#7  commons

     A commons arises whenever a given community decides that it wishes to manage a resource in a collective manner, with a special regard for equitable access, fairness and sustainability.

Week Ten | November 6, Reading

Commoners as an Emerging Political Force by David Boiller

'We are now witnessing the rise of all sorts of new genres of commons:

* free software;

* collaborative websites and archives;

* social networking communities;

* the tens of millions of blogs in the blogosphere;

* a large constellation of wikis;

* the music remix and video mashup communities;

* and many others.

All of these astonishing phenomena are part of what I call “the Commons Sector.” What unites them is their innovative ways of creating value OUTSIDE of the conventional marketplace.

The Commons Sector is all about socially created value. Socially created value is becoming a macroeconomic and cultural force in its own right – as Yochai Benkler has so insightfully explained over the years.'

~D. Boiller

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