[lbo-talk] Yannis and new queer agenda show...

Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
Mon Jun 25 11:43:47 PDT 2012


No reason whatever for any private individual not using Microsoft if that is the most convenient. Again, it is only anti-political moralism that would object.

Carrol

-----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of shag carpet bomb Sent: Monday, June 25, 2012 9:20 AM To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Yannis and new queer agenda show...

Wrt open source, I hate to say it but I'm currently working in a windows shop. All microsoft, all the time. After working for years with the patched up hodge podge of open source toolery + MS word / excel + whatever was cheap 'n' easy for email ... all I can say is: Microsoft's office productivity and project management tools kick the ass of anything else I've ever used.

I'm not clear on the use of "manager" and "mini-manager" here. and i'm especially confused by "inner mini-manager". Is the role of manager a bad thing, to be gotten rid of?

Tayssir wrote: <> I agree. Right when you posted this, I simultaneously just posted a <> more pessimistic response (to one of your posts, in fact); and I hope <> you find much in it to agree with? <> <> I'm simultaneously excited about Doug's teasers about Yanis's upcoming <> story, and cynical about the hyperindividualist tech company-men who <> subordinate themselves so utterly to their boss's interests. <> ("Anarchism for the privileged" isn't any decent kind of anarchism.) <> <> I'm also excited over reading about highly participatory schools. More <> is naturally better. But to the extent that it's mainly privileged <> children who attend them and proceed to more effectively dominate <> other former children, there's also something horrific and terrible <> about their existence. I had such conflicting feelings of wonder and <> revulsion, the last time I stood in one of these schools and saw the <> happy/privileged children running around those benevolent/smug <> teachers. <> <> <> All the best, <> Tj <> <> <> On Mon, Jun 25, 2012 at 1:27 PM, lasko <lascaux at riseup.net> wrote: <>> On 6/25/12 6:31 AM, Tayssir John Gabbour wrote: <>>> <>>> Some resources to momentarily sate those impatient to hear more <>>> about <>>> Valve's workplace... <>> <>> <>> I'm not sure what this shows except that capitalist enterprises can <>> function <>> without managers or by making everyone into a manager - that's what <>> the <>> Github experience is, apparently: <>> <>> "It's often cited that GitHub doesn't have managers. In my opinion, <>> a better <>> way to describe the phenomenon would be to say that everyone at <>> GitHub is a <>> manager. Instead of assigning 100% management duties to individuals, <>> the <>> basic role of management is spread between 1.) every single <>> employee, and <>> 2.) a set of custom in-house tools that serve to keep everyone in <>> the know <>> with regards to other projects." <>> <>> http://tomayko.com/writings/management-style <>> <>> It is possible to frame the cultivation of your inner mini-manager <>> combined <>> with technologies of surveillance in a less positive fashion. <>> <>> Furthermore, the essential capitalist relation of production - <>> private <>> property - is still intact. The broader relations of production <>> beyond a <>> group of elite programmers at a single company is unaddressed. <>> <>> With Valve, a producer of "first-person shooter" games, you have not <>> just <>> "the perfect place to test things like virtual currencies, real-time <>> econometric modeling, and democratic, egalitarian, long-term public <>> planning," but also the reproduction and intensification of less <>> desirable <>> activities. Refer to Valve's scholarly publication "Rendering Wounds <>> in Left <>> 4 Dead 2." <>> <>> Yannis' second blog post, in describing the gamer economy within <>> Valve's <>> Steam platform, repeats what someone following Graeber might call <>> the barter <>> fallacy. On examination, Steam's barter economy would seem to <>> confirm <>> Graeber: it arose in a currency-less virtual world populated by <>> people <>> already accustomed to real-world currencies. The upcoming <>> development of <>> their "virtual currency" is taking place in a virtual world where <>> the entire <>> population has the role of soldier. <>> ___________________________________ <>> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk <> ___________________________________ <> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk <>

-- http://cleandraws.com Wear Clean Draws ('coz there's 5 million ways to kill a CEO)

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