I was looking back through an old photo album, and found this picture that my wife took in 2002. It's hard to believe gas was ever this cheap!
Petroleum = Our Temple
A Chronicle of Change
This just came to mind, thinking about crazy ideas... How about starting a neighborhood microcurrency? You could make it as high tech or as low tech as you want, but it doesn't change the theory.
Low tech:
Print up a bunch of bills (Or some other token) and hand an equal number to each member. When somebody needs help, or use of a tool, or a gallon of gas, or anything, they post it on a central bulletin board with the service/good and how much they're willing to pay somebody for it. If a person ends up with a glut of bills, they can take it a little easier, if somebody's out of bills, they'd better pull their weight, or just drop out of the economy entirely. It makes it easier to help out members in need, also. People can choose to give bills to anybody that they want to. Then, you can help to provide something for which you wouldn't have the skills or materials otherwise. Of course, bartering isn't off limits, but in small communities, you can't always barter for what you need at the time.
Issues:
Trust - All of the members must trust each other. The members should, if unanimous, be able to vote someone out of the economy. At that point, no transactions can or will be performed with the offender either for a predetermined length of time, or permanently. It isn't like Amish shunning, barter should still be possible, just not currency transactions.
Counterfeiting - This ties into trust, but detecting counterfeiting could be difficult. In a small enough community, it should become obvious that a person never does anything, but still has bills. By the time the community gets large enough, there really should be some sort of government in place to handle tracking bills by serial number or somesuch. Come to think of it, using serial numbers and sending a note to all members letting them know the range would work. If the fake bill is outside the range, it's obvious. If it's printed inside the range, you could only put so many into the economy before duplicates started popping up.
New members - if a new member joins, then a number of bills should be printed equal to the number distributed at the start and given to the new member. Of course an updated SN range should be sent to all members.
High Tech:
Easy, store each balance in a database, and tie it into a computer bulletin board. Same rules apply.
I have no idea if this would really work. I'm not even sure how you could run an experiment, as the economy probably needs to reach a certain size before it really operates well.
Just another crazy thought. Feedback is welcomed.
Low tech:
Print up a bunch of bills (Or some other token) and hand an equal number to each member. When somebody needs help, or use of a tool, or a gallon of gas, or anything, they post it on a central bulletin board with the service/good and how much they're willing to pay somebody for it. If a person ends up with a glut of bills, they can take it a little easier, if somebody's out of bills, they'd better pull their weight, or just drop out of the economy entirely. It makes it easier to help out members in need, also. People can choose to give bills to anybody that they want to. Then, you can help to provide something for which you wouldn't have the skills or materials otherwise. Of course, bartering isn't off limits, but in small communities, you can't always barter for what you need at the time.
Issues:
Trust - All of the members must trust each other. The members should, if unanimous, be able to vote someone out of the economy. At that point, no transactions can or will be performed with the offender either for a predetermined length of time, or permanently. It isn't like Amish shunning, barter should still be possible, just not currency transactions.
Counterfeiting - This ties into trust, but detecting counterfeiting could be difficult. In a small enough community, it should become obvious that a person never does anything, but still has bills. By the time the community gets large enough, there really should be some sort of government in place to handle tracking bills by serial number or somesuch. Come to think of it, using serial numbers and sending a note to all members letting them know the range would work. If the fake bill is outside the range, it's obvious. If it's printed inside the range, you could only put so many into the economy before duplicates started popping up.
New members - if a new member joins, then a number of bills should be printed equal to the number distributed at the start and given to the new member. Of course an updated SN range should be sent to all members.
High Tech:
Easy, store each balance in a database, and tie it into a computer bulletin board. Same rules apply.
I have no idea if this would really work. I'm not even sure how you could run an experiment, as the economy probably needs to reach a certain size before it really operates well.
Just another crazy thought. Feedback is welcomed.
Working in programming has its perks. My boss just approved two telecommuting days a week! Also, a neighbor and co-worker of mine was able to change his schedule, so we're carpooling the other three days. That, combined with basic hypermiling should reduce my gasoline usage to about 20% of pre-shock. My gas budget has dropped to $50/month or about 12 gallons a month! As long as there aren't shortages, I'm set. There will be shortages though, and then I'll have to cut farther. I imagine that inflation is going to be a real problem soon, so I liquidated my retirement funds today. I'm looking at a nice parcel of riverside land between Macon and Augusta. It's close enough to bug out to when things get too crazy here, has a river nearby, and a built residence onsite. It seems like a better retirement bet than my Roth right now. Good thing I'm telecommuting today. I was about to go to the store this morning, when the car wouldn't start. Wouldn't you know, some psycho siphoned all of my gas! I'm within walking distance of a gas station, but it was still annoying. I'm going to have to rig up some sort of lock on my gas tank.
I posted this earlier, but ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1)
lirath1 asked me to repost it, and I think that it's especially important now. It's a collaborative map so that we can keep track of everyone's location. Create a profile and add yourself to the map. Maybe if we can find others nearby, we can create some real communities within our virtual one. After all, everything's about to become a lot more local. Remember, think globally, act locally!
http://www.wayfaring.com/maps/show/36169
lirath1 asked me to repost it, and I think that it's especially important now. It's a collaborative map so that we can keep track of everyone's location. Create a profile and add yourself to the map. Maybe if we can find others nearby, we can create some real communities within our virtual one. After all, everything's about to become a lot more local. Remember, think globally, act locally!http://www.wayfaring.com/maps/show/36169
I have a feeling that we're going to be seeing a lot more of this sort of thing in the near future. This video describes an engine that runs "only on water" Hooray! We've been saved! I can drop by the lake and fill up my Hummer on the way home! How does this work, you might ask? Why through their "unique electrolysis process" of course. But wait, doesn't that require electricity? Well... Yes. And where would that electricity come from? Ummm, well, mostly coal, oil, and gas. It's misinformation like this that got us in this mess, and it will continue to give false hope to those who don't know any better. It's up to us to keep people educated so we can concentrate on the REAL solutions.
I got back from the store. I went ahead and doubled up on Jeffrey Yago's $25 10-day survival pack. Since we don't know when gas will become scarce, better to have some supplies in case we run out on the road. I also bought a good amount of tuna fish and tuna helper with some sterno canisters. It won't go bad for a while, and all you need is water (and heat) to cook it up. The prices don't seem that high in the stores yet. It'll probably take a week as they get new shipments in and diesel starts catching up with gasoline. I thought about getting an extra freezer, but if I can't count on the grid, I'll just end up with spoiled meat. Better stick with canned food for emergency rations. Hopefully market pressures will force the local grocer to start carrying local foods from the surrounding farms, but I don't know if enough is available to support half a million people. Do you think I could sell my house in a week?
Well, I just joined my first meetup group. Atlanta Beyond Oil seems to be fairly active, with meetups on a regular basis. Anyway, I posted to their mailing list about WWO. Hopefully I'll get some connections here in Atlanta. Feeling kinda lonely so far :)
Ok, just got word of the re-negotiations of oil futures contracts. Not good. Not good at all. Driving to work today, I saw some guys out changing the numbers at the gas station. You know that they're going to get a lot of grief. It's not their fault. For the most part, they're just making an honest living. At lunch, I'm going to go get on the waiting list for a hybrid. By the time the list gets to me, there won't be any question of whether hybrids are cost effective. I just hope that they haven't shut down the factories by then. In the meantime, I think I'll try some hypermiling. Hopefully, I'll get a good 25% increase in MPG. Maybe enough to offset the current increases. I have to stop by the grocery store after work. I'll let you know how food prices are going here in Atlanta. Hang in there guys, this is just the beginning.
Later,
Rumpletoe
Later,
Rumpletoe
Look at this picture:
Now look at this one:
Rotate it a little bit. They look extremely similar to me.
Now, take the fact that the name of the image is mtg-granda.
I looked up Granda & Colombia in Google, and I find Rodrigo Granda, a leader in the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia–People's Army, a guerilla group. Could Rico have been meeting with Granda in Colombia? Colombia's neighbor Venezuela happens to be a member of OPEC as well. Could we be talking about a revolution of the proletariat? What better way to pull off a revolution than to remove the means of production (oil) from the supposed bourgeoisie (industrialized nations). It levels the playing field. The vast majority of us will have to rely on labor, becoming proletariat ourselves. It's a scary thought that someone might be following an ideology at such a cost, and be able to pull it off...
Reading back over this, it seems kind of crazy in a New World Order sort of way, but I'll post it anyway. After all, we're living in crazy times.
Now look at this one:
Rotate it a little bit. They look extremely similar to me.
Now, take the fact that the name of the image is mtg-granda.
I looked up Granda & Colombia in Google, and I find Rodrigo Granda, a leader in the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia–People's Army, a guerilla group. Could Rico have been meeting with Granda in Colombia? Colombia's neighbor Venezuela happens to be a member of OPEC as well. Could we be talking about a revolution of the proletariat? What better way to pull off a revolution than to remove the means of production (oil) from the supposed bourgeoisie (industrialized nations). It levels the playing field. The vast majority of us will have to rely on labor, becoming proletariat ourselves. It's a scary thought that someone might be following an ideology at such a cost, and be able to pull it off...
Reading back over this, it seems kind of crazy in a New World Order sort of way, but I'll post it anyway. After all, we're living in crazy times.
colt_becker had the thought of seeing the interstates filled with bikes. Well, here it is! The other funny thing is that several of the events in this commercial could happen in a world without oil. An article remembering obesity, mini-sized meals, organic apple vendors, and 24 hour libraries. There may be the slightest silver lining to this thunderhead.