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  • From: Jeff <toobeeorknottoobee@gmail.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Live Together or Die Alone - Copyright vs Cooperation
  • Date: Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:26:03 -0700

Thanks for your insight. You shifted my thinking slightly. -Jeff

Permaculture Cooperative wrote:
Live Together or Die Alone - Copyright vs
Cooperation<http://gaiapermaculture.com/projects/permaculturecooperative/blog/2009/11/17/live-together-or-die-alone-on-copyright-cooperation/>
by Nicholas Roberts <http://gaiapermaculture.com/people/niccolo/profile>

[image: Old and new Mondragon / Arrasate]

1. *Group Effort*:

The Permaculture Designers Manual was a group effort: the manuscript was
written and edited by Bill’s x-wife: Reny Mia Slay. It was illustrated by
Andrew Jeeves. Do they get any money, royalties or credit ? where are they
now ? I heard Reny went broke and now drives a taxi.

2. *Sourcing*:

There are precious few sources, or references for such a big, dense book ?
so, the filter of Bill’s mind, then his dictation/colloboration to Reny and
to Andrew make this legal, but maybe not the most ethical way to write such
a encyclopedic designers manual. The contents of the manual are drawn from
all over the world, and re-branded “permaculture”. For instance, do a search
for permaculture in relation to the ecoburb Village Homes in Davis
California.

3. *Inspirational not very educational*:

As an inspirational guidebook, a pointer to future research directions, the
Tagari Permaculture Designers Manual is the Old Testament. its stands apart,
a kind of keystone to the Permaculture guild of books. However, as an actual
Designers Manual, its not that good. I realise for many permies this is
heresy, but I know quite a few people in Australia, that went through a long
phase where they treated the PDM as a manual and actually lived by it, and
quite frankly they are p%^ed off. Its full of factual inaccuracy, half baked
theories, poor references, and is indiosyncratic in the extreme. They still
believe in many of the ideas, but the content of the designers manual is not
that great.

4. *Tagari Farm the Reality*:

I went to Tagari Farm in Tyalgum in the mid 90s, during the peak of that
wave of Permaculture popularity, the Global Gardener had followed-up In
Grave Danger of Falling Foods on national TV in Australia and the Designers
Manual had just been carried by the ABC book shops. The story I was told was
that something like 3000 species has been planted in something like 20
acres. Already the ecosystems had signs of unbalance, bamboo running, sweat
potato spreading. Worse the damns - 30% was to be aquaculture - eventually
sprung leaks. The property Tagari in Tyalgum was eventually abadonded and is
kind of the skeleton in the closet, the crazy aunt in the attic of
permaculture. The Tyalgum farm was meant to embody, manifest the glories of
the Permaculture Bible (Designers manual) from the Prophet Bill. No doubt if
someone was crazy enough to buy the Tyalgum property for 2 million
Australian dollars, Tagari in Tasmania would be in a much better financial
situation. http://www.tagari.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/web_version.pdf

4. *Spanish and other language editions*:

Why isnt there a Spanish translation ? let alone other languages. Again, a
story; I was told that someone made a verbal arrangement with Bill, did the
translation and had copies printed all at their own expense. Then there was
some kind of dispute with the Prophet and it came screeching to a halt, and
the Spanish translator went broke. These kinds of stories around copyright
with Bill/Tagari are legion.

5. *Permaculture Word Copyrighted*

Tagari tried to Copyright and license the actual usage of the WORD
Permaculture. That would mean all of us, using or planning on using
Permaculture in marketing material would need to obtain (and presumably) pay
for a license. How many of the “Copyright is good crowd” have a paid-up
license for using the Permaculture Word ?

6. *International Copyright*

Most developing nations, including and especially the United States of
America IGNORED intellectual property regimes during their own development.
It was the only way that they could break free of the imperialism of Europe
and establish their own economic rights. The founders of the US where deeply
sceptical of Copyright.. From the authors of the original Copyright Clause,
Jefferson and Maddison
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#History<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#History%20>

*Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the
progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive
fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in
exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less
susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the
thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess
as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces
itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess
himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the
less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea
from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who
lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas
should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and
mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have
been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them,
like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any
point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical
being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then
cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. —Thomas Jefferson, to Isaac
McPherson 13 Aug. 1813 Writings 13:333–35[14]*

7. *International Development*:

If someone is starving to death, say in East Timor, your are not going to
send them a book of high-level concepts and a myriad of interesting and
inspiring stories. You need to help them with practical information now. The
idea of sending the Permaculture Designers Manual to the Global South is
basically like sending Bibles to the natives. Its much better to support the
writing of a local edition of a Designers manual, drawn from global best
practice (there are dozens of good permaculture and related specialty books
now) and local knowledge. An excellent example is the East Timorese
Permaculture Designers Manual, written like a cartoon, containing local
species and traditional practice, in the local dialects. This book was
funded and written in East Timor, “authored” by Ego Lemosand many others..

http://www.idepfoundation.org/ptl.html

http://www.petrabali.com/petra-s-publications/permaculture

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/arts/the-face-ego-lemos/story-e6frg8n6-1111119019080


8. *Online Market for the Designers Manual*:

There isn’t an online market for the Permaculture Designers Manual, there
never has been, and chances are there never will be. If there is any money
to be extracted from the Mollison PDM it will be captured by Google and your
ISP. Not the online publisher. There has been a huge ongoing debate about
opensource, opencontent etc.. and many, many commercial operations -
software especially - release software code AND documentation FREE.. .they
do this as a kind of loss leader, a marketing exercise.They use the
educational and marketing materials and experiences as an elaborate sales
process. Then they make money from consultation and maintenance.

9. *Squabbling while the planet burns*

The Copenhagen Climate talks are offically going to fail, no agreement for
reductions. However,
thehttp://www.Klimaforum09.org<http://www.klimaforum09.org/> is
organised by a permaculturalist Tony Andersen, and they are working on a
plan called 10 000 Trees per lifetime and less than 1 tonne GHG per persons
year. To implement this plan they are lobbying for a carbon tax of 100 euro
per tonne. They want to use the international permaculture network and
expand the base of permaculture institutes from 300 to 50 000 in 50 years.
Whether this plan gets funded or not, it gives one a sense of the WORK
needed, the expansion of the International Permaculture Network required.
Its way beyond where we are now as a discordant collection of permaculture
small businesses. http://permaculture.tv/?s=klimaforum

10. *What-If for Permaculture.coop* ?

What if the 300 institutes and hundreds of design and related permaculture
businesses and cooperatives and organisations, established a
*Permaculture.coop
Intercooperation Framework* (using Mondragon as a good model, like Mollison
said in 1983 http://permaculture.tv/?s=mondragon) What if this
Permaculture.coop Intercooperation Framework had a Retirement Fund, that
could provide Pioneers like Mollison with an income and real, tangible
support ? Like maintaining their farms in Tasmania and Tyalgum ? What if
there was a sensible, global mass-multi-media campaign developed, where the
large array of books, DVDs, courses etc, was managed like a global commons,
and exploited sustainably ? If we gave away FREE a lot more courses, books,
videos etc, and got a lot more PAID work and funds, and expanded the
international permaculture network, this argument would simply disappear
into the history of the 1990s. http://permaculture.tv/?p=1224
http://permaculture.tv/?tag=mondragon<http://permaculture.tv/?tag=mondragon%20>

11. *Freedom is Not Free*

I know how much time, money, resources go into publishing - I was webmaster
for *The Australian* and *The Daily Telegraph*, and about 30 other
newspapers in Sydney at News Ltd, between 2000-2003. The realities of modern
print-publishing are really pretty dire. Its not easy printing these
Designer Manuals. But it would be a hell of a lot easier if there was a
cooperation system that went beyond email exchanges and some casual sending
of funds. Online publishing is a nightmare. Quite literally MOST of the
economic value of internet publishing is being gathered by Google. Look at
the Google Books Settlement or this for a taste
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/randall-amster/a-googlement-above-the-pe_b_165024.html

12. *Reality Check*

Like Evan, who I respect, I have been trying to get the International
Permaculture Network to adjust to the realities of the 21st century; sudden,
abrupt cllimate change, globalisation, neoliberalism and the Internet. Evans
publishing of the PDF is important as a political gesture but its irrelevant
in terms of effecting sales of the book. Reading PDFs online is not a great
experience <http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20030714.html>, and you would have
to be pretty desperate (and poor) to do so. Those that can afford to buy the
book, will. But sadly, many people in the West, and most people in the
South, and that includes those who need them cannot afford them.

13. *A different model*:

The computer book publisher, Oreilly invented a new subscription based
service, that allow you to spend say, 20 USD per month and you get access to
a limited number of chapters and videos. What would happen if we did
something similar ? a quality online offering ? allowing users to pay and
login and access books, videos etc online for a subscription. It would
actually create a market where none existed before. We could then pay
authors, and offer free access for schools etc.
http://my.safaribooksonline.com/home?subpage=hometab2

As they said on the TV series “Lost”… “Live together or die
alone<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Together,_Die_Alone>


skype permaculturecoop
email permaculturecoop@gmail.com
phone +1 415 670 9710
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