I spent some time on a farm that could liberally be called a "commune" and there's actually a ton of innovation to be had all over the place. Somewhere, I probably still have a moleskine with notes on the matter. A couple things I remember:
-Crop Rotations: The texts I read about this subject were the result of some very painstaking note-taking, and keeping all this information straight can confound even the very studious. We had at least 3 copies of Elliot Coleman's "The New Organic Grower" around and they were all falling apart from constant reference. Having instant access to your planting history would be invaluable, especially if coupled with pH effects of relevant crops and other useful info.
Certifications: The process for getting that nifty "certified organic" label is quite difficult. You have to submit all sorts of things. It was even worse for us because we had commercial kitchen equipment (we sold jarred jams, salsas, etc)
Marketing: We sold shares of our output through a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program. ~100% of people who partook found out about us from meeting us at a farmer's market. I think there's a decent market for CSA shares, but not really any way of comparison shopping, or even knowing what's available.
It would be neat to work on a project to solve these problems while simultaneously encountering them on the day-to-day. But fair warning: "plowing the fields all day" does not really leave one in the mood for hacking. Contemplation? Surely. Conversation? Absolutely. But I wouldn't expect to get a whole lot of hacking done, at least not in your first season.
Alright. I called it a moleskine because that's what we called it on the farm. We ordered them like a dozen at a time and everyone used them. Truth be told, I didn't even consider calling it anything else. I wasn't trying to be smug, I used the term that matched with the image in my head of what I was describing.
I think its more like how people call an "over head speaker system" a "tannoy" or adults over the age of 50 call any console video game system "the nintendo" etc.
So you're admitting that the only reason you made your previous comment was because you thought that the commenter was being smug and you wanted to put him/her in his/her place?
Alternatively, I googled it after being dumbfounded by the seemingly random specificness of the post (does anybody say "I had a few beers while I watched my Panasonic"? No, everyone just calls TVs "TVs"), and discovered that the poster was just making an attempt at being smug.
I take issue with your taking issue with his taking issue with the post :)
Specifically, this is a threaded comment system. We can have as many discussions about something (post or other comment) as we want: go off on wild tangents, point out the spelling, have a pun thread, mention patterns of blogging/commenting the parent fits into, reply to the author on a separate subject, share anecdotes related to the subject of the post, and actually talk about the content of a post or comment, all at the same time, without breaking anything. That's what's so neat about threaded discussion: it doesn't require the "comparative notability" that a linear conversation needs in order to function.
TV's are commodities. There's no important difference from one brand to another. Moleskines, by merit of their unique design and brand identity, are in a different boat.
Agreed- even defining the notebook as a moleskine suggests a certain type of content. More so, it's a seemingly generalized trademark (like Kleenex or Xerox).
But by questioning why he voiced his argument, you validated his argument and thus the reasoning behind it. Your question, posed as such, answers itself, in a way.
Can you provide more details on this? By "little cottage", I assume this was meant for one (you), and $130K might be a bit steep for a single-person, experimental venture. 10 AC is hardly a small area, though, and suggests potential to expand it to, say, a 3-10 person number. If the marginal costs required to increase water, electricity, etc, to support such levels don't add to the final price tag dramatically, it could be quite interesting.
Commune does not mean being without internet, nor does it necessarily imply growing food.
Think about it: if we had bunk beds, we could stack hackers on top of each other to save space. Compress at least twice as many in the same space. And if we bought food in bulk, we could eat better on the same amount we ordinarily need to live on ramen budgets.
All this being said, I am broke, broke, broke! I burned through all my school financial aid until next semester starts in January. My email is citizenkeys@gmail.com . If anybody's got an extra bedroom for a month...
but tightly-packed communal living is a solution to high rent. Share a bedroom between 8 people. Add office space, kitchen, bathroom, and you've got your entire startup packed into one 2-room apartment.
I just watched The Secret of Kells on Netflix and was wondering the same thing. The protagonist has a complete devotion to the creation of illuminated texts which seemed like a perfect stand in for [insert open source project that would illuminate the world here]
Seriously... I'm going to register a domain and try and set this up on kickstarter. If anyone wants to help out with design or whatever, send me an email to citizenkeys@gmail.com .
In theory, if we just had a big rental place with couches, bunkbeds, a kitchen, and a place to shower. That'd be enough to start.
Anyone thinking of working with him on a housing project should consider his attitude toward contracts and paying rent:
"Here's how you deal with big apartment complex property management companies: just lie. Seriously. And give a friend's phone number as your "employer". Make up some fake paystubs in quickbooks. Big property management companies usually hire stupid people that sit in the office all day, do nothing, and collect a paycheck. They don't verify income, or any of the other things they request. Since they don't care, neither should you. Fuck 'em.
Another final comment about big apartment complexes: at a certain point, if you know you're going to move, just quit paying rent. Apartment complexes take a hands-off approach to evictions and actually file real eviction proceedings. As such, you can sit there and live rent free for an entire month or more while they file the legal paperwork against you. Save that rent money you're not paying and save it for when you do find another place." -citizenkeys
So I wasn't acting alone when I bought capitalistcommune.org a few months back?
I have a 'giant' mansion...in Iowa...with open rooms for hackers. Hit me up, libertarian-capitalist-economical living can be a real ideal. See pic here: http://organicgrant.posterous.com/winter-home-0
House is in Cedar Falls, Iowa (University of Northern Iowa)
Though it has a CS department, hackers will respect its reputation for producing Elementary Education teachers (make proper inference here) and the highest pass rate for Accounting majors taking the CPA exam.
Since we're discussing Iowa, I live in a trailer house in Ames and have a spare room. I'm five miles off the ISU campus, just outside the north edge of town. adam at reineke.me
Around 4,000 sq ft. 6 bedrooms, library, bar/lounge in the basement. 3 bedrooms are occupied, but if you want to live for basically free and focus on your hustle, do get in touch.
I think I'm going to pursue pushing this idea out more in my area. Napoleon Hill would view it as a Mastermind.
wouldn't a hacker hippie commune be more about building a robotic plow and spending your, now spare, time OCRing and analyzing old farmers almanacs to determine the optimal time to plant/rotate/water crops?
In today's culture, it might be dreamed up on facebook, funded on kickstarter, promoted on twitter, picked up by 10,000 blogs that all poach from each other and then abandoned by the next semester because the earth-water-sun interface is ancient and suffers from significant design issues whose tickets never get responded to by the upstream provider.
I'm tempted to start blogging up the project proposal for a hippie arcology to be built on a south facing slope in southern Oregon with geothermal backup heat and a fiber optic connection to the internet for the remote workers whose economic contributions exempt them from the maintenance duties that the less skilled have to do (hey, someone needs to turn the compost heaps and feed the tilapia you know). The basic design concept is to have one largish thermal envelope that encloses multiple garden and dwelling spaces that are kept at a relatively constant temperature year round.
I would really like to bring the Whole Earth Catalog hacking tradition full circle.
> I would really like to bring the Whole Earth Catalog hacking tradition full circle.
Sort of a tangent, but the Whole Earth Catalog scene and the tech scene were surprisingly inter-related in the 60s-80s, which is something I didn't know until recently. Ted Nelson, who had coined the word "hypertext" about three years before the first WEC was published, was greatly influenced by it for his 1974 book Computer Lib / Dream Machines, and Steve Jobs was an avid reader as well. There was even briefly a software version in the 80s: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_Earth_Software_Catalog_an...
I think I was surprised to find a connection mainly because in 2010 I associate the Whole Earth Catalog more with anti-technology primitivists, which doesn't seem to have originally been the case--- seems plenty of technologists were also interested in it, since DIY doesn't have to mean primitivism.
> hey, someone needs to turn the compost heaps and
> feed the tilapia you know
Now I'm just picturing the Dharma Initiative, and Ben's burnt-out, drunken father that came to 'the island' thinking that he was going to be a part of something special, only to find out that they wanted him to be the janitor.
many years ago, i've lived on non-hacker hippie communes. there's actually several outside of austin in texas. it makes sense given all the cheap ranch land in rural texas.
ideally, you have a "main house" with the kitchen and where everybody meets up. then you have little cottages all over the ranch with bunk beds where everybody sleeps and works. when people need to buy stuff, they drive into town.
for hackers that just need a roof over their head and a few meals so they don't starve, it's not a bad idea.
Wow, only on hacker news would my flippant, but secretly serious, comment lead to an actual working implementation of something great. Are you involved with the sproutrobot? Super cool idea and I've just signed up!
I've been thinking about it for years. The only problem is that most programmers seem to be status quo capitalists bordering on libertarian. It might be easier to teach hippies to program than programmers not to be aspirational yuppie SWPLs.
A couple of cults have gotten by on programming and/or web design, Aum Shinrikyo and Heaven's Gate come to mind.
In communes, you don't really do your own thing. I think you're talking about an apartment building where a lot of hackers live that has a hacking room instead of a gym. Or possibly efficiency apartments. Maybe you meant "common kitchen" rather than commune? Like a dorm?
A hostel is just like a hotel, except you usually don't get a room (unless you're willing to pony up an extra $20.) You're just looking for a cheap place to stay, but you don't want it to be scary. Hostels generally are not scary at all, and are filled with mostly pleasant foreigners. They used to have rules that require that you have ID proving that you don't live in the town that you're hostelling in, though; don't know if that's changed at all.
I think the bay area hacker version of a hippie commune is a co-op loft that hosts parties on the weekends to cover some expenses. Or some version there of. The ones I knew of still charged rent but it was easy enough to work out a way to do work for rent or a sliding scale.
Not nearly as communal as what you're imagining, but way more communal than 99% of living situations.
I lived in co-ops for two years of college. It was very inexpensive, about $550/month including "rent" (not actually rent since we were technically owners), all utilities, furnished, and all meals, in an excellent downtown location near campus. A comparable apartment in the area might go for $700/month per person, assuming it's a two- or three-bedroom place, and that doesn't include utilities or food. Of course the rooms were tiny, the house was very used-up (the two I lived in were 50+ years old), lots of carpet stains, scuffed floors, and you have to deal with living with 20+ young people (noisy, drama etc.). It was a good way to meet people though. At my school at least, co-ops were basically frats for hippies.
I was joking about this with a friend a while back. I prize my solitude a bit much, but I think it might be fun. Outdoor work might be better for hackers' brains than most realize. Get your body in shape in the morning and your mind in shape in the afternoon. Hrmm.
You could always start up one of your own. Kickstarter could help. :P
Only if you actually apply for citizenship. I believe there's a way for foreign citizens (US? others?) to live there indefinitely w/o actually immigrating.
I don't know details, but I'm pretty sure that only applies if you're seeking citizenship. Also, at older ages, the amount of service you have to do goes down considerably.
In case you don't like short stories and didn't click the link, the title is a line from a Jonathon Coulton (of Portal fame) song, "The Future Soon" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZEEDa9Mej8
this is almost what i had in mind, only my version has bedrooms, showers, and allows pets.
noisebridge kicks ass. it's a giant hacker studio. i've never been here before. if you're a hacker and live in san francisco, you owe it to yourself to just show up here at least once.
i will be here for awhile tonight if anybody wants to chill out.
Noisebridge has had some issues (actually ongoing issues) with people that treat it as a living space, or just "forget to take the last BART" with suspicious regularity. Maybe your idea would solve that problem. Or maybe it would exacerbate it, not sure.
Unrelated: there's also another movement called "cohousing" which tries to strike a middle ground between the post-WWII standard of one-family-per-house, and communes that tend to have a complete lack of privacy.
I share a large close to luxury house with atleast three hackers located in Bali, Indonesia. Recently we finished the transfer by getting a good internet connection (not that easy in mountains, but totally worth it). My advice - move to the friendly environment that lets you live off really small money (100$ is a good salary for locals here) and then things are easy and pleasing.
I met a couple of people about two years ago in Tennessee who lived in the middle of nowhere in a house in the mountains. They had a couple of solar panels that basically produced enough power to run an iMac so they could do some freelance design work to make money. They had a Verizon data card for net access.
I was just thinking that if they didn't keep up with their skills, they might have a hard time getting work. (Not necessarily that they were using it for video games or youtube or anything.)
Yes! I'm involved with a hacker space in Vienna, Austria (we're proud that Noisebridge cites us as inspiration) and I've long believed that on the floor above every hackerspace there should be a hostel. A "hackers in residence" program, if you will – complete with international exchanges and a "worldwide pass" subscription.
I haven't figured out how to cover the starting costs, but using Kickstarter is a really good idea.
You should start a mailing list/Facebook group/wiki.
This is something I'd be very interested in, I'm currently looking for a new place to live. If anyone knows of anyone doing something like this in the UK, let me know!
-Crop Rotations: The texts I read about this subject were the result of some very painstaking note-taking, and keeping all this information straight can confound even the very studious. We had at least 3 copies of Elliot Coleman's "The New Organic Grower" around and they were all falling apart from constant reference. Having instant access to your planting history would be invaluable, especially if coupled with pH effects of relevant crops and other useful info.
Certifications: The process for getting that nifty "certified organic" label is quite difficult. You have to submit all sorts of things. It was even worse for us because we had commercial kitchen equipment (we sold jarred jams, salsas, etc)
Marketing: We sold shares of our output through a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program. ~100% of people who partook found out about us from meeting us at a farmer's market. I think there's a decent market for CSA shares, but not really any way of comparison shopping, or even knowing what's available.
It would be neat to work on a project to solve these problems while simultaneously encountering them on the day-to-day. But fair warning: "plowing the fields all day" does not really leave one in the mood for hacking. Contemplation? Surely. Conversation? Absolutely. But I wouldn't expect to get a whole lot of hacking done, at least not in your first season.