Moving S.L.O.W. and Fixing Things
Ideas whose time has come
I saw this on a friend's timeline today. I had to laugh because it speaks directly to the story I was telling about how I used to describe S.L.O.W. Tech.
Back in 2010, when the concept of S.L.O.W. Tech came to me, I had to find a way to describe it to people who just wanted tech to go faster.
I would begin by explaining that the purpose of tech was to improve the way we work.
I used a horse and wagon as an example to illustrate the importance of positioning the tech correctly for the best outcome.
If you put the horse behind the wagon, gave it fuel, and said 'push', you ended up with a pile of crap and the wagon didn't move. If you then put the horse in the front of the wagon and said 'pull,' you were able to move things forward.
And, as this cartoon illustrates, if you use the wrong tech to improve the quality of human life, you might kill us all. Personally, I think we've all had enough of moving fast and breaking things.
Bene Esse: Getting Back to the Human Experience
So if ‘move fast and break things’ is the problem, what does the alternative actually look like?
This is why SLOW Tech is part of the Bene Esse plan.
The concept of S.L.O.W. Tech emerged from my experience creating Community Renaissance Market (CRM), a community-based micro-incubator in a former grocery store in South Austin.
Back in 2010, I watched an interview with the editor of the Austin Business Journal in which he dismissed the value of the CRM concept as ‘low tech’ and therefore unimportant to the future of Austin as envisioned by the people with money & power.
At first, I was angry, but then I was inspired to create S.L.O.W. Tech: Sustainable Local Organic Work + Technology = Inclusive Sustainable Community, which is only now becoming clear to folks as the missing piece. Ultimately, S.L.O.W. Tech is about using technology to improve the human experience, not distract from it.
S.L.O.W. Tech Activates Community at a Human Scale
The core driver of the Bene Esse community story is the household. Every decision made either produces or consumes the well-being of the household. Community stability starts at the household level, and access to the tools of wealth production is essential to the sustainable future of those communities. Paraphrasing Mahatma Gandhi, if the household fails, the community fails.
Following Gandhi’s thoughts, the purpose of the S.L.O.W. Tech model is to add specific technology to non- or low-tech household-level, human-scale businesses to better equip them for sustainability. In this model, businesses are designed to reflect and meet the local community's needs, e.g. C2B versus B2C or B2B.
Bene Esse = Community + S.L.O.W. Tech + 214 Alpha
This is where the system comes together.
If we want an eco-balanced [economy + ecology] sustainable future, we must bring the tools to the communities ‘holding the ground’ and root deeply in the mission of creating and keeping wealth local. S.L.O.W. Tech and 214 Alpha are the tools we need.
S.L.O.W. Tech matches the right tech with the right job, keeping the enhancement of the human experience at the forefront of decisions.
With the 214 Alpha platform as the economic engine, it’s simple to create a virtual marketplace and root the local ecosystem as the brick-and-mortar community is being built out. The platform allows the seeding, rooting, and growing of the invisible ‘keystone capitals’ needed to complement and multiply the ‘hard’ capitals, such as money, real estate, and other resources that can be objectively measured for value. And, most importantly, it provides governance tools to manage the community resources.
Reweaving the Pieces for Personal Peace
Progress isn’t just about speed; it must be aligned with human well-being.
At this time in our social development, we need a story that properly situates people in their communities, neither isolated from each other by virtue of our history, nor overwhelmed by the enormity of the task of reclamation due to lack of experience.
We are partners in what we are building. We draw from both remembered and rediscovered wisdom, and the imaginal cells in all of us are ready to awaken in a materially, intellectually, and spiritually evolving community identity.
We need to make peace with our past and create a new future that’s inclusive, accessible, and sustainable for all, no exceptions.
Bene Esse makes this possible.
