Comment by pplante
14 hours ago
So you mean a customer? Why do you want them to own it? Just open source it if you want to share without building a business.
14 hours ago
So you mean a customer? Why do you want them to own it? Just open source it if you want to share without building a business.
Customer owned co-operatives are an established business model. First one was founded in Rochdale, England, in 1844, and is still operating today as a convenience chain called simply "Co-op", across the UK.
The main advantage to this is that it gives customers incentive to support the business financially, not just take the assets. You can still have cashflows in way that don't exist in open source models, and around products that can't be open sourced (like loafs of bread, pints of milk, as per the Co-op model).
SWIFT is the cooperative of banks, for instance.
Open source just gives away the code, without setting up resources for the people who work on it. If I charge for the service, which is owned by the members, I could presumably pay upkeep (hosting, dedicated workers...etc).
As far as I know this is how places like REI or some groceries work. They are essentially customer owned. I'm not an expert in this, which is why I was asking for advice.
I don’t believe this is a great representation of REI. My understanding of REI, as a member, is that rather than holding shares, I receive a dividend relative to what I spend in each year, and I have access to certain perks, but I cannot elect board members and I cannot earn any additional power through working or volunteering labor for the organization
REI Board elections are open to all members. In the last election the REI union recommended not voting for all of the incumbent board members due to their hostility towards the union.
However I believe the board nomination process used to be open, but now only board members can nominate people for a board seat
The person directing you to the tech coop peer group is a spot on. There are many ways of doing this, but IMHO it ultimately comes down to writing bylaws for an organization that dictate how resources are accumulated and distributed, and evaluating the associated incentives and dynamics generated by those rules.
This is a beautiful vision, but I think it would be hard implement in practice. I’m trying to imagine how a pitch like this might work. Do you offer the customer/members some kind of profit sharing? A discount on future services?
Given that customers often want to avoid lock-in on any purchasing decision, it seems hard to build a service that has a larger up front psychological and legal commitment. I love the idea of getting bonus points in life for building structures with collaborative ownership, but realistically most people and businesses only want a simple “buy a service that I can cancel” relationship.
That said, I'd love to see someone try it! I think it could work well in a niche environment, or something like a Kickstarter where people feel they helped bring something into being.
I think my (and other) Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farms would disagree with you.
I buy shares in the farm per my needs. The CSA takes my money and buys seeds, fertilizer, etc. I get discounted (100% :-) products from them throughout the growing season. They also sell their goods at farmers' markets, do deliveries, etc. My CSA has been growing for years. They're a part of a larger co-op org that spans the NE US, IIUC.
So yes, the "beautiful vision" can be, and is, implemented. Even in tech; I'm sure you've heard of neighbors getting together and building their own local networks because the local ISP won't service them.
2 replies →
This is exactly how Vanguard works.
>As far as I know this is how places like REI or some groceries work. They are essentially customer owned. I'm not an expert in this, which is why I was asking for advice.
I wouldn't say they work well, though, given the state of REI and grocery customer cooperatives.
[flagged]