Open Design Now | Why design cannot remain exclusive The Third Industrial Revolution - a response to the Economist The Third Revolution by nature of its high mechanisation and non-labour intensity means an ever larger proportion of the general public will be excluded from the production process or remunerated to ever lesser extents. Amid the atonal monotony of crisis that has increasingly sirened from the media during the last several years, it has been very rare to hear of ‘good news’ stories with regards to political economy, manufacturing or industry, particularly within the context of the OECD countries. Equally rare are stories that choose to take a longer term view, that zoom out of the immediate predicament in order to take a more macroscopic view of things. That ask ‘where next?’ This is unsurprising of course. That is why the leader article in this week’s Economist ‘Manufacturing - The Third Industrial Revolution’ stands out. The article itself is clear that this ‘revolution’ will lead to the increased ‘irrelevance’ of the cost of labour in the final costs of production,
OKFestival South Africa - ECONOMY South Africa - The Economy South Africa TRADING ON JOHANNESBURG'S financial markets reached a new all-time high on April 26, 1994, reflecting the buoyant mood of voters of all races who were about to participate in the country's first democratic elections. As South Africa emerged from the economic stagnation and international isolation of the apartheid era, the new government and its theme of economic reconstruction received international acclaim and encouragement. At the same time, however, it faced conflicting pressures to speed economic growth, to strengthen South Africa's standing among international investors and donors, and, at the same time, to improve living conditions for the majority of citizens. South Africa's economy had been shaped over several centuries by its abundant natural resources and by the attempts of immigrant populations to dominate and to exploit those who had arrived before them. South Africa South Africa - The Economy - Historical Development External Debt
TechShop is America's 1st Nationwide Open-Access Public Workshop -- What Do You Want To Make at TechShop? Modern banking's fatal flaw Does this surprise you? It should not. It has been this way since 1844. In that fateful year, the British Parliament passed the Bank Charter Act, an attempt to bar commercial banks from engaging in fractional reserve lending. Back then, people would deposit gold (the money of the day) for safekeeping in bank vaults. These banks soon realised they could create banknotes that looked just like the original banknotes, with the same contractual stipulations (that is, a claim on gold) and lend them out to merchants at interest. This was fractional reserve lending. Creating economic havoc The injection of excessive monetary liquidity into the economy fuelled euphoric speculative bubbles in asset markets. The unredeemable banknotes immediately lost all their value. British legislators rightly wanted to avoid these unnecessarily destructive cycles. Put simply, banks continued to lend more money than actual gold on deposit, rendering the financial system as unstable as before.
Cooperative In short, a coop can be defined as "a jointly owned enterprise engaging in the production or distribution of goods or the supplying of services, operated by its members for their mutual benefit, typically organized by consumers or farmers."[4] Cooperative businesses are typically more economically resilient than many other forms of enterprise, with twice the number of co-operatives (80%) surviving their first five years compared with other business ownership models (41%).[5] Cooperatives frequently have social goals which they aim to accomplish by investing a proportion of trading profits back into their communities. As an example of this, in 2013, retail co-operatives in the UK invested 6.9% of their pre-tax profits in the communities in which they trade as compared with 2.4% for other rival supermarkets.[6] The International Co-operative Alliance was the first international association formed by the cooperative movement. It includes the World Council of Credit Unions. Origins[edit]
Logic Freaks Economics has increasingly become an intellectual game played for its own sake and not for its practical consequences for understanding the economic world. Economists have converted the subject into a sort of social mathematics in which analytical rigour is everything and practical relevance is nothing. At least three Nobel laureates have expressed their concerns. In 1997, Ronald Coase complained: “Existing economics is a theoretical system which floats in the air and which bears little relation to what happens in the real world.” What happened after these prestigious complaints? The problem is not necessarily mathematics per se, but the obsession with technique over substance. Geoffrey M.
A newbie's guide to UAVs What is an amateur UAV? An Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) is an aircraft that has the capability of autonomous flight, without a pilot in control. Amateur UAVs are non-military and non-commercial. What do I need to make one? ---1) An RC plane, muticopter (quadcopter/hexacopter/tricopter, etc) or helicopter. What does DIY Drones have to offer? The DIY Drones community has created the world's first "universal autopilots", ArduPilot Mega (APM) and its next-generation big brother, Pixhawk. A full setup consists of: Pixhawk autopilot: The electronics, including twin processors, gyros, accelerometers, pressure sensors, GPS and more (shown at right). You can buy Ready-to-Fly UAVs (both planes and multicopters) from 3D Robotics: Last but not least is flight safety. Also, here's the FAA's official word on what's legal and what's not.
World's richest woman says poor should have less fun, work harder Just in case you were beginning to think rich people were deeply misunderstood and that they feel the pain of those who are less fortunate, here's the world's wealthiest woman, Australian mining tycoon Gina Rinehart, with some helpful advice. "If you're jealous of those with more money, don't just sit there and complain," she said in a magazine piece. "Do something to make more money yourself -- spend less time drinking or smoking and socialising, and more time working." Yeah, let them eat cake. Rinehart made her money the old-fashioned way: She inherited it. Her family iron ore prospecting fortune of $30.1 billion makes her Australia's wealthiest person and the richest woman on the planet. "There is no monopoly on becoming a millionaire," she said by way of encouragement. "Become one of those people who work hard, invest and build, and at the same time create employment and opportunities for others." Boom. Why are people poor? And now it's out there. Thank you, rich people.