Skoll World Forum

MJ Applies to the SWF via the TED Network

Time is ripe, as major scaling of open civilization reconstruction is nigh. What are you currently working on?

1

We have been working on the Global Village Construction Set since 2008, and we are currently finishing the product release of the Seed Eco-Home, with a goal of making affordable, ecological housing widely accessible. We are at the stage of starting an apprenticeship with 24 students, where we teach to build this code-compliant, incremental housing build in 5 days. We have uncovered how to reduce build labor costs 3x by a combination of efficient design and modularity, where the house can be site build or built in a workshop and then assembled rapidly on site. Our specification is the highest quality house at the lowest possible cost. We believe we have finally reached the stage of a robust enterprise model that allows us to cross-subsidize our much larger original goal, the Global Village Construction Set. We are developing scalable design-build techniques based on open collaboration, with the same initial goal of eradicating artificial scarcity.

2

We are finishing the product release of the Seed Eco-Home, and starting an apprenticeship with 24 students, where we teach to build a complete, code-compliant, incremental starter home in 5 days. We have uncovered how to reduce build labor costs 3x by a combination of efficient design, modularity, and swarm build techniques. Our specification is the highest quality house at the lowest possible cost. We believe we have finally reached the stage of a robust enterprise model that allows us to cross-subsidize our much larger original goal, the Global Village Construction Set. We are developing design-build techniques based on scalable open collaboration that can be applied to various global issues.