Oh, also found this to be relevant: http://www.creatinglearningcommunities.org/etcetera/selflearning.htm http://www.creatinglearningcommunities.org/book/internet/lamoreaux1.htm http://alcob.com/new/alcom_alcob/alcom_alcob_disp.html
Cheers! Sebastian 2008/12/1 Sebastian Silva <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Hello, > I realize I should have jumped into this discussion earlier. Please > excuse me, I've just put myself thru an intense matrixesque > self-learning weeks around learning communities, communities of > practice, community learning, critical pedagogy, radical pedagogy, > network logics (economies, brains, forests, evolution, the internet), > network economics, ecology, emergent control, beekeeping, and > de-centralized governance... it's been fascinating. > My research question has been "¿how to jumpstart an ecosystem?" > > The reason for my research is because I've been looking for a > sustainability model for our FuenteLibre.Org grassroots initiative. > I'll briefly relate our story: Born peruvian, raised in Chile, > came to Lima where I have familiy a year ago to volunteer for OLPC. > Got into suport-gang, eek, > support for G1G1? So Walter comes, brings me an XO laptop, I meet > Hernan Pachas from the ministry, and I offer to organize volunteers > for support and training, etc. At the time, they had their hands full > (and their heads), so they informed me they would not be working with > volunteers, "they would handle it" and that "I should not worry about > it". > > I understood immediately that for this project to succeed, it needed > community involvement and transparency. I rallied for volunteers and > got over 150 emails from educators, techies and all sorts of people > accross Perú interested in helping out. I tailored a Xubuntu+Sugar > LiveCD in spanish for download. Alas, as yama puts it, I was "nobody", > so we were left out of helping out in the deployment and were pointed > to "boring" (but important) stuff like translating the wiki. This was > very frustrating and I will not make this mistake again. This is not > to say we wont translate - its part of our mission too. > > Now back to the point, Regional SugarLabs. I investigated the Ubuntu > LoCoTeam "model" if there is such a thing. I found none, sorry to say, > only a Howto describing very crude "how to run a team" and "what a > team can do". It does not go into the relation to the mission a local > group should have, the relationship it would have with SL central > ("explicit connections outside" mantra). It also does not touch into > the organizational principles or the strategies or goals of a > relationship. > > The ubuntu LoCo team is explicitly compared to Linux user groups, that > is, interest groups, fan clubs. That is what it is, basically, a fan > club. Now I know sugar has fans, I'm one of them, but ubuntu has a > large user base and great momentum, neither of which sugar has. In the > spirit of the message being the medium, nobody is getting the message. > > Regional SugarLabs should be highly autonomous, carry their own > identity and mission (which should significantly overlap or include > central sugarlabs's mission). They should agree on similar set of > values / principles and also joint set of goals. We just want to be > "community centers", nodes in a network, not "Regional Offices". > Basically this means recognition as local partners and ability to > collect donations for our efforts. The reason for this perhaps is > obvious: ¿How are we to expect peer recognition if our own structure > is vertical? > > I'm thinking the problem is the underlying model of "aid" - developed > countries helping developing countries. How are we hoping to bridge > the divide with this mental model? > I suggest a diffent approach, an education project aproach for > de-centralized massive collaboration for learning communities. > FuenteLibre leverages Sugar fot this and hopes to explore the realm of > libre social networking (integrating Elgg with the schoolserver for > instance). This way the medium is the message. For supporting this > model I'll point you to some strategies in this book: > http://www.kk.org/newrules/ "New Rules for the New Economy" by Kevin > Kelly, in summary: > > 1) Embrace the Swarm. > 2) Increasing Returns. > 3) Plentitude, Not Scarcity. > 4) Follow the Free. > 5) Feed the Web First. > 6) Let Go at the Top. > 7) From Places to Spaces > 8) No Harmony, All Flux. > 9) Relationship Tech. > 10) Opportunities Before Efficiencies. > > So paraphrasing NN, regional sugarlabs Are Educations Projects, not > Software development projects. This is important, because as such, we > will be more involved in deployment / integration / training. > FuenteLibre, is currently involved in a potential deployment of 2300 > desktop computers with Sugar and Ubuntu, and will be offering a > community learning workshop model for the regional education direction > tech team that will be deploying and supporting these 200 computer > labs. > > We would be more like a community managed education technology > consultant non profit, community partner of sugarlabs and working > closely in accordance to whatever we agree. One of FuenteLibre's goals > is also to explore replicable / scalable governance model for learning > communities, so we would encourage more local groups with diverse > models / missions, and support and incubate them, provided they agree > to the givene set of principles. > > This brings us to the principles, which I'm currently working on very > heavily for FuenteLibre, for to quote Greg again, in large > de-centralized projects, the values are the organization. One point > here where FuenteLibre has a strong commitment is with free software > and once our discourse and our legal personality (in the works) are in > place, we will lauch a campaign for rejecting propietary software in > education (this is also an example of why we shuold keep our own > identity). > > I'll preparing the principles for FuenteLiber and our new site at > http://beta.fuentelibre.org/ > > Thanks for walking with me thru this, and thank you for your support > of our efforts! > > I'll add my comments to the other stuff bellow. > > Sebastian > > 2008/11/28 Rafael Enrique Ortiz Guerrero <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: >> For example here in Colombia, OLPC/Sugar pilots are beginning to get >> managed by Companies or Foundations, with needs for money but not with needs >> for doing things well or loving what they are doing ;). > > > >> >> Barely they are beginning to understand the project, but they are >> truly advanced in relation to contracts.($$$). >> >> In addition to this, they are not even remotely interested in free software >> communities...and in some way the liberties are getting compromised. > > In our economies, there is not much meritorcracy. Contracts are gained > by influence. We grassroots geeks have no influence. You re our only > point of refernce for influence and we expect your full support > because we locally represent our shared principles that are being > compromised by these incumbents. > >> So as David says there are two schemes, and people in countries can begin to >> adjust to one or another. > I'm very interested in this "company partner" scheme. Will be > monitoring and figuring how to make it work here as well. > >>> > On Sat, Nov 29, 2008 at 1:13 PM, Yamandu Ploskonka >>> > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >>> > >>> >> One thing that we need to see is about giving legitimacy to volunteers >>> >> in >>> >> countries where only if you have an "official" piece of paper you are >>> >> to be >>> >> taken into account. Right now I have an active, enthusiastic, capable >>> >> volunteer in Uruguay who is not taken into account by higher >>> >> authorities >>> >> because he basically is "nobody". >>> >> > He must be my twin brother then! Please put us in touch. > > PS: I'd like to have my blog on planet too, tags OLPC and Sugar... Thanks!! > -- > Sebastian Silva > Iniciativa FuenteLibre > http://blog.sebastiansilva.com/ > -- Sebastian Silva Iniciativa FuenteLibre http://blog.sebastiansilva.com/ _______________________________________________ Sugar mailing list Sugar@lists.laptop.org http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/sugar