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Sun 9 Feb 2020 3:27PM

DisCO - Distributed Cooperative Organization

MN Matt Noyes Public Seen by 39

In a separate discussion the idea was raised of reading and discussing the DisCO Manifesto and/or Governance Rules. (This could also lead to a Social.Coop Happy Hour video chat with someone from Guerilla Media Collective.)

ST

Stacco Troncoso Thu 23 Apr 2020 11:17AM

Hi everyone! Just a heads-up, there's a DisCO webinar this afternoon/morning/middle of the night depending on where you are: OPEN 2020 Webinar – DisCos & Guerrilla Translation

Click on the link if you'd like to join. Thanks!

NS

Nick Sellen
Yes
Sun 15 Mar 2020 7:38PM

I can't promise attendance, as it's a bit far in advance for me to know what will be happening, but I would love to join!

MN

Poll Created Thu 12 Mar 2020 7:30PM

RSVP: Social.Coop Reading Group on the DisCO Governance Model Closed Thu 19 Mar 2020 7:03PM

Outcome
by Matt Noyes Thu 19 Mar 2020 7:24PM

Okay. Eight people have responded to the check poll about participating in the April 6th reading group session on the DisCO Governance Model. I will post a zoom link closer to the date. For now, let the reading rumpus begin!

April 6th, 07:00 USA Mountain Time (UTC 13:00, Tyo 22:00, Bilbao 15:00)
https://zoom.us/j/842150179

Main reading: DisCO Governance Model v3.0

See also:
Our Governance Model
DisCO Manifesto
Tales of a DisCO
Punk Elegance

Results

Results Option Voters
Yes 8 MC MN JB NS M ED ES AU
No 0  
Undecided 39 ST BH LF JD GC ÅM LS TB DU FD EM MY CI A LO CCE DU L CW C

8 of 47 people have participated (17%)

CW

Caitlin Waddick, @[email protected] Mon 17 Feb 2020 5:15PM

I will participate, if I am able once the meeting time is set. ❤️🤓.

I don’t know why: I don’t have permission to vote in the time poll. 🤔

M

mike_hales Mon 17 Feb 2020 6:37PM

@Nick Sellen All of the above! 1, 2 and 3. All pretty chewy. Personally I would like to really go after 'value' (including 'use value') and replace it in every instance with 'valuing' as a skilful facilitated practice of actual persons in actual contexts of commoning.

I really appreciate your gloss and look forward to digesting it more, but am not sure it moves toward either narrower focus or starting simple! But I now will try to identify equivalents of your 1/2/3 as I read the documents. Maybe if this list didn't run to more than, say, five core themes, that might just be workable?

NS

Nick Sellen Mon 17 Feb 2020 3:48PM

my interest to start higher level and drill into detail later is with the thought that people who join this group might be starting in many different places, so having a way to synchronise ourselves could be useful before detailing with the nitty-gritty.

so from my perspective starting with the why not the how is a nice approach. why are we (anybody who joins the calls) here? why did this DiSCO thing start?

I would worry that just starting with the how part, it's reduced to a set of technical rules to discuss.

to make it more specific, the things that interest me so far from reading the manifesto (I didn't even finish it yet...):

  • the progression of: co-ops --> open co-ops --> open value co-ops

  • critiques of "traditional" co-ops? ("islands in a sea of capitalism")

  • critiques of platform co-ops? ("Open-Value Cooperativism — the radical edge of Platform Co-ops." also [1])

  • the missing feminist perspective on all these things, why?

  • historical "fluid modes" of governance (linked to this David Graeber essay - talking about seasonal variations in governance structure)

  • a diversion off to inspect "AnyShare" (given as an example of Open Cooperativism), to find a seemingly abandoned project, what happened? why don't these things work?

  • another diversion off to https://metamaps.cc via some links - seems a recurring theme/dream: digital tools to unleash our potential for collaboration

  • this linked David Bollier Re-imagining Value workshop/study thing, and the wider topics of "value" definition (I liked this quote from that [2], I think the risk described there is very much still alive), and moving towards "relational value" as a key idea

  • I drifted off into metamodernism for a while too...

  • my recurring question with many of these things is, aren't they still all just dependent on capitalism via client work to keep it going? to what extent to they lead to a new economy vs just nicer work environments? ("islands in a sea of capitalism"), the aim is to go beyond that [3], but is it working? what are the tensions? limitations?

I know exploring all the related topics is probably a never-ending thing, and I don't mean we should go into everything I just wrote there, that's just a flavour of this wider context and my perspective as I try to make sense of it all. I'm also interested in the specifics of the model, and very interested to just listen to people too.

I wonder if we could kind of curate the available topics into a digestible set, and then vote them into priorities depending on peoples interests. topics could come from anywhere related. what aspects are you interested in? why are you interested in it?

[1]

Open Cooperativism argues that it’s not enough to have a better Uber or a more democratic AirBnB: we must tackle issues like housing and transportation head on. The root causes of our dysfunctional, destructive economies can’t be danced around.

[2]

"Praetorius is also suspicious of “value” as a word associated with the German philosophical tradition of idealism, which she regards as “an unreliable authority because of its strange methodological origins” – “Western bourgeois men of the 19th and 20th Centuries, who created an invisible sphere of abstract concepts meant to denote certain qualities, as a means to forget their own belonging to nature and their own basic needs, especially towards women.”"

[3]

On the flipside, if cooperatives are islands in a sea of capitalism, we need better catamarans, bridges, and data lines to connect them to each other and to other transformative economies. Our view of cooperation in this context includes collaborations that make good use of the salvageable affordances of DLTs along with the culture of the Commons and Cooperative movements.

MN

Matt Noyes Sun 16 Feb 2020 7:19PM

I like the idea of starting with the governance model because we can compare it to our experience here and in other organizations. If we do two sessions, I would suggest spreading them out a bit.

M

mike_hales Sat 15 Feb 2020 4:40PM

@Nick Sellen suggested that we take a chapter per session, multiple sessions. I noted how much there is to read in the Model and the Manifesto, and suggested we read just the Model. One way or another we have a challenge here, of bulk and density. What do folks propose?

I propose we adopt the two top-scoring slots from the time poll, and run two sessions. I doubt that we’ll sustain a longer programme of meetings. But I‘m open at this point, regarding which document/s we read. What do others feel?

BH

Bob Haugen Sat 15 Feb 2020 12:10AM

I hope it is clear to everybody what that middle column of hand gestures meant....

MN

Poll Created Fri 14 Feb 2020 11:58PM

Social.Coop Reading Group: DisCO Governance Model Closed Fri 28 Feb 2020 11:03PM

Outcome
by Matt Noyes Fri 28 Feb 2020 11:32PM

The best times were April 5th and 6th, 07:00 Mountain Time in USA, with 10.5 people each. (UTC 13:00, Tyo 22:00, Bilbao 15:00).

A 90 minute meeting on Zoom to discuss the Distributed Cooperative Organization Governance Model.
See the thread for additional reading suggestions from Stacco Troncoso and others.
The times proposed are intended to make it possible for people from Japan to Spain to participate. If you add an option, please notify everyone so they can change their vote.

Results

UTC Votes MN BH JD JB MAS M MC GB ST AU LO ED
Sun 15 Mar 2020  1:00PM
5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Sun 15 Mar 2020  9:00PM
5.5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mon 16 Mar 2020  1:00PM
7
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mon 16 Mar 2020  9:00PM
5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Sun  5 Apr 2020  1:00PM
10.5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Sun  5 Apr 2020  9:00PM
7.5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mon  6 Apr 2020  1:00PM
10.5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mon  6 Apr 2020  9:00PM
7.5
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

12 of 46 people have participated (26%)

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