One Community

[trix]

I appreciate the feedback and will integrate it to the best of my ability.

I'll give you equally candid feedback. This feels more like trolling than an attempt to be constructive or helpful. Your guys' attitude towards me and and the project, including repeated profanity, personal attacks and questions that go far beyond focusing on facts and data, and general rudeness lead me to believe you'll never be satisfied with my answers.

I'll keep working. If you run into others like me actually getting things done and working to create a better world, I hope your approach will be more constructive. If it is, you'll probably maintain a more receptive audience. Reading your replies, I think there's more abuse here than help and I'm returning to focusing on what needs to be done rather than continue to participate here. As I said, I'll integrate what you've said though. Thank you for the input.

I think part of this is not quite understanding where you are.  This may be my mistake, as I should have warned you when I sent you the link. 

I appreciate you taking the time to come here and respond directly.  Try to see each persons response individually, as this is a place that contains many who love to troll.

As someone who is much more familiar with the general nature of this forum, I can tell you that your reception here is surprisingly positive.  Several highly respected members that are experts in areas your project needs experts in, have shown interest in this.  Many others are highly skeptical and even offensive, yes, me included, but that's the internet and it shouldn't stop you.

I will continue to watch the progress and see if anything happens, but if you really want this thing to be successful, or at least to maximize the chances, many of the questions that you haven't answered should be answered before people seriously consider contributing time or money to your project.

I understand you are busy and thus unlikely to take the time to really understand your audience here, but believe me when I tell you it is larger, more diverse, and made up of many more professionals and experts than you likely realize.  If you were able to truly satisfy the questions of many of those here and convince a few of the right folks I think you'd be very surprised at the result.

---

If Jae flounced well, I suppose we tried.  I agree with Nigel that it's probably not a scam, and I also believe there is probably a lot of people involved who take it completely seriously and will do whatever it takes to get it going.

I just don't see their approach to funding as something that seems like it would work out.  They admit to needing millions of dollars, that's the part that gets me, yet the questions here about financial specifics go unanswered.  I get the impression that out of all their volunteers, they don't have enough business professionals or folks that know how to prepare the information being requested.  Maybe that's the problem.

[Junkenstein]

For absence of doubt and total clarity, I'm not trolling.

Your answers lack any substance to relatively simple questions. Answers provided raise red flags like drunk day at NASCAR.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

When criticism and/or questions are taken as trolling, I assume up front that something religious is going on, and I lose interest.  And that's what happened right there.

[Pergamos]

I checked out the website a few years ago,  they were keeping the location secret because planning to buy then.  If you can't get a piece of land bought in a few years then I am doubtful as to your ability to do anything other than make a confusing website.

[Pergamos]

Buying land is not hard to do, for someone middle class.  There is an absurd amount of really cheap land in the SW which is all really nicely suited to solar power, and which is also in a climate that works really well with earth based construction (Adobe or earthbag)  it's also a great area for figuring out water sustainability.  It's what I am most aware of since I live in the SW but there is cheap land all over the country and that they haven't bought any yet is a pretty huge red flag.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I appreciate the feedback and will integrate it to the best of my ability.

I'll give you equally candid feedback. This feels more like trolling than an attempt to be constructive or helpful. Your guys' attitude towards me and and the project, including repeated profanity, personal attacks and questions that go far beyond focusing on facts and data, and general rudeness lead me to believe you'll never be satisfied with my answers.

I'll keep working. If you run into others like me actually getting things done and working to create a better world, I hope your approach will be more constructive. If it is, you'll probably maintain a more receptive audience. Reading your replies, I think there's more abuse here than help and I'm returning to focusing on what needs to be done rather than continue to participate here. As I said, I'll integrate what you've said though. Thank you for the input.

Oh, yes, of course. That makes perfect sense. We somehow lured you here to troll you by asking critical, probing questions about your project. Makes perfect sense, and is much, much easier than answering the questions or asking yourself whether the criticisms are valid and might help your project.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

For absence of doubt and total clarity, I'm not trolling.

Your answers lack any substance to relatively simple questions. Answers provided raise red flags like drunk day at NASCAR.

I kind of want to link him to a real CV. It's possible that he doesn't know what one looks like. Also to some of the many small communities around the world who are already doing what he wants to do, but on a small scale. I would normally anticipate that someone spearheading such a project would already be familiar with many ongoing sustainability projects and have worked for or with several of them, but since he doesn't have a CV I can't tell who he's worked with or what his experience is.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I have to say, if this feels like trolling he probably shouldn't apply for any grants (of which there are many out there - I wonder if he is aware of this or has grantwriting experience?) because they will be much harder on him when they return his grant proposal the first time.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I checked out the website a few years ago,  they were keeping the location secret because planning to buy then.  If you can't get a piece of land bought in a few years then I am doubtful as to your ability to do anything other than make a confusing website.

who?  The Citadel, or these guys?   

Any time - EVERY time - a group decides to buy land to sequester themselves on, the outcome is either hilariously awful (hello, Jonestown!) or nothing happens at all.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Buying land is not hard to do, for someone middle class.  There is an absurd amount of really cheap land in the SW which is all really nicely suited to solar power, and which is also in a climate that works really well with earth based construction (Adobe or earthbag)  it's also a great area for figuring out water sustainability.  It's what I am most aware of since I live in the SW but there is cheap land all over the country and that they haven't bought any yet is a pretty huge red flag.

Land is cheap here because it's EVIL and nothing grows¹ and EVERYBODY DIES.



¹ At least not without a water deficit from hell.  You see all those cotton farms up by Gila Bend?  That's why both major rivers are empty.  well, that and a 6:1 actual-to-sustainable population.

[Junkenstein]

I have to say, if this feels like trolling he probably shouldn't apply for any grants (of which there are many out there - I wonder if he is aware of this or has grantwriting experience?) because they will be much harder on him when they return his grant proposal the first time.

They'd laugh him out the door based on the financial information and statements alone. Hence the reliance on volunteers and eventual crowdfunding. There's the other slightly problematic issue where it's all totally not a scam (Which isn't even strongly denied), funders/investors and the like have a bit of experience in spotting possible flaws so they don't just piss all their money away. It's why they like plans, projections and actual steps towards the goal to be demonstrated.

This guy has been trying to buy the same bit of land in this "high value tourist trap" for many years.
Q If said land is this desirable, and there's that much demand(Local places booked out 6 months ahead, guests by default!) , why hasn't any random chain thing grabbed it?
A Because it isn't any of the above. Or just simply does not exist.

It's almost tempting to sign his NDA because I expect it has the legal weight of "please don't". If it exists at all.

 

the outcome is either hilariously awful (hello, Jonestown!)

That's almost worth a list and thread of it's own. There's many examples and they all go wrong in spectacular ways.

[Junkenstein]

When criticism and/or questions are taken as trolling, I assume up front that something religious is going on, and I lose interest.  And that's what happened right there.

That would still make this a type 4. If anyone thinks otherwise, I have national monuments for sale, very cheap, transportation included.

[Pergamos]

Buying land is not hard to do, for someone middle class.  There is an absurd amount of really cheap land in the SW which is all really nicely suited to solar power, and which is also in a climate that works really well with earth based construction (Adobe or earthbag)  it's also a great area for figuring out water sustainability.  It's what I am most aware of since I live in the SW but there is cheap land all over the country and that they haven't bought any yet is a pretty huge red flag.

Land is cheap here because it's EVIL and nothing grows¹ and EVERYBODY DIES.



¹ At least not without a water deficit from hell.  You see all those cotton farms up by Gila Bend?  That's why both major rivers are empty.  well, that and a 6:1 actual-to-sustainable population.

That's why it's a great place to work on sustainable water use.  It's a sort of a forced crisis situation and there are a lot of ways to address it.  Rainwater harvesting during monsoon, aquaponics, greywater, waterless toilets among other options.  An intentional community could figure out how to live on the rather small amount of rainwater and their techniques could be used by the larger population.  The larger population isn't really trying at all, as far as I can tell. 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Rainwater harvesting during monsoon

Aquifers?  who needs 'em?  Dude, out on Sandario road there are artificial lakes designed solely to shove water deep underground.  which is water management, but the exact opposite of everyone collecting their own rainwater and dying of fowleri or e colli.

waterless toilets among other options.

we have those on the mountain.  It's roughly the same as pissing in the corner of your office, and cleaning them out takes water and loads and loads of bleach.

 

An intentional community could figure out how to live on the rather small amount of rainwater and their techniques could be used by the larger population.  The larger population isn't really trying at all, as far as I can tell.

Of course they aren't.  Because nobody is making them do it (yet).  However, I am going to file the idea of 6 million people collecting their own water (just in the two major cities), for my future efforts in eradicating the puny humans.

[Pergamos]

I dunno.  Id like to see people trying.  Actually, I do see people trying, there's a few intentional communities in the area, they just don't do the sort of publicity that One Community does.  Observation seems to imply that the more likely a group of people is to actually be doing worthwhile work in this area is, the less likely they are to have extensively documented it.