Post-Capitalism

Novara Media hosted a session called “Technology and Post Capitalism” at #lab17’s The World Transformed, unfortunately it clashed with the CLPD intro and I couldn’t make it, but they video’d it and posted it on YouTube.

I have watched it now, and here are my notes.

It’s not obvious from this, but from Mason’s Post Capitalism, he believes the correct exchange value for software is free. It’s a long argument which I need to re-read but it’s obvious that using classical theory of the firm and marginal utility theory this is the case, but Mason argues under a Labour Theory of Value model it should also be free, as he argues in his book and on the video quoting Marx’s Grundrisse and the fragment on machines, software is social knowledge. (I need to reread the chapter on LTV to better articulate how it sees software as free).

Later in the panel, they raise the question of platforms as business and the ease by which they could be co-operativised. It starts from a rant from Mason about Uber, who have just lost their licence to trade in London. But if the moral , legal, true/optimal economic price for software is free, then Uber could be nationalised with compensation for pennies and the real wealth creators (and in Uber’s case capital stake holders) allowed to own the company and retain the surplus value.

What’s of course interesting is that if there is an overwhelming moral case and even a welfare optimisation case for the public ownership of platform co-ops, then we need to recognise that banks are platform companies. The real stake holders are the savers, its hard to see what stake shareholders have in a modern bank.

They rightly spoke about climate change and the energy industry. Mason repeated his argument that, possibly, only a centrally planned solution of the energy markets will be able to reduce temperature growth to 2%. Alice Bell spoke of the small starts being made at instrumenting and digitalising the power grid and the conversation moved on to smart meters and smart home controllers. The questions were asked about who controls/owns the data. The benefits of automating power distribution are clear in that it’ll help reduce the demand. But who owns the data, in the case of the datenkraken’s home IT controllers, the data will be available to the device vendor. We should recognise that the smart meters, being rolled out today were designed to minimise cost and designed several years ago, they are going to run out of capability and will become insecure.

Bell pointed out the macro governance regime that generators have to sell to the grid and consumers buy from it. She remarked on the difference in the Brighton’s sea horizon view, with its new windmills. This all raises question of democratic control of the energy industry. One feature not explored, which to me is important is that basically energy can’t be stored and its wasteful to transmit it. 30% of power generated is lost in transmission. This it would seem suggests that a decentralised power generation scheme would serve society better; our problem at the moment is that we are commissioning nuclear power stations to reduce carbon consumption which requires large amounts of capital; this implies funding via government bonds or shares. I am definitely of the view that we need to re-engineer the grid and consumer units to reduce the wastage.

Another unmentioned fact is that 7% of the UK power consumption is driving IT. This all converts to heat; experiments on reusing this heat have not proved successful and the concentration of IT into data centres caused by the relatively slow speeds of even the fastest system interconnections are also physical centralising tendencies. Mason even argued that data is a public good and should be centrally stored. I don’t think this is going to happen; it completely ignores the gravitational attributes of data (and its volume).

The issue of data ownership and even market efficiency raised the issue of ownership models. Labour’s white papers on new co-operative models were briefly noted but as above, we need to review ownership models and capital funding models.

In a world where finance capital is no longer scarce, we no longer need the joint stock company, limited liability and fiduciary duty. The time for consumer/worker co-ops has come.

ooOOOoo

The presenters are introduced at the beginning of the video, David Harvey, Paul Mason, Alice Bell and James Medway. …

Crisis in Catalonia

Crisis in Catalonia

I made a storify about the Crisis in Catalonia when the Spanish Police disrupted the Referendum in Catalonia. This story includes an article by Owen Jones and two by Craig Murray, together with one or two other articles that I hoped might help me understand what was happening. I transferred this to the blog, as at the original date of publication, once Storify announced they were abandoning the service.  …

Mother of Meetings

Listen up Lewisham labour party folks…today we start a week long series of AGM meetings! Check out where you need to be, when you need to be there and what time.

Bring two friends, your membership card and get ready to vote for your reps. #grassrootsdemocracy #forthemany”

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Counting Votes

Advice from someone who’s been there!

Important lessons learned & tips for tellers. PLEASE READ & SHARE.

  1. Make sure the meeting elects competent & confident tellers. Officers/Councillors/MP are NOT entitled to count by virtue of their position.
  2. Carefully count numbers of eligible voters in the room for each vote.
  3. Ballot papers should only be issued to eligible people in the correct number.
  4. Make sure only tellers collect ballot papers from members – no one else should do this. (Ballot papers SHOULD be posted into ballot boxes. We are looking into getting these for our meetings).
  5. No of ballots cast should match to no of voters. Check & confirm independently. In no circumstances, should
  6. Count votes for each candidate. Tellers should double check each other’s counts & re count until agreed. Do not be afraid to recount. Everyone should be satisfied that the count is correct. Don’t be rushed.
  7. Make a note of total ballots cast, total for each candidate & any missing or spoilt papers. Numbers should all add up. If ballots are unclear they can’t be counted.
  8. No one should count or handle ballots who’s not an elected teller. If someone is interfering or distracting you whilst counting don’t be afraid to ask them not to!
  9. If anything odd happens, someone else collects ballots , ballots are missing or additional ballots cast raise this immediately and ask for a fresh ballot to be held.
  10. All the tellers must certify the result in writing, and the results announced.

If anything has been missed please comment below. …

Tidemill

I am proposing the following motion to the Lewisham Deptford Labour Party General Committee.

This CLP resolves to send the following motion to London Regional Conference

“This Conference notes

1. The passing of Composite 5 on Housing at Labour Conference 2017
2. Jeremy Corbyn’s leader’s speech in which he stated “Regeneration under a Labour government will be for the benefit of the local people, not private developers, not property speculators … [&]… councils will have to win a ballot of existing tenants and leaseholders before any redevelopment scheme can take place.”
3. That Lewisham Council Strategic Planning committee approved planning permission to redevelop the Old Tidemills School site involving the redevelopment (destruction) of 16 council houses and the loss of Tidemills Community Gardens.
4. That further planning permissions involving the loss of council houses in Lewisham Deptford have been prepared.
5. That Councils have a duty to follow the direction of the Mayor’s Housing Plan

This Conference calls on the Mayor of London to call in planning permissions granted which involve the destruction of social housing”

This CLP instructs the Secretary to write to the Mayor of London informing him of this motion calling on him to “call in” the Tidemills Planning Application.

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