[permaculture] Why is permaculture more about selling books, DVDs and training courses?
Lawrence F. London, Jr.
lflj at intrex.net
Wed Jun 24 09:34:19 EDT 2009
Suraj Kumar wrote:
> I get the feeling that the permaculture movement has morphed into a
> market place to sell books, DVDs and training courses related to
> permaculture than a platform for sharing techniques and allowing
> humans to live closer to nature in a simpler way. Many a material I
> find on the internet are incomplete and keep referring to "Stuff to
> Buy" or "Courses to Take". Just search for permaculture on youtube and
> that's what you find. Any site claiming to be a "permaculture" site
> talks about doing a course.
>
> Or am I mistaken? I'd love to be corrected if I'm mistaken.
>
> I remember some noble soul here who had setup permaculture.info - that
> is great! WTG! But, why do the 'experts' end up locking themselves
> into seclusion and not share their knowledge?
Very good question, one that has been asked many times in the past. One answer given: they need to retain
a certain amount of proprietary material, their own knowledgebases, their information resources collected over
the years to use to earn a living through teaching appointments, workshops PDC training courses they offer.
If they gave it all away noone would need to pay for coursework, consultation and workshops they offered.
Personally, I have always thought that more in-depth sharing of information and resources through mailing lists
and wikis such as permaculture.info would stimulate business rather than reduce it. Course they could always say "we're
not geting paid to share this material so why do it". Because it stimulates business opportunities that would result in
greater income for them and add to their personal knowledgebase.
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