Small Scale Utopia

[Reginald Ret]

I would like such a community house thingy Kai mentioned.
As long as people stay the fuck out of my room(unless invited, obviously).
I imagine it is a bit cheaper too.

[Triple Zero]

Actually, most of them had outside jobs, and those that didn't the "crops" they sold were weed.  Some people (my dad, the woman who later became my stepmom and one of the other families) grew enough food that we could have theoretically lived entirely on it, but we still bought things like cheese, which dad never got the hang of making, and flour, which takes more acreage to grow than we had available.  Most people bought the majority of their food.  We had our own water system and most of us were off grid as far as electricity goes, outhouses instead of sewage, but we were not a fully autonomous commune like some.  The non weed crops on the farm were pretty much entirely for internal consumption with the exception of the milk from dad's cow, cause cows produce a LOT of milk and just the people on the farm could not have drunk it all.

Hm, a shame your dad couldnt get the hang of making cheese. Cause cheese is a great way of using up surplus milk.

What's so hard about it btw? You need rennet, and that's it, basically. If you want fancy cheese, you can use a little chunk or blue fluff of whatever you want as a starting culture and that works too.

Ok I never tried it because the only place I could find rennet was the eco green hippie store and they sold it (like everything) at an insane price.

But I did make paneer a few times, which is as easy as squirting a lemon into two litres of milk, adding some cumin and salt, boiling shortly and straining the liquid from the curds. Then you press it and optionally smoke it or burn the outside.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Except "self sufficient" means something different.

I meant self-sufficiency in the sense used to discuss sustainable living, not self-sufficiency as in a closed economy. 

In that case, I'm already self-sufficient.

Dok, just cause the city won't let you use their sewage system anymore doesn't mean you're self-sufficient... it just means you plug the pipes up too often.

Okay, Rat, seriously. You just went from off the grid is self sufficiency, which is sustainable living, but it ISN'T sustainable living, just my personal definition of what sustainable happens to be.

Wait, what? I think I'm confused and maybe I should have clarified my terms

"Off the Grid" in the sense I am using it can be defined as "living in a self-sufficient manner without reliance on one or more public utilities." That's how its used by the people I talked to and that's how I used it... Sorry if that was unclear

'self-sufficiency' in the usage here means that the home is capable of running without external resources, particularly fossil fuels. IE it requires no outside resources for energy generation etc.

Sustainable Living I meant as the process of reducing your use of natural resources by altering your lifestyle (carbon footprint, transportation, food choices etc).

Now, its entirely possible that the people I've talked to are using these words improperly. If so, then sorry for any confusion.

In the instance of these Earthships, they are 'off the grid' in that they are not connected to public utilities. Many of the individuals/families are "self-sufficient" since the energy they use and the crops they grow mean that they don't rely on grocery stores, utilities etc.  And they consider it sustainable living because its a drastically reduced carbon footprint, water is cycled so that gray water is automatically pumped into the garden, sewage is incinerated in a solar toilet system that creates good planting soil. Also, they're big on earthships not impacting the environment in the way that wood/brick houses do.

So, besides using the Internet to make money, they don't really rely on the outside for anything.

Which terms should I use for that sort of living?

[Kai]

Because somebody can be living sustainably and yet still be "on the grid".

Which lead to:

Except "self sufficient" means something different.

I meant self-sufficiency in the sense used to discuss sustainable living, not self-sufficiency as in a closed economy. 

In that case, I'm already self-sufficient.

Yes? Or have I misinterpreted your terms /again/?

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Because somebody can be living sustainably and yet still be "on the grid".

Which lead to:

Except "self sufficient" means something different.

I meant self-sufficiency in the sense used to discuss sustainable living, not self-sufficiency as in a closed economy. 

In that case, I'm already self-sufficient.

Yes? Or have I misinterpreted your terms /again/?

Nah, I think I used the wrong word there.

I should have defined the terms like I just did in the last post.

[BabylonHoruv]

Actually, most of them had outside jobs, and those that didn't the "crops" they sold were weed.  Some people (my dad, the woman who later became my stepmom and one of the other families) grew enough food that we could have theoretically lived entirely on it, but we still bought things like cheese, which dad never got the hang of making, and flour, which takes more acreage to grow than we had available.  Most people bought the majority of their food.  We had our own water system and most of us were off grid as far as electricity goes, outhouses instead of sewage, but we were not a fully autonomous commune like some.  The non weed crops on the farm were pretty much entirely for internal consumption with the exception of the milk from dad's cow, cause cows produce a LOT of milk and just the people on the farm could not have drunk it all.

Hm, a shame your dad couldnt get the hang of making cheese. Cause cheese is a great way of using up surplus milk.

What's so hard about it btw? You need rennet, and that's it, basically. If you want fancy cheese, you can use a little chunk or blue fluff of whatever you want as a starting culture and that works too.

Ok I never tried it because the only place I could find rennet was the eco green hippie store and they sold it (like everything) at an insane price.

But I did make paneer a few times, which is as easy as squirting a lemon into two litres of milk, adding some cumin and salt, boiling shortly and straining the liquid from the curds. Then you press it and optionally smoke it or burn the outside.

I've also made paneer, it's easy and fun, and my dad was actually fairly decent at making fresh cheese.  The problem was aging it.  After it had been aged a while it came out tasting like unwashed feet.  I think the problem was the wax personally, but after making a mess of it a couple times dad decided to stick with yogurt, butter and ice cream, all of which he made pretty well.

[BabylonHoruv]

Except "self sufficient" means something different.

I meant self-sufficiency in the sense used to discuss sustainable living, not self-sufficiency as in a closed economy. 

In that case, I'm already self-sufficient.

Dok, just cause the city won't let you use their sewage system anymore doesn't mean you're self-sufficient... it just means you plug the pipes up too often.

Okay, Rat, seriously. You just went from off the grid is self sufficiency, which is sustainable living, but it ISN'T sustainable living, just my personal definition of what sustainable happens to be.

Wait, what? I think I'm confused and maybe I should have clarified my terms

"Off the Grid" in the sense I am using it can be defined as "living in a self-sufficient manner without reliance on one or more public utilities." That's how its used by the people I talked to and that's how I used it... Sorry if that was unclear

'self-sufficiency' in the usage here means that the home is capable of running without external resources, particularly fossil fuels. IE it requires no outside resources for energy generation etc.

Sustainable Living I meant as the process of reducing your use of natural resources by altering your lifestyle (carbon footprint, transportation, food choices etc).

Now, its entirely possible that the people I've talked to are using these words improperly. If so, then sorry for any confusion.

In the instance of these Earthships, they are 'off the grid' in that they are not connected to public utilities. Many of the individuals/families are "self-sufficient" since the energy they use and the crops they grow mean that they don't rely on grocery stores, utilities etc.  And they consider it sustainable living because its a drastically reduced carbon footprint, water is cycled so that gray water is automatically pumped into the garden, sewage is incinerated in a solar toilet system that creates good planting soil. Also, they're big on earthships not impacting the environment in the way that wood/brick houses do.

So, besides using the Internet to make money, they don't really rely on the outside for anything.

Which terms should I use for that sort of living?

I think the issue may have been that the internet is a public utility.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Except "self sufficient" means something different.

I meant self-sufficiency in the sense used to discuss sustainable living, not self-sufficiency as in a closed economy. 

In that case, I'm already self-sufficient.

Dok, just cause the city won't let you use their sewage system anymore doesn't mean you're self-sufficient... it just means you plug the pipes up too often.

Okay, Rat, seriously. You just went from off the grid is self sufficiency, which is sustainable living, but it ISN'T sustainable living, just my personal definition of what sustainable happens to be.

Wait, what? I think I'm confused and maybe I should have clarified my terms

"Off the Grid" in the sense I am using it can be defined as "living in a self-sufficient manner without reliance on one or more public utilities." That's how its used by the people I talked to and that's how I used it... Sorry if that was unclear

'self-sufficiency' in the usage here means that the home is capable of running without external resources, particularly fossil fuels. IE it requires no outside resources for energy generation etc.

Sustainable Living I meant as the process of reducing your use of natural resources by altering your lifestyle (carbon footprint, transportation, food choices etc).

Now, its entirely possible that the people I've talked to are using these words improperly. If so, then sorry for any confusion.

In the instance of these Earthships, they are 'off the grid' in that they are not connected to public utilities. Many of the individuals/families are "self-sufficient" since the energy they use and the crops they grow mean that they don't rely on grocery stores, utilities etc.  And they consider it sustainable living because its a drastically reduced carbon footprint, water is cycled so that gray water is automatically pumped into the garden, sewage is incinerated in a solar toilet system that creates good planting soil. Also, they're big on earthships not impacting the environment in the way that wood/brick houses do.

So, besides using the Internet to make money, they don't really rely on the outside for anything.

Which terms should I use for that sort of living?

I think the issue may have been that the internet is a public utility.

Which is why I said that its no longer City Mouse OR Country Mouse. We're gonna end up with a hybrid.

The net and modern technology means that people will be able to live way the fuck out of the way, and still make money. People will be able to dedicate hours a day to their gardens, generators, home building AND STILL make teh monies on teh Net.

The old 60's hippie idea of being 100% disconnected can still work, there are still some Utopian groups that cling to that view... but the future of communes/self-sufficient systems etc... are, in my opinion, gonna use the Internet to generate easy money.  Site management, component development for CMS solutions like Joomla, Drupal, etc. Graphic design etc etc can all be done from home. If you're not paying energy costs, grocery costs etc that money can easily be sufficient to live on.

I don't think being completely separate from society is the way to go... separate from urban life while still making money off of it though... that seems doable to me and the net makes it easy. I know a guy that runs some of these stupid aggregate sites that are filled with banner ads... He makes thousands of dollars a year on sites that he does little to nothing to manage... he doesn't eve create the content, its crazy.