permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lflj@intrex.net>]

Keith Johnson wrote:

> Organics AND genetic engineering? Release date Mar 2008.
> (Links from Kim Stanley Robinson)
>
> Tomorrow's Table: Organic Farming, Genetics, and the Future of Food
>
> http://indica.ucdavis.edu/news/in-press-tomorrows-table

Keith and others, including me:

I just created sustag for sustainable agriculture discussion.
I notice than many of us post ag related news and lots of other stuff
not really related to permaculture to this list. I do this a lot
but with reservation. I know you think this info is important for
permaculture people to see and think about and respond to but does it
really belong in a permaculture forum?

I am leaning toward changing this forum to reflect exchange of ideas
and resources that are strictly about permaculture and encourage those
who want to stray from that usage to join and post to any of the
other forums: seedsavers, approtech, sustag, marketfarming, scythe.
This would help those forums become useful with a more robust exchange
of resources while leaving this as a permaculture-only forum, or put 
differently,
permaculture for the purists.

The sustag list could be the catch-all or wide open forum while all the others
would be tightly focused on its designated subject.

A list as a blog is one thing but a list as a forum for vital exchange
of well-focused information is quite another. Blogs are very open but a list
can be like the original Usenet newsgroups, vital to those seriously involved
with the subject covered by the forum.

This is just a suggestion. What do you think? What is consensus?
We can do nothing, individuals can act on their own initiative or we can 
decide as a group
to change the way this forum functions and direct users to other lists on an 
ongoing basis.
They could be directed to the homepage for this list where there would be a 
list of links
to the other forums and external, non ibiblio, ones too.

I for one, will follwo my own suggestion and post non or quasi permaculture 
posts to other forums.

Then there is the issue of whether permaculture should be political or is it 
in some way a political movement.
In that context posts about human or civil rights as well as general 
agriculture and environmental issues
could be considered appropriate. I prefer not to go this route and instead send all of the above this to the sustag 
forum for the most part. It can be the environmental forum as well as one for sustainable agriculture. If I want to 
discuss farming per se I will use the market farming list or this one, especially if the topic fits both forums as with 
soil improvement, land management, water storage etc et.

Ideas, suggestions?