Hello all, I am new here and wanted to introduce myself and hear y’all’s opinion on something’s I’ve been working on.

I am a multidisciplinary designer with a concentration in architecture and environmental design. Lately I’ve been researching and exploring novel approaches to organized efforts, infrastructure development, and strategic implementation. The above image is mostly an unrelated snapshot example of my past work and design approach. It utilizes 80% up-cycled transportation repair materials such as scrap road-plate steel, treated lumber, common masonry, common schedule steel pipes, and polyethylene tubing to create an expanded public transit stop which uses solar heat gain to de-ice the surrounding ground during colder months.

Currently my focus has been on complex business model design. While I can’t share much of the details yet, I will say that it interlocks with more than a dozen symbiotic business models and social governance solutions into an approximate one square mile area through 400 pages of documentation; and can serve up to 1,000 people with a minimum of 100-120 people’s maintained efforts.

Everyone here would be doing me a huge favor towards such ends by providing short feedback to a brief set of questions related to the broad-stoke lived experience of what belonging to such an effort may be like.

Questions:

  1. How willing are you and how willing do you believe millennials and gen-z are to relocate their life some number of hours away to participate in a funded solar punk initiative?

  2. How willing are you and how willing do you believe millennials and gen-z are to share a 800 square foot all seasons yurt with one other person for 5-6 years?

  3. How willing are you and how willing do you believe millennials and gen-z are to participate in a flexible productivity schedule which typically requires 8-24 hours of blue collar work, 8-24 hours of white collar work, 8-24 hours of learning/teaching, and 8-24 hours of leisure weekly?

  4. If satisfactorily completing question 2 and maintaining question 3 legally assures lifetime private residency in a 2,000 square foot passive house with no rent or mortgage, utility or repair expenses, and gives rights of first refusal to ones children; would you still be interested if it means you do not own the house on paper?

  5. If your only income is from a cooperative owner-operated business model which straddles a couple of symbiotic businesses and professional expertise how satisfactory would this be to you?

  6. How willing are you and how willing do you believe millennials and gen-z are to work towards perpetually improved labor automation by sweating approximately 8-24 hours a week for as long as it takes?

  7. How might your answers change if the above things together resulted in a housing addition from 2,000 square feet to as much as 4,000 square feet after 10-12 years?

  8. How might your answers change if you are assured direct democracy over virtually all collective efforts supported by subject experts advocacy?

  9. What is your first reaction to the idea that the only way for someone to be removed from their residence and the community is through reaching a 85% community-wide vote?

  10. How might your answers change if the above allows for relocating to another networked community with a largely similar framework and governance as may be necessary and or available?

  • stabby_cicada@slrpnk.net
    0·
    9 days ago

    (clippy) It sounds like you’re trying to build a commune. Would you like help with that? (\clippy)

    So I’m going to try to answer your questions, but before I do I want to emphasize the commune issue. It sounds like you’re trying to draw people together, artificially build a community where people live, work, and play in common under the guidance of the same organization, and keep them working together for a lengthy period of, frankly, impoverished struggle.

    You’re trying to build a commune from the top down.

    The problem with communes is they require a HIGH level of trust between members BEFORE they commit to sharing their lives, finances, and other resources. because of how quickly they can lose everything if the commune’s leadership exploits or fails them, and how easily they can be exploited by free riders and abusers.

    And they need members who won’t abuse that trust. Which, historically, has been the sticking point.

    When you set up a situation like this, where a person’s employment, housing, and social life all depend on maintaining their status within the same organization, you’re building a fragile edifice. Because if that organization fails, either through bad decisions, exploitation, or reasons out of its control, everyone who relies on it goes down with it.

    It’s the opposite of the sustainability and resilience that we need in the uncertain future.

    And it attracts a higher than normal share of desperate people, exploiters, and bad actors. Because people with good prospects in society won’t gamble those prospects, and people with strong economic and social ties to society won’t give those up, by submitting their entire lives to the governance of one organization.

    Also, I am NOT millennial or Gen-Z so am not going to speak for them - polling people in those demographics directly would be a lot more helpful to you. And since the answers to a lot of your questions will reasonably correlate with age (e.g. older people who already own homes will be MUCH less likely to go live in a yurt), I think adding age ranges to your more formal polling will really help you focus on your core age demographics.

    Anyway:

    Q1. I’d be mostly unwilling, primarily since I’d have to quit my job, though I’d at least be curious. Not speaking for other generations.

    Q2. It depends VERY MUCH on the details your question leaves out. Do I know the person? Can I choose the person? Can I switch people? Being stuck with the same roommate for five years can be fine and can end up a complete nightmare - the situation would need a strong conflict resolution model at minimum.

    And then there’s the environment. What are summers and winters like? What heating and cooling exists? What kitchen/bathroom facilities are there? Is there any privacy in this four seasons tent? Is this going to be five years of basically camping?

    And what’s the incentive? Do I have to pay for five years of camping? What do I get out of it and do I get any of that reward if I back out before the five years?

    PLEASE DO NOT TRY TO ANSWER ALL THESE QUESTIONS. I’m not joining your commune and don’t need the answers. I’m just bringing up things people WILL want to know before committing.

    Q3. Holy labor law violations, Batman! I count a max of 72 hours of blue collar + white collar + teaching work in there, and I would absolutely not sign up for anything even remotely near that without seeing a contract with much clearer labor terms and worker’s rights protections. And how exactly is the 8-24 hours of “leisure” separate from the rest of your life during that week? Is this managed leisure of some kind? Honestly that description reminds me of a 996 startup grind and I would come at it with extreme suspicion.

    Q4. And there’s the incentive: five years of camping with a roommate and 996 grinding in exchange for the lifetime right to live in a 2000 sq ft house. For me: absolutely not. For younger people who have basically no chance of ever owning a house in this economy? I won’t speak for them, but maaaaaaybe?

    Here’s the thing. I don’t believe land should be owned. I believe land should be managed by communities, with usage rights to a home guaranteed to the members of that community who reside in it. So from THAT standpoint your idea sounds like a great prefigurative phase shift from private ownership to community ownership. But it’s still ownership, because we still live under capitalism - and if I don’t own the home I live in, who does? What rights do they have that I don’t? And what happens when we disagree?

    And circling back: who decides what counts as “satisfactorily maintaining”, and to whom can someone appeal if that decision-making body abuses its authority? Because if it takes five years to vest in a house, and in year 4 management realizes they’re not going to have enough houses for everybody and decides to kick out half their workers…

    Q5. Fuuuuuuck no. This is where a lot of communes fail - because they’re totalizing, and the worker’s homes are linked to the worker’s jobs are linked to the worker’s status in the community, and if the employment fails everything fails. (Look up “The Farm” in Tennessee.) I think a community that relies so heavily on one employer, owner operated or not, multiple divisions or not, is dangerously fragile.

    Q6. As long as it takes? Not writing any startup a blank check for my labor. Sorry.

    Q7. Won’t change. My problems with this setup have nothing to do with the size of the house.

    Q8. Holy shit, no, fuck that. So abusable.

    Q9. My first reaction is to fear for victims of domestic violence.

    Without going on an incredibly lengthy rant, the best way to protect individual human rights is to guarantee those rights universally, and, if those rights have to be restricted or removed for some reason, have a carefully structured procedure with objective oversight, checks and balances, and an appeal process, before anyone’s rights are restricted. And if this sounds like a court system, that’s because taking away people’s rights for the good of society is what a court system does, and even then there are some rights not even a court can take away.

    A system where someone can lose their place in a commune - lose their home, lose whatever sweat equity they put into the work of the commune, and so on and so forth - if a sufficient number of fellow commune members hate them enough to vote against them, is a bad system. The way it could facilitate racism, bigotry, prejudice of all kinds, should be obvious.

    And I bring up domestic violence in particular because I’ve seen too many people somehow find the courage to accuse a well-respected community member of abuse, and end up ostracized, punished, even banished from their community, because the community took the side of the well-respected member and believed they’d falsely accused a good man of a heinous crime.

    Q10. That question has so many caveats and unknowns that the answer to it wouldn’t change anything for me.

    • Ayla_Leren@slrpnk.netOP
      0·
      7 days ago

      (Part 1)

      Hello Clippy, I see you have been here since around the reddit migration. Something that isn’t lost on me. My account is freshly minted, so please bear with me as I get familiar with the space.

      Thank you for the thoughtful response. You bet your ass I plan to give the conversation a similar level of commitment lol. I don’t expect you to respond further in kind. However I do wish to make responses so others can see. If you’ll let me I’d mine you for whatever perspectives you might be willing to offer.

      It is important to keep in mind the scale and funding I have been designing around. Three to five billion of non-profit funding deployed to approximately 100 community land trust locations over 5 to 10 years.

      Participation would be through what is best recognized as a networked startup business model with a 5-6 year on-ramp/vestment period where 80-120 people utilize approximately 20-35 million dollars to revitalize and improve exhausted agricultural land according to shared principles as well as permaculture, polyculture, regenerative agriculture and sustainable infrastructure guidelines. Just like any startup there would be protocols and policies related to joining, leaving, or such things as medical complications.

      It isn’t so much drawing people together under an existing team, but rather collectively offering a set of tools, framework, and mentorship through which it becomes easier for symbiotic relationships to gravitate towards each other. Also worth keeping in mind that about 20-25% of the 400 pages I have drafted so far relate to governance, social technologies, and related frameworks. People would be spending about 1-3 hours a week for 2 months networking remotely with diverse skilled and knowledgeable individuals, then spending a week on site further getting to know each other in person before ever starting to process of making a commitment. The intended framework and progression maintains a failsafe mindedness which acknowledges the potential for unforeseeable and catastrophic failure and allows for rolling back, pausing, or even dismantling at various stages. No one would be facing financial ruin by participating.

      As someone at least beyond middle age as you mention, years bear with them a degree of life experience and perspective on human failings which isn’t lost on me. I am aware the pitfall of personalities which represents the one bad apple’s ability to spoil or derail well beyond what most might believe.

      I mainly chose to focus on millennials and gen-z as they are likely the most able-bodied available for portions of blue collar work and are typically less set into their lives. Not adverse to older individuals, just aiming at center-mass so to speak. More formal polling will come in time. Right now the feedback vibe is decidedly more a temperature check and first impression.

      Question #1 response: Understandable. It is neither a small commitment nor unexpected that someone beyond middle age would have some roots which can cause hesitancy and a degree of risk aversion.

      Question #2 response: You would have spend at least 2 months and about 20 hours of loosely guided remote video call gatherings with the full 80-120 people in your cohort. All throughout however would be available asynchronous social media topic discussion groups where everyone may organically gravitate to each other. Housemate pairing would be through a perpetual weekly private rank choice vote and subsequent satisfaction measurement before the recursive voting process cycles back through towards the highest satisfactory measurement. Switching would be possible or even ideal, though may require negotiation with additional others which could necessarily become involved. Perhaps the group would collectively make prior intentions for everyone to swap housemates every X number of months. Plenty can be leaned on from the various conflict resolution processes university housing professionals utilize regularly as well.

      It would be a four seasons yurt, meaning insulation, heating, cooling, power, water, shower, etc. While adaptable to most bio regions, my current regional intent is looking at hardiness zones 6a through 7b. Many yurts aren’t just tents, but can be built to permanent housing building codes standards while yet maintaining relatively greater mobility. You pay nothing to participate, having all reasonable living expenses covered. After 5-6 years you are assured lifetime residence in a newly constructed 2,000 square foot passive house built with sustainable materials that has no maintenance cost or utility expenses. First refusal rights would belong to your children so long as they intend to participate as well. Continuing to reside and participate means: free education, free primary healthcare and perhaps more, free fully rounded nutritional needs comfortably met, a stipend aimed at meeting all outstanding debt payments within reason for 5-6 years, and facilities space with utility bills paid for in which you and your chosen startup co-founders can deploy sufficient grand funding so long as your goals are toward the betterment of the human condition in some fashion. After reaching stable business success, opportunities for income expands rapidly and potentially shifts various funding and expense models.

      Question #3 response: Off course I’m not looking towards 72 hour work weeks. Life needs balance, also all work and no play burns everyone out eventually. The goal is to do the most with the least. Ideally this means 16-32 hours of combined blue and white collar work weekly with no single mentioned category reaching more than 24 hours weekly. The ranges given are to account for a diversity of abilities and availability As the years get on the hopes are to progressively be able to concentrate more and more time into education and leisure. If someone wants to only work 32 hours a week that is fine. If someone wants to work more than 40 hours a week that is fine as well. Everything obvious would meet labor law requirements. The 8-24 of leisure time is more to so insure no one works more than six days a week, ever, even during the busiest couple of weeks around harvest season. The other side of this is routinely having days where only 8 hours of blue collar work a week during winter is needed. Want to have a vacation? Save up 8 hours of leisure quota a week to be scheduled whenever.

      Question #4 response: I partly answer this above. The primary incentives are having virtually zero monetary living expenses with comfortable living arrangements for a minimum of 5-6 years while having access to facilities, funding, expertise, and co-founders with which to turn a startup into a stable business with. Someone who is fresh out of school and owns practically nothing but student debt can literally live rather comfortably. Never working more than 32 hours a week for more than 5 years while ending up a partial business owner on the other side, who has the option of continuing to never having living expenses so long as they continue to uphold the communities social contract.

      I don’t believe land should be owned either. The land and select infrastructure is held in a nonprofit community land trust while the houses and facilities spaces are held by a nonprofit mutual housing association. Mostly common tripartite governance with elected community members keeps everything on the level. The community itself sets its own bars and thresholds. The decision and conflict resolution bodies are nested based on the subject and intensity at hand and always maintained through rank choice voted positions. You would be the management, if not directly then by chosen representation. Everyone holds each other to account because the ultimate success depends on the diligence of the collective. You and your 100 closest friends would be building the homes. The stronger the community, culture, and dedication are the greater and sooner the desired outcomes arrive.

      Question #5 response: Think of it partly as contractual collective homesteading or business building of sorts where ample leeway is afforded for mitigating and unforeseeable challenges, be they individual or more ubiquitous. Unless someone truly needs to leave a community, their residence is ironclad for a minimum of 5-6 years. This also extends to living expense which are fully covered while a stipend covers all outstanding debt payments within reason for the same period. The model is designed such that members are afforded comfortable living standards while being insulated from antagonistic factors which plague typical western economic models. Admittedly having one’s income tethered to performance such as seen in commissions or proportional business profits isn’t for everyone. Although, I have spoken with plenty of recent graduates who say they would jump at an opportunity to live isolated from financial obligations while building their desired business with the assistance of sufficient grants and investments.