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Participate

on Sat, 09/03/2011 - 14:01

Welcome to this collaborative space!

We look forward to work together with you to bring the Commons alive in our world. No matter how small or large, your gifts could be the seed for a vital part of the new ecosystem we will create together. 

Share with us your skills, your availability and your passion and we will help you find the best way to make them available for the benefit of the Whole. Collaboration when combined with acting for the benefit of the Whole makes the seemingly impossible possible and inspires hope for others.

The list below gives some ideas of what is needed to build a Commons. Scroll through them and let us know what excites you most. 

table of content:

Participate in our commons
  commons educators
  experience designers & serious game designers
  film and video makers
  geeks
  knowledge gardeners
  online hosts 
  pattern seekers
  social reporters
  transmedia wizards and story tellers
  visual artists
  interns


 

Participate in our commons

 

One of two facets of the School of Commoning is that it’s a commons itself. This commons is yours if you feel so, and your action shows it.

Your action creates the most traction and leverage when you bring your talents and energy to where the momentum is building. Currently, it is the Commons Economy Rising Campaign.

Below are some examples of how you can participate by sharing your talents if our work inspires you. Choose according to your inspiration and interest. Of course, you can also invent your unique personal way to support the Campaign, not listed here, which will be welcome.

 

* commons educators

Do you have something to teach that is related to commons and commoning? Are you so passionate about it that you would do it anyway, even if there was no remuneration? Perhaps you need some support in evolving or presenting your commons curriculum or educational approach to a wider audience ? If yes to all three questions, why not join forces with us in forming a commons education commons?

* experience designers & serious game designers

There is nothing that we learn from more deeply than our personal experience. Serious games allow us to choose the experience that we want for our learning and evolution, both as communities/organisations, and individuals. We, at the School of Commoning, are in a very early stage of designing a social game, called The Commoning Game. We plan to release it in the first half of 2012.

If you would like  to explore possibilities for collaboration on this initiative, please leave a reply to this post.

film and video makers

The Gutenberg civilisation is yielding its place as the key enabler of our cultural evolution, to a civilisation of moving picture. Books, journals and magazines may not disappear any time soon, but viral videos open the possibility to a greater reach of new cultural memes and behaviours, quicker and further, than ever before. If you enjoy working with the camera, editing films and videos, and have a passion for the Commons, let’s co-create something worth watching and learning from, by zillions of commoners.

geeks

Are you savvy about working with Drupal or other open source tools and social media that can make the use of our webspace even more triple-E: more Effective, Efficient, and truly Enjoyable?

Designing and powering up virtual environments with features and tools that commons can benefit from, is a competence that can make a HUGE difference for how quickly people can discover and learn about nurturing their specific commons. The School of Commoning needs the help of conscious geeks, who are willing to give a hand at turning our Web presence into a more fun and evolving platform for social learning, collaboration and commoning.

We want to make the online experience of our commons members delightful, so we need to continually improve the mix of the electronic, cognitive, and social technologies that we use. Your support on the tech side of things could contribute to not only that result but also, to your own learning, by helping us meeting the challenges set by the commons’ evolving needs and aspirations.

* knowledge gardeners

We, as a commons, can only enjoy the benefits of our collective intelligence because the work of the knowledge gardeners, information ecologists, and community cybrarians. (Please note that knowledge gardening is a community art.)

Web-enabled commons tend to create information and knowledge faster than means for making sense out of it. Knowledge gardeners attend (seed, feed, and weed) the expanding content on our sites, facilitate the harvesting of knowledge nuggets from online and face-to-face meetings, and make them easily findable, even years from now.

Their work is what can enable collaborative sensing, meaning-making, and meeting commons challenges and opportunities at increasing scale. If you have one of those talents and care to use it for profound social innovation, let our commons appreciate and co-evolve with it.

* online hosts

Do you have experience in hosting online communities, facilitating online conversations, and harvesting conversations? 

Commons are networks of conversations, where the flow of meaning and co-inspiration is not inhibited by bureaucratic structures. Online hosts are facilitators of conversations that matter. As the commons and its complexity grow, so does the number of conversations worth hosting. 

Online space is never as convivial as physical space can be. If you are a real "people person" who is also at home online, then stay connected with our “Converse” space, see how things unfold there, and let us know whether you would enjoy playing host to a new conversation when need be.

pattern seekers

What if we could aggregate the commons-relevant news from many sources and channels, and present them in a way that would make it easier to see interesting patterns that connect them? Pattern-seekers and explorers of the commons phenomena play a pivotal role in the emergence of shared meaning.

social reporters

What are the innovative practices in commons development and commoning, in various areas of human endeavour? Where do interesting commons events take place, online and in the physical world? Social reporters are scouts and chroniclers of the future as it’s emerging in the social practices of the present. They expand horizons, broaden perspectives, and are natural partners of commons educators.

transmedia wizards and story tellers

Stories told “across multiple forms of media with each element making distinctive contributions to a fan's understanding of the story world” (Wikipedia) The different "entry points" to it facilitate immersion and decentralized authorship. Given that, the collaboration of social learning architects and transmedia wizards can open new dimensions to commons education.

Together, they can stimulate our visions of the future, connect the dots, discern and narrate the meta-plot as it carries itself forward. They enable collaborative narratives to be woven from many voices, teaching us about the commons’ concerns and create "the shared understanding of a situation that provides a common platform for collective action." (Inside Out: Stories and Methods for Generating Collective Will to Create the Future We Want, by Tracy Huston)[link it to its book page]

visual artists

Expressing complex ideas visually through beautiful and engaging imagery that have a significance to the commons is their best chance to be understood and integrated in the commons’ knowledge. As our network or conversations and Knowledge Garden expand and deepen, so will the need for contribution from more graphics people. If what you find on this site is inspiring you, then contribute your art and let it inspire other members and visitors.

interns

If you want to intern with the Campaign, let us know in which area you want to develop yourself and join our team for 3-6 months, when you'll be in the forefront of pioneering profound social innovation.

Students and young professionals, who want to develop their talents in any of the roles listed above are accepted as interns only when they can be supported by more seasoned commoners working in the same field. Currently we have openings for interns only in the roles, marked with * . If interested, please get in touch with us.

Collaborating with one another, commoners in the different roles described above can make the commons more co-intelligent. Together, we become the commons’ distributed nervous system that let us sense, learn, remember, and coordinate action with one another.

Whilst none of those engagement opportunities are paid work, at the present, you will be part of an amazingly creative community and learn with us about the ways commoning can evolve communities, organisations, and social systems.