Tag: communism

The American Civil War 2

On November 16, 2009

I am deeply concerned with the Liberal / Conservative flame wars. Countless Facebook discussions start with a casual reference to one position or the other, then quickly devolve into deeply divisive language. I see it in forums, chats, comments on blogs, news articles and YouTube Videos.

It’s getting worse – people can no longer agree to disagree.

I do not believe in big government. On the other hand, I do not believe that corporations should be the sole protectors for safeguarding the social charter. Call me an idealist, but I truly believe that given the right incentives, people can govern themselves to a very large degree.

Weapon of Mass Reconstruction

We have at our disposal the most powerful tool ever created for the potential benefit of humanity. Societies since the beginning of our time would have envied us beyond words – as their villages were pillaged, as the plague spread, or as the hurricane hit shore – if they had a system that could unify and organize people as we can do today with social media.

My fear, is that we will use this tool to divide instead of unify. Traditional media and the advertising industry are in deep trouble as people go online to self-select their news and content. This is no fault of Mr. O’Reilly, Mr. Beck or Mr. Limbaugh – they are entitled to their jobs. Nor is it the fault of emerging Liberal opportunists looking for pick up a used G4 for the Holidays.

Trust me, I’m your friend

Unfortunately, traditional media (TV, print, and Radio) are under extraordinary pressure not just to maintain ratings, but to increase ratings to subsidize less successful areas of the enterprise. As a result, the content must become more and more sensational in order to keep people watching commercials. If I earned one dollar for every minute of YOUR time that I could waste, would you trust me? Yet people do.

The Terrorist Within

I am terrorized by the notion that Americans will turn against Americans. The problems facing this nation are so complex, so controversial, and so far reaching into the past and the future that it is unlikely that any intelligent person is more qualified than any other intelligent person to hold the highest office. Barrack, Hillary, John, would all have the same pressures pushing back on every move leading them down 95% similar paths. None could be better and none could be worse – we’re officially in this together.

So until the super-star with extra-human discernment rides out of the clouds, People should really really be looking for a third way through this. Pure Communism is a Failure, Pure Socialism is a failure, and we are quickly learning that Pure Capitalism will also runs out of track.

The Next Great American Civil War will be a battle against ourselves – all of the artifacts of past generations that pull at our subconsciousness; the reactionary fight or flight instinct of our ancestors. We are being called to something new. Let’s get on with business and find out where this road leads – together.

I am released the draft copy of Part I from my book; The Next Economic Paradigm. It can be downloaded here. Please let me know if you have any comments. I will publish the remaining 2 parts shortly.

I Am Capitalist and So Are You

By Admin

On March 16, 2009

In General Information

In case you have not noticed, it is largely in the best interest of one group of people to keep another group of people poor, weak, and disorganized. I’ll let the reader connect these dots as they see fit, however, the fact is that is how capitalism works – there must be a merchant class and there must be a working class. And even after all the inequality that this arrangement implies, capitalism is still the only game in town for creating and distributing wealth.

As the burden of supporting the capitalist system is increasing with interest on debt that can never be funded, the pressures on the working class will enter a phase of rapidly diminishing returns.

The Poor:

The inherent conflict is that the working class will always seek to maximize their wages and the merchant class will seek to minimize those wages. Inadvertently, there is a suppression of information, and therefore education, to the working class. The result is a net loss of intellectual capital.

The Weak:

The inherent conflict is that the working class is assigned the tasks of carrying out the wishes of the merchant class even if it is not in their own best interest. Inadvertently, conformity becomes a survival strategy for the working class. The result is a net loss of creative capital.

The Disorganized:

The inherent conflict is that the working class will organize themselves into collectives as a means to match the relative power of the merchant class. Again, inadvertently, if people are held below a certain economic threshold, they will fail to organize because their concern is greater for simply feeding their family. The net result is a loss of social capital.

Diminishing returns

The result of the net loss of social capital, creative capital, and intellectual capital is the inability to create new wealth. While these conditions were once the exclusive domain of less developed countries especially under communism, similar conditions are now arising in the United States under capitalism. That is, before Social Media was used to enrich, empower, and organize.

I am a capitalist:

The tools of the old merchant class trade are eroding. As the financial crisis envelopes the United States, more and more people are turning to Social media. Traditional media is over commercialized, polarized, and gentrified while the audience can now control their bandwidth, seek multiple opinions, and become highly diversified. The draw to social media is nothing less than extraordinary even among those who still have jobs. When people are released from the clutches of the merchant class, they wake up, look around and inspire each other. The innovation economy is upon us.

Innovation Economics

The paradigm shift is really quite subtle. It behaves as a function of the human embodiment of innovation. For example; most of us do not wake up every day aspiring to improve the Ipod, the Wii platform, the better mousetrap, or any other inanimate object for that matter– instead, we seek to improve ourselves, and by extension, those around us. This is the self embodiment of innovation – something improved with an economic outcome. To improve one self is to innovate; social capital, creative capital, and intellectual capital are the factors of production and social media is the corporate structure. I am Capitalist and if you have read this far, so are you.

Socialism, Capitalism, or Social Capitalism

By Admin

On January 13, 2009

In General Information

Throughout history, technological change has also brought changes in the organization of society around the new ways to allocate resources. The industrial revolution spawned the two prevailing economic theories of our time; Capitalism and Socialism.

The current wave of technological change will likely spawn new economic theories and social organization systems as well – it makes no sense to look to the past for reference to the future of anything.

Capitalism arose from feudalism and is roughly characterized by a merchant class that owns the factors of production (land, labor, and capital) and a working class whose physical toil adds value to natural resources. The capitalist acting in their own best interest is ultimately acting in the best interest of society by creating jobs that employ people.

Then Karl Marx came along and noted the inherent conflict where the workers would seek to maximize their wages and the merchants would seek to minimize wages. He argued that class struggle would ultimately result in a communist system replacing the capitalist system. The communist acting in the best interest of society is ultimately acting in their own best interest. Socialism is widely regarded as the transitional stage between capitalism and communism.

But the struggle is really over the control of the means of production, or factors of production. “Are land, labor, and capital” private property or public property? Are these notions even relevant in the age of the Internet?

Today, computer enabled society engaged in an innovation economy presents an entirely new set of conditions. What happens when the factors of production are social capital, creative capital, and intellectual capital? How are these “means of production” going to be controlled and by whom?

This is a serious philosophical quandary that will be brought down upon us in the next generation of social media because neither socialism or capitalism are applicable in a traditional sense. Like Heisenberg’s theory of indeterminacy – the more control you have over one factor, the less control you have over the other. This is not a condition related to the ability to control someone or something, rather, it is a condition related to the nature of the system itself. That’s a big deal.

For the traditional Socialist: in order to control social capital, one must equalize society – as such, the system retains little innovation production value. In order to control creative capital, one must standardize creativity – likewise, the system retains little innovation production value. In order to control intellectual capital, one must control the intellectual development of another – again, the system retains little innovation production value.

Likewise for the traditional Capitalist: In your world is no ROI to curb global warming, there is no ROI to educate the poor, there is no ROI for human rights, and there is no ROI on the national debt, etc. As such, the system is constrained by the social burden to innovate – you can no longer scale.

There is, however, a business plan to liberate social capital, creative capital, and intellectual capital as tangible financial instruments in their own right, by definition, reflecting social priorities in an innovation economy. This is where the next generation of social media is leading to – and it scales magnificently. Have you noticed?

That is Social Capitalism.

Tag: communism

The American Civil War 2

I Am Capitalist and So Are You

Socialism, Capitalism, or Social Capitalism

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