The Minciu Sodas laboratory.  See also our proposal .  Andrius Kulikauskas , Direktorius.

Creating an Economy for Working Openly

We're creating an economy for working openly. We can help you start up your own economy. I've also written up some thoughts on the rationale for our economy .I appreciate your interest, response, suggestions, critique!  Write to me, Andrius Kulikauskas, ms@ms.lt

Why do we need an economy for working openly? Could people pay directly for work to be open?
Why is our laboratory concerned? We need such an economy ourselves.
What does it mean to work openly? Inclusively, transparently, progressively, publicly, voluntarily, freely, loosely.
Why would anybody pay for open work? We discover who we work best with.
What will our economy look like? Our members may act as both Sponsors and Authors.
What enterprises might participate? We're approaching enterprises that need to cultivate partnerships.
What are examples?
How will our economy fit within the normal economy? Working openly, businesses cultivate relationships to be ready for opportunities as they come.
When should we work openly, when intimately? Work openly to build assets, intimately to earn profits.
How do we work both openly and intimately? Openly invest in roads, but intimately offer access.
What can this be compared to? Markets for open source software.
How does our economy compare?
What are the principles of our economy?
Where does this lead, in the long run?
How can people participate?

Minciu Sodas is creating an economy for working openly. We invite you to join us to start up our economy. We intend to discover how our economy can sustain itself, explain itself, and reward investments. We can help you start up your own economy for working openly.

Why do we need an economy for working openly?

Open work is increasingly appreciated, as in the case of free software. People value openness, but they are not paying directly for it. Business models ultimately depend on revenue from proprietary software and extra services. Free software is created on the periphery of the economy. So far, it depends on enthusiasts, volunteers, gifts, charity, strategic corporate investments, and tax-supported institutions. Must people be taxed for software to be free? Must the creator work for free? or under corporate direction? Can there be an economy where people pay directly and voluntarily for work to be open?

Why is our laboratory interested?

We serve and organize independent thinkers. We include entrepreneurs, developers, consultants, artists, authors. We function as a networking club. We prefer to work openly, with and for each other. We ourselves need such an economy to fund our staff and our members to work together on our endeavors.

What does it mean to work openly?

Working openly is working inclusively, encouraging others to work alongside and integrate their efforts. We encourage others by working transparently, progressing incrementally, so that all may consider how they might help. We author our work under licenses that contribute to the public wealth, such as Public Domain or Copyleft. We thereby ensure that our work together is voluntary, so that we are all free to reorganize ourselves. We work freely, and are therefore extremely alert to what networks of human activity sustain themselves naturally. We work together loosely, each choosing how to foster such networks, connect and layer them so that they thrive.

Why would anybody pay for open work?

In our laboratory, we all have a shared value of "caring about thinking". We are therefore all prospective partners, interested to help each other, and invest in each other. We can work for each other more flexibly, in smaller increments, with quicker feedback. We each discover who we work best with, and can also work for each other privately, as needed.

What will our economy look like?

Our economy is for our members only. Our members have a shared value ("caring about thinking"). Our members join by helping with any one of our shared endeavors. Our members may act as both Sponsors and Authors. Sponsors purchase tickets in increments of $480, paying in advance. Our laboratory holds this money, and takes 25%, leaving $360. Authors post what they are able to do for $360, what kind of work, roughly how many hours. (The number of hours is ranging from 2 to 36). Sponsors indicate what they wish to accomplish, which may be anything at all that they can somehow relate to our shared value. Tickets must be used within 12 months. Sponsors and Authors make simple agreements about work to be authored under a public license. If the Sponsor is unsatisfied, they may choose to have all or part of the money go to charity, rather than the Author. If the Sponsor is satisfied, our laboratory pays the Author, at which point the Author may purchase a ticket at cost, $360.

What enterprises might participate?

We're approaching enterprises that need to cultivate partnerships.

What are examples?

Under construction!
I'll think up some good concrete examples. I'll base them on the real people in our laboratory, and prospective enterprises. I want to focus on real people from our laboratory: Raimundas Vaitkevicius , Peter Kaminski , Andrius Kulikauskas , Alex Shapiro, Shannon Clark, Natalie d'Arbeloff, Algis Cibulskis.

For example, Hewlett-Packard might sponsor work at our laboratory to explore how large-sized printers could be used in conjunction with tools for organizing thoughts. Their purpose would be to open up new markets to increase sales of such printers. They would give one of their own researchers a budget to spend at our laboratory. That might go to
figure out and enable useful work patterns, such as how and why a giant web of thoughts in TheBrain might be examined globally with software like Touchgraph, and then how such a web might most usefully be printed out. They might also sponsor work to promote the results more widely, get feedback as to what particular industries might be most interested. Such work is best done publicly. The HP researcher might spend their budget on consultations with TouchGraph inventor Alex Shapiro, on custom programming by Raimundas Vaitkevicius in Lithuania. They might distribute part of their budget to users who help advise, and who provide content to experiment with. They might spend their budget on organizers who can approach and involve others whose companies might purchase such printers.

How will our economy fit within the normal economy?

Wealth is relationships. They give us access to loans, opportunities, ideas, markets, partners. An economy works as a rebalancer of initiative, a resolver of opportunity. The more initiative that participants can inject, the more capable is the economy. Typically, businesses work intimately so as to apply their initiative to particular opportunities. In a rapidly changing economy, initiative and opportunity become less directly connected. Working openly, businesses cultivate relationships to be ready for opportunities as they come.

When should people work openly, and when intimately?

How do we work both openly and intimately?

Imagine human activity as traffic on a road. A business earns profits by charging tolls for access. However, a business grows in assets when those roads become more attractive, regardless of who owns them. Working intimately is important when there is a chain of economic activity, as when ore becomes iron becomes steel becomes beams. There is direct competition over each link in the chain. Here is also where direct profits are made. Working openly is important when there are layers of parallel activity. People participate in many overlapping networks of behavior: giving presents, shopping for books, reading reviews, making purchases, delivering packages, writing greetings, paying bills. People want to make use of many networks at once. Assets grow accordingly. Working openly lets a business appreciate how roads come together, and work with others to connect them attractively for all manner of traffic. A business earns profits by understanding its customers, and setting up a toll booth at the right location. Openly invest in roads, but intimately offer access.

What can this be compared to?

In 1998 and 1999, at least six markets for open source software were dreamed up. There were all quite different, but their character seems to have been determined solely by the size of the renumeration. Surprisingly, each of them resulted in the same number (about 20) of renumerated projects.

Short histories of each market describe how and why they were created and funded, they succeeded and failed.

What lessons can be learned?

Under construction!
CoSource: Much more money involved in the concept, then actually exchanged hands.
Asynchrony: confidential, proprietary. Alongside private enterprise, help solve work pool.

Why is our economy different?

Under construction!
We're selling people, not products. We're selling professionals, not amateurs. We're not pooling money.

Where does this lead, in the long run?

Under construction!
Shifting the economy so that working openly is the norm, working intimately is an indication that our society is not yet perfectly inclusive.

How can people participate?

We're looking for funding to jumpstart our economy, establish infrastructure and provide matching funds as incentives. We're looking for funders that would benefit from simply knowing why and how such an economy can work. We welcome workers, especially those who can help with public endeavors that we might accomplish together.