Transition Culture

Is the date correct , if its Friday to Sunday, my calender says thats the 27th till the 29th?

Um… is it just me or do those dates not tally? Should it be 27th-29th or March or 24th-26th April 2009?

Unless I’ve gone completely crazy, the 24th March is a Tuesday and the 26th a Thursday. Did you mean April when the 24th – 26th is indeed over a weekend?

Not sure if I am being dim, but there doesn’t seem to be any such date. 24th to 26th March is a Tuesday to Thursday, I think?

Matt

Gah… sorry everyone… it was very early on the morning… it is May, definitely May, as in May. Apologies and thanks for pointing out my errors!!

The 24th May is a Sunday…

please confirm which friday to sunday in may.

So does that make it the 22nd of May ’til the 24th of May then?

Yes, that’s right – Friday 22nd lunchtime till Sunday 24th lunchtime.

Dear all… apologies again. One would think it the simplest of tasks. Perhaps it is down to overexcitement and keenness to tell you all, as a result of which the fact of telling you takes precedence over factual rectitude. Anyway, yes, as amended above, the dates are Friday 22nd to Sunday 24th May 2009. Sigh.

I expect Rob just wanted to check and see if anyone was reading his blg

Really pleased it’s going to be in London as lots of interest in getting an initiative (or several) going in Lewisham at the moment. As a politician, not so keen that it’s the week before the Euros, when we’ll all be out campaigning – or is that part of the plan, to keep us politicos away?

I have a shocking conspiracy theory.

The incorrect date was announced on purpose to distract us from talking about Peter Lipman’s legs.

Rob’s obviously jealous of them.

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Oh bugger this clashes with a permaculture intro course I’m co-running that weekend. But I’ll be there in spirit and I’m sure some fellow westcliff trannies will be in attendance won’t they Kamil??

I saw Daevid Allen out of Gong and Robert Calvert out of Hawkwind reading poetry at Battersea Arts Centre (then Battersea Town hall) on my 17th birthday in 1977!

I’ll better start my May and June school assignments now:) so I’m fresh for the conference.

Woah Graham! Quite an act to follow…but I’m sure the conference will come a close second in a creative, transcendent sort of way.

Oops, had had one or two ‘light refreshments’ too many in the pub following our Transition Westcliff meeting last night!

[...] Food Forests and even green the desert – an update from Transition around the world, and – the Transition Conference 2009 Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Round up of the weekTeens Spend 31 Hours Online [...]

Oh my word that film “A Farm for the Future “on BBC2 this evening was fantastic
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00hs8zp

Echo Sue’s point although, I don’t see how transition is not political. The Euros are going to be important elections as the BNP are hoping to return at least one MEP in the North West and possible another in the South. It’s all very well flapping our gums about a good, inclusive and positive transition but then not challenging the BNP’s lies on the door step during an election and offering a different future or a way to create one.

The least that transitioners could do is sign up to “hope not hate” and get the plastic out.

http://www.hopenothate.org.uk/

There are many people who are engaged in the Transition movement who are involved in politics in one way or another. However Transition is not the place for specific political activity.

Sorry, I didn’t realise that some activities had been proscribed as un-T.

I am very much looking forward to this conference, both as a newcomer to the Transition movement and as I am currently establising a CIC (community interest company) to work with waste and recycling in Carmarthenshire, Cymru.
I will be very interested to share ideas and see working examples of community engagement. Please feel free to view and comment on the ‘habitable’ group, it is designed as an online workshop for Transition Town Llandeilo and its environs.

Hope to see you all there!
Regards,

Adam S. Margetts
Co-ordinator, theARCproject.

Three things I note with interest:

# The premiere of ….. (drumroll)…. ‘The Transition Movie’

# Training courses, on setting up Community Supported Agriculture initiatives.

# An opportunity to observe and participate in the extraordinary ‘Energy Descent Plan in 2 Hours’ workshop.

——

I wonder how we Antipodeans might be able to benefit from these wonderful offerings?

James

Transition Radio: I’m hoping those with a love of Transition AND community radio, can come together at this event to record and broadcast some of the proceedings, special moments via the web. Possibly live.
This can help Antipodeans and any others not there in physical form.
Who wants to help me with this?

When can I book my place??

Very interested in this conference – how can I book?

when will booking arrangements be published?

I understand that the new date when bookings will open is Monday 9th March – on http://www.transitiontowns.org

Ooo, ouch – another clash. Radical Routes (network of radical co-ops) has also got a conference/workshops in London on 23rd May:
‘Practical Economics – radical alternatives to a failed economic system’. It’s at Conway Hall, which ain’t particularly close to Battersea, so not easy for cross-fertilisation.

Rob, I was going to ask you to do a workshop on the Saturday afternoon – is that out of the question?

[...] Today, I’m looking forward to uploading my recent Transition interviews with Rob Hopkins, Ben Bragwyn, Patrick Holden and Chris White (TTE), and creating a long-overdue Transition podcast. This in anticipation of being the ‘radio guy’ at the Transition conference 2009! [...]

How can you justify a 85 quid price tag?

I think that is ridiculous, exclusive and bad strategy, sorry.

It is really quite easy to do events for much cheaper. As an example…

This weekend:
http://www.oekonux-conference.org/ – FREE (despite having many international speakers)

On the same day as Transition Conference:
http://www.radicalroutes.org.uk/content/view/130/111/ – FREE

How on Earth can we expect to get more people involved with such expensive prices?

Disappointed,

Josef.

How can you justify a 85 quid price tag?

I think that is ridiculous, exclusive and bad strategy, sorry.

(I’ve another comment in moderation saying the same thing and giving links here to FREE as examples of more inclusive conferences)

How on Earth can we expect to get more people involved with such expensive prices?

Disappointed,

Josef.

gotta agree with the sentiments Josef. (My spare cash and time is going on hope not hate anyway.)

Gate fees are antithetical to resilient, resourceful, inclusive communities.

B****r forgot to sign off

Be the change you want to see…………..

Hi Josef and Bob…
Over on the forum this question has been raised too. Here is Ben’s response to that…

“Thanks for the comments – the issues around diversity and inclusiveness are well made.

A conference held in a specific location is, per se, not inclusive. How can an event held in London feel inclusive to someone in Aberdeen?

Our hope is that soon there will be regional get-togethers (as has happened in Wales recently) so that more people can get involved at that level.

As far as cost for this event is concerned, an indoor event, in London, with 2 packed conference days, a dazzling smorgasbord of workshops, three meals, 4 tea breaks, 2 massive evening events, a movie premiere, sports on Clapham common, all for £85 is unbelievably cheap in my judgement.

My view is that people could equally be saying “how the hell did you manage to put it together so cheaply?”

We could have it in a field in tents and last year just such a weekend was organised and I believe another is in planning phase right now. I expect the costs of that will be somewhere closer to the Earth First event you mentioned.

The question of diversity and inclusiveness is very high up on our agenda, and there are no easy answers as far as we can see. We’ll explore it in depth at the conference and beyond”.

I agree with his thoughts re. cost… we have striven to make it as affordable as possible.. last year’s conference ran at a loss, and we were determined for that not to happen this year, but it should more or less pay for itself this year.

As Ben says, for what is included in that, it feels like incredibly good value. We could have left out the teas and the 2 meals, but then everyone scatters at mealtimes to go and find food and that potential interaction time is lost. I don’t agree that “gate fees are antithetical to resilient, resourceful, inclusive communities”. Since when? So in a resilient, resourceful, inclusive society, the cinemas, art galleries, theatres, football grounds, music concerts will all be free? And anything promoting any kind of learning or education or skilling will be free? Perhaps we will reach a stage where Government funding for such things is abundant and directed to the things that we feel matters, but in the meantime, I would argue that we need to design our events to be as inclusive as possible, as intensive and life changing and extraordinary as possible, with as much volunteer input as possible, but that are also able to pay for themselves. We aren’t getting any funding for this event, and it needs to stand on its own feet. As Ben says, given all that is included in the two days, one could just as easily ask how we have managed to make it so cheap.

I don’t buy the “how have we managed to make it so cheap” line at all, sorry.

I have been to many many events that offer much more (e.g. accodomation as well!) for less.

At the very least there should be some kind of sliding scale of payments so that those on lower incomes should be able to pay less.

In the past I’ve organised successful events on the “pay what you like” principle that have managed to break even. Empower people to be generous.

Really, think you need to take these criticism A LOT more seriously and not just brush them off with “actually it is amazingly cheap”. That just doesn’t cut it I’m afraid.

I refer you to Transition Network Princples number 3 and 4 “Inclusion and Openess” and “Enable Sharing and Networking”. I was going to refer you to the one about being open and responsive to feedback, but discovered there isn’t one! So instead I refer you to David Holmgren’s Permaculture Principle number 4: “Apply self-regulation and accept feedback” http://permacultureprinciples.com/principle_4.php (lots of the others are relevant here too like intergrate rather than segregate, valuing diversity and the marginal etc).

I’d suggest that you invite everyone who has expressed similar sentiments to organise next years conference and see what they can come up with. I think you’ve pleasantly surprised/ blown away be what can be acheived.

Expecting criticism to be more fully heard,

Josef.

PS – Maybe I suggest you adjust your comments setting so posts by people who’ve already had a comment approved don’t end up in moderation each time they include a useful link

Hmz, it would appear all comments on this thread are now heading into moderation. Again, that is not very transparent, open and responsive to feedback

yes – let Josef organise next year’s…

I don’t normally feel an urge to post comments on blogs, but I do find the tone of Josefs comments rather unhelpful.

Yes, I would agree that £85 is a lot of money for some of us, myself included. However that does not mean that I do not understand that that is how much it costs to put on the conference if you are not receiving any funding. I have been involved in organising events, festivals, performances and I know there are always people who will feel that things should be free and when you have busted a gut to put something on and done your best to make it as inclusive as possible it can be quite insulting to hear people go on and on about how expensive it is, even when you are offering the option to pay less to those who cannot afford the ticket price.

The fact is that the way our society is organised most things cost money. So whether it is the funders who are subsidising your ticket or the people who decide to all volunteer their time to run a free event or you yourself paying for a ticket, some exchange is being made. When an event is put on for ‘free’, it just means that you are not seeing or being part of that exchange, but an exchange is happening. Those of us who are not in a position to get a venue, food, administration, equipment etc for nothing have to pay for it and then have to ask anyone who wants to come in to re-imburse us, if they can, please.

Dear Josef, please remember that everyone is doing their best even if it doesn’t seem to come up to your standard. I will assume that you are too.

Warmly,
Inez

Rob, Ben

If you are standing looking at this ethical problem of charging an entrance fee for accessing the creative/learning experience on offer, from an “inside” vantage point with the conceptual framework you’re working within – market based thinking and the profit and loss account, then you’re absolutely spot on. On this basis it looks like some very good business decision have been made. The people who attend will, naturally, be a self-selecting group who’ve decided that they can afford £85: the offer looks like good value for money. And I would have to agree with that, if I compare it with other possible events or weekends away – a premier division football match will set you back nearly £85.00, a weekends coasteering or a permaculture course probably twice as much. Hats in the air.

If you look at this ethical problem from a different view point – “outside” and with the notion that the intellectual common ground being created is just that – part of our commonwealth, then admission fees by their nature commodify and commercialise both the ideas and the creative process. From this perspective – one I share – then the conference begins to look exclusive. Drawing a parallel between the creative/learning process that Transition conference is trying to facilitate and cultural activities such as cinemas, art galleries and football etc. is an odd one. The fact that capitalism has so successfully managed to expropriate, package and sell back to us so much of our culture and indeed the physical space of towns, cities and landscape is no defence for Transition adopting the same thinking. Should culture be free at the point of creation and enjoyment I’d have to say yes it should, we need different social relationships to creativity and culture.

You also ask whether education and learning should be free! Of course it should, how can it ultimately be anything else – how can we simultaneously tap into our collective genius and then start erecting a fees structure? “The people who turn up are the right people” – yeah but there are still lots of right people out there with genius but short of £85!

We do actually live in a super abundant society in the West, successive Government’s have had vast wealth (lots of it from oil and gas) but have chosen to commodify and marketise education since the early 1980s. Our Government’s have squandered our commonwealth on adventurist wars, nuclear weapons systems, rubbish IT systems, and ploughing it into the banking sector.

I appreciate that a national gathering is a different scale of event to a local initiative but we organised our first gathering on local food as a free open event, not “serviced”, everyone gave freely of their time and skills, we asked everyone to bring and share food, cooked some soup and bread, asked the Council for their support and met all other expenses from the donations bucket that sat quietly on a table. 90 people came along and we had a thoroughly good and creative time – we created a microcosm of the change we wanted to see. If we had started with a business plan and a profit and loss account we’d have had to charge £10-15 per head. Transition ought to be able to unleash its collective genius to find a way beyond admission fees.

The question was/should be: “how do we involve as many people, from as many different backgrounds in creating a national event without having to charge? Discuss.”

Challenging TI to host half a dozen regional events on the same day (with some internet linkage?) would have been more interesting, inclusive, diverse and powerful. Challenging TI to collectively raise the costs would have been the change.

By the way Job Seekers Allowance is £47.95 (under 24). The minimum wage is £3.53 – £5.73 per hour. Unemployment is 2m and growing. Makes you think about value for money.

Bob says:

“I appreciate that a national gathering is a different scale of event to a local initiative but we organised our first gathering on local food as a free open event, not “serviced”, everyone gave freely of their time and skills, we asked everyone to bring and share food, cooked some soup and bread, asked the Council for their support and met all other expenses from the donations bucket that sat quietly on a table. 90 people came along and we had a thoroughly good and creative time – we created a microcosm of the change we wanted to see. If we had started with a business plan and a profit and loss account we’d have had to charge £10-15 per head. Transition ought to be able to unleash its collective genius to find a way beyond admission fees.

The question was/should be: “how do we involve as many people, from as many different backgrounds in creating a national event without having to charge? Discuss.”

Challenging TI to host half a dozen regional events on the same day (with some internet linkage?) would have been more interesting, inclusive, diverse and powerful. Challenging TI to collectively raise the costs would have been the change.”

Yes. Exactly.

When I read Ben’s response that “an even in London is not very inclusive to people in Aberdeen” I immediately though “well, unless you have decent online stuff before and after and a video link during” but left that aside for the moment. Glad Bob has brought it back up though.

Carl: If I’m in the country (which is looking pretty unlikely at this stage) I’d love to get involved in organising next year’s conference. But not just me, LOTS of people could get involved, started with ALL who have expressed similar sentiments to I and Bob. Many hands make light work.

Hi Inez,

I’m sorry you find the tone of my comments unhelpful. I think this is just to do with the lack of body language

I’d request that you “assume good faith” http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?AssumeGoodFaith

My understanding is that the venue in this case was got for free, no?

I have organised lots of events and have never paid for a venue. In some cases the venue have paid me. Its about looking around for the right place and having a bit of the “gift of the gab”.

Similarly with food. Yes, its great that meals are being provided. Splendid. But it is easy to provide meals VERY cheaply (especially in cities). One way is to do as Bob suggests, i.e. encourage everyone to bring something to share.

When combined with the age-old trick of going to markets at the end of business and collecting all the stuff that would otherwise good to waste then one can feed MANY MANY people for almost no cost.

The activist and squatting communities are expert at this and routinely demonstrate its viability. They are also communities the Transition Network really ought to be engaging with a lot more (because many of them, despite having slightly different tactics, have been living low carbon transition lifestyles for decades)

Apparently lots of people have expressed concern about such high conference prices. To me, it is Rob and Ben’s response that “actually, its really cheap” that are not very constructive responses.

Of course, that is not to say I don’t MASSIVELY value the work they do. But responding to feedback that “its too expensive” with “no, its cheap” isn’t good enough and I feel someone has to say so.

Warm regards,

Josef.

“Its incredibly cheap” – yes, it sounds great value for money, 2 days of top class workshops and events at a central(ish) London venue with food and other activities thrown in.

“Its too expensive” – yes it is if you can’t afford it.

Both perspectives are right, maybe the question asked above needs to be slightly rephrased to something along the lines of “How to we run a high quality event to professional standards, ensuring that organisers, staff and workshop leaders are valued and fairly rewarded for their inputs and efforts, whilst at the same time ensuring that nobody is excluded due to lack of ability to pay for admission?”

Its a question that is constantly being considered when running permaculture courses, and comes down to a mixture of using sliding payment scales, ‘potluck’ see what turns up meals, blagging and using the ‘gift of the gab’, and sometimes an acceptance on the part of teachers that we aren’t going to get the full renumeration for the work we are putting in, often working whole weekends for something a little below the national minimum wage.

But I think there is also something there about throwing some responsibility back to potential participants. Without employing means testing but instead relying on trust and transparency, its perfectly appropriate to ask those who ask for concessions “Well how much can you genuinely afford? How much do you value this event and the efforts that are going in to making it happen? If you really havn’t sufficient cash can you find sponsorship through your local TT group or other organisations you are involved with, or negotiate some alternative means of payment, either helping out with catering, clearing up, publicity, etc, etc”

If Transition is about harnessing our creative genius I’m sure we can crack this one between us!

Graham says:

“Both perspectives are right”

“How to we run a high quality event to professional standards, ensuring that organisers, staff and workshop leaders are valued and fairly rewarded for their inputs and efforts, whilst at the same time ensuring that nobody is excluded due to lack of ability to pay for admission?”

“comes down to a mixture of using sliding payment scales, ‘potluck’ see what turns up meals, blagging and using the ‘gift of the gab’”

“If Transition is about harnessing our creative genius I’m sure we can crack this one between us!”

Yes, yes, yes and yes again.

Josef.

Seems to me that some people here are talking about an event organised FOR Transition Towns and others are assuming an event organised BY Transition Towns.

I think I know what you’re getting at DaveDunn, but they are not really mutually exclusive.

Lets try next year to organise a conference BY and FOR Transition Initiatives that ensures nobody is excluded due to lack of ability to pay for admission, yes?

If 350 people pay £85 each that comes to almost £30,000!!! That’s a staggering amount, enough to buy a small house in some areas.

I’d assumed that most of the cost would be for the venue but the comment above says the venue is free. The other major cost of these types of events is publicity but I suspect that is done via the web – so also free. Another cost is food but no one can eat anything like £85 worth of food in a couple of days.

Given the above I’m curious to know how this phenomenal amount of money is being spent.

Steve: good point. Where money is involved transparency really helps.

To be clear I’m not at all certain the venue is free. I just remember reading on this blog that Transition Network were “invited” to have their conference at the venue and I’m assuming that means for free. I should hope so. An invitation to spend a load of money isn’t much of an invitation in my book.

is the next conference going to be really crowd -organized (ideas for a better word)? Sounds good to me and looks like it with so many people interested in helping out next year:)

Firstly, I would like to distinguish between an inability to pay and an unwillingness to pay. Two very very different things in my book. I feel very sympathetic towards the former, as I often fall into that category myself, and feel rather baffled by the latter for reasons I explained in my previous post. As much as I believe that most money circulating in our society is spent on things that have little real value and contribute very little to our happiness, I also know that when the mortgage has to be paid there is no point turning up with a basket of apples, even though one can make a good case for saying that they may soon be worth more than my debt in real terms.

Secondly, lets be very careful about making assumptions about free venues and what £30.000 may be spent on. Why not ‘assume good faith’ as Josef suggested we did around his comments and assume that everyone working on the conference is doing the best they can and no-one is making a mint.

If anything, it is better for one’s peace of mind to trust and let go, or if that isn’t possible to remove one’s energy from a given situation and go off and do better. This is best done without a lot of noise.

Anyway, off to enjoy the garden – it’s free!

Good points, Inez

I for one am quite certain that no-one is making a mint out of it (lots of people who have never organised events before assume that people are making loads of money by doing simple calculations like Steve did – often without taking into account the many hidden costs involved in event organisation).

Most events do seem to actually loose money (as I believe last years conference did)

However, transparency is a wonderful thing and I like to jump in and sing its praise wherever possible!

Enjoy the garden!

Josef.

having organised many events myself, I have long since concluded that the world is divided into two: people who go to events and people who organise them. Only those people who have themselves organised events know that a succesful event dosn’t happen on its own and it is the result of carefully thinking out all the details.

Inez said: “I would like to distinguish between an inability to pay and an unwillingness to pay. Two very very different things in my book.”

Personally I think the two are very closely related. One’s ability to pay will have a very large influence on one’s willingness to pay.

For instance for a £30k salaried professional the entry price is going to be a piffling amount not even worth thinking about. For someone for whom the cost is all they’ve managed to save for the past 6 months then their willingness is likely to be seriously reduced. They’re going to weigh up all the other possible ways they could spend that money and may well conclude that other things are a higher priority for them.

Josef said: “lots of people who have never organised events before assume that people are making loads of money by doing simple calculations like Steve did”.

Umm I haven’t assumed any such thing. Having been involved in organising quite a few events I actually assume the opposite: that few, if any people will be making any money out of this. And that some people will be working very hard in spite of this because it’s what’s they believe in. And I take my hat off to them because I know how much hard work these things are.

However if we’re to discuss whether the cost is too high or not some idea of how the costs are split would be useful. If the cost is too high for many people, as I suspect it is, then to plan future conferences more cheaply it is necessary to look at where costs could be cut, and what aspects would be lost because of this.

Hi Steve, didn’t mean to accuse you of making those assumptions, just that lots of people who do sums like the one you did do make that assumption

Some inspiration from the Open Source world about how to run a profitable self-organised conference:

http://dc2009.drupalcon.org/news/drupalcon-dc-numbers-community-profit-and-sustainability

Also a great example of total transparency, particularly with reference to this thread: there’s a complete breakdown of all the income and costs.

Could someone put something similar together for this conference please?

Hey, I’m going to Radical Routes’ Practical Economics conference on the Saturday, but can I come to Transition Conference on Friday afternoon/ Sun morning? How much for that?

[...] har sagt jag till att hjälpa till att anordna en nationell konferens för Transition Towns och även om pressen är på känner jag mig ganska avslappnad i att jag kan [...]

I’m getting a cheque out today… but for me the unknown cost will be the travel to London and back to York… I’m hoping for a couple of cheap train tickets, maybe £20 or £30 each way (or less?)and then I’ll investigate where to stay.

Any potential hosts for a very keen composter? House trained, likes washing up, free composting advice….