Notices by Matt Cropp 🌲🌲 (mattcropp@social.coop)

Little #coop win of the day:

To secure the space for the #btv co-op brewery project that has been in the works for ~5 years, a group is forming a real estate co-op to buy the commercial condo that we'd like the co-op brewery to end up in.

We've set the minimum investment for the REC at $1k, and want the (future tenant) brewing co-op to be a members, but it's currently tight on cash, so we put the word out for new members & added equity from current members.

Raised the minimum $ needed today!

Cool old wind generator found on an island on #LakeChamplain.

#vt #vermont

#BernieSanders proposes giving the workers at media outlets right of first refusal for an #EmployeeOwnership buy-out when mergers are proposed.

"We will also require that, before any future mergers can take place, employees must be given the opportunity to purchase media outlets through employee stock-ownership plans—an innovative business model that was first pioneered in the newspaper industry,” he adds."

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/458902-sanders-releases-media-plan-press-shouldnt-be-controlled-by-corporations

@neil Neither; #ESOP is a creature of US retirement law, whereas an #EmployeeOwnershipTrust (#EOT) is a common form of EO in the UK, and has just started to see occasional use in the US in the last few years: https://medium.com/fifty-by-fifty/the-british-are-coming-esops-and-perpetual-trusts-c1d4cf45ba61

In a time when learning to differentiate truth and falsehood is increasingly challenging and high stakes, an explicit, ritualized, time-demarcated, Carnivalesque festival of playful falsehood Is Good Actually.

Now that #Vermont is back to single digits F, time to share my favorite ice-related infograpic.

#LearnFromSenseiPenguin

"Cultural Marxism" should mean when someone likes the "sense of community," but only shows up to cadre meetings on major holidays.

This article by David Graeber on the place of militarism in working class culture is really insightful: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-army-of-altruists

Just posted a note to the #FullBarrelCoop membership seeking to raise $5k in common co-op equity to fund a feasibility study of the space we're considering launching in.

😬 :TwinPines: 💰

#CoopStartUp #coops #CoopDevelopment

The short summary of my possible plan to use a newly formed "#Burlington Real Estate Co-op" to acquire the space for our brewing #coop as its first project:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_N4PTWNGJiAsLxjYGq_b2rYJo2apYSp_dfJpetmKyX8/edit?usp=sharing

#btv #coopcapital #coopfinance

@pinafore Is it possible to manage multiple accounts on the same instance with Pinafore?

@mayel @mayel

How long before we need a "Federation of Cooperative Instances"? 😃

@Matt_Noyes @jakebeamish From the article comments:

"All the co-ops carried margarine at that time. At the Mill City event, the CO spokesman accused co-ops of refusing to carry the product. From behind the line of people singing "Row, row, row your boat" a co-op employee who was barricaded inside the store opened the door and threw out a box of margarine to prove just how wrong the CO was."

A short piece about the #Minneapolis #coop wars of the mid-1970s:

https://blogs.mprnews.org/cities/2014/03/when-twin-cities-co-ops-went-to-war-over-margarine/

Was reminded of this in my chat with @jakebeamish and @Matt_Noyes ;)

Good piece on #surveillancecapitalism and #facebook by #corydoctorow:

https://locusmag.com/2018/07/cory-doctorow-zucks-empire-of-oily-rags/

Interesting slide deck from 2013 on #Hawaii's co-op economy, with an intro to the #coop model.

http://kohalacenter.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/HINewWaveCoops.pdf

Me explaining #WorkerCoops to #ESOP folks as a guest on a recent ESOP podcast: https://t.co/mWfy7rMgj2 :)

#employeeownership #solidarityeconomy #economicdemocracy #sharedcapitalism

Ten members have confirmed on the check poll that they've reviewed the draft #socialcoop Code of Conduct thus-far, and there's some really good conversation happening in the document comments!

Once I'm over the hump of my big day-job conference this coming Friday, I'll put out a schedule poll for our review and integration of the feedback but, in the meantime, give it a gander in the Community Working Group if you've not already: https://www.loomio.org/g/0uqIXEbc/social-coop-community-working-group

"More U.S. Businesses are Becoming #WorkerCoops: Here’s Why" in #FastCompany:

"And with millions of baby boomer-owned businesses set to change hands in the upcoming decades, this transition could be an opportunity to create more democratic workplaces across the country–if business owners, workers, and advocates can work together to convert these enterprises into #EmployeeOwned #cooperatives."

https://www.fastcompany.com/40572926/more-u-s-businesses-are-becoming-worker-co-ops-heres-why

"#SocialCapital is really just the relationships and trust we have but it’s also a type of #currency that we can give and gain according to certain rules that we’ve largely intuited or aggressively been forced to learn. This social capital as currency can then aggregate around #CultsOfPersonality, creating the recipe for dominance and #coercion."

https://emmibe.wordpress.com/2016/11/25/the-conversations-we-cant-have/