Promote Passion Projects
Much of today's world runs on money and trade, but what really makes the world go round is creative, heartfelt effort. This is done by people working closely together, who have built trust and shared challenges over time.
Around 1900, there were many innovators making progress on flight. For example, Samuel Langley had impressive credentials and well-funded connections, and he got government grants to pursue his experiments, as did Clement Ader, Hiram Maxim, and Alberto Santos-Dumont.
However, those independent bicycle shop owners, Wilbur and Orville Wright, are recognized as "first in flight". It's interesting that they felt that they didn't just focus on launching and keeping the plane in the air: they had to give the pilot full control. Others worried more about the takeoff, and some contraptions could be called catapults; Otto Lilienthal's recent death gave the Wrights good reason to carefully design the steering mechanisms along all three axis, and they built up their skill piloting so that they could control flight AND landing. That was one of many small things that ensured their place in history. Other people's contributions helped, of course, but the fact remains that their success was due to passionate, dedicated work and long-term collaboration.
That is how we get long-lasting progress in the world.
People's choices of how and where to contribute time and attention is underappreciated. The world runs off this kind of motivated work of everyday people, and small-scale news and long-term efforts don't often make it into mass media. That's fine because media companies are meant to make money, but there is an unbalanced amount of attention given to big or sensational stories. We aim to rightsize that balance, that's why we're making TimeSafari.app.
In my world, people have some amount of extra time and a wide range of options for ways to employ it. Let's make it easier and more fun for individuals to find and work on projects together.
- Gratefully recognize where people choose to give attention and help.
- See proposals for expanding that activity, and offer to help with those plans that interest us.
- Propose even more plans that we're willing to organize.
- Recognize the work done, and get community endorsement... done in such a way that the recipients of that gratitude can show off those endorsements to others as they go to school, to new jobs, etc.
One way we'll know we've succeeded is if larger and larger plans are executed. If people voluntarily take on more responsibilities because it aligns with their own desires and because they respect the organizers, that will be the best reward for all us creators.
“The hard problem of our species is coordination.”
- Cory Doctorow
There are many efforts currently supported by force (ie. taxation) but such things have always been run first by the free association of people, though admittedly on a smaller scale. We hope to make those voluntary approaches even more attractive and resilient than the solutions mandated and managed by the state.
"I do not believe in democracy, but I am perfectly willing to admit that it provides the only really amusing form of government ever endured by mankind."
- H L Mencken
Another way we'll know we've succeeded is if children use the platform. Wouldn't it be exciting to see their creativity and capabilities grow as they start from a young age to participate in projects, and then to propose and to organize bigger and bigger ones? Portfolios have become just as important as grades.
I will announce here when we have the first release ready. (We're almost finished with privacy-preserving notifications.) So... you can visibly show your virtue while we force you to wait.
Heard. On it. (Note that it is live now at TimeSafari.app)
PS, with regards to amounts recorded on the platform:
The metrics of hours (and money) are useful to show the general value of contributions; this can help to balance expectations and commitments, and also to assess relative value afterward. So the platform counts time and money directly between people and projects but it doesn't provide unique tokens to transfer. Sure, trade & tokens bring efficiency & convenience & interoperability, and there is a place for those; however, our focus is to show off the interpersonal rewards that come from work together. Obviously, you and I would adjust how we work with people who estimate terribly or fail repeatedly, and we would recommend the same to our friends; any mismatch between contributors is something that those participants can see and feel and then judge how they want to respond outside the platform. True progress does not require such exact accounting – it comes from the tighter relationships and greater accomplishments... of which accounting is just one piece.
