In America’s earliest days, there were barn-raising parties in which neighbors helped each other build up their farms. Today, in some churches, there are debt liquidation revivals in which parishioners chip in to free each other from growing credit card debts that are driving American families to bankruptcy and desperation. IN DEBT WE TRUST is the latest film from Danny Schechter, “The News Dissector,” director of the internationally distributed and award-winning WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception), an expose of the media’s role in the Iraq War. The Emmy-winning former ABC News and CNN producer’s new hard-hitting documentary investigates why so many Americans are being strangled by debt. It is a journalistic confrontation with what former Reagan advisor Kevin Phillips calls “Financialization”–the “powerful emergence of a debt-and-credit industrial complex.” While many Americans may be “maxing out” on credit cards, there is a deeper story: power is shifting into fewer hands…..with frightening consequences. IN DEBT WE TRUST shows how the mall replaced the factory as America’s dominant economic engine and how big banks and credit card companies buy our Congress and drive us into what a former major bank economist calls modern serfdom. Americans and our government owe trillions in consumer debt and the national debt, a large amount of it to big banks and billions to Communist China.

See also:

• Money as Debt
• Money
• The Money Masters
• More money books
• Zeitgeist - The Movie: Federal Reserve

An examination of the commercialization of Christmas in America while following Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir on a cross-country mission to save Christmas from the Shopocalypse (the end of humankind from consumerism, over-consumption and the fires of eternal debt.) The film also delves into issues such as the role sweatshops play in America’s mass consumerism and Big-Box Culture. From the humble beginnings of preaching at his portable pulpit on New York City subways, to having a congregation of thousands – Bill Talen (aka Rev. Billy) has become the leader of not just a church, but a national movement.

See also:

• A Place Called Chiapas
• In Debt We Trust
• The Corporation, Zapatista, Space Hijackers and Lab of ii…
• Coconut Revolution
• The Take: Occupy. Resist. Produce.

These are my links for December 1st to December 8th:

• Increasing the sustainability of existing homes by sharing information, developing local action networks and facilitating co-operative buys. - The Eco-Renovation Network is a new and voluntary initiative. We want to encourage individuals to take action to increase the sustainability of their own homes. Our aim is to make it easier for people to find out and share information on eco-renovation and to reduce the costs to people through co-operative buying.
• ECIS (Ethical Consumption Information System) conference - Details of first ECIS (Ethical Consumption Information System) conference. One to keep an eye on
• YouTube - Uckfield Eco Team Present: ‘THE ECO-MAFIA’ - Check out this amazing group of talented, eco-conscious young people from Uckfield, Sussex, UK. Enjoy the lyrics and see what sustainable projects they are setting up at Uckfield Community Technology College.
• Complementary Currency Software - P2P Foundation - A nice page with details of software for community/ complementary currency software options.
• SmartSoil - the Clever Way to Compost - A Composting Revolution from Sweden!
  Introducing the JK 125 & 270 Domestic and the JK 5100 Community Composters

See also:

• My del.icio.us bookmarks for December 20th through December 30th
• Links for November 24th to December 1st
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for December 3rd through December 12th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for November 27th through December 1st
• Links for December 1st

These are my links for December 1st:

• Landmatters Permaculture Project - Home - Landmatters Co-operative own and manage a 42 acre holding in South Hams, Devon. Using a design system called permaculture, we are managing the land for the benefit of bio-diversity and wildlife whilst providing for many of our own needs for community, food, water, energy, shelter, creativity, transport and waste management. We are also developing land based livelihoods, reducing our ecological footprint and acting as an educational resource for the wider community.
• About the book at Run Your Diesel Vehicle on Biofuels - Run Your Diesel Vehicle on Biofuels is a heavily illustrated guide that shows how to run any diesel engine on vegetable oil, used cooking oil or biodiesel!
• WordPress › Google XML Sitemaps « WordPress Plugins - This plugin will create a Google sitemaps compliant XML-Sitemap of your WordPress blog. It supports all of the WordPress generated pages as well as custom ones. Everytime you edit or create a post, your sitemap is updated and all major search engines that support the sitemap protocol, like ASK.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO, are notified about the update.
• WordPress › pageMash > pageManagement « WordPress Plugins - Customise the order your pages are listed in and manage the parent structure with this simple Ajax drag-and-drop administrative interface with an option to toggle the page to be hidden from output. Great tool to quickly re-arrange your page menus.
• SourceForge.net: EventCalendar for Wordpress - Event Calendar plugin for Wordpress. Use Wordpress to manage future events as an online calendar. Display upcoming events in a dynamic calendar, on a listings page, or as a list in the sidebar. You can subscribe to the calendar from iCal or Sunbird.
• WordPress › Subscribe2 « WordPress Plugins - Subscribe2 provides a comprehensive subscription management and email notification system for WordPress blogs that sends email notifications to a list of subscribers when you publish new content to your blog.

See also:

• My del.icio.us bookmarks for August 26th
• Links for November 24th to December 1st
• Links for May 6th to May 9th
• Links for December 1st to December 8th
• Links for April 15th to April 21st

These are my links for November 24th to December 1st:

• WordPress › cformsII - contact form « WordPress Plugins - cforms is a highly customizable, flexible and powerful form builder plugin, covering a variety of use cases and features from attachments to multi form management, you can even have multiple forms on the same page!
• CHAGFORD HUB - THE HUB - for all things sustainable in the Chagford area. If any one wishes to post information of a local and sustainable nature please E Mail via the Home Page. The HUB is here to serve as a conduit and central point of reference for all wishing to work towards a more sustainable and bright future. ALL WELCOME!
• Kingdom Bioenergy Ltd - Kingdom Bioenergy Ltd is developing and encouraging the use of low-cost biogas technologies in the UK and elsewhere in the world. Biogas technology, as a renewable energy technology, has been available for many years, but has mainly been ignored, apart for certain specialist tasks and in some countries. The situation is now changing very rapidly. Large national projects are working very effectively in countries such as Nepal, India and China. Europe has a fast growing interest in biogas technology, with the UK trying to catch up.
• ProperJob - Reuse, Recycle, Compost Site - At the RESOURCE CENTRE, our activities focus on reducing waste to Landfill. We are constantly improving our facilities, towards a local target of ZERO WASTE TO LANDFILL BY 2015. We are an independent, 'not-for-profit' organisation, and hope to demonstrate that radical waste reduction is possible (it is also essential!). DIVERSE RECYCLING and re-use are key to waste reduction, but of equal importance is YOU!. Even with the best facilities in the UK, we could not improve recycling rates unless the public will use them. So if you have not yet visited, come along and see how enjoyable it is (yes, actually enjoyable!).
• Compost Doctors - The Compost Doctors are a consortium of experienced, professional composters specialising in small scale, on-site composting of food waste. Sharing case studies and experiences of on-site composting has built up a unique body of expertise within this group, ranging from equipment to legislation. We provide consultancy to all kinds of catering establishments from pubs, hotels and visitor attractions to prisons and hospitals. 5 a day composter. We understand that managers are busy people, that catering is a busy profession and it is difficult to find the time to implement environmental solutions - we can help. If you are interested in setting up an on-site composting system, but don't know where to start, please contact us.
• Devon Community Composting Network - Welcome to the home page for the Devon Community Composting Network. Take a look at What's New in our web. Devon Community Composting Network is supported by the Devon Authorities Waste Reduction and Recycling Committee. A full information pack is downloadable as a pdf file (7mb) - beware this could take some time to download! Alternatively addresses in Devon can have a copy posted for free. Other address please send an A4 SAE envelope with five first class stamps, to cover costs, to Nicky Scott, 8 Meldon Road, Chagford, Devon, TQ13 8BG Or individual pages can be viewed on this site - mostly without pictures There are links to the National Community Composting Network - CCN and other relevant sites: community; Countywide etc. If you want to start a community composting project in Devon please contact: Nicky Scott Nicky Scott, 8 Meldon Road, Chagford, Devon, TQ13 8BG nicky.scott@devon.gov.uk
• Decreixement.net - Inici - Degrowth site. This lot did a 76 day cycle tour around Catalunya promoting degrowth, economic alternatives and transition culture. Excellent!
• Crisi | Crisi - Campaign for a Banks users strike and other cool stuff. Check it out.
• The Library House - Social Centres are self-managed spaces, a means whereby people can come together to create, conspire, communicate and offer a collective challenge against capitalism…Social centres have always been a vital part of the infrastructure of radical social movements. The Library House is one such place located in London, Brixton/Camberwell and is available to the community and political groups that need free space to meet, organise, put on events or workshops etc. The Library House includes 3 rooms: a small one (coined as the”dining room” roughly, for cosy meetings or small cafes) and two bigger rooms that can contain from 15 to 30 people each (one is the “cafe room” and has sofas+our free shop, the other one, just called the “front room”, is virtually empty to make it available for workshops like capoeira or theatre). We meet as an open collective every tuesday evening from 9pm to discuss use of the space and hear proposals. Email us at libraryhouse..at..lists.riseup.net
• Permaculture TV BETA - Great new site collecting videos about permaculture, ecovillages etc.

See also:

• Links for December 1st to December 8th
• Links for June 17th to August 26th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for December 20th through December 30th
• Links for November 11th to November 13th
• Links for October 26th to October 28th

We’ve got Swaporamarama and Swishing and now, the Topshop Swap Shop…

Topshop Swap Shop

Just in from the inimitable Space Hijackers: Ladies and Gentlemen we are proud to announce the restyling fashion mash-up event of the year! In the light of the current economic crisis and the outrage over the sweatshop conditions that most high street brands make their clothes in, the swapshop is your chance to re-vamp your wardrobe with a free conscience! Leaping away from the drudgery of big corporate fashion with it’s dodgy business practices and spend spend spend attitude, the Topshop Swapshop takes fashion back to its roots.

Simply turn up at TOPSHOP on Oxford Street wearing an outfit you wish to upgrade, then on the stroke of 2, marvel as hundreds of fashion moguls offer to trade your clothes with you.

Fancy that girls jumper? Why not offer to swap your belt for it? That boy’s hat is to die for, how about a trade for your jeans? Nice skirt, fancy trading my t-shirt for it?

After a hectic re-working of your look you can then walk proudly back onto the streets of London town with a new wardrobe and not having spent a single penny.

You can buy lots of clothes but you can’t buy style.

DISCLAIMER:

The above event is in no way supported or condoned by TopShop. Any similarity to any brand living or dead is merely coincidental.

2pm sharp on Sat 29th November – Topshop Oxford Street.

See also:

• free stuff party
• Support THE SQUARE this FRIDAY 9AM or earlier
• Dance upon injustice
• [rampARTannounce] two square meals
• Interdependence Day, 1st July 2006

These are my links for November 20th to November 24th:

• The Mad Housers - an Atlanta-based nonprofit group engaged in direct action to shelter the homeless - MAD HOUSERS Inc. is an Atlanta-based non-profit corporation engaged in charitable work, research and education. Our charter outlines our goals and purposes:
  * To provide shelter for homeless individuals and families regardless of race, creed, national origin, gender, religion, or age.
  * To develop low income housing for people in need of housing.
  * To help people develop the skills and knowledge for constructing and rehabilitating housing and shelter.
  * To increase the quantity and to improve the quality of housing in the world.
  * To act, if necessary as an advocate for the homeless, to ensure that their moral and civil rights are protected.

  The Mad Housers believe that if a person has a secure space from which to operate, they are much more capable of finding the resources to help themselves.

• Complementary currencies | drupal.org - Currencies like dollars and Euros are not the only way to recognise and track work done and contributions to the social good. Local, community currencies such as LETS and timebanks facilitate trading in communities all over the world. Such currencies
  * are resilient against recesssion and collapse
  * do not favour the rich by charging interest
  * belong to communities, not to banks
  * prefer local goods and services over the globalised economy
  * are used for economic regeneration and international development
• ‘I will create a standing order of 5 pounds per month to support an organisation that fosters alternatives to the current profit-driven economic system’ - PledgeBank - I will create a standing order of 5 pounds per month to support an organisation that fosters alternatives to the current profit-driven economic system but only if 1,000 other people will do the same.
• Welcome - SoundCloud - SoundCloud lets you move music fast & easy. The platform takes the daily hassle out of receiving, sending & distributing music for artists, record labels & other music professionals.
• optimaes - Open Project to Investigate Money and Economic Systems - Open Project to Investigate Money and Economic Systems

See also:

• Links for November 11th to November 13th
• Links for November 13th to November 18th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for November 12th through November 13th
• Links for September 5th to September 19th
• Links for November 24th to December 1st

These are my links for November 13th to November 18th:

• Survey: Software for LETS - The web archive page of a list of software project for community currencies
• Richard Kay’s 2005 WSFII Bullet Points - Links to some open source community currency software projects
• Dimdim: Free Web Meeting, Free Web Conferencing, Meetup, Open Source, Net Meeting, eLearning, web conference, Unified Collaboration, Online Meetings, Online Training, Free Screen Sharing, collaboration, live meeting - Dimdim’s mission is to become the leading provider of open source web meeting software. Dimdim strives to be an open and transparent company, with source code, product roadmaps and simple technical documentation freely available online. We also listen closely to the needs of the open source community and are actively improving our product based on their feedback.
• WCBC: Social Enterprise Toolkit - The Social Economy Project, in partnership with Liverpool Plus, produced a step-by-step guide to starting and running a social enterprise, which is available free of charge to community organisations in Wrexham.

  The Manual for Developing Social Enterprises is available to download or alternatively a hardcopy or CD ROM version can be obtained from AVOW. (Tel: 01978 312556).

• home - ammado - ammado connects nonprofits, socially responsible companies and engaged individuals in an interactive and unique environment. We harness the power of the internet to accelerate communication, awareness and fundraising. The ammado community will generate inspirational stories and create real heroes.
• Repoze Notes : /tom_gross-repoze_plone-20081113.html - Props to Tom Gross, who has tackled the job of figuring out and documenting the minimal set of changes needed to make use of repoze and WSGI from within a stock Plone buildout.

See also:

• Links for November 5th
• Links for November 20th to November 24th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for November 15th through November 17th
• Links for November 11th to November 13th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for November 12th through November 13th

These are my links for November 11th to November 13th:

• The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia - Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom were brought to an unceremonious close today.
• The Yes Men - Impersonating big-time criminals in order to publicly humiliate them. Targets are leaders and big corporations who put profits ahead of everything else.
• Secure Form Mailer Plugin For Wordpress · Dagon Design - This is the WordPress plugin version of my secure PHP form mailer script. This plugin has a wide range of features including: Support for multiple instances, an easy to use dynamic form generation system (any number of fields, in any order), multiple recipients, multiple file attachments, optional auto reply feature, an image verification system, numerous security features (including protection against email header injection), a message template system, multiple languages, and too many other things to list. This plugin was designed to be easy to use, while still being extremely flexible. If you just want a simple contact form, you can set one up with just a few clicks. For those of you who need something a bit more advanced, you can completely customize the plugin to fit your needs - whether it is 5 fields or 500. A non-WordPress version is also available. ReCaptcha support has also been added, as well as support for storing the data in a delimited file.
• Australian Social Forum » Media Cooperative Pilot Project - From November 2008-January 2009 a Media Cooperative Pilot Project will be run by Nicholas Roberts and Cameron using the Octapod Association as a base to develop the self-sustaining Media Cooperative. The main 5 sub-projects will be
• Social Media Classroom - Welcome to the Social Media Classroom and Collaboratory. It’s all free, as in both “freedom of speech” and “almost totally free beer.” We invite you to build on what we’ve started to create more free value. The Social Media Classroom (we’ll call it SMC) includes a free and open-source (Drupal-based) web service that provides teachers and learners with an integrated set of social media that each course can use for its own purposes—integrated forum, blog, comment, wiki, chat, social bookmarking, RSS, microblogging, widgets , and video commenting are the first set of tools.
• CMS Summary - techmeet - A lot of work has been done over the past year researching candidates for a new Indymedia CMS. The purpose of this summary is to provide a snapshot of all the work that has been done researching and analyzing existing Content Management Systems. The goal of that project has been to find one that fulfills our requirements document. In addition, the intent is the collate all the information about the CMS project onto one page for convenience. At the end is an attempt to break down all the data and show where we are.

See also:

• Links for November 20th to November 24th
• Links for November 6th to November 10th
• Links for November 24th to December 1st
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for August 26th
• Links for November 13th to November 18th

These are my links for November 6th to November 10th:

• Attention Profiling: APML Beginner’s Guide - Robin Good’s Latest News - Attention profiling is quite possibly the next wave of smarter, more relevant web browsing. APML is an emerging standard that promises to make it much easier for websites and services to cater to your exact tastes, reducing the information overload of seemingly endless web content.
• Core Developers - Plone Social Network Experience was: 18 Things I Wish Were True About Plone - Interesting thread about plone
• Paris Bobun Sprint #2 at Google HQ : getting Open Social into Plone - Plone Social Networking | Google Groups - The goal of this sprint is to enable Plone as an Open Social container,
  allowing any Plone site to host Open Social applications (also nicknamed
  "gadgets", or "boxes", since those applications tend to be enclosed in a
  well-delimited box of a social network website).
• Managing Multiple Plone Sites at Oxfam — Plone CMS: Open Source Content Management - Managing Multiple Plone Sites at Oxfam. Duncan Booth's presentation from Plone Conference 2006.
• Solheimer in Iceland -
• Plone vs. Drupal, Take One | modulus - Recently, my colleagues and I decided that we needed to replace our public website's content management system. After some preliminary evaluation, we determined that we would evaluate Plone and Drupal. In the end, we went with Plone at work, and I've been working with it a lot for the past few months. However, I was also impressed by Drupal, and that's what I use to run this blog.
• Digital image resizing with the GIMP - Processing digital images is a very common task today. Image processing tools are so common that users often process images by trial and error, without really knowing what they are doing. One of the operations people fail most commonly is resizing an image. In this article I will explain how to resize images. This is a way for me to celebrate 10 years since I started studying digital image processing!

See also:

• Links for November 11th to November 13th
• Links for October 26th to October 28th
• Links for November 13th to November 18th
• My del.icio.us bookmarks for November 19th through November 26th
• Links for November 20th to November 24th