What is needed from an online community that isn't available elsewhere?

A rough sketch, just thrown out for consideration and discussion -

1. A place where writers and thinkers are valued and honored

2. Breathing space and elbow room away from the identity politics - "you are a Republican!!" and the oppressive New Age liberal dogmas and doctrines

3. A place where a broader range of people can participate without being bashed around - minority people, blue collar people

4. A place where Leftist economic ideas have a chance to be heard and discussed

5. A place that practices what it preaches - run by the principles being advocated.

6. A place that integrates the private with the public and sees politics as a way of looking at society, not one of many hobby or vocations available as a lifestyle choice for the well off with time on their hands

Number one and number three are seen as contradictory by most liberals - either we have the "right" intellectual people in our club or we let the riff raff in with their non-progressive ideas. I am certain that this is a false idea. I find it easier, not more difficult, to talk socialism to the riff raff, for example, then it is to discuss it with the enlightened progressive people.

Number two - I wouldn't say that we should suppress the New Agers. We need to be alert to the drive on their part to suppress others and chase all but the true believers away, though.

Number three - At a dozen different boards I have had many AA and Latino people pm me and describe all of the subtle and not so subtle ways they are made to feel unwelcome by the progressive liberals. There is also a vicious antagonism in the progressive community to blue collar people.

Number four - The liberal activist community is dominated by "winners" - the "haves" or those who kiss up to and admire the haves and the somebodies. This cripples any discussion of Leftist politics, because there is a built-in bias against the have-nots and the nobodies.

Number five - How can you promote a just and democratic society when the group itself is run on the principles of tyranny and aristocracy?

Number six - Politics as a compartment in a person's life - as a leisure time activity along the lines of the charity work of upper class people, as the "white man's burden," as a parlor game, an amusement of no consequence, as as a hobby pursuit for those obsessively interested, as a fashion accessory to a person's lifestyle choices - ensures that nothing meaningful can ever be discussed and that the status quo will always be reinforced and defended.

This is close to exactly what the mission statement should be IMO.

You've put a lot of time into this I think and I don't mean to demean that with an off-the-cuff response but this is really good and has thrown me for a loop because I was concerned with whether these ideas could be conveyed adquately

1. A place where writers and thinkers are valued and honored

This is weird because if it ends up feeling like an exercise in academia, that is clearly bad because it repels so many people who don't feel they can hack it at that level or roll their eyes thinking we are overintellectualizing things.

But yet clearly thinkers are devalued right now, consider anyone not conforming to the groupthink on sites like DU. Vicious personal assaults, malicious tactics of argumentation employed against, an overt "you are not welcome or wanted here" vibe.

The funny thing is I *thought* PI had this, although in hindsight it really didn't. Witness the high postive ratings dished out to you and chlamor, and newswolf and anaxarchos and others. All of whom, chlamor nothwithstanding, are persona non grata there now.

2. Breathing space and elbow room away from the identity politics - "you are a Republican!!" and the oppressive New Age liberal dogmas and doctrines

More like breathing room from the fantasyland partisanship and the mindfuck that is party politics. Its all a bunch of pretend nonsense for people who have too much recreational time to kill.

As for the other, doctrine and dogma, one thing I would consider is to note the different types of news items and responses posted on conservative leaning boards. MUCH more concerned with rights and freedoms and more sensitive to infringements and predations by the government, by the police, by the media (however slanted their perspective), by busy-body do-gooders.

That is naturally the things I am interested in reading and discussing, but note the complete dearth of that on PI. A clue to people's true leanings maybe. There IS a huge desire and need for that type of talk in a non-right wing setting I can assure from all of the times I saw some meek liberal poster shouted down whenever he objected to the intolerance, bigotry, and general hatred expressed by many of the RW posters. Yet they came back for some reason..

3. A place where a broader range of people can participate without being bashed around - minority people, blue collar people

Oops, I kinda got sidetracked watching the game so I'll edit in the rest later

EDIT: talking about Kos, I saw a thing there one time asking if the site was too white since it was like 90+% whites. Part of the conclusion these yutzes came to was that it was just bc whites were more likely to have internet access and gravitate toward progressive politics and internet message boards in general. There's something funny in there, although its such a sad commentary its hard to laugh at.

The point that we might draw from that is ways in which this might be inadvertently exclusionary, I don't have any in mind other than the comments about pt #1 (overly scholarly in the sense of pandering to academic types). There probably are some others I'm neglecting though.

4. A place where Leftist economic ideas have a chance to be heard and discussed

Yeah, the self-righteous backlash by white-collar people, acting as though they are being discriminated against for not being the working poor is especially insane.

This is weird because if it ends up feeling like an exercise in academia, that is clearly bad because it repels so many people who don't feel they can hack it at that level or roll their eyes thinking we are overintellectualizing things.

But yet clearly thinkers are devalued right now, consider anyone not conforming to the groupthink on sites like DU. Vicious personal assaults, malicious tactics of argumentation employed against, an overt "you are not welcome or wanted here" vibe.
Historian Jacques Barzun has this idea that democratic society has transmogrified (here I go using big words lol) into what he calls "demotic society" - instead of raising all up to leadership and citizenship, we lower everyone and everything to the lowest common denominator. Instead of everyone having an equal voice, everyone's ideas are seen as equal - "well that is your opinion, no better or worse than anyone else's."

It doesn't have to be that way.


The funny thing is I *thought* PI had this, although in hindsight it really didn't. Witness the high postive ratings dished out to you and chlamor, and newswolf and anaxarchos and others. All of whom, chlamor notwithstanding, are persona non grata there now.
It descended into an orgy of vicious anti-intellectualism. Keep in mind that it was not blue collar people attacking the intellectuals.


As for the other, doctrine and dogma, one thing I would consider is to note the different types of news items and responses posted on conservative leaning boards. MUCH more concerned with rights and freedoms and more sensitive to infringements and predations by the government, by the police, by the media (however slanted their perspective), by busy-body do-gooders.
Absolutely agree with you. Not only do many who are supposedly "conservative" or "Republican" have ahold of an important part of the puzzle that liberals are completely missing, I think the piece they have is not only more important, but is also the shortest path to the alleged goals of the liberals. Banning aspartame will probably never contribute to fighting the growing police state and corporate fascism. Fighting the police state and fascism, will, however sweep away many of the problems the liberals are dedicated to fighting..


There IS a huge desire and need for that type of talk in a non-right wing setting I can assure...
That is exactly why I think this project is important and needed. For every person served by DU, PI, Kos, et al, there are hundreds with nowhere to go.


...talking about Kos, I saw a thing there one time asking if the site was too white since it was like 90+% whites. Part of the conclusion these yutzes came to was that it was just bc whites were more likely to have Internet access and gravitate toward progressive politics and internet message boards in general. There's something funny in there, although its such a sad commentary its hard to laugh at.

It isn't an accident. They try to claim that it is - that the board just happens to have mostly well off whites.

Remember that conversation I had with a certain Green party advocate at PI? I said that the Green party represented a very narrow demographic, and that this was no accident but rather was the result of an exclusionary way of thinking. He denied that, and said "yeah sure my local Green chapter is mostly software engineers. That is who happens to live in this area." In other words, he was saying that the Green party was mostly white professionals because that is who was in that particular community. Yep. Just software engineers here.

I said that I know Palo Alto. I said that I also know that in Palo Alto someone is scrubbing the toilets, someone is cleaning the windows, someone is wiring the buildings, hauling the trash, driving cab, fixing the road, running the daycare, cleaning the streets, mowing the lawns, repairing the plumbing, waiting on tables, manning the retail counter, fixing the roofs, driving the bus, mopping the floor, cooking the food, stocking the shelves, climbing the utility poles, delivering the groceries, fixing the cars, and cleaning the sewers.

He walks right by all of those people every day and he doesn't see them.

The liberal activists don't “see” most of the people in the country. They don't see those who they automatically think of as their inferiors. That isn't neutral. It isn't an accident. When we clamor on behalf of those people – demand that their very existence be acknowledged - the liberals become very annoyed and angry. “Who do you think you are?” and “what kind of ego trip are you on?” or “you are romanticizing the common people.” In other words, they won't tolerate anyone tromping around on their beautiful imported rug with muddy boots, and they resent the nobodies getting all uppity on them.


Yeah, the self-righteous backlash by white-collar people, acting as though they are being discriminated against for not being the working poor is especially insane.

Yes! That is so amazing and so transparently elitist and malicious. The haves want to have everything including what they imagine to be the higher moral ground and romantic image of the poor. Try to suggest dignity and equality for the poor, and the well-off go into paroxysms of indignation and self-righteous anger. “Are you trying to say there is something wrong with being rich? How dare you. You little nobody. We will crush you. You are not our kind of people, and don't dare accuse us of being elitist or you will really be sorry!”

Totalitarian Democracy: a New Poem
By LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI

The first fine dawn of life on earth
The first light of the first morning
The first evening star
The first man on the moon seen from afar
The first voyage of Ulysses westward
The first fence on the last frontier
The first tick of the atomic clock of fear
The first Home Sweet Home so dear
The sweet smell of honeysuckle at midnight
The first free black man free of fright
The sweet taste of freedom
The first good orgasm
The first Noble Savage
The first Pale Face settler on the first frontier
The last Armenian and the last Ojibway in Fresno
The first ball park hotdog with mustard
The first home run in Yankee Stadium
The first song of love and forty cries of despair
The first pure woman passing fair
The sweet smell of success
The first erection and the first Resurrection
The first darling buds of May
The last covered wagon through the Donner Pass
The first green sprouts of new grass
The last cry of Mark Twain! on the Mississippi
The First and Last Chance Saloon
The ghostly galleon of the half-moon
The first cry of pure joy in morning light
The distant howl of trains lost in book of night
The first morning after the night before thinking
The last new moon sinking
The last of the Mohicans and the last buffalo
The last sweet chariot swinging low
The first hippie heading for the hills
The last bohemian in a beret
The last beatnik in North Beach with something to say
The last true love to come your way
The last Wobbly and the last Catholic Anarchist
The last paranoid Lefty
The last Nazi
The first bought vote in the first election
The last hand caught in the last cookie jar
The last cowboy on the last frontier
The last bald eagle with nothing to fear
The last buffalo head nickel
The last living member of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade
The last Mom and Pop grocery
The last firefly flickerng in the night

The first plane to hit the first Twin Tower
The last plane to hit the last Twin Tower
The only plane to ever hit the Pentagon
The birth of a vast national paranoia
The beginning of the Third World War
(the War Against the Third World)

The first trip abroad by an ignorant president
The last free-running river
The last gas and oil on earth
The last general strike
The last Fidelista the last Sandinista the last Zapatista
The last political prisoner
The last virgin and the last of the champagne
The last train to leave the station
The last and only great nation
The last Great Depression
The last will & testament
The last welfare check for rent
The end of the old New Deal
The new Committee on Unamerican Activities
The last politician with honest proclivities
The last independent newspaper
printing the news and raising hell
The last word and the last laugh and the Last Hurrah
The last picture show and the last waltz
The last Unknown Soldier
The last innocent American
The last Ugly American
The last Great Lover and the last New Yorker
The last home-fries with ketchup-to-go
The last train home at midnight
The last syllable of recorded time
The last long careless rapture
The last independent bookstore with its own mind
The last best hope of mankind
The lost chord and the lost leader
The last drop of likker
The cup that runneth over quicker
The last time I saw Paris Texas
The last peace treaty and the Last Supper
The first sweet signs of spring
The first sweet bird of youth
The first baby tooth and the last wisdom tooth
The last honest election
The last freedom of information
The last free Internet
The last free speech radio
The last unbought television network
The last homespun politician
The last Jeffersonian
The last Luddite in Berkeley
The last Bottom Line and the last of Social Security
The first fine evening calm and free
The beach at sunset with reclining nudes
the lovers wrapped in each other
The last meeting of the Board
The last gay sailor to come aboard
The first White Paper written in blood
The last terrorist born of hate and poverty
The last citizen who bothered to vote
The first President picked by a Supreme Court
The end of the Time of Useful Consciousness
The unfinished flag of the United States
The ocean's long withdrawing roar

The birth of a nation of sheep
The deep deep sleep of the booboisie
The underground wave of feel-good fascism
The uneasy rule of the super-rich
The total triumph of imperial America
The final proof of our Manifest Destiny
The first loud cry of America über alles
Echoing in freedom's alleys
The last lament for lost democracy
The total triumph of
totalitarian plutocracy

CODA

Cut down cut down cut down
Cut down the grassroots
Cut down those too wild weeds
in our great agri-fields and golf courses
Cut down cut down those wild sprouts
Cut down cut down those rank weeds
Pull down your vanity, man, pull down
the too wild buds the too wild shoots
Cut down the wild unruly vines & voices
the hardy volunteers and pioneers
Cut down cut down the alien corn
Cut down the crazy introverts
Tongue-tied lovers of the subjective
Cut down cut down the wild ones the wild spirits
The desert rats and monkey wrenchers
Easy riders and midnight cowboys in narco nirvanas
Cut down the wild alienated loners
fiddling with their moustaches
plotting revolution in hopeless cellars
Cut down cut down all those freaks and free thinkers
Wild-eyed poets with wandering minds
Soapbox agitators and curbstone philosophers
Far out weirdos and rappers
Stoned-out visionaries and peace-niks
Exiles in their own land!
O melting pot America!

Populist Manifesto No. 1

Poets, come out of your closets,
Open your windows, open your doors,
You have been holed-up too long
in your closed worlds.
Come down, come down
from your Russian Hills and Telegraph Hills,
your Beacon Hills and your Chapel Hills,
your Mount Analogues and Montparnasses,
down from your foothills and mountains,
out of your teepees and domes.
The trees are still falling
and we’ll to the woods no more.
No time now for sitting in them
As man burns down his own house
to roast his pig
No more chanting Hare Krishna
while Rome burns.
San Francisco’s burning,
Mayakovsky’s Moscow’s burning
the fossil-fuels of life.
Night & the Horse approaches
eating light, heat & power,
and the clouds have trousers.
No time now for the artist to hide
above, beyond, behind the scenes,
indifferent, paring his fingernails,
refining himself out of existence.
No time now for our little literary games,
no time now for our paranoias & hypochondrias,
no time now for fear & loathing,
time now only for light & love.
We have seen the best minds of our generation
destroyed by boredom at poetry readings.
Poetry isn’t a secret society,
It isn’t a temple either.
Secret words & chants won’t do any longer.
The hour of oming is over,
the time of keening come,
a time for keening & rejoicing
over the coming end
of industrial civilization
which is bad for earth & Man.
Time now to face outward
in the full lotus position
with eyes wide open,
Time now to open your mouths
with a new open speech,
time now to communicate with all sentient beings,
All you ‘Poets of the Cities’
hung in museums including myself,
All you poet’s poets writing poetry
about poetry,
All you poetry workshop poets
in the boondock heart of America,
All you housebroken Ezra Pounds,
All you far-out freaked-out cut-up poets,
All you pre-stressed Concrete poets,
All you cunnilingual poets,
All you pay-toilet poets groaning with graffiti,
All you A-train swingers who never swing on birches,
All you masters of the sawmill haiku in the Siberias of America,
All you eyeless unrealists,
All you self-occulting supersurrealists,
All you bedroom visionaries and closet agitpropagators,
All you Groucho Marxist poets
and leisure-class Comrades
who lie around all day and talk about the workingclass proletariat,
All you Catholic anarchists of poetry,
All you Black Mountaineers of poetry,
All you Boston Brahims and Bolinas bucolics,
All you den mothers of poetry,
All you zen brothers of poetry,
All you suicide lovers of poetry,
All you hairy professors of poesie,
All you poetry reviewers
drinking the blood of the poet,
All you Poetry Police -
Where are Whitman’s wild children,
where the great voices speaking out
with a sense of sweetness and sublimity,
where the great’new vision,
the great world-view,
the high prophetic song
of the immense earth
and all that sings in it
And our relations to it -
Poets, descend
to the street of the world once more
And open your minds & eyes
with the old visual delight,
Clear your throat and speak up,
Poetry is dead, long live poetry
with terrible eyes and buffalo strength.
Don’t wait for the Revolution
or it’ll happen without you,
Stop mumbling and speak out
with a new wide-open poetry
with a new commonsensual ‘public surface’
with other subjective levels
or other subversive levels,
a tuning fork in the inner ear
to strike below the surface.
Of your own sweet Self still sing
yet utter ‘the word en-masse -
Poetry the common carrier
for the transportation of the public
to higher places
than other wheels can carry it.
Poetry still falls from the skies
into our streets still open.
They haven’t put up the barricades, yet,
the streets still alive with faces,
lovely men & women still walking there,
still lovely creatures everywhere,
in the eyes of all the secret of all
still buried there,
Whitman’s wild children still sleeping there,
Awake and walk in the open air.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti

That seems to be a hard question. During the purge at PI, I saw people surface (just as in a soviet state trial, I swear!) to testify that you, Mike, posted so much that you suppressed not merely their activity but their very thoughts, and forced them to go away to preserve their mental lives (or something that sounded a lot like that). I thought it was pretty amazing that anyone could have that much power ascribed. The subtext seemed to be that once they'd repeated themselves a time or two, that should have been your cue to back off and let them alone; that it wasn't fair of you to keep digging away at them when any normal person would have picked up on the subtext of rejection and stopped trying to convince them of something against their will.

Raph and I are digging away at one another here. She and I are both tough as old boots, so I don't really have any fears that either of us is going to burst into tears and run away sobbing, even metaphorically. But it surprised the hell out of me that there were people at PI who apparently don't understand the purpose of non-trivial discussion. And I wonder whether they'll show up here, and whether they'll charge me (or Raph) with the same "crime" of insensivity. Those PIers obviously felt "bashed around" by you, but I bet you didn't know you were doing it!

But it surprised the hell out of me that there were people at PI who apparently don't understand the purpose of non-trivial discussion. And I wonder whether they'll show up here, and whether they'll charge me (or Raph) with the same "crime" of insensitivity. Those PIers obviously felt "bashed around" by you, but I bet you didn't know you were doing it!
The funny thing is that I was always trying to walk lightly as it was, consistent with making my point, and I was extremely careful not to make personal attacks or bark too loudly. I don't think those people were getting hurt feelings, I think that is just a ruse. They get offended, and they get offended because their pretense and hypocrisy is confronted. If people feel personally offended when their ideas are challenged, that is their problem, I would say.

There was a dynamic that was developing at PI that reminded me of the neo-fascist rallies that we used to infiltrate back when I was younger and more courageous (or foolish :) ) and also it reminds me of the rallies like the Promise Keepers or Amway distributors have. They want to create a certain shared group emotional state, where everyone is vibrating at the same frequency. Anything that contradicts or detracts from this drive towards a certain shared emotional state is deeply resented. It is as though they are trying to meditate and the words and ideas they are using are for the purpose of creating a trance state. There was a lot of talk that we were "discouraging" them and "depressing" them" and "taking their oomph away." Not because we were overtly or intentionally doing anything to them – no one claimed that - but rather because we were vibrating at a different frequency and causing dissonance in their drive to create a fugue-like trance state.

One must "feel" that Dennis is a good person, and then let one's words and ideas flow from a heightened state of consciousness that we few, who are tuned in to the right vibrations, are achieving.

because mberst was generally polite. He was just an easy target, especially since he was jarring comfort zones.

because mberst was generally polite. He was just an easy target, especially since he was jarring comfort zones.
Exactly. Which makes me wonder whether that might be an insufficiently-considered problem. There are a helluva lot of people out there who don't want to know, and who resent any attempt to inform them. What are they defending against? If you told them there was a deranged-looking man creeping up behind them with an ax, nearly all of them would want to know that. Or that there was a thousand dollars in a sack in a hollow log waiting for someone to pull it out, they'd want to know that.

So what makes a political message unimportant and even aversive?

Is Mike correct, and the problem is that they believe they already know all there is to know and don't want anyone disturbing them with irrelevancies?

Or is it that they feel powerless, so it's not so much like there's a thousand dollars in the log but more there's a hundred thousand dollars but you have to work your ass off for twenty years AND be one-in-a-million lucky? Which they know they've never been in their lives, and that even if they did work their asses off, some crook would steal it out from under them? Is the subtext that their dreams are all that they have or ever will, so anyone trying to mess up their dreams should bugger off?

Is it both? Neither? Something completely different?

I suppose I should stop beating that dead stinking horse, but I can't see how they can claim they are any better than DU. Even Jimmy Carter has broached the taboo I\P subject in the mainstream now with the publication of his new book-and gradually like gay marriage it will become less inflamatory. Why even Kucinich won't have to be on the fence for political expediency anymore.
They don't want to hear about it--what a big fat lie it all is. They don't want to know about all the holes in their carefully crafted illusions.
They want peace and unity.
I can't see how they can demand accountability or unity when their attitude is let's-get-past-this-and-move-on. You commented something to the effect that Tinoire had stepped on her tongue, but it doesn't seem to bother her any--she didn't make any effort to make amends or address it. And everyone ignores that big old elephant in the room. I can't see how they are any better or any different from those they condemn. Plenty of times I've tangled with mberst- big deal. Sounds like others just whined about that old meany, mberst who wasn't getting with the program and offending the priviliged with his expose on gaping economic injustices. Well, that is what the Left does--is it any surprise? Isn't that the point? (Wonder what she feels about the situation in Haiti, being Haitian herself)
Is the purpose to all agree and anyone who disrupts the harmony by challenging the "peace" is cast out as a disrupter? Is that what they mean by peace and unity? Group think with nothing but the most superficial civil exchanges about anything that really matters? Peace. Love. Unity. What happened to Liberté, égalité, fraternité? Christ, I think that board was co-opted.

Mairead, you asked me somewhere else if I would be willing to fall on my sword to make that stand. In retrospect, I have to say, yeah, I will get right up there in their faces. Does it do any good? Perhaps not, but it sure draws the curtain back. Doesn't seem to matter when every one is unwilling to look. I guess you could say it is taking action though when everything else is just talk.
The capacity to rationalize is human fraility. Maybe it is expecting too much for people to do always the right thing--but don't expect it of others when you can't even pull the weight for yourself.

Is this sulking or licking the wounds in a safe place and is there something to be learned and remembered from all this?

The one thing that has always bothered me is the hierarchy that emerges when posters become management. Even DU had a policy of revolving board monitors, whereas on PI it seemed to be permanent authority assignments.

Is this sulking or licking the wounds in a safe place and is there something to be learned and remembered from all this?

The one thing that has always bothered me is the hierarchy that emerges when posters become management. Even DU had a policy of revolving board monitors, whereas on PI it seemed to be permanent authority assignments.

I believe it is quite a safe place, absent one or two unknown and so-far silent folks' possible impacts.

It is our plan to run this as a commons, both practically and in terms of ownership. As the interest grows, it is my hope that we will establish a trust, each member a trustee, to 'own' this commons.

At this time, the temporary 'ownership' is solely for the purpose of making it possible to realize the giving away of the site to its participants, come what may.

That said, why sulk when we can instead apply lessons learned to charting a new way?

pple

Is this sulking or licking the wounds in a safe place and is there something to be learned and remembered from all this?

The one thing that has always bothered me is the hierarchy that emerges when posters become management. Even DU had a policy of revolving board monitors, whereas on PI it seemed to be permanent authority assignments.
Myself, I am not sulking or licking wounds. I feel stronger, not wounded. I also have no misgivings or second thoughts about what I did and would do the same thing again. I think we now have a glorious opportunity - finally! - to see things clearly and move forward. Always at DU an PI and other boards, there was a fog that you couldn't see through - all sorts of confusion. I think it is a very good thing that the authoritarian and hypocritical people who are not by any stretch of the imagination Leftists, and who steer and control all discussion on the Left, have been driven out into the open.

Not only are there things to be learned and remembered from this, I think that the most important and powerful things we could ever learn and remember are involved in this.

As far as this being a safe place, etc. - notice the quality of the posts here. It is so completely different from PI. I feel like I can talk to Mairead and Raphaelle for instance with complete freedom. Why is that? I think that is because there is always a cadre at the liberal boards who are not so much interested in contributing an opinion or ideas, but are motivated to break up and prevent any sort of productive conversations of any kind from happening. I don't think there is necessarily a conspiracy, or even always intentional. It could be that modern liberalism is founded on some deep contradictions and inconsistencies, and true believer liberals get very uncomfortable when those are in danger of being exposed.

My thinking is that we can get some momentum in private, set out some ground rules and create a framework, expand the range of people participating, and then be able to move forward without being taken down by the disrupters. I am sure this can happen. It WAS happening at PI – that is why they needed the purge – things were getting out of hand and were in danger of leading everyone away from liberal fantasy land and into reality.

I believe it is quite a safe place, absent one or two unknown and so-far silent folks' possible impacts.

It is our plan to run this as a commons, both practically and in terms of ownership. As the interest grows, it is my hope that we will establish a trust, each member a trustee, to 'own' this commons.

At this time, the temporary 'ownership' is solely for the purpose of making it possible to realize the giving away of the site to its participants, come what may.

That said, why sulk when we can instead apply lessons learned to charting a new way?
I think everyone is so programmed to think in certain terms about this - who is the big dog? PPLE is looking into a trust as the legal structure. There is no reason not to think of this whole thing in completely new ways. I could probably take charge and start making decisions and no doubt people would go along, and probably the board could be "successful" and if I were clever instead of being such an idealistic and impractical dreamer, I could probably pull a Kos or a Skinner and make a nice living for myself at the expense of the membership and become a "player" - get interviewed on NPR and have lunch with James Carville.

A funny thing happened at PI a few months ago. People were starting the "do something!!" chant. I wrote up an exaggerated example of the standard normal liberal activist organization plan - based on what Code Pink and other organizations have done to be "successful." Set up a non-profit, get grant funding, woo some big money people, run inflammatory campaigns with the public to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, hob nob with the insiders, stage media events, pay ourselves all nice salaries for leading it, promote, market, sell and advertise for "our" cause. I meant is as a parody - as an example of what not to do - but several people there didn't catch that and said "Yes!! That's it!! Let's get going on it!"

http://www.npr.org/programs/asc/archive ... #radiohead (http://www.npr.org/programs/asc/archives/bestof2003/listenerpicks.html#radiohead)

my father would've loved it.

A funny thing happened at PI a few months ago. People were starting the "do something!!" chant. I wrote up an exaggerated example of the standard normal liberal activist organization plan - based on what Code Pink and other organizations have done to be "successful." Set up a non-profit, get grant funding, woo some big money people, run inflammatory campaigns with the public to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, hob nob with the insiders, stage media events, pay ourselves all nice salaries for leading it, promote, market, sell and advertise for "our" cause. I meant is as a parody - as an example of what not to do - but several people there didn't catch that and said "Yes!! That's it!! Let's get going on it!"
I think I remember that, or something else you did along the same line. I can remember feeling boggled when you had to explain it, since you'd done everything to tip people off except wear a red putty nose and fright wig made of yarn.