Since We Won't Change, what will follow dystopia?

I seldom stray to the political in this journal, but perhaps it is appropriate today.

The following is from the in-depth intro to BFU philosophy (as opposed to the simple intro to Bastiat free University). Neither the intro nor the text is overtly political - but it presents a powerful parallel to where the western world is headed.

- In finance there is a rule of thumb for large investors. If they own a great deal of stock in a company and notice the company has not, and will not, repair a flawed business plan; they sell their stock to protect themselves. They will then sell short more stock to profit from the collapse they think is coming. Their sales may alert others to look for problems and the stock may start it's decline.

I believe as the netcohort society takes hold our traditional, inefficient, expensive, snobbish, government supported and regulated universities must change. They have a flawed business plan for an information society. That finance rule of thumb? If something is going to fall, it should to be pushed.

Innovation by the entrepreneur, argued Schumpeter, led to gales of "creative destruction" as innovations caused old inventories, ideas, technologies, skills, and equipment to become obsolete. The question, as Schumpeter saw it, was not "how capitalism administers existing structures,... [but] how it creates and destroys them." This creative destruction, he believed, caused continuous progress and improved standards of living for everyone.

Bastiat Free University is creating an alternative learning system; cost appropriate distance learning customized by and for the individual. As Oscar Wilde said “an idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.”

So what brings this to mind from a political perspective?

America, two hundred years ago a bastion of freedom, is becoming progressively more tyrannical. Anyone who cares to look will see freedom vanishing. In like manner the free markets that gave America its wealth and influence have been decaying for over a century. We are devouring our inheritance.

Since the federal reserve (owned by private banks) was created in 1910 and ratified in 1913 the currency of America has lost most of its value. (a dollar in 1913 is worth less than a nickel now - even as measured by self-serving government statistics).

Much as the Patriot Act stripped Americans of privacy and dignity; so the new financial bailout is set to strip Americans (those not important enough to connect with government) of their savings and their hope for a better future.

The same non-government federal reserve (fed) that destroyed the dollar is to be put in charge of controlling all markets, the same markets that have been interfered with covertly for decades. You can not find out who owns the "fed" except by inference - which banks got to bail out LTCM or buy Bear Stearns with government guarantees of assured profit? Those are the likely backers of a new program where the fed will bail out everyone - again to guaranteed profit and increased power of a select few.

The American Revolution started by Franklin, Washington, Madison, Adams, et al is over -- we lost.

There is good news. We are in the end game.

Last century a dollar taken from taxpayers and spent by government would bring close to a dollars GDP growth - less than in the taxpayer's hands - but its benefits controlled by government.

Now they are spending the lifestyles of our children by borrowing trillions of dollars just to gain a little until after the elections.

Soon they will begin slipping down hill, no matter how much of your depreciating money they throw around. It is going to be verrry messy.

That is the reason for this journal entry - the poverty that is soon to impact the world will effect all - except those that are already living at a subsistence level or below.

This then is a warning.

Do what you can to prepare. If I am wrong, preparation will cost little, if I am right it may save your life and the lives of those you love.

Disruptive Technology & Disruptive Innovation

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Disruptive technology and disruptive innovation are both well described in Wikopedia. Joseph Schumpeter presented a well developed economist's view of the same idea in the 1940s, he called it creative destruction .


Regardless of origin, the idea that new technology slowly overtakes and then passes entrenched methodologies, to everyone's benefit except the old tech, is a sound concept. A new disruptive technology is frequently just a niche play at first, but as it develops it is found to be an improvement of the prior designs.

"Don't let schooling interfere with your education."
Mark Twain

Bastiat Free University employs a potentially Disruptive Technology. The Docebo open source learning system used at BFU fits many of the potentialities for disruption as outlined in Clayton Christiensen's books about disruptive technology. Your own Bastiat Free University hopes to become a Disruptive Innovation and inspire change within the traditional, inefficient, expensive, snobbish, and archaic government supported and regulated universities.


Whew.


Let me say that again: traditional, inefficient, expensive, snobbish, and archaic government supported and regulated universities.

An even stronger disruptive education format is being developed for the Netcohort Institute; think peer to peer education, P2Pedu.

OK, back to the post.


BFU has an article that performs an ad hoc comparison of distance learning and brick and mortar schools. Currently B&M is ahead. This article does not mention disruptive technology, but the arguments raised support the concept.


Our working premise is that the bureaucratic age is ending. The rise of the information and miniaturization age is itself disruptive. Economies of scale are reversing. In the Industrial age large organizations and centralized decisions were efficient and pushed out smaller enterprises from all but niche markets. Today a new Netcohort is creating customer centric small and adaptive groups that are surgically appropriating the most profitable sectors from the industrial age dinosaurs. They do this using disruptive innovation to satisfy their customers.


The cost of centralized vertical management, in time and money, is causing the implosion of bloated bureaucracies. Organizations based on the economies of large size dwarfing the needs of the individual are falling as the individual finds personal satisfaction elsewhere. Disruptive information technologies will substantially reward the small efficient netcohort as they freely associate and collaborate based on reputation.


Bastiat Free University is participating in this individual centric disruptive innovation. The fact that archaic education will need to be replaced is already apparent. The current system stamps out machine part graduates to fit in industrial age social machines; just as the industrial age grinds to a halt.


BFU is not even noticed by B&M as of yet, and honestly may never be a threat. There will however be many such technologies launched. One of them will be effective at inspiring and training the reputable entrepreneurs needed.


The new network society needs a netcohort; disruptive innovators that will replace the vanishing middle class of the industrial age. Education needs to create independent, knowledgeable, action oriented graduates that enjoy learning. They will want to find pleasure in learning; as change accelerates learning will become an everyday, all life experience.


BFU offers Renaissance education, looking back to move forward. This new age is likely to be more like the Renaissance, individualistic and creative, than like the industrial age that has just past. Discover how to be a disruptive innovator by using Bastiat Free University's disruptive technology.


Rediscover the pleasures of self directed learning.

Allan
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