediate actions. I’ll write a list of choices, do the Loomio, everyone writes a vision statement and we’ll review where we are at during our next call on July 17th and we plan for some time end of August workshop. We’ll review where we are at and redefine our strategic framework and sharpen our document.
Sh: Yeah
G: Yeah
Sil: These are the immediate actions that we talked about.
G: I have one comment. The woman that organises OSCE Toronto, she felt that she was looking forward to working across the network on common projects. This is a strength that we haven’t leveraged. This is what the network is about, we work in silos, other than that we never really work sustainably on any one project.
Sil: We also talked about another project management tool. The forum doesn’t offer a space to do that.
G: It doesn’t. The simplest form is a spreadsheet. you could use G-Drive.
Sil: The limitation of that is to handle a lot of text and you can’t attach drawings or files.
G: You could offload that to Google drive with a link to the project page that the global team works on.
SIl: Let’s get on with some of them.
G: Sharon, did you have an event?
Sh: We are planning an event in August, but moving to Sept. We are planning to meet the councillor in Hackney to speak to him about waste issues in the borough.
Gi: What do you think about posting these intermittent events throughout the year. People are having them at different times. This week it’s this one. It gives us a bigger presence. We could host this on the website. Could people log their event on the website and host a hangout and talk. There may be other contributors that could help, to address what this lady in Toronto was talking about.
Sil: It’s easier to contribute live to help to move things along.
G: Another way could be to hack the Cape Town crisis. There is a crisis her, you can’t use so much water, people are going to extreme measures, we have a whole load of solutions through our house designs. We could hack together and accumulate designs.
Sil: They capture dew on very fine nets, bog nets…
G: Yes, or condensation technologies, salination technologies, to invite the communities to work on real world designs…
Sil: What were people doing 50-100 years ago…
G: We have the community participating.
Sh: Could you write a short brief or challenge outline so that we could see about running something in the University?
Sil: We will need to wrap things up…
Shar: Before we finish I would like just to draw your attention to Jaime’s diagnostic process. It looks like a useful process to run the workshop that we are talking about.
Sil: It looks great, I’ll read through it. I don’t know how eminent that payment is. We need a minimum amount…just to keep our main tool alive. Losing that content is my fear, every time I see an error I’m afraid we lost it all.
Sil: Whoever wants access to the forum should contact us.
Sil: Good to hear you. We’ll get working on what we promised.
Gien: Bye
Shar: Bye
