Networked Labour University Information Bulletin No. 1 | 1-7 May 2015 [ENGLISH] | Networked Labour

1. Culture and knowledge for classless societies is networked in process! 

Networked Labour University is designed as an educational module to be integrated with a broader network composed of Global Networked Labour Union, Networked Labour Research unit, and networked labour coop GNLU. Tied to a greater ecology of universal, free and open access community projects, such as Faircoop, the Earth Cooperative, all our projects aim mutual empowerment at the bottom level. Unconditional empowerment of the dis-empowered, excluded, and oppressed with direct solidarity is the reason why we exist for. Our platform is designed to liberate knowledge from alienation and domination of any kind at the point of production and distribution. In order to enable money-free access to most essential cultural resources we rely on free/libre, open source software, but the platform also aims to facilitate broader solidarity economy by encouraging and enabling open-cooperative exchanges between participants.

Our invitation is an wide open one, anyone can join and contribute by offering and taking courses, moderating circles or skill shares, helping out with web design, platform development, promotion, or any other way!

2. Networked Labour University Opening Meeting

Date: 7 May 2015
Time: 14.00 – 17.00 (ECT / UCT+1)

Check-ins (14:00 – 14:15)

Opening and presentation of the system (14:15 – 15:00)
Networked Labour University and Worker to Worker Study Circles

Discussion (15:15 – 16:45)
How to use cross-border communication and which digital tools to build commons knowledge, culture, politics, and economy for the classless society and from the oppressed point of view?

Closing and Check-outs (16:45 – 17:00)

Access: Participation is on-line, open and free. What you need to do to is to open an account on the website below and to selfenrol for the event before. Working languages are English/Turkish

Website: networkedlabour.networg.nl/moodle
Email: networg@networg.nl

Click here to register as a user 

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The P2P Prince?: The form and the program of the transnational REvolutionary subjectivity

Below text is an excpert from unpublished and unedited 2012 article Another World, Now! Coming of the Transnational REvolutions and the P2P Prince.

The  modern  prince,  the  myth-prince,  cannot  be  a  real  person,  a  concrete individual. It can only be an organism, a complex element of society in which a collective will, which has  already been recognised and has to some  extent asserted itself in action, begins to take concrete form. (A. Gramsci)

 

Italian political activist and theorist Antonio Gramsci’s core concepts like hegemony, organic crisis, historic bloc, war of position and war of manoeuvre are central to our understanding of today’s complex global capitalist system as well as the catastrophic changes that are currently taking place in it. Referring to the original concept developed by Gramsci, global political economy theorist Stephen Gill describes the 2008 global financial turmoil as the manifestation of an organic crisis at the global level. [1] We can also read the outcomes of the global organic crisis following another neo-Gramscian theorist Robert Cox as a mixture of three scenarios he describes.[2] First one is a global (military) Keynesian recovery being pushed by the West. Regional wars moving from the periphery to the centre involving massive destruction of lives, cities and the nature, as we witness it happening since the 9/11. The second scenario is the rise of global fascism in tandem with the regional wars. This has also been happening, especially increasingly in the centre, since 2007; highlighting the race to the bottom caused by the strengthening of totalitarian forms of capitalism at the main contenders like China, Russia and India. Finally and the last scenario is accompanying transnational revolutions, like the uprisings in the northern Africa, Americas and Europe also happening.[3]

What brought humanity to this point is not a secret and also made clear by many thinkers, intellectuals, and activists. The above mentioned article by Gill is only one of the public records. It is very clear however where we have to drive history as the humanity, the third option: Transnational revolutions. Again, following Gramsci and Gill, we can think of the realisation of the transnational revolutions in relation to the ‘Prince’. For his time Gramsci thought of it as the collective subjectivity which will give the moral leadership to a wider counter-hegemonic historic bloc, and shape the form and content of the communist revolution in a national context. And it was the communist part of the working class. Gill referred to the anti- and alter-globalisation movement.

Open Letter from Peter Waterman Asking Eric Lee of Labour Start the Reason Why He is Suspended and Banned from Unionbook | 24.07.14

I have received the below open letter from someone who is very well-known by devoting his life time efforts to international and global solidarity and social emancipation: Peter Waterman. Peter, though, did put a stress on labour internationalism of which he saw that the solidarity between unions is only one and a small part in the broad picture. Coming from a Jewish family himslef he, has been openly critical of Zionism and Israel’s ever-expanding a barbaric occupation on Palestinian territory.

Peter had been actively blogging about global labour and union solidarity in his blog page on Unionbook, since 2008-9. I say he ‘had’ because, the ‘owner’ of the Unionbook and its mother project LabourStart, Eric Lee, self-claiming ‘democratic socialist’ yet who is also known with his over sympathy to the Israeli state, who is the owner and the administrator of the Unionbook did ban Waterman’s user account two days ago. Eric created the Unionbook on Ning servers, which belongs to the corporation owned by Zuckerberg’s ex-partner -also the creator of Napster. Altouhg Unionbook thought as a social network site for all the unionists of the world it did manage to attract at around 5600 international unionist as its users. Lee cut off Peter’s communication, as Israel cuts off Gazza’s roads, food and electriciry. So now Peter has no access to his acount, pages, posts etc. on Unionbook, so he can not responde this move using his own blog page.

In the below open letter Peter makes a guess about the possible reason behind this ‘occupation’ of his cybersland by Lee and invites him to discuss the issue publicly -may be a ‘two network admin solution’ (?). According to Peter Waterman the ban came right after he re-blogged Lee’s own article where Lee openly supports recent war/sate-terrorism launched on Gazza. Waterman gives details from his perspective and indicates the limits of the marriage between ideologies like Zionism, as well as other nationalisms and internationalism.

Now you can read on, as Peter always sez:

View this document on Scribd

Global Labour Institute International Summer School 2014 #ISS14

The third GLI International Summer School will be held from Monday 7th – Friday 11th July 2014 at Northern College in Barnsley, UK. The aim of the Summer School is to bring together trade union activists from around the world to debate and question what are, and what should be, the politics of the international trade union movement.

This year, up to 100 participants will be attending the Summer School – including delegations from national unions and global union federations, invited trade union activists, labour movement researchers and educators.

Most participants who attend the school are nominated by supportive unions, union federations and organisations. If you’re interested in attending the Summer School, get in contact with your union in the first instance.

If you have any further queries about the Summer School, drop us an email at gli-uk@global-labour.net

The Programme

#GeziFest Invitation (EN) open for all the Chapullers of the World / Bergse Bos, Rotterdam, NL / 21-22 June 2014

View this document on Scribd

Confronting the most difficult challenges facing the international labour movement

by Eric Lee – 15th May 2014, 17.00 BST

In the next couple of days, more than 1,500 trade union leaders from 161 countries will meet in Berlin for the Third World Congress of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).  The ITUC unites national trade union centres, including Britain’s TUC, all over the world.

The ITUC event will be followed on Friday in the same city by a slightly smaller one: the LabourStart Global Solidarity Conference. Almost 700 people, from 75 countries, have registered to attend.

To a casual observer, these sound like very similar events. And there’ll certainly be some overlap. For example, the leader of Australia’s trade unions, Dave Oliver, will open the LabourStart event, though he’s also attending the ITUC Congress.

Here’s the difference: the ITUC Congress is a bit like a TUC Congress in the UK. Elected leaders attend, discuss issues, pass resolutions, elect a leadership and so on. Although, unlike TUC, ordinary rank-and-file workers, shop stewards, branch union officials and others won’t be there.  It is where the senior leadership of the international trade union movement meets.

And it’s a direct continuation of global trade union meetings that started 150 years ago in London, where Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels led the foundation of the International Workingmen’s Association, known as the “First International”.

The LabourStart event, on the other hand, is something new, something that probably couldn’t have been imagined before there was an internet.

All the Net workers of the world, mesh network!

This wiki is a meta-strike developing space created by GNUnion. Inviting interested digital and analog workers, labour and union activists to use it for inventing, initiating and networganising collective hactions to target Meta-Data abuses of the Capital. Besides PRISM contractors, there is a need to forge class struggle against digital capitalists of Amazon.com, Huffington Post, and others who undermines human dignity and rights, gained after hundereds of years fighting back!

*Operation PRISM Knock-out!
Objective: To stop PRISM contractors abusing people and data, and promote an escape route to FLOSS alternatives
Targets: Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple, Twitter, Skype, Yahoo
Twitter: GNUnion – One Big Mesh Network
HashTag: #OPprismknockout
Planning: Irc

*Operation Mechanical Jurk
Objective: developing direct hacktion operation targeting Amazon.com’s Mechanical Turk mass-exploitative model
Target: Amazon.com
Twitter: @GNUnion
Hashtag: #OPmechanicalJurk
Planning: Irc

Unite the Union’s USI mediates the established union world entering into the networked organising (networganizing) era

The below are Google Hangout videos taken from the USI’s website:

i. Hack the Union from US interviews with Andrew of Union Solidarity International: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4U4FNAkZtSc

ii.  A small step for unions, but a giant step for global labour
emancipation?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=k6BmWC5lr8Y

This following link is to a nice article by Walton Patland introducing the ON platform:
http://www.scoop.it/t/networked-labour/p/4017080234/2014/03/05/karl-marx-on-facebook-what-is-the-ideology-of-your-social-network?hash=fd4c16ef-09d3-468d-a043-3b8de2a28135

Karl Marx on Facebook. What is the ideology of your social network?

4 March 2014, By Walton Pantland

A social network isn’t a neutral space. It is designed for a purpose, and that purpose is ideological.

Is your social network designed by techies, out of a pure love for seeing what is technologically possible? Is it designed to bring people together, to help them organise? Or is it designed to sell them things, and to collect data? Or, more insidiously, is it designed to give the illusion of bringing people together, so that it can sell things and collect data?

If it’s collecting data, what is the date being used for? Sociological research? Control and surveillance? Marketing? Or is it to help people organise politically?

All technology is political, and it’s useful to think through the politics if we are going to use it. This will help us to stay in control, and not be manipulated by subtle design elements.

So what is the politics of, say, Facebook? I guess is it essentially classically liberal – generally, it likes to give a platform for free speech, and favours the free market. It is dotcom neoliberalism, cyber hipster libertarianism, that some theorists have labelled “the Californian ideology“.

All the fists of the world are GNUniting! First Brainstorm – Online Meeting This Sunday at 13.00 PM GMT

All the fists of the world are GNUniting!
First Brainstorm – Online Meeting This Sunday at 13.00 PM GMT
https://www.facebook.com/GlobalNetworkedLabourUnion

We are the workers whose free labour and privacy has been stolen, and sold
for greed! We have been abused, spied on and betrayed constantly. Before
this massive exploitation and surveillance machine turns into a global
apparatus in the hands of fascism, being operationalized for direct
oppression, we have to unite our fists and strike back!

This May Day is the time… How and what is not decided yet, there are
initial ideas but much is needed to put the global collective intelligence
at work to defend our and our children’s rights and dignity! Join us this
Sunday and bring your most free, creative, powerful and peaceful ideas and
dreams along… We did beat Freon, Caesars, Barons, Kings, Emperors,
Merchants, Industrial Capitalists and Nazis in the past, we can beat the
TNCs, CEOs and 1% as well!

We call all the workers, hackers, makers, farmers, artists, indignant and
outraged to GNUnite all their constructive capacity around the most
spectacular free libre and open sourced swarm to fight back and win!

Hasta la Siempre Victoria!
https://www.facebook.com/events/583310555077672/?ref=3&ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular
https://www.facebook.com/events/252508808246947/?ref=22&source=3&source_newsfeed_story_type=regular

World Revolutionary Forum: Towards WorldWideWave of Actions in 2014 (#www)

Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/593164267417330/

HashTags: #WREF, #www

#www call: http://gnunion.wordpress.com/www/
#WREF: http://gnunion.wordpress.com/worl-revolutionary-forum/
GNUnion: http://gnunion.wordpress.com/

Hosted by GNUnion – One Big Meshwork for All the Working People

Again, 2014 will be full of struggles, actions and mobilisations for a real global change. This Mumble call will be about starting a new series of forums and assemblies that are open to all individuals who will able to make independent efforts from any corporate, state and NGO funded agenda and; who could be exactly themselves when changing the world, when getting together, discussing and collaborating with others; either as a part of a collective, group, network or individually, and by using either online, or face to face means, or both.

Fight austerity and free trade! Blockade the EU Summit! #TTIP #D1920 #occupybrussels #occupyEU #blockupy #EuroCrisis

06 December 2013

Location: Brussels Date: Wednesday, December 18, 2013 – 18:00 to Thursday, December 19, 2013

Join citizens, farmers, NGOs and trade unions from across Belgium to fight back against the EU’s destructive austerity policies and its attempt to give corporations the keys to Europe through a new EU-US free trade deal: ****BLOCKADE THE EU SUMMIT – 19 DEC 2013!****

The day of action is organised by the D19-20 Alliance, and is part of two days aimed at fighting the EU’s ultra-neoliberal austerity policies and for democracy, food sovereignty and the future of the planet. 18th December

– Meeting Against Austerity Representatives from different sectors of European society will be speaking about how the impacts of ultra neoliberal austerity policies are felt on a daily basis. 18:00 – Bvd Roi Albert II, 5, 1210 Brussels 19th December –

Blockade of the European Summit From 7am on December 19, strategically picked cross-roads will be blockaded to prevent our so-called leaders reaching the European Summit and push on with their damaging neoliberal agenda. More details will be announced in the following days, but until then, spread the word, tell your friends, colleagues and families, get your organisation to sign-up, put up posters, print out flyers, book the day off work!

 

GNUnion (Global Networked Labour Union) One Big Meshwork of Workers, Hackers, Farmers, Artists, Makers and Opressed Peoples of the World

Global Networked Labour Union, GNUnion – One Big Mesh Network, is the released 1.0 Beta version of new generation, free to join, borderless worker self-organisation, a work in progress. Its main ispiration is the history, struggle and experiences of Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) on the one hand, and free-libre, and open source software GNU/Linux, on the other.

GNUnion is also inspired by comrades standing against global capitalism in women, Lgbt,  immigrant, environmental and social justice movements, Zapatistas, anti & alter golobalisation movements, social forums, free knowledge- information and culture movements; as part of organisations like WikilLeaks, Caos Computer Club, MayFirst People Link, or of recent wave of digital and real world uprisings Anonymous, 15M, Occupy, Gezi and others.

Networked Labour | Networking and collaboration toolkit that we use

Networked Labour was an outcome of an international seminar held in Amsterdam between 7-9 May 2013. The seminar was initially supported by Networked Politics, transform! europe, Transnational Institute and IGOPNET (Institut de Govern the Polítiques Públiques).

At the end of the seminar several ideas have emerged one of which was to improve this web space and try to transform it into a transnational and distributed network space, through which all of us could build new ties and expand our nets of collaboration.

WHY, HOW AND WHERE YOU CAN JOIN  

Zapatistas celebrate 10 years of autonomy with ‘escuelita’| ROAR + message from OWSZapatista and SupMarcos

following is an email from comrade OWSZapatista and attached is the last
communiqes from SupMarcos…

The Zapatistas invite 1.500 activists from all over the world to a
‘Little School of Liberty’ in Chiapas to learn from their experiment
with autonomy.

It was 10 years ago, on January 1, 2003, when — having exhausted the
road of dialogue with the government as well the one of a “big R”
Revolution that would overthrow the Mexican state — the Zapatistas of
Chiapas decided to “abandon the politics of demands, and with it, all
contact with the state.” Instead, they chose to concentrate on
building their own autonomous, horizontal forms of self-government
within their own territories and with their own means.

Global March to Dignity – Transnational Solidarity Weekend 6-7 July 2013 [EN. TR, PT, BG, FR, ES]

THIS WEEKEND WE ARE RISING WITH NEW ENERGIES AGAINST ALL THE INJUSTICE:

ERDOGAN, MURSI, DILMA, OBAMA, JiINPING, PUTIN, MONSANTO, GOOGLE, FACEBOOK, NSA, PENTAGON, CIA, MOSSAD, IMF, WB, OECD, WTO…..

LEAVE THE PEOPLE AND THE PLANET ALONE, ANOTHER WORLD NOW!

SPREAD THE BELOW CALL AND THESE PRISM FREE ORGANISING TOOLS: http://prism-break.org/

JOIN OUR GLOBAL DAYS OF ACTION: Global March to Dignity – Transnational Solidarity Weekend 6-7 July 2013

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/events/267576746717479/

READ THE CALL IN 1) ENGLISH 2) TURKÇE 3) PORTUGUÊS 4) БЪЛГАРСКИ 5) FRANÇAIS 6) CASTELLANO

1) ENGLISH

Global March to Dignity – Transnational Solidarity Weekend

Turkey, Greece, Brazil, Bulgaria, Egypt…. once more the fire of the global revolution is sweeping out the entire planet. We are taking streets, squares, parks in millions and revolting against the police brutality, torture, environmental destruction, corruption, the looting of the commons by the 1%.

Once more we are throwing away the unbearable weight of naked injustice that we have been forced to carry on our shoulders for thousands of years.

Once more, sons and daughters of ancient civilisations are showing how to walk towards the light without fear and anxiety. A new civilisation is emerging out of joy, fun, fight, pain and blood.

With this call we invite all the comrades to go out this weekend, 6-7 July 2013, with out borders and reclaim the streets, squares, parks and all that belongs the humanity. Let us rise doesn’t matter wherever we are; in Egypt, Brazil, Turkey, Greece, Bulgaria, in the cities, towns, and villages of the World. Let us rise up together, not only for standing in solidarity with each other, but also to feel the fact that we are fighting our own struggle with the others all over the world.

We might have differences, in our appearance, thinking, cultures, choices, etc. but we are deeply connected and we decided to march towards Dignity as a whole and no matter what it takes to get there.

Let us stand up and walk together!

Egypt, Brazil, Turkey, Bulgaria, (China?),…… tens of millions are uprising! Where is the media?

Egypt, Brazil, Turkey, Bulgaria, China,…… hundreds of millions are uprising, where is the god damn media!

Egypt Today:

Transnational Online Forum to Evaluate the Re-resurgence of the Grassroots [EN, TR, FR, ES, PT, IT, AR]

Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/141335846062355/141667739362499/?notif_t=plan_mall_activity

DATE: 27th June

UCT / GMT: 18.00
London: 19.00
Madrid: 20.00
Istanbul: 21.00
Rio de Jenairo: 15.00
New York and Montreal: 14:00
…
Check your local time here: time zone converter (http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html)

WHERE?
Location: MUMBLE: Occupytalk.org server
Room: Assemblies & Round Tables > OPEN SPACE

HOW TO CONNECT?
Mumble is a voice chat Open Source software (works similar to Skype but is not a corporate tool). Please follow these instructions to get connected. If this is the first time you use Mumble, please try to log in at least half an hour in advance, we will be there to help you.
How to join Mumble: http://www.global-square.net/how-to-join/

AGENDA:

Updates from countries
Exchange on global may and re*resurgence of the peoples
Where are we heading?
(Facilitation of the meetings start half an hour before.
You are more than welcome to share this invitation in your networks!)

Signs we use in the text chat during our mumble meetings:
WWWW or +1 = I agree
MMMMM or -1 = I disagree
****turn**** = I ask for turn
+++++ = I have a direct response
TTTTT = I ask for a technical point
##### = please kindly try to conclude

PAD TO PREPARE THE MEETING:
http://titanpad.com/globalMAYcallplanning

==================================
Read this invitation text in
1) English 2) Türkçe 3) Français 4) Português 5) Italiano 6) Español 7) Arabic

1.ENGLISH:
This call is to build together an international assembly on Mumble (chat/voice program) with the comrades from Spain, Germany, London, US, Brazil, Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Turkey, Tunısia, Quebec and all other places we could reach, where people fıght for their dignity themselves.

The naked truth is that the peoples were already on the streets and squares yet they are once back in masses…

Things are still hot and many things (re-)emerging, in Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Bulgaria, Brazil, Greece, Germany, London, US,….. and there are lots of things and information we need to engage with.

Therefore with this call we invite you for an transnational online assembly to exchange and update each other on Global May mobilisations and the new uprisings coming in its
aftermath.

We would also like to reflect on where we are heading: 15O, 5November, 19O, …….
http://titanpad.com/internationalcallXactions

#GLOBALP2P Video Conference with Simultaneous Interpretation on Mumble | Democracy and Life, transversal democracy

Indigenous, Arab Spring, Squares, Indignados, Occupy, Yo Soy!, Chapulcular, Hackers, Students, Artists, Designers, Activists,……

Today, 14 Jun, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM

http://thinkcommons.org/live

Coordinado por +Domenico Di Siena (@urbanohumano) y +Bernardo Gutiérrez (@bernardosampa)La democracia representativa está viviendo el peor momento de su historia. La transformación hacia una democracia participativa, abierta, interactiva, parece inevitable. Sin embargo, no acabamos de llegar a un nuevo paradigma democrático. El rumbo de las etiquetas / líneas de trabajo #GobiernoAbierto, #DatosAbiertos y #Transparencia parecen insuficientes. El nuevo papel de las urbes en la política parece insinuar un nuevo orden de poderes en el que lo nacional, lo regional, lo municipal y lo global van de la mano. Por otro lado, algunos Gobiernos están creando plataformas y herramientas de participación ciudadana. Pero, en ocasiones, la participación es menor de la esperada. La comunidad, la ciudadanía, no acaba de entrar en los mecanismos participativos diseñados por el poder. Y la política, el comportamiento político, está ocurriendo en otras plataformas, en otros lugares, en otros territorios. En la era del WI-FI, los teléfonos móviles con conexión y la información ubicua, la democracia en tiempo real es posible. La democracia es algo que puede suceder en cualquier lugar, en cualquier momento

[Google translation]

Representative democracy is going through the worst time in its history. The transformation to a participatory democracy, open, interactive, seems inevitable. However, we just got a new democratic paradigm. The direction of the labels / lines work # GobiernoAbierto, # DatosAbiertos and # Transparency seem insufficient. The new role of cities in politics seems to suggest a new order of powers in which the national, the regional, the local and the global go together. On the other hand, some governments are creating platforms and tools for citizen participation. But sometimes, participation is lower than expected. The community, the citizens, not just entering participatory mechanisms designed for power. And politics, political behavior is happening on other platforms, elsewhere, in other territories. In the era of Wi-Fi, mobile phones with free and ubiquitous information, real-time democracy possible. Democracy is something that can happen anywhere, at any time

Gördüm – Bir Gezi Parkı Direnişi Belgesel Filmi / I Withnessed A Documentary Film of Gezi Parki Resistance