A talk given at the MobilityShifts conference (http://mobilityshifts.org/) at the New School in New York City on October 11, 2001. A nice description of the session is here: http://dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2011/10/mobility-shifts-day-2-privacy-surveillence-and-the-academic-commons-guest-post.html . Audio to be added at a later date.
2. The CUNY Academic Commons
Conception, Strategy, Process, Use
The Commons
Histories, Theories, Models
New Models for the Networked Commons
Challenges, Publics, Possibilities
Sunday, October 16, 11
3. The CUNY Academic Commons
Conception, Strategy, Process, Use
The Commons
Histories, Theories, Models
New Models for the Networked Commons
Challenges, Publics, Possibilities
Sunday, October 16, 11
30. “ we judge our tools by one key metric
above all others: use. Successful tools
”
are tools that are used.
Tom Scheinfeldt
“Lessons from One Week | One Tool – Part 2, Use.” Found History.
2 August 2010. <http://www.foundhistory.org/2010/08/02/lessons-
from-one-week-one-tool-part-2-use/>
Sunday, October 16, 11
50. The CUNY Academic Commons
Conception, Strategy, Process, Use
The Commons
Histories, Theories, Models
New Models for the Networked Commons
Challenges, Publics, Possibilities
Sunday, October 16, 11
52. What is a
commons?
a shared resource
Sunday, October 16, 11
53. Traditional Commons
Natural resource -- plot of land
CC-licensed photo: “Cow in Niederbauen” http://www.flickr.com/photos/akane86/182443256//
Sunday, October 16, 11
54. 3 Phases of English Common Land Tenure
1. Saxon Age before Norman conquest
most village lands held and worked in common.
2. After Norman conquest
village lands belong to local manor, rights of the
common granted on condition of fealty to manor lord
3. Age of enclosure - early 18th century - end of 19th
century
common land divided up, fenced, converted to private
property in modern sense.
Sunday, October 16, 11
58. Design principles of robust, long-enduring, common-pool resource institutions
(Ostrom 1990, 90–102):
• Clearly defined boundaries should be in place.
• Rules in use are well matched to local needs and conditions.
• Individuals affected by these rules can usually participate in modifying
the rules.
• The right of community members to devise their own rules is respected
by external authorities.
• A system for self-monitoring members’ behavior has been established.
• A graduated system of sanctions is available.
• Community members have access to low-cost conflict-resolution
mechanisms.
Sunday, October 16, 11
59. Libertarian vs.
Associational Commons
Sunday, October 16, 11
61. social networks
middle-state publishing
emphasis on process
Sunday, October 16, 11
62. “The common is not to be construed, therefore, as
a particular kind of thing, asset or even social
process, but as an unstable and malleable social
relation between a particular self-defined social
group and those aspects of its actually existing or
yet-to-be-created social and/or physical
environment deemed crucial to its life and
livelihood. There is, in effect, a social
practice of commoning.” -- David Harvey
Sunday, October 16, 11
63. What is a
commons?
a shared space
for creating
resources with a
community
Sunday, October 16, 11
64. What is a
commons?
a shared space for
creating resources
with (and within) a
community
Sunday, October 16, 11
66. “the process of creating public
knowledge [is] an additional good,
because such work builds social
capital, strengthens communities,
and gives people skills that they
need for effective citizenship.”
-- Peter Levine
Sunday, October 16, 11
67. “the cornucopia of the
commons”:
more value is created as more
people use the resource and
join the social community. The
operative principle is “the
more, the merrier.”
Sunday, October 16, 11
86. The CUNY Academic Commons
Conception, Strategy, Process, Use
The Commons
Histories, Theories, Models
New Models for the Networked Commons
Challenges, Publics, Possibilities
Sunday, October 16, 11
89. Challenges
A GROUP OF SILOED COMMONS
Sunday, October 16, 11
90. Challenges
INTERACTION FATIGUE
Sunday, October 16, 11
91. Challenges
ENTERPRISE-LEVEL LEARNING
MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Sunday, October 16, 11
92. Challenges
PROPRIETARY PLATFORMS
Sunday, October 16, 11
93. Challenges
SECONDARY ENCLOSURES,
THREATS TO COLLABORATION:
PATENTS, TRADEMARKS,
COPYRIGHT
“MONOPOLIES OF INVENTION”
Sunday, October 16, 11
94. Challenges
TRACKING, SURVEILLANCE
Sunday, October 16, 11
95. Possibilities
BUILD RECURSIVE PUBLICS
Sunday, October 16, 11
96. “Free Software . . . is not simply a technical pursuit but also the
creation of a ‘public,’ a collective that asserts itself as a check on
other constituted forms of power—like states, the church, and
corporations—but which remains independent of these domains
of power. Free Software is a response to this reorientation that
has resulted in a novel form of democratic political action, a
means by which publics can be created and maintained in forms
not at all familiar to us from the past. Free Software is a public of
a particular kind: a recursive public. Recursive publics
are publics concerned with the ability to build,
control, modify, and maintain the infrastructure
that allows them to come into being in the first
place and which, in turn, constitutes their everyday practical
commitments and the identities of the participants as creative
and autonomous individuals.”
– Christopher Kelty, Two Bits:The Cultural Significance of Free
Software (2008)
Sunday, October 16, 11
97. Possibilities
BUILD GENERATIVE SPACES
Sunday, October 16, 11
98. “Generativity is a system’s capacity to
produce unanticipated change through
unfiltered contributions from broad and
varied audiences. . . . Generativity pairs an
input consisting of unfiltered
contributions from diverse people and
groups, who may or may not be working
in concert, with the output of
unanticipated change.”
– Jonathan Zittrain, The Future of the
Internet - And How to Stop It (2008)
Sunday, October 16, 11