[cc-community] On the Impossibility of Sharing Hardware (was: The Liberated Pixel Cup: FSF + CC + OpenGameArt game authoring competition)

Alan Cox alan at lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk
Wed Apr 18 14:47:16 EDT 2012


> Might it be possible to organize a company that held shares on behalf of 
> shareholders such that customers got one share for each dollar spent with the 
> company during the year. You get to vote the shares allotted to you due to 

Thats how a lot of co-operatives work.

> There would be no shares held by anyone else. Just this customer pool.

This doesn't change his concern however because a shareholder can buy a
lot of units, gain a lot of voting power and sell those units to third
parties at a profit to fund more purchases.

It's bounded by the fact that anyone could join the co-operative and
purchase direct themselves but its often more convenient to use an
intermediary, and there are a lot of very daft people around.

One of the societies I am a member of manufactures items that (initially)
are sold only to members, the society having through membership borne the
cost of production tooling etc. Several members resell items and on ebay
they go for ludicrously high prices even though it would have been
far cheaper for the purchaser to join the society and buy the item
direct...

Alan


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