Annual Report Editing

Marcin Jakubowski was born in Poland, where his early experiences were shaped by his family’s history. His grandfather acted in the Polish underground, derailing German trains in WWII, and his grandmother survived a concentration camp. When he was 10, tanks rolled down the streets of his neighborhood - and it wasn't a parade. These were times of martial law behind the Iron Curtain, and a clear state of material scarcity. Marcin and his family waited in line for staples like butter and meat. His life would be transformed when his family left for America, but he never forgot the terrible things that happen when resources are scarce and people fight over opportunity.

Marcin thrived in the United States, graduating with honors from Princeton, and earning his Ph.D. in fusion physics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. At the same time, Marcin began to think that the most essential type of freedom starts with one's individual ability to use natural resources to free oneself from material constraints.

To test his convictions - Marcin started a farm - in rural Missouri. He learned about the economics of farming. He bought a tractor - then it broke. He paid to get it repaired - then it broke again. And then soon enough - he was broke, too. He realized that the truly appropriate - low-cost tools that he needed to build a sustainable farm and settlement - just didn’t exist yet.

He needed tools that were robust, modular, highly efficient, low cost, made from local or recycled materials, and, that were designed for a lifetime - not obsolescence. He realized that he'd have to build them himself.

So he did just that - and he tested them - and found that industrial productivity - can be achieved - on a small scale. So then he posted all the designs, schematics, instructional videos, and budgets on a wiki. Then contributors from all over the world began showing up - prototyping new machines, during dedicated project visits. As such, the tractor, the brick press, and a number of other machines were born. And the rest is history.

Wherever material scarcity exists in the world, we see impoverished, isolated beings powerless to take care of themselves and live the healthy, productive lives they desire. Open Source Ecology is building a solution, where information flows freely and openly so that everyone has access to information on how to process raw materials into the life-stuff of modern civilization. We believe that everyone should have access to material security, efficient production, and autonomy.

At Open Source Ecology (OSE), we find it paradoxical that many of the populations living in poverty are surrounded by the absolute abundance of natural resources - namely sunlight, rocks, plants, soil, water - from which all the wealth of the economy is built. We are convinced that the big challenge to producing true freedom is bypassing the artificial roadblocks of scarcity, to give as many people as possible access to know-how and the right tools so they can convert their environment’s abundant raw resources into personal good and freedom.

OSE’s primary project is the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS) - an open platform of the 50 industrial machines that it takes to build a small civilization with modern comforts. The GVCS provides open solutions for food, energy, housing, transportation, and industrial manufacturing: everything needed to build vibrant, sustainable economies. This is freedom. This is progress. Lowering barriers to efficient production means going forward into a richer, more just and sustainable future. We’re excited to build a bright, new, more equitable and abundant future, and we’re grateful for your support.

Executive Director's Statement

Open, collaborative development promises to revolutionize the way the economy operates today. It allows companies to innovate faster via access to prior work and crowd-based contributions. It fosters the emergence of a greater number of producers, resulting in a broader and more diverse ecosystem. It lets us (re)shape the artifacts we use and in this way shape our own experiences. Open Source Ecology is working on mechanisms by which this can happen in practice - in our lives and in our work. How can we participate in a more meaningful, ecological, and satisfying system of production? How does open development lead to a more efficient economy, one in which nobody is left behind?

First, there was social enterprise. Now, we are introducing Distributive Enterprise. In our work, we commit to sharing not only our machine designs but also our enterprise plans. In an economy that is becoming increasingly efficient - collaboration means survival.

We design our products in a different way. Our designs are simple and modular - and are crafted for a lifetime of service. Our goal is for people to gain full control over their technology, like playing with Lego blocks for life- size machines.

To achieve our goals, we need a serious phase of organizational development. Our goal for 2013 is to stabilize Open Source Ecology - by developing a solid executive team and attaining full organizational structure as a humanitarian organization. In 2013, we also aim to streamline our radically collaborative development and production techniques so that we can go into high gear. We aim to continue machine development, as we deploy pilot projects worldwide to test feasibility under the most diverse and demanding conditions.

In 2014–2015, we intend to enter a high-velocity development phase for the remaining machines of the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS). We intend to finish all 50 machines of the GVCS - including full documentation - by the end of 2015. This is our Apollo Project for a regenerative economy.

From 2016 to 2021, we intend to enter the replication phase, where we build 144 facilities worldwide. These facilities are the OSE Incubators - model enterprise hubs and incubators disseminating best practices of open enterprise - as a step toward an efficient economy. Our focus is to generate a collaborative, open source product development pipeline where collaboration becomes favored over competitive waste. Our goal is to help unleash innovation worldwide - to regenerate the modern economy.

What began a couple of decades ago as the open source movement is now extending into open source hardware, open product development, and open enterprise. What lessons can we learn from these collaborative trends as we enter the next step in the evolution of the modern economy? Do we have the courage to take the opportunity to disrupt manufacturing, stabilize economies, restore ecology, unleash productivity everywhere, leapfrog through old problems, and leave nobody behind?

If we do have the courage - then we may be entering the next phase of human evolution...

Forward,

Marcin Jakubowski, Ph.D.

Executive Director