Biography
(source wikipedia)
Simona Levi is the coordinator of CONSERVAS. She is an Italian multidisciplinary artist and activist based in Barcelona, Spain, since 1990. She is a prominent activist in European social movements that support the free circulation of knowledge, and has actively participated in movements in defense of the right to housing and the use of public space. In the past few years she has focused on the issues of free culture, e-democracy and the strategic use of digital tools for collective organization, communication and action.
Artistic career
A stage director, actress and dancer by training, Simona Levi studied performing arts in Paris, where she worked as a programmer in the squatted arts space l’Oeil du Cyclone. She started touring as an actress with several companies in 1982, eventually settling in Barcelona in 1990. In 1994 she set up Conservas in Barcelona’s Raval, a venue that promotes local, innovative, independent performing arts based on a self-production paradigm.
In 1999, she founded the company Conservas, and that same year the company presented its first stage production, Femina ex Machina, directed by Levi and Dominique Grandmougin. The piece was awarded the fad special critics price and the Aplaudiment award, and toured extensively to festivals and theaters in Europe (Spain, France, the UK, Switzerland, Italy, Slovenia, Norway…) for more than two years. In 2003, again with Dominique Grandmougin, she directed the company’s second work, Seven Dust, which premiered at the Mercat de les Flors in Barcelona. The production toured through several European countries, including Italy, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Finland, Slovenia and Poland. in 2007, with Marc Sampere, she co-directed the third show by company Conservas, Realidades Avanzadas, which questioned representative democracy and the concept of property. At the end of the show, audience members could take home a CD-ROM with the texts, videos, music and images used in the show. The idea for the production was sparked by a video posted on Youtube in October 2006 that denounced real estate speculation and included footage recorded with a hidden camera in the anti-mobbing office at Barcelona city council. The video was removed from youtube at the request of the bank la Caixa, which alleged copyright infringement based on the use of images of one of its branches.
Since 2001 to 2011 Simona Levi directed the performing and applied arts festival Innmotion, which is held at the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona.
Since 2008 she has managed the stage production of the Oxcars.
Activism
Simona Levi is one of the founders of EXgae (now Xnet), a non-profit association created in 2008 which explores alternative models for cultural diffusion and royalties management. Since 2008, Xnet, with the support of Conservas, has organized the annual OXcars non-competitive awards ceremony, which puts the spotlight on projects created in different arts disciplines based on the paradigm of free culture.
As a member of Xnet, she is also the coordinator of the FCForum, an international arena in which organisations and experts in the field of free/libre knowledge and culture work towards creating a global strategic framework for action and coordination. She is also a founding member of Red Sostenible, a citizen platform created in January 2010 to fight against the introduction of the anti-download legislation known as the “Sinde Law” in Spain, and to defend internet rights.
In 2010, she appeared before the European Union Parliamentary Sub-committee on Intellectual Property law reform to defend the proposals contained in the “Charter for innovation, creativity and access to knowledge”, a document that was drafted collectively by participants of the FCForum. In her intervention, she offered an overview of some of the omissions in the legislation and suggested possible solutions set out in the charter, such as the abolition of Spain’s levy for private copying or “canon digital” and the need to restructure copyright collecting societies, claiming that they “hinder the free circulation of knowledge and sustainability for authors”.
In recent years, she has participated as a speaker and observer at national and international events, where she talks about the Xnet project, the current royalties management situation and possible alternatives to this model. She has spoken at the Ministerial Forum for Creative Europe (The Czech Republic), Transmediale (Berlin), Economies of the Commons (Amsterdam) and at the Sustainable Economy Law and the Internet seminar at the Telecommunications Technical Engineering Faculty at UPM. As a representative of the FCForum, she is a lobbyist at the European Commission.
She co-wrote the book Tecnopolítica, Internet y r-evoluciones – Sobre la centralidad de redes digitales en el #15m and coordinated Cultura Libre Digital – nociones básicas para defender lo que es de todos, both of which were published by Editorial Icaria in 2012.
Some texts by Simona Levi:
- Notes for a R-evolution 2 (version 2.0): Stage two: Vices vs. New Tactical Virtues
What we’ve learnt from the Net and how we can extrapolate it to all spaces of struggle
(Some thoughts geared towards action, compiled for the Radical Community Manager courses that we organise at Xnet)
The Internet is not just a tool, it is an epoch in history.
Technological progress changes the ways in which we organise, think about and see the world.
The Internet is both a tool and a battleground.
The internet is not “a space in which to publicise myself”, it’s a device for
sharing and connecting inputs, an opportunity to find new forms of action and to change the rules of the game.
[Important! Explanatory note: What we say about the Internet only matters if it affects the outside world.
Note on the explanatory note: when we say “affects the outside world” we don’t mean it leads to a protest or demonstration, we mean that it changes the world… but we hope that this becomes clear as you read on.]
Outline for political action as at 24 June 2012.
A few things to consider before reading the following outline:
a – the only two things we can count on with absolute certainty are death and our fingers. @Mic_y_Mouse
b – The Net is constantly moving and evolving; this is what defines it, at least for the time being. A tactical formula that works for a while will stop working unless it is constantly changed and improved. The things that we are going to tell you here are changing even as we write. We can only hold onto the essence, the philosophy, the ethics of these practices, rather than the practices themselves.
c – the thoughts compiled in this text refer to the way political actions are structured. We can start many actions simultaneously, but we have to study each one separately. We’re talking about actions from inside the illogical logic of the system. Naturally, we also have to inhabit spaces outside of the system. But those are governed by other rules and ways of behaving that aren’t included in these pages (4).
d – It is clear – or maybe it isn’t – that we have to tactically consider what a particular moment in history demands from us.
For example: there’s a big difference between the actions required by the momentum of the Indignados’ Movement in its early days and what the Indignados need now. In other words, the tactics that worked six months ago won’t work now, and the ones that work now wouldn’t have worked then.
e – For this same reason, the first bad habit we have to get rid of is our tendency to emulate ourselves.
This bad habit is closely linked to onomastic obsessions: celebrating our own anniversaries, in our own “historic” places. We write ourselves into history before we’ve finished.
An that’s a pity because our main asset is surprise: the ability to do the unexpected, unexpectedly, in unexpected places.
So here it is, a step-by-step outline in which every step is vital:
1 – Cry elsewhere (4)
It seems obvious, but it isn’t: we have to ask ourselves what our objective is, and then stick to it.
The objective must be specific. Not a hypothesis. A concrete plan with demonstrable solutions.
We have to carry our legitimate hopes, dreams, dogmas and faith with us (see below when we talk about our “ideological body of beliefs” and “memeplexes”), but we have to store them away at the bottom of our hearts/minds.
The only things that belong in the shared space of struggle are concrete things that can/should be achieved.
How can we tell whether or not something is concrete? J
One clue is to apply the following military formula, to the letter.
Ask: who, what, how, when, where. And above all: why.
If you can’t answer these questions, your objective is not concrete enough to share. And even if you can answer them, it still might not be.
Where am I going with this? I simply want to start by sharing these things that I’ve learnt. By suggesting that it’s probably best not to bother anybody unless we are well-prepared and clear about our objectives, so that we can contribute solutions, not problems.
When we talk about objectives, the critical aspect tends to take all the picture; the proposal itself and affirmations tend to be weaker and lacking in grounds.
It’s easy to know what we don’t want because we experience it. But it’s difficult to know what we do want, because it has to be a mix of invention and experience at the same time, otherwise it won’t have any consistency.
Perhaps we only know the questions and not the answers? It’s important to resolve our doubts and do our complaining in other spaces, to “cry elsewhere”, otherwise we do not know how to be free.
The Internet, the ethics of the Net and the hacker ethic (2), have taught us to do things, rather than demand that things “get done” The only thing we demand is the removal of all obstacles to “doing”.
The hacker “ethos” has been summarised as follows (2):
– The world is full of fascinating problems waiting to be solved
– No problem should ever have to be solved twice
– Boredom and drudgery are evil
– Freedom is good
– Attitude is no substitute for competence
That said, and once we have our concrete objective, we have to come together and define:
2 – Who we want to be and who we are:
– an individual
– a closed group
– an open group
– a diffuse group
– a platform of groups and/or individuals
– etc.
We can be several of these at the same time, but we have to be aware of the different kinds of behaviour each identity entails. Mixing them unwittingly can turn out badly – tactically and even “legally”.
When you choose one or more of these identities it doesn’t mean that you withdraw from more general voluntary or inevitable spaces for interaction (assemblies, neighbourhoods, cities).
We must occupy and work in all possible spaces. But we have to respect the identity required by each dynamic.
If things goes wrong, keep reading to find out the importance of the fork.
Note on step 2: Some thoughts on the opportunity to be a one way or another (inspired by conversations with Xavier Barandiarán).
[Note on the note: you have to read this note because even though it’s a note, it’s actually more important than point 2 itself J]
Herd (loosely based on Wikipedia definition): a herd is an association of a number of individual agents interacting with one another and with their environment. Their collective behaviour is decentralised and self-organised. The herd acts as a unit that moves in the same direction, but its function emerges from non-coordinated behaviour of individuals who follow their own impulses.
In a herd, each individual spontaneously carries out different roles according to their ability during brief periods of time. Any individual can briefly take control, or be at the centre or at the most exposed edge for a few moments, until another individual naturally takes over.
“Herd” in the very positive sense of the term. We can also think of a flock of birds.
(see also “swarm behaviour”, although this is a slightly different metaphor to the one I’m suggesting here)
A herd cannot act with speed and precision, but it has a great capacity to expand and grow.
Our brains spontaneously synchronize stimuli: if something “makes sense” a connection happens; if it doesn’t, there is no connection. Connection means collective “attention” although it does not necessarily lead to a collective decision.
Catalyst (loosely based on Wikipedia definition): a catalyst is a substance or device that speeds up a scientific process. In chemistry, catalysts are small groups of molecules that change the rate of a reaction, making it faster (or slower). Catalysts decrease the amount of energy required for a particular process. Catalysts amplify and guide the power of a reaction. They are small, flexible groups that channel “collective attention.” They do not consist of more than 20-50 molecules.
Rubén Sáez says: “In biochemistry, the metabolic pathways that enable the functioning of the extremely complex system of the human body are based on networked catalytic cycles. In fact, the emergence of life (the most brilliant of all known emergent properties – no offence intended to creative thought) is linked to the emergence of the first self-replicating catalytic cycles. If we manage to create various catalysing groups and interconnect them in the right way, we will generate catalytic cycles. And if we manage to continue to work in that way, we will generate the capacity for them to self-replicate. The end result – after leaving due time for evolution, interconnection and social metabolism – could be a new socio-political order as an emergent property.”
Certain times in history require us to behave as a herd, other times require us to act as catalysts.
We should not be afraid to be few in number if that is all we can or should be. And we shouldn’t attribute the qualities of a catalyst to a herd.
At this stage of the Indignados’ Movement, the time has come to speed up processes by working as many small, independent nodes with autonomous decision-making capacity, who know what needs to be done, and support each other when and only if it becomes necessary, recognising each other through our work, which is also the basis of our reciprocal trust.
3 – We already know that it’s not enough to simply know who and what we are.
We also have to decide how to show ourselves in the outside world.
We can show ourselves in the form of:
– a “brand”
– an ephemeral identity
– an anonymous identity
– a lobby group
– a communication medium
– etc.
We can take on several of these identities at the same time, but we should be aware of the different kinds of behaviour they entail. Mixing them up unwittingly can end up badly – tactically and even “legally”.
Just as in the previous case – or even more so – numbers aren’t important:
whether we are few or many, we are the future no matter how we present ourselves.
4 – Our interactions should not be horizontal in nature, but merit-based, in the positive sense: the kind of merit that is always in process, always available to those who cultivate it through work and experience, following their own needs. This idea tends to shock people who are unfamiliar with networking dynamics, but it’s patently obvious to the members of most virtual communities, who work with it as part of their everyday practices. We are all different. This is what guarantees the impossibility of imposing verticality onto a “meritocracy”, because there will never be just one merit or a single skill, there will always be many different ones developed by all sorts of people. This is why forces tend to come together around “finished work”, theories-put-in-practice and ways of life, rather than around fantasies and opinions.
It is not our identity that defines us, it is our results.
Note:
Horizontality is a fallacy: as Michel Bauwens and many others have amply shown, in a given group 1% of people execute, 9% contribute and 90% parasite, complain and weigh it down (btw, these are the ones who have not done their “crying elsewhere”. For them, we paraphrase some advice from marketing wiz Paul Arden: energy is 75% of the job; if you haven’t got it (or can’t have it), be polite).
To explain this “provocation” J that I’m using to try and shake up what I see as a certain stagnation, all I’m trying to say is that when somebody expresses an opinion, we should be able to ask: “This thing that you’re expressing an opinion on – what have you done in relation to it, or what do you know how to do?” If the answer is: “I haven’t got the faintest idea, my opinion is based on my beliefs”, well this person loses points and will find it much harder to win the stuffed toy prize at the end.
And lastly @axebra, sent me this important clarification: “We can prevent a meritocracy from becoming an excuse to fall into influence peddling and corruption by including two other variables from hacker culture: Transparency (so that merit can be analysed objectively – as you can see the code that each developer has contributed in open source projects), and that the result must become part of the Commons (the material generated cannot be claimed by a particular individual or group, but must benefit everybody, like free software or a corrupt politician going to jail J).
5 – This is also why we defend attribution (which includes anonymity, that is the impossibility of attribution if the person who “makes” it prefers it that way): individual autonomy and empowerment create healthy groups that each member can contribute to according to her abilities, opportunities and knowledge at each point in her life, and be recognised and respected for it. Recognition from the community and the outside world means selfcare and identity. It frees you from the frustration and anxiety of affirmation, and allows you to calmly free the fruits of you work for the common good.
A needs-based approach is basically charity.
A skill-based approach recognises that skills have to be valued or they will go to waste.
We’re not asking for anything, least of all charity. We simply are.
6 – In praise of the concept of the ‘fork’
From way back, we’ve always defended “divorce” J (the fork): we cooperate as autonomous individuals around specific projects; ideally, we don’t ask the group for things that it can’t give us, because we’ve already done our crying elsewhere. We can take different paths at any moment. Being together and hating each other is not a strength; it is cowardly and it’s a weakness. Distributed networks don’t need a nucleus in order to operate. We are autonomous individuals, independent nodes that happily, voluntarily come together for a common purpose at a particular time. We can try to achieve the same aim separately if our methods and moods are different; in the most of the cases, every bit helps. We interact through dynamics of cooperation, not dependency.
Against the concentration of powers, the Internet ‘de-concentrates’ powers. J
The Network of Networks is a distributed network, and this is the basis of its functioning and philosophy: relevant trust networks that are distributed and autonomous in relation to their specific activities, in which no node needs to know in detail what the others are doing in order to move forward and support each other. These nodes, which are separate but linked by bonds of trust, can support each other when the need arises, but as a rule they operate as sovereign, autonomous groups.
Centralisation is neither possible nor desirable; federation is the option.
A global association of selfish radical reformers. [1]
Altruism is selfishness that hasn’t come out of the closet.
Even in its smallest form (two people), “democratic” organisation is not about attaining the impossible goal of always agreeing (dogma and centralist control). It’s about creating a space of ethical trust that allows some of us to look after certain aspects and develop our skills in them, while at the same time we can let go of controlling other aspects because we know that others will take care of them. This forces us to shed the prejudices that lead us to try and control the actions of others.
People who are obsessed with centrality (the centrality of an assembly, a neighbourhood, parliament) don’t realise that the things that are outside of the centre will always be “more”: more representative, more numerous, bigger, freer, more flexible, more volatile, newer and, above all, more real.
What better example than “representative democracy”: the dictatorship of the largest minority over the majority of minorities.
It’s not true that if we want to reach our goal “we must stay together”, that “together is better”, that the herd is always best.
It’s always good to separate. It’s the only thing that makes it possible to come together again.
We can live together for as long as we please, but we will never be of the same flesh.
Fortunately.
7 – We are uncountable and unlocatable. So why are we so determined to be counted and located? Why, when, and for what?
Why do we organise demonstrations?
Why do we collect signatures?
We have an unprecedented historical opportunity: why then are we playing against ourselves?
It’s rarely useful to count ourselves; it’s even more rarely useful to let ourselves be counted. It’s only useful when there are more of us than the minimum number required for a specific purpose.
That’s something we have to know in advance. And I mean “know”, not “wish”.
How can we find out?
By using a mathematical formula that I worked out and can guarantee 100%: you are able to summon 10% of the people you are directly in contact with. That excludes twitter, fb and similar networks.
In other words, if I have 100 email addresses, 10 people will turn up. If I hand out 1000 flyers, 100 people will sign.
That’s the way it is: if we want 10,000 people at a demonstration, we need to contact 100,000 people directly.
There have been rare exceptions, and all of them were very well organised in advance, such as the Indignados’ Movement (3 months preparation).
So we shouldn’t bother people with mass calls for participation if we can mathematically calculate that we won’t end up massively summoning anybody.
We have to know how to work with what we have. We can grow without frustration, without envy, with pleasure.
A few can be as effective as many, depending on the circumstances.
This means that we can free up our energy and cover more fronts at the same time. The lower the numbers required to bring about catalysis, the more catalysts will be able to have.
All of us may not be present at a particular moment, but that doesn’t mean that our numbers are not much larger than they appear.
8 – There’s no 1 without the 8: what is our target group?
– our peers
– people who think like us
– sympathisers
– people who listen but are unlike us
– people who do not listen (but are similar)
– people who do not listen (and are different)
– the enemy’s friends
– the enemy
– institutions, the media
– etc.
Each of these groups requires a different use of tools and, more importantly, a different aesthetic in order to make it from the screen/street -> to the retina -> to the brain -> to the guts.
We can have several ‘targets’ at the same time, but we should be aware of the different kinds of behaviour they entail. Mixing them up unwittingly can turn out badly – tactically and even “legally”.
If we want to analyse further, there are several options to choose from. By way of example, I’ll just mention a few elements of the Mactor method used by the army, among others:
“the information gathered about the actors is set out in the following way:
• their objectives, goals, projects under way and maturing.
• their motivations, constraints and internal means of action (coherence)
• their past strategic behaviour (attitude).
• the means of action that actors have at their disposal.
• …”
9 – Remember that when we talk about political action we are really talking about communicating to bring about change.
Communication is a dialectical relationship between the communicator (us) and the interlocutor (our target).
This means that we can’t just express what we have to say. We also have to say what the interlocutor can understand, in a way that she can understand it.
As systemic psychologists say, it is impossible to not communicate, in other words:
– If our interlocutor can’t understand the language we’re using, we probably actually want to be misunderstood (by the people we are addressing), we want to take the role of the victim; (1)
– Silence is communication too;
– excessive communication is not “message”, it’s “noise” (or SPAM) and only puts people off.
10 – The content: our (brilliant) ideas
Meme: (loosely based on Wikipedia definition): a meme is a unit of cultural evolution that is analogous to the gene in that it self-replicates and mutates. A meme can be anything that is copied from one person to another and can include habits, skills, songs, stories and other types of information. Memes reproduce through copying that brings about variations and selection. As only some variants can survive in a battle to the death, memes compete for space in our memories and for the opportunity to be copied again.
Given that social learning takes place differently in each person, the process of imitation cannot be considered to be perfect. This means that there is an extremely high rate of mutation in memetic evolution, and that mutations can even take place within each and every interaction in the imitation process.
Clusters of memes join together and form memeplexes, in which each meme is a cultural unit in a complex cultural system, such as the body of ideological beliefs that each person creates and uses as a guide.
Memes, which we can consider to be in-between stages of the creation of memeplexes, are terribly concrete. And if we apply the metaphor to ourselves, it is very difficult for a coalition of several memes to come together and create a memeplex that exactly matches our own body of ideological beliefs… there’s a lot of work to be done.
This shouldn’t discourage us. It’s a good thing.
It leads us to be more concrete and to win frequent, well-aimed victories in the present. And to lose some non-definitive battles too.
Meme transmission shares the characteristics of all evolutionary processes: fecundity (some ideas are particularly effective), longevity (they persist for a very long time) and accurate copying (traditional conservatism, specially as taught in primary education, that is, Freud’s “compulsion to repeat”).
In the same way that genes self-replicate just because its their nature (that is, unconsciously), memes also tend to replicate; a good idea isn’t really a good idea unless it can also spread successfully. This means that memes are indifferent to truth.
Ergo, it is not enough for an idea to be good to win.
Whether we like it or not, no power means no rights.
I’m not talking about tension between good and evil, but about something much more trivial, more like “the customer is always right.” In the current climate (the dominant meme), it’s not enough to say something “isn’t true”: We have to create a stronger meme, one that can devour the existing one.
How? How do we make our meme go “viral”? The basic thing about memes is movement.
A text (5) that Xabier Barandiaran has written about bacterial networks can help us understand:
“Life is a fusion of two types of stability: the stability of dynamic self-organised systems (autonomous or autopoletic systems) and the stability of replicating forms or templates (DNA-ARN)”, which are comparable to genes. The first are systems that function outside of thermodynamic balance, the latter are energetically stable structures subject to recombination. The fusion of these two forms of stability leads to the concept of information (genetic information). As such, they are also the biological bases of communication” and of life.
In this sense, there are two basic types of evolution: the first uses horizontal transfer, and the latter uses vertical inheritance.
Vertical or Darwinian evolution is probably better known: it makes it possible to follow the genealogy of genetic changes over time and their lineages, going all the way back to our evolutionary origins.
Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is the transfer of genetic material from one organism to another organism that is not its offspring (not from generation to generation): bacteria, single cell beings, exchange their genetic code.
According to neo-Darwinist theory, mutations are the source and the direct cause of evolutionary change, but they are by no means the mechanism that leads a change to become fixed.
Natural selection is what leads some changes to become fixed and gets rid of others. A gazelle might be born with some type of advantageous gene, but if it is eaten by a predator just as it raises its head, goodbye advantageous mutation.
In horizontal transference, bacteria have the capacity to send hundreds of thousands of copies of the genetic sequence into the environment. They generate a massive parallel, distributed process that spreads innumerable copies of a resistance gene, in which the bacteria on the receiving end can instantly incorporate the new gene as part of their metabolism.
The basic idea is that exchanging instructions that have successfully solved a problem (bacterial evolution) may turn out to be a faster and more effective evolutionary mechanism than saving those instructions in order to attain a greater comparative reproductive success (Darwinian evolution).
In short, it is an evolutionary or innovatory model that increases individual autonomy through collective cooperation. This is precisely the model that we advocate in the free culture movement, and the one that we practice, among other things, in technopolitical networks.”
11 – The new: Transforming our imaginary so that we can subvert reality
Newness is our responsibility. It’s extremely difficult. Our ontological nature makes us tend to be dependent, possessive and insecure. But above all we tend to be conservative: we only trust familiar patterns, we feel a compulsion to repeat. Our whole psychic structure is totally resistant to change. Doing something that is unfamiliar and truly new for us requires an extreme effort of consciousness and will, while our nature tries to pull us the other way. Particularly during difficult times, we return to familiar places and defeated practices.
But didn’t we want to bring about change? If so, we must make this effort. Indignados’ is a digital native movement, and this “novelty” was behind the great qualitative leap in comparison to past movements. But when difficult times hit, it has tended to regress back to familiar models that have been used before, and are now obsolete. We must defend the courage to experiment with new ways of doing things, right up to the very end. We should learn to read the signs, so that we can plan ahead.
“The best way to predict the future is to create it” (Peter Drucker).
And “You can and should shape your own future. Because if you don’t someone else surely will do it for you.” (Joel Barker).
The future is made up of tendencies that are a continuation of the past and present, along with elements that are totally new. This means that we have to understand what’s happening today and what happened before. We have to learn from history and then put the same amount of effort into inventing.
“The past belongs to memory, the future belongs to imagination and will.” (P. Massé)
Yes, it requires willpower. It requires taking a strategic attitude to our desires and our nightmares. Survival itself means learning to see what’s ahead.
“Those who do not read the future are doomed to repeat it” (George Santayana)
We can’t subordinate the effectiveness of an action to ideological prejudices. This doesn’t mean that anything goes, even immoral acts. Once we’ve pre-set our objectives (“ethical” should be implicit), we should sweep away the prejudices that pop up in our minds because of human nature. It’s simply fear of the new. Just sweep them away. With our willpower. Do our crying elsewhere.
This pays off.
We know that there is no juicier vertigo than to achieve something new. It is like fast-forwarding through history, hurtling at full speed, with the wind in your hair.
12 – “Doing” and not “doing”
Not “doing” things that we need to do can end up being expressed in many forms.
For example, hatred.
A person who gives up, festers in hate. She is the eternal victim. Inversely, if somebody is festering in hate, it is because she has given up.
Hatred is legitimate and inevitable.
But right now I think we can channel it in other ways that will be much more harmful to our enemies.
I would sing it like this:
Without pleasure and rage, there’s no empowerment.
Without empowerment there’s no rebellion.
Without rebellion there’s no r-evolution.
Not “doing” can also take other forms.
Perfectionism, for example.
The best way to response to this problem may be to read the hacker manifesto called the “Cult of Done” (3).
I am pasting it below, but first I want to remind you that we only have to “do” the few times that it is necessary – with specific goals, focused plans and quick, targeted victories. As mentioned earlier, too much “doing” is not “doing”, it’s noise (see SPAM above).
The “Cult of Done” (3) goes like this:
1. There are three stages of being: not knowing, action and completion.
2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
3. There is no editing stage.
4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what
you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing, even if you don’t, and do it.
5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.
6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.
7. Once you’re done you can throw it away.
8. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done.
9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right.
10. Failure counts as done. So do make mistakes.
11. Destruction is a variant of done.
12. If you have an idea and you publish it on the Internet, that counts as a ghost of done.
13. Done is the engine of more.
13 – Our way of disseminating:
Viral Marketing (based on Wikipedia definition):
“Viral marketing is a technique for producing exponential increases in “brand awareness” by means of self-replicating viral processes analogous to the spread of viruses.”
To put it briefly, we’re talking about the following stages of an action:
a – observe the situation without prejudices (that is, without deforming it to make it fit in your theories and desires)
b – choose the concrete stages or “memes” that will create memeplexes.
c – find a lowest common denominator that you share with your target for each meme.
d – create them in the right order.
e – before you release it (and only when it’s completely finished, so you don’t bother busy people) check it with like-minded peers for feedback, improvements, contamination, positive energy, dissemination.
f – aim it at the target and release it, knowing that it will activate 10% of your selected target.
g – if the meme manages to take over the space of another existing one, it will be co-opted (1) and the operation will have been a success.
h – so we’ll disappear.
Things are won without anybody noticing.
No real change has ever come about overnight. Not even the discovery that the earth revolves around the sun.
Ideas and memes that catalysts have fought for, shaped, brought to the forefront, have then been co-opted and used for good or evil, by any individual or any form of human organisation that has adopted them. Even commercial television.
Yes, winning is also painful, it means ceasing to be useful (in this battle – don’t worry, there are many more to come!). It means a loss of identity, loss of authority, of control, of unity and purity, it means nostalgia and emptiness. But apparently offspring are always a blessing in the end 😉
We invade the mainstream without shame, letting it co-opt us, because it will never restrict us.
Why do we want to spread?
– Perhaps because we want to “contaminate” even more people, to expand an idea to an infinite degree, so that it takes hold and displaces others (to broaden the base and stability of an idea)
– To make our ideas occupy the memetic space that was previously occupied by ideas contrary to our own (displace the enemy)
– To empower ourselves (Watch out! This goal is rarely compatible with the other two – although achieving the other two would empower us, so this one on its own is of less interest)
Unfortunately, in most cases we only achieve c) even though we’re really after a) and b), because we are weakened by the innumerable self-referential tics that only amuse the person or group that launches the action and like-minded people. Self-affirmation can be good, until we reach a certain threshold. Then it becomes counterproductive because it is not inclusive, it creates borders, hinders expansion, creates a boundary that limits us and makes us recognisable and exclusive.
Also, you get what is known as “double bind” in psychological jargon: a contradictory imperative that is inherently impossible to fulfil, such as “be free”, “be spontaneous”, “be anti-capitalist”.
We need to realise that our target audience is probably made up of people who are not like us. This means that we have to let go of insecurities, stop repeating our beliefs (which should be well-embedded in our souls by this stage), and concentrate on what our interlocutor – the target of our efforts – needs (even if this target is our enemy).
As in all dialectic relationships, we can’t ask the other party to come to us. We have to find shared ground, or go and find them on their own territory.
Note on a target group that I’m particularly interested in:
In the current context of the Indignados’ Movement, I’m particularly interested in “the middle class” as a target group. I’m using this term in the positive sense too. I can consider myself middleclass. By middle class I mean people who are middle class and those who want to be so. And those who don’t want to be middle class, they feel upper class, but will end up being so anyway. And professionals, and working class or unemployed people who aspire to the promise of the “middle class”, that is, the idea of some kind of dignified life within this system that sells the precariousness of life as a temporary circumstance when it is actually the main condition of their existence.
The middle class is the largest group of people who participate or sympathise with the Indignados’ Movement on a mass scale, and identify with the movement’s outrage or “indignation”. It is also what sets 15M apart, not to mention the fact that it allows for the “non-criminalisation” of the movement to a large extent. The middle class are also the group that political parties need to cajole in order to legitimise their power. It therefore has great leverage in this battle. The middle class is the group that has suddenly flirted with politicisation on a mass scale. It can continue along one of two paths: it can follow the opportunity for change, roll up its sleeves and contribute to pushing the current system over the edge, or it can succumb to the fear that the existing system wants to instil, in which case society will become increasingly fascist, as has occurred at many other times in history. Once again, we have the tension between repeating familiar models or having the courage to create something new.
Without relinquishing the radical nature of our utopias, we have to be able to mediate among ourselves; it’s important to breathe optimism and empowerment into adversity. Rage is not standardised, and each of us has different limits and experiences. If we want resounding victories, we must be inclusive.
14 – We shouldn’t do the things we like to do, but the things that we can win at: and we’ll end up liking it.
Classic head-on confrontations, are not effective because they are predictable. They are only effective when you have enough resources to win. You should not try to surround the enemy either unless you have the numbers to do so.
We can apply the 10% rule that we discussed earlier. To the letter 😉
We are perfectly aware of our numbers.
It is possible to win many things if you have fewer numbers and/or less means than your opponent, as long as you are smarter, given that winning basically means that you get the enemy to make a wrong move and disappear.
What can we do?
– find vulnerable points – if we can’t directly attack the centre of gravity, we need in-between points;
– break and/or infiltrate the enemy ranks;
– make the enemy doubt your strength and its own, by staying under the radar, unidentifiable and uncountable;
– break down its leadership;
– etc.
If the enemy is powerful, it’s not in our interest to make it feel that it is under attack, because then it will swell. It’s in our interest to make the enemy feel betrayed, unmasked, abandoned.
Why do we continue to confront the enemy directly even when we lack the numbers or means? Why do we need to measure how radical we are against daddy-the system? Why do we do the same thing in our personal life? We do it when we feel small or defeated or angry. To be aggressive towards the hierarchically pre-designated interlocutor is a consequence of depression. If we ignore this interlocutor, it doesn’t mean we are not firm. Reacting to provocation is a sign of weakness. Indifference and steamrolling ahead are signs of tenacity. The measure our radicality is history, now and always. The history that we are able to create.
Note to the police (if any have read this far): we are entirely peaceful but unremittingly firm in our determination to sweep away injustices, legal or otherwise, by means of all the ethical actions that we consider to be tactically necessary.
It’s not a matter of principle.
We will do it because these injustices deprive us of the pleasure of life, they attempt to condemn us to be engulfed by sad passions.
It is life or death for our being-human.
The system wants us to be sad and servile. Joy is our greatest revenge. We have a lifetime in which to disobey.
15 – We have to do our crying elsewhere 2 (4)
The proposals that we bring to our spaces of organisation have to be in a finished state. We don’t organise a campaign just because we need affection (let’s join forces!). And we don’t get behind a fantasy just to feel less alone. And then there’s the counterproductive obsession with counting how many of us there is, in order to find out whether we’re right.
We don’t organise a campaign as a way of getting people to work for free towards our grand ideas. And we don’t really believe that everybody has to stop what they are doing because what we’re doing is better. We don’t organise campaigns to educate them.
And we don’t organise campaigns and then infinitely examine the nuances because we’re afraid of going out on the battlefield.
Here lies the difference between moralism and ethics. Moralism is a state of racism and cowardliness at the same time. It is the sense of superiority of the person who does not act.
Then there is the ethics, which is implicit in actions. It is the direction of “doing” (the body of theory we carry in our hearts).
There’s no time for purity.
There’s not enough time; the enemy, the real enemy, quickly regroups.
We are guided by ethics, not by moralism: our goal is to share not to educate/indoctrinate (1).
When we think about anything we’ve ever learnt, we can see that we learnt it because we encountered it at a point in our lives when we were receptive to it, and needed that knowledge. Whenever we’ve learnt anything it was because our practices became learning, ideas.
We won’t force anybody to learn; we can only share what we know, so that it can be picked up by those who need it.
The ethics of doing, the ethics of sharing, free us from the moralism and stagnation of dogmas.
All these steps are anti-natural.
We tend to be self-referential. Our psychic structure pushes us towards familiar things; our compulsion to repeat prevents us from being spontaneously faithful to the objectives that we set ourselves and encourages us to betray the things we know are good for us. Our historical responsibility, our rational efforts, must focus on remaining faithful to our desire for change. This means overcoming the fear of the new in the ways we think and behave.
As our colleague Toret says: when you have no imagination, you turn to memory.
And as Marx – Groucho Marx – says: better new than never.
All these steps are anti-natural. They all lead us to what we truly desire.
We’ve been able to do it and we’ll keep doing it; this is why we’ve been able to take a r-evolution into a space of arid thought.
As I write, there’s no doubt that I am missing some of the subtleties. In general, I’m better at creating history than talking about it. Like everything we do, egoism drives what I do. The future doesn’t interest me. I don’t have children to pass it on to, and I don’t think the human species deserves to survive. But the future is here in my present, every day. And as the saying goes, “I’m interested in the future, as I’m going to spend the rest of my life there.”
See you there, along with my personal heroes who aren’t in any book.
My heroes are my comrades in the fight.
Justice and quality
Simona Levi
Barcelona, March-June 2012
(translation: Nuria Rodríguez)
PS: I’ve been accused of overlooking the more “feminine” texture of the struggle. Perhaps because of my military tone? J I actually don’t overlook it at all, but this didn’t seem the right place to show it. Children may be reading. J
But I do think that we should take advantage of the widespread contempt for women. The enemy don’t see us coming, and by the time they realise, it’s too late for them.
Licence: you can do whatever you like with this text as long as you mention the authorship.
Notes:
[1] : This text is a continuation of this one which I wrote last year. It’s called “Working Notes for a R-evolution” and it includes the following subjects, which you may miss in this second text:
– The defense of the Internet and of sharing
– The Internet as a tool for counterinformation and self-organisation; as a way of ending impunity and the atomisation of ideas for change.
– Netiquete and a new ethics that favour maturity and autonomy thanks to the recognition of each individual’s merits and skills, and the standardisation of forms of organisation that favour decentralised control, the empowerment of end users, and the shared distribution of resources.
– Timing
– Spaces: affinity groups and online collaborations; anonymous, viral presences; “brand” development; assemblies.
– The “how”: be radical, demand the possible.
– Learn to win: whenever there is change, there is loss.
– This war is a language war
– We need to be present at all levels.
– Letting ourselves be co-opted.
– Finding resources within the system.
[2] Erick S. Raymond, «The Cathedral and the Bazaar», Indianopedia version.
[3] Thanks to my friend Stef for passing me “The Cult of Done”.
I think this is the original source, but I’m not certain.
[4] When I say “do your crying elsewhere” I don’t mean “go and cry on your own somewhere like a stray dog” I mean “we should treat our spaces of organisation as a space where we go once we have our ideas straight, not a space where we can dump our insecurities and weaknesses.” We have to build ourselves strong affective networks that include other spaces in which we can care for each other and show our fragilities. But we shouldn’t ask strangers who may feel as needy and lost as we do to cover our emotional needs and understand our fears. Our space of political action and our emotional space may be the same, but this is not usually the case.
This is not a text on spaces of affect – don’t look for any of that here; that’s a text I haven’t finished writing yet. J
[5] Xabier Barandiaran and Lluis Guiu
Metabolismo, comunicación y evolución en redes bacterianas y tecnológicasOther texts that I consider complementary and very useful:
– Amador Savater: “¿Cómo se organiza un clima?
– Un mensaje para el #12M15M desde el barrio de Internet
– This DVD: very useful, even though it’s completely off-topic 😉
– Jacques Lecoq, my theatre teacher, taught me two things that he never wrote down:
1- When you start an improvisation, accept things as you find them. Use the elements that are available, never say “no” to them and try to impose your own.
2 – Always ask “why?” about everything.
_________________________
Spanish original version: https://conservas.click/tacticas/
- Working Notes for a R-evolution
Simona Levi
(translation Nuria Rodríguez)
Barcelona, 23 June, 2011The contribution I can make is basically some working notes in relation to the activities of the last few months, which are about the type of struggle we have been constructing over the past few years and, on a practical level, on how to face up to the problems that we are encountering at this point.
We believe that the struggle we have been participating in – for the defense of the Internet and sharing – has been crucial for arriving at the #15M movement.
Crucial at two levels.
Firstly for the maturity it has created, which cuts right across all layers of public opinion, both in terms of defending something that belongs to it and is in danger of being snatched away – the neutral Internet – , and secondly in terms of ethical ways of relating to others.It is clear that the Network of Networks is changing the history of humanity. It does more than just allow for rhizomic forms of counterinformation and self-organisation, and more than just leave economic and political powers bewildered by the end of the univocity of their messages – of their monologues – in the face of the real-time dissolution of the impunity of their decisions aimed at perpetrating power and their own interests. Rather, the people – through the Net and like the Net – are dialectically putting an end to the fragmentation of ideas of change and the endogamy of groups, setting up a new ethical system that recognises the merits and skills of each person and allows for their maturity and autonomy, and normalising forms of organisation that are based on decentralised power, the empowerment of the end user and the shared distribution of resources.
Netiquette [1] enables and structures the behaviour of people in the group, providing an at least partial solution to one of the problems that we have always encountered in social movements: the psychological aspect, the personal fulfilment of each individual in the struggle. This aspect, which is often ignored, plays a particularly important role in destroying movements.
Using the same medium, although for reasons that are partly different here than in Arab countries for example, public opinion has been getting ready for the re-evolution.
It is not only possible when you reach rock bottom, it is not only desperation that makes it possible. It is also possible when we arm ourselves with tools that allow us to think and develop autonomy, ideas and intelligence.In our text for last year’s FCForum, we tried to explain to our international activist comrades involved in the defense of the Internet that the way Spanish public opinion matured and evolved on the subject of the defense of the Internet and against the “Sinde Law” on intellectual property was not simply anecdotal – on the contrary, it was the construction of something.
We said that “Spain (where sharing is legal and people fight on a mass scale to ensure that it remains so; where a small business can sue multinational entertainment corporations and win, stripping them (we hope) of the digital levy that is their main source of funding; where the outdated practices of royalties management societies and cultural industry lobbies have created a lucid awareness of the abuses that were being perpetrated and of the flaws in the legislation, and a public that is very knowledgaeble and active on subjects that are apparently technical and apparently not a question of life-and-death; where over 200,000 people sign the Manifesto in Defense of Fundamental Rights on the Internet and support actions against the new “Sinde” copyright legislation, such as setting up Red Sostenible and “Sinde’s List” etc.; where 200,000 people interacted with D’evolution Summit during the meeting of EU Ministers of Culture; and where an action led to the resignation of a minister in 2009 with the Molina Pírate campaign…) should not be seen as an exception that is hanging in there but on the brink of extinction, but as leverage. As a spring board.”
They didn’t pay much notice, and now they’re astonished :-).The awareness of the need to defend the Internet has taken root, and together with the organisation of struggles through social networks, this process has been a training and empowerment ground and the fuse underlying the explosion of the #15M movement (which is naturally influenced and constituted by the convergence of many years of a very diverse range of struggles, as well as the possibility of massively and collectively sharing the frustration of being fed up, which we used to experience in isolation).
Taking this as a starting premise, I want to look at how we have developed in this context by mentioning some basic “laws”:
Tempos
As one of the DRY comrades put it, the idea is to:
make people indignant first, then inform them, and then ensure the strategy catches on.
The idea is to inflame you, not teach you, Jean Genet said.And I would add a stage four: normalise the mainstream, offer ourselves up for cooptation,
reveal the falseness of the cliches through irony and humour, not through dogma. We do not teach; we share and magnify shared perceptions.Spaces
1 – Work that takes place out of the spotlight is carried out by groups that share common interests and collaborations on the Net.
We prefer to give priority to a non-open, protected space – although networked with the Net – so that the intensity of the struggle can be faced in a psychologically healthy environment. Contrary to some recent claims, we are in a hurry. Our tempo is the tempo of history, not the tempo of individual psychology. To convince ourselves of this, we use a phrase by Andretti, Formula 1 racing driver, who says: “If everything seems to be under control you’re not going fast enough.”2 – The work directed outwards is of two kinds: either as anonymous, viral presences, under control but innumerable, ungraspable, which everybody can adopt as their own;
or else, as openly branded work by affinity groups or networked alliances. We participate in many of these “trademarks” in the area of the struggle for digital rights, each with its own frameworks and complicities, which cover different targets: Xnet is more of a consultancy service; the oXcars is a show that rescues – or at least tries to – the artistic community from its role as serfs and as an excuse for the privatisation of knowledge and the destruction of Net neutrality. The oXcars are a practical example for normalising free culture at the mainstream level, a show that openly invites cooptation by the system and by any one who happens to be passing by; the FCFORUM, a serious and earnest international lobby, a Trojan horse in European ministries and commissions; and RedSOStenible, the Spanish lobby trademark…
To name just a few. Nobody knows how many there are, how many or who we are, who is responsible, or what they will do, but they are a trademark in the light of day, you can interact with them and obtain good results.Finally, in these prosperous times, we dissolve, putting our skills at the service of collective decisions; we dissolve into the general assembly of the people which,with its extraordinary collective intelligence, never ceases to amazes us, even though has been theorised: when all is lost, a mature assembly, of people who have their own opinions and have been informed and counter-informed on the Net, free from dogmas of one tendency or another, an assembly of between 1000 and 4000 complete strangers, mysteriously does the right thing.
How
Lately we have been saying:
be radical, ask for the possible.
Here we come to an aspect that is violently confrontational with a sector – a small one, fortunately – of the 15M movement. If the reader will allow me a simplification that is somewhat exaggerated due to exasperation because of the number of hours we have spent on debating with it, the people who make up this sector are the people who we consider to be the real problem, Trolls aside, on one hand I’m talking about the “pure” radicals who think that the system cannot be reformed – so far, so good – but also sabotage attempts to use reformist demands as a guerrilla form. And on the other hand, the “critical intellectuals” who you don’t see much at assemblies because they’re busy rewriting history with texts of the “What now? A Pacific 19-J demostration Destroys Revolutionary Potential” variety.We think that right now demands for reforms structured in a pragmatic and no ideological way are the only manner to deeply transform the current system; because the system is ready to face enemies, but it is not ready to have its own internal contradictions blown open.
Confronting the system with an ontological impossibility “destroy yourself”, determines its way of defending itself: to become your antagonist. If you force a closed system that is bunkered down in the defense of its privileges to “improve itself”, the only possible way out that remains to it is desertion and escape. We all know that it is necessary to leave an exit open for the enemy if we want to win.We should also learn to win. In these times of great victories, we can clearly see how difficult it is to accept them as such.
We don’t know how to win. Those who exaggerate the confrontation cannot “do” anything anymore because the confrontation is its only way of “doing”. Now that we are winning, we need to abandon the trenches perspective and accept the freedom to mediate with our dependency without the need to destroy.Transformation always entail loss, even when change is possible, but that is no reason to avoid it. We have to be aware of it in order to free ourselves of nostalgia.
The dynamic that has destroyed great revolutionary experiments is an inner fear of the new; this is why we want our message to be coopted, and we want to claim a victory when it happens.
Perhaps what I’m going to say next may appear to be a bit “Icelandic”, but if is an opinion I share with many people in the 15M movement.
If in the space of only a month, politicians have already taken several steps in an effort to copy or apply our demands, we should be pleased and claim it as a victory.
With VdeVivienda we didn’t claim victory when the Minister Chacón implemented the “youth funding” scheme. True, it is difficult to claim something as disgraceful as this as a victory, but not doing so may be what demoralised and weakened us at the time.Because the accusation that hurts us most – given that it cuts off our communication with a large part of society – is not that we are violent, but that we’re just a bunch of kids protesting, with no ideas and no ability to govern ourselves.
Of course the politicians who take some scraps of what we say do so badly, of course they do it for populist reasons, but they are being forced to do it because we have demanded it. Of course it’s a joke payasada, but we should celebrate it as a victory, every time, because it proves that they are afraid of us, because, whether they like it or not, we equal votes, and for them losing votes means losing their job. Isn’t that what we want, to fire them?
Our strength lies in sneaking doubts into their minds, nightmares, thoughts of justice that they would never have imagined themselves having. To rupture their psychic structure, their imperturbable calm.
The techniques of escrache are essential.It is curious to see that those who reject this tactical option later ferveently defend protests against the retalladas, the cutbacks, as if that weren’t the most reformist demand of all, and as if everything had been wonderful before the cutbacks.
This war is a language war
The first thing that has to change is language, and the change must be based on profound self-criticism. We can no longer rejoice in the martyrdom of asking for the impossible; we must evolve beyond accepting a role as antagonists on the losing side. The very language that we use is incomprehensible so that we can claim to be misunderstood.
We have to be responsible for our actions.
If we cannot be understood by the majority, we help society move towards “fascistisation”.Because of the euphoria and then the strength that it gave us to see ourselves united in such a great multitude in the 15M movement, some people are now trying to impose particular aesthetics and language, dogmas that have been mentioned and repeated like mantras for many years now. It is understandable, these are words that we have fought for, and that we are very attached to, but they are overused and faded now.
Please don’t misunderstand me: words are one thing, ideas are another, and there can be excellent ideas but they can be expressed through synonyms, we could say, which ultimately have the same objective.In fact, the massive consensus achieved through the 15M movement did not come from any of the words we have been repeating for years.
The new words are “Iceland”, for example, and “Time for Outrage!” (Indignez-vous!), a small book that is weak on content but introduces a new, inclusive imaginary and a word that hasn’t been exploited yet.
We’re getting it wrong; we’re not winning because of what we have always said, but because of what we have always defended. In other words, first comes the practical abolition of privileges, and then global justice. That’s how 15M was born and this is its wave, whether we like it or not.What we have been defending for some time now already forms part of this wave, it goes without saying and we have to express it through new aesthetics and words, ones that are based on winning.
The old words only suggest defeat and division, and now is the time for victory and for infinite diversity with a few minimum common denominators. A global association of radical reformist egoists.We have to be present at all levels. We have to work on the implementation of direct democracy, but also dismantle the existing power from the inside, as well as its media and memetic image. We have to be tactical with words and actions. We have to conceive our actions for the real, specific results that they want to achieve, not for visceral reasons or reasons of abstract justice…
If you ask people to hate their way of life they will position themselves against you; if you share their hatred arising from the same frustrations, we will be invincible.
As the Icelanders say in mundane terms, “occupy the media so as to win over the people who watch TV”.
Don’t we want that mass consensus? What’s wrong? Don’t we want to mix with the people? If we use the language that the majority understand, we will naturally be using a language that has been absorbed by the system. So? What’s the problem?
What people are asking for (and I include myself) is to understand the laws that govern us. People are starting to see that laws are accessible and quite surrealistic texts, written by mere mortals who are terrified of losing some of their privileges. This is the base of the great empowerment of the people that is taking place right now.
They no longer respect the law, and I’m not talking about the idea of the law, but the law-thing. They read laws and discuss them. They no longer delegate this operation to specialists.We have been working like this since the time when Barcelona’s civic by-laws were being introduced (2005).
For us, the main part of the game is to study the law, understand it, explain it in other words, make fun of it, hack it to render it useless, destroy its authority by replacing it with other positive channels that will ultimately be coopted with the bad taste and time-lag that characterises the system, clearing away whatever had been there previously and leaving a blank slate.WHAT ARE THE MAIN URGENT NEEDS NOW, IN TERMS OF THE #GLOBALREVOLUTION
1 – To create a “fork” between the “Iceland aesthetic” and the “Greek aesthetic” so both of these can co-exist without clipping the wings of either.
What is proving most difficult these days is to fight against the deeply rooted idea that it is “better to remain united” when internal tension is bringing things to a standstill and when our real strength is actually the fact that we have a thousand faces and a thousand names.2 – The time has come to show immediate results. We’re working on it.
3 – For all of this, it is necessary to generate economy: we need cash. If we don’t free up time for political work within capitalism, they will win.
Conservas, the cultural association that we have set up, as an “anomalous” cultural institution, considers the cultural subsidies as an important contribution to the r-evolution, given that culture – as we understand it – is a fundamental ingredient of the r-evolution.
Obviously, this has also brought well-being to its members, because as I said earlier, without the economic health of artivists, the r-evolution loses a lot of energy.
Now that there are no more cultural grants, we must re-direct the litany of the cultural sector that “we want more money for artists.” The issue is not how society will feed artists, but rather where artists will get money from in order to take it to the r-evolution and society.Aside from this, we are studying microcredit and crowdfunding systems, so that they can shed their aura of poverty and charity and become real sources of self-funding within and against the capitalist system, on the level of something like “venture anarchism”, to paraphrase our comrade D. Kleiner, Telekommunisten.
As a continuation of the How-To Guide for Sustainable Creativity which we released this year through the FCForum, we are experimenting with “formulas conceived
to allow commoners (all those who actively participate
in the production, reproduction and and management of common assets)
to share and exploit the commons, but conditioning the way in which companies or for-profit entities
relate to said commons.”
In cases that generate profit or other benefits, the “creating” community must receive part of these benefits.
Xnet (ex EXGAE) proposes that 15% of the profits obtained by content distribution platforms be shared among those who contributed content to said platforms, based on a inversely proportional cube root estimate based on a scale of 1 to 1000 that goes from the works with the highest number of visits to a minimum, agreed-upon amount.Finally, asking for an end to the privileges of politicians, bankers and the rich is not a moral position; it is a way of creating funding which is what we are really after.
And that’s all.
Justice and quality.
Simona Levi
Barcelona, 23 June, 2011Licence: you can do whatever you like with this text, mentioning its authorship
_____________________NOTE
[1] Excerpts from the Hacktivistas.net Netiquette guide:
Think, develop and then act.
Before you pitch an idea, investigate. Perhaps somebody had the same idea before you and has already put it in motion. Otherwise it would mean speculating with the prior non-existence of this project.
In your proposal or project, you must mention the resources that you need, the resources that you have, and most importantly, what you will contribute. Hacktivism consists of two parts: one is knowledge, the other is eagerness. You do not need to know how to intervene in the communications of half the planet. Others will take care of this, but you will have to contribute as much as you can to the project because it was your idea and you are the most interested party.
But the most important thing is to follow up on your proposal. Pitching ideas on the run and forgetting about them is a loss of energy. Of all of our energies. Threads without continuity always turn up sooner or later, and the work that was invested in them vanishes into thin air.
Many members are specialised in a specific subject; it is important to recognise the skills of each person.
Points of view.
It seems that the really difficult thing is to understand your interlocutor. We are too busy trying to think of an answer to understand everything we’re told. We hacktivists we are pioneers in reading, understanding and then, if it is really necessary, giving an opinion. We will put ourselves in your shoes before expressing disagreement with you. And we hope that you will do the same for us. There are two choices that you can consider, and you’ll see neither of them are correct. On one hand, you can assume that each person has a valid opinion that must be discussed and from which can give rise to a collective action. This is necessary for encouraging participation. The other option is to assume that we are all idiots, and that we don’t have the right to make mistakes, thus ruling out the message. As you can see, neither of the assumptions are totally reliable. This is why we position ourselves in the middle. In the option of understanding before acting.
