A resource based economy

The news item today about the soldier who was killed while trying to defuse a bomb in Afghanistan mentioned the view of one expert that more hi tech kit for remotely carrying out such dangerous tasks should be available to the armed forces.

Yes, maybe the same company that makes the bombs or the bits for them could make a robot to disarm them. That would all of course generate work for people to do and therefore be a good thing according to the current system.

More generically this is creating a problem and then creating a solution for it - many suspect more mundanely that firms who sell anti-virus software can also ensure that the viruses are created to keep them in business. If this were to happen it would be no more than a racket, but the justification that it creates work is just the same.

We do not want to create work. We want to be more efficient - get the same yields /outputs from less work. It's only our no work = no food stricture that means we have to create work so that people can get money for doing it, so that they can buy food. Very silly. We've seen the success of mechanisation in agriculture, where the yields per person employed have grown astronomically. I'm not saying agriculture has got everything right, my point is why should we not want to get the same thing for less work?

To argue this point people often use the analogy of a closed community on a remote island. They have finite resources within which they must live. Now they could co-operate and find the ways that the least work gave them the best sustainable use of resources, or they could invent money, and compete to get more of that. But money isn't a resource. It would be no good if, say, they had more oranges than they could ever eat, because no-one would ever buy one. They would have to make oranges scarce so that they could be monetised.

Well the earth is the same as an island in this sense. It is a closed system with finite resources. What are we doing wasting them? The competitive model has got us where we are today - a world at war and in the slavery of working to pay back the bank the money they have lent us, either directly, or through the taxes we pay to the government to pay to the banks.

Yes all money is on loan from the banks. All loans have interest on them. Where do you get the money to pay the interest? It has to be a bank loan, which -er - has interest on it. Yes the money owed to the banks is more than all the money that exists, because of interest.

Barking & Dagenham Council Cycle to Work Scheme

I have been asked about this scheme, for some reason, and the council even referred one caller asking about it to me! Just for the record I DO NOT WORK FOR THE COUNCIL. The term 'borough' in 'borough co-ordinator' refers to the geographical area and does not mean the same as the council, who are the council of the borough, but not the borough itself.

Anyway, now that I know the info, I will put it here:

Application form: https://myaccount.taxfreecycle.com/request/202394832086

Frequently asked questions: http://lbbd.barking-dagenham.gov.uk/staffinfo/bicycle-user-group/docs/faq.doc (this is on the council's intranet, not the web)

Cycle Surgery (supplier of bikes and equipment to the scheme): http://www.cyclesurgery.com/

Contact: Tel: (020) 8227 3320 email: gloria.millis@lbbd.gov.uk

Impossible to fix the economy?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8702883.stm

Former MP Chris Mullen spent a long time, it says here, trying NOT to have a ministerial car. Now with government cutbacks happening, it seems like a good idea to reduce the amount of chauffeuring round of ministers, except that they work while they're being driven, so provided the price of car and driver is less than the price of the work done while being chauffeured, we're OK.

Here's the thing. The chauffeurs get low wages and rely on overtime to make up their money, so they want more chauffeuring to do. Some ministers, sympathetic to the low wage situation, actually contrive(-d) to get more work or the chauffeurs. Right - we're getting work done that doesn't need doing at all (unnecessary extra chauffeuring) so that the chauffeurs can get more money. It would make more sense just to pay them more in the first place.

But we still have the problem that the chauffeurs want more work to get more money, and the government wants to spend less money. These two are plainly incompatible and an example of a common problem.

In this case, we have an activity that [arguably] needs doing - moving people from where they are to where they need to be on time and in an environment where they can still be productive. Working on the assumption that the thing needs doing (and is not just being done so people can be paid for it) we need to consider the options of reducing the need to do it and/or using technology to do it so that people don't have to (we don't want to create work for humans just so that we have an excuse to pay them, we want humans to do things for the benefit of humanity (see 'People Need Jobs" on this blog for an explanation).

It would seem to be incredibly complex to optimise the whereabouts of many people so that they are in the same physical location at the same time as others they need to be with. One imagines a network of mobile offices, where in each someone constantly works, whilst the system moves them around in so that they are in the right location relative to others for their meeting. Of course it doesn't matter if they are moving all the time while working alone, but they would have to have enough working alone time for the movements to happen.

The one imagines video conferencing. Why isn't that happening more? But if it was abundant, would there still be meetings in the flesh, by choice? It seems likely.

In this scenario, we may need a further level of abstraction. What are thes politicians doing and why are they having the meetings? the Zeitgeist Movement and Venus project that I am advocating and whose principles I am trying to apply would say that we don't need politicians - only scientists. In systems terms why try to optimise the subsystem (politics / political government) rather than the parent system, which we may be sub-optimising. Peter Joseph, I think would test this for a 'physical referent'. What physical thing is going to happen as a result of the minister going to the meeting?

New ATOC London Connections Map out

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/passenger_services/maps/London_Connections.pdf

The new map "effective from 23rd May" shows the DLR branch to Stratford International with "opens Summer 2010". It doesn't show the street level interchange between Dalston Kingsland and Dalston Junction that TfL show on their maps such as their (arguably) most useful one the 'Oyster Rail Services Map' (the effective successor to TfL's London Connections Map, which did not colour code National Rail lines at all). Trains will run through from Dalston Junction (East London Line) to Highbury and Islington (North London Line) from May 2011 and the train service between Gospel Oak and Stratford resumes next month.

How super is your bike lane?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/20/super-bike-lane

With the launch of the cycle super highways this summer, the Guardian is doing an on line assessment of the quality of what it calls "bike lanes", including the CSH. (Conventionally cycle lanes are in the carriageway, cycle paths are away from the carriageway and cycle tracks are alongside but not on the carriageway - though shared unsegregated use of the footway is not normally thought of as a cycle track. Cycleways serves as a generic term for all these things).

One of the first CSH's starts/ends in Barking by Greatfields Park. There's a launch event on Saturday 24 July - details to follow.

Where to trade skills on line

If you want to avoid the monetary system, try these skills/time swapping sites:

http://swapaskill.com/ - also swap unwanted presents for skills/favours
http://timebank.org.uk/ - National Charity matching volunteers to volunteering
http://justfortheloveofit.org/ - "The world's fastest growing alternative economy". "Your local freeconony"
http://lingofriends.com/ - specifically for language teaching/learning
http://www.noshortageofwork.com/ - learn, teach, mentor, collaborate

Econogo Electric Scooter

http://www.econogoelectricscooters.co.uk/

The USP is the removable lithium battery. The 30mph and 40mph versions seem to be the same price (-->£2K) and have the same range (22 miles/battery), per the website. Not sure why you'd buy the slower one on that basis.

Pram-tricycle

http://www.tagabikes.com/default.asp?lang=eng

Elegant looking pram that converts into a tricycle, but at the price of c. £1549 you's want to be sure of an aftermarket for when your children have outgrown it.

People need jobs

This is something often heard, but a little examination reveals it to be untrue. People need jobs to get money and they need money to get food, warmth, shelter, clean water, etc - the basics of life. Needing to get money to access the basics for life must be the world's most outstanding immorality and we should be ashamed as a species that people are dying for want of food, water, shelter and other basics.

Our job as a species is to ensure that we survive and thrive as a species, which must include ensuring we safeguard the planetary resources that are essentially all we've got to survive on. The jobs that need doing are those that enable us to survive and thrive as a species. Plainly, if some or all of those jobs can be done by technology, that frees up human energy for doing those things that need some human involvement, or those things that aren't strictly necessary for our survival - like food and water - but which add quality to our lives - say art in its broadest sense.

At the moment, technological progress is held back because people "need" jobs for reasons explained. We have created a system in which our own ingenuity cannot work entirely in our favour.

If people should have to work to survive how can we make moral decisions about what work should be done? Why shouldn't someone go out and be - to take an extreme example - a drug dealer? The reasoning is that drug abuse is seen as being socially destructive. I'm not saying it is or isn't - the point is that why should anyone have to do a socially destructive job? There's nothing illegal about being a tobacconist, but the dangers of tobacco use are well known and we're employing people to try to stop people from smoking and to treat people who have become ill because of tobacco as well as people to sell cigarettes. It doesn't make any sense.

Some work is not necessarily socially destructive, but could be done by technology, but isn't because then people would lose their jobs, and therefore not get any money and therefore not be able to get the essentials in life.

I was on a course recently and the instructor was reluctant to give out electronic versions of his materials in case others should start teaching the same course and do him out of a job. This means money holds back education. I don't plame the instructor - that's what the system does. Derren Brown was on TV doing a documentary about a technique which claims to help blind people(even if they have no eyes) see - the Bronnikov method. At one point they weren't allowed to film because the method is a commercial product and they have to preserve their income. I expect the Bronnikov method is all bunkum, but the point is if it worked, or if some other technique or medicine works, how can we call ourselves civilised whilst not making it available as widely as possible without reference to money?

In the musical stage show "Britain's got Bhangra" the rapper character uses the hero's recordings to "mash up" a music track for himself. He is seen as having stolen the singer's work, but by inference this has deprived him of money and therefore the essentials of life. So, we are not to have a new piece of art derived from / built upon an old piece of art because it doesn't suit the monetary system. Even in the sphere of our aesthetic achievements money holds us back.

John Seddon, the inventor of the Vanguard method (Systems Thinking for services), based his method on the Toyota Production System (TPS) in which the customer "pulls" a car through the manufacturing system, so that only a car that is ordered is made and inventory and costs are kept low. One criticism of systems thinking is that a 'system' can itself be a subsystem - Seddon himself warns against optimising subsystems - he often uses call centres, which seek to optimise the phone answering subsystem but fail to help optimise the greater system of which they are a part.

The people buying a car from Toyota are in fact "pulling" a transport or mobility solution, or to abstract it a step further, they are pulling a solution to the problem that they are (sometimes) not where they need to be to achieve something they need or want to achieve. Keep abstracting a system further and further and you will reach the idea of the earth as the system to be optimised. Even the earth is a subsystem, but our scope for optimising the solar system or the universe is severely limited compared to our scope for optimising the earth.

Perhaps we are competing for scarce resources and perhaps money is a medium for allocating those resources, but it is also the means by which the resources are squandered. We have to have built in obsolescence - products which don't last as long as possible - so that money can stay on the move, but this leads to the cycle of consumption and terrible waste.

Returning to the work that needs doing for the true success of our species, and that can't be automated, there is the question of what will incentivise people to do it. Perhaps there is a role for money here, but also consider that people do and have all kinds of good things voluntarily, every day, for the good of society. It seems most work is currently done to get money rather than for the furtherance of our success as a species. If we stopped doing all that work, would there really be much left to do? Even if we didn't do all that we could, if we stop spoiling our planet and killing each other on purpose (war), it would be a major step forward.

This piece is my take on The Zeitgeist Movement and The Venus Project

Adult Cycle Training

If you live work or study in LB Barking & Dagenham you should be able to get free or subsidised training to ride a bike. I can't find any information on the council's website, so your best bet might be to fill in this form on TfL's site. Do let me know how you get on getting training from B&D Council

https://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/roadusers/cycling/request-cycle-training.aspx

That said, I'm told TfL are sending the completed forms to an invalid / obsolete e-mail address at B&D council, so in the meantime you're probably best off contacting Craig.Elliott@lbbd.gov.uk and/or Nick.Davies@lbbd.gov.uk - 020 8227 3167 / 3950

Tfl Money for employer cycle facilities

If you work within 1.5 kilometres of the two superhighways routes which run through Merton, Wandsworth, Lambeth and Southwark (A3 , A24) or Barking and Dagenham, Newham , Tower Hamlets to City (A13, B126), you may wish to alert your employer to a cycling package offered by TfL . It includes a choice, or combination of, cycle parking/bike maintenance/ cycle training. It is effectively an offer of the items (parking/training/bike maintenance) rather than cash and requires a commitment to an evaluation. The initial step to express an interest in the package and the rest follows. The text below is on the LCC website.

Transport for London is offering cycle parking, training and maintenance to workplaces located up to one and half kilometres from Superhighway routes 3 and 7 (Barking to Tower Hill, and Merton to Southwark). The packages could be worth up to £5000 for an organisation with 250 people or more.

While the chief target is organisations with 50 employees or more, LCC understands that smaller organisations that share a building or courtyard can put in a joint application.

LCC is encouraging members to register their workplace’s interest promptly via the website www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/cycling/14120.aspx . The scheme is due to run throughout 2010, but there is limited amount of funding

Good video from Seddon

http://vimeo.com/11327874

Systems Thinker John Seddon gives a good talk here against the culture of targets and command and control management. I think he shows more clearly why these systems don't work as well as his usually mockery of them, showing that they don't work and showing how the Vanguard method achieves results that target setters would never have dreamed of.

Best Rail Journey Planner

Fares and timetable supremo Barry Doe recommends:

http://jplanner.travelinenortheast.info/ which despite its name covers all the UK. It includes train reporting numbers (fka headcodes).

Train Tickets delivered to your mobile phone

http://www.mytrainticket.co.uk/ticket-delivery

According to the website this feature is "coming soon". Presumably other ticket sellers will follow suit and hasten the end of paper tickets. Fare supremo Barry Doe, as far as I know still recommends http://www.eastcoast.co.uk/ for the best ticket prices

Eco friendly vehicle hire?

Greater London Hire Limited is "London's first Carbon Acknowledged Private [vehicle] Hire Organisation".