- Spanish Indignados Return to City Squares
- Cooperative Leaders Meet with White House
- The Bank Vs. America Showdown
- A Vision of America the Possible
- Move Our Money Month
- How I Found Happiness (in 130 Square Feet)
- Mobile Slaughterhouses Help Meat Go Local
- Food, population and climate change: Where are we headed and what can we do?
- OWS Marks May Day With a Beatific Vision and a Big March
- May Day in Context
These articles are commissioned, or are the best that we have found on the web, since the last issue.
A new 130-page book written by 24 members of New Zealand’s most successful Local Employment & Trading System is now available. Get A Handle on H.A.N.D.S. can help anyone better understand and utilise a complementary currency and assist and inspire community groups wanting to start their own. In 48 varied pieces, with nearly 50 graphics and photos, the book explores the how-tos, philosophy and significance of New Zealand's foremost community currency.
Golden Bay H.A.N.D.S. has published a new 130-page book, Get A HANDle on H.A.N.D.S. (How About Non Dollar System): 24 members reflect on New Zealand’s foremost community currency.
The back cover blurb reads:
Only after the fundamental causes of systemic economic failures are eliminated will evolution towards a sustainable and socially just global economy become feasible.
The current economic crisis has renewed interest in the need for
global monetary reform. Only after the fundamental causes of systemic
economic failures are eliminated will evolution towards a sustainable and
socially just global economy become feasible.
But how should the monetary system be reformed? What should new
money be like, what purposes should it meet and what functions should it
perform? The ultimate aim of the First International Social Transformation
Conference on Energy Currency is to place the study of alternative
The track-record of STRO (Social Trade Organization, previously Strohalm) is unrivelad in the currency scene. Since 30+ years they developed currency systems all around the world, today focussing on Latin America and their flagship software Cyclos. We met founder Henk van Arkel at their headquaters in Utrecht, NL.
What are the questions you would most want to explore with fellow movers and shakers in the complementary currency movement?
My question is: How to get the currency thinking into the mainstream? But more then talking, I prefer to create examples and hope that other will do the same. That is what its all about. And on the long run, sustainability comes from the diversity of 1000 people trying, even if only one of them succeeds. That will be the success of everybody.
The western most province of Austria, Vorarlberg, is home to the reputable "Talente" currency system. From its start as a province-wide timebank in 1996 it succeeded to combine different targeted currency models and even got the local authorities to accept some of them for tax and fees. We sat down with Rolf Schilling, long standing developer and outreach person of the Talente model, to talk about the state of the movement, particular in the German speaking countries.
What are the questions you would most want to explore with fellow movers and shakers in the complementary currency movement?
The most important issue is that of practical implementations of CC ideas.
As much in our own system as in the Regiogeldverband we are now trying to move from science and theory into practice, which is never as straight forward as theory makes us believe. And top-down implementations will not really work, we need to meet people at eye-level.
While Madison, Wisconsin had been more in the news for their public struggle against right wing legislators last year, Dane County TimeBank has been constantly setting benchmarks for successful currency-led community developments. We talked to its founder, director and senior activist Stephanie Rearick.
What are the questions you would most want to explore with fellow movers and shakers in the complementary currency movement?
John Rogers has been working on the forefront of the CC movement for nineteen years, fourteen as a LETS coordinator, Time Bank Developer and researcher in Wales and since 2007 as a trainer, consultant and author based in Germany. There, we asked John about the history and future of the movement.
What are the questions you would most want to explore with fellow movers and shakers in the complementary currency movement?
Innovative Open Source On-line Banking Software Counters Economic Crisis with own Currency
Today, the Social Trade Organisation released its banking software Cyclos 3.6.
An overview of the world-wide currency movement.
Ever since the crash several years ago, Americans have felt precarious about the nation's economy and the value of its currency. Money seems to take inconceivable, abstract, and even magical forms, traveling around the world at lightning speed with little oversight and obvious mismanagement.
The short article explores the Occupy Wall St. movement in the context of recent research on the participatory governance of money and how the two movements together empower community.
“The Occupy Wall Street Movement and Shared Monetary Governance”
S. Destinie Jones, destinie.jones@montgomerycollege.edu October, 2011, Washington, DC. (This article does not reflect the views of Montgomery College)
Local currencies are not an end in themselves. Bruce Colley explains how a local currency is intrinsically connected to the local economy
Any study of local/community currency systems will reveal that many of these have failed. Of the ones that have survived, many have had very minimal economic impact. In fact, it is possible through a rather basic economic analysis, to demonstrate that even many of the surviving systems have accounted for an extremely small portion of economic activity in the regions they serve. While that analysis is not the purpose of this article, it does make one wonder if there is some greater force at work here, or some overarching law which constrains the success of CC systems.
Big players who want to get a piece of the lucrative financial services pie (don't forget the rest of the economy is depressed) are moving into online payment systems. to that end, the law is being upgraded. Startups without capital, privacy activists, bitcoin, and others will all need lots of capital and legal approval in order to sell payment services.
Most people don't regularly check the California Senate Committee on Banking, Finance and Insurance for the latest news about potential legislation, and so it's no surprise that most people have never heard of California Assembly Bill 2789. That's too bad, because California AB 2789, passed into law in September, 2010 and effective January 1, 2011 as the Money Transmission Act, is a ticking time bomb, and the big red numbers are glowing "50" as of midnight tonight.
If an equal dollar doesn't equal a dollar, what does an equal dollar equate?
Last year, the Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced an increase in the amount that the Federal Reserve Banking system will charge for overnight banking. That decision, along with other factors, is causing members of our community to experience the affects of the declining purchasing power of the US dollar. For example, last year this time it cost the average Philadelphian $30 to fill up a 13.2-gallon gas tank. Today, it costs them $45 to fill up the same gas tank. The $100 spent at the grocery store last year, buys the average person less groceries this year.
In this article for shareable, I wanted to explain that money is only one dimension of life and that changing money is part and parcel of changing our lives.
As a monetary activist, I shun state-sanctioned-commercial-
Though connected to social justice issues, monetary reform is not necessarily linked to either side of the political spectrum. This promotion of the questionable 'Transition' currencies comes from the UK far right.
Everyone knows that the current banking system is at the root of many of the economic evils we face as a Nation. The banks enslave people with interest and stifle business investment.
Yet Nationalists are not looking hard enough at alternatives like Credit Unions and, dare I say it, the Islamic banking system – which forbids the charging of interest on loans (usury). I’d like to kick off some debate with a very brief look at one alternative, the idea of local currency systems.
It seems that in the last 3 months, local monies have been squeezed out of the conversation, as all attention is directed towards the visibly crumbling global economy. We are seeing widening discussion about the role of gold, and the effects of printing money on prices and wealth distribution. We will see increasing calls for a return to the gold standard, and while this would prevent inflation it would not change the power base significantly or prevent corruption.
This very well written introduction to why we need differently designed currency has an interesting review of historical experiences, in particular how evolutions after the meltdown of 1929 could help find solutions for the meltdown of 2008.
During the Great Depression, the esteemed Yale economist Irving Fisher came to a stark realization. In the midst of this grave economic crisis he observed that not only were the majority of Americans suffering as a consequence of poor monetary policies, but also in large part they were suffering needlessly. In the aftermath of Black Tuesday, October 29, 1929, millions were left unemployed and in severe financial hardship.
Juan Esteban Lopez is from Medellín, Colombia, and has been living in Venezuela for the past four years where he has helped coordinate the Network of Exchange Systems, which has been implementing local currencies in many different communities in Venezuela.
Ithaca hours is one of the most successful community currencies running today. This is largely due to the groundwork and commitment of Paul Glover. We caught up with him in Holland to find out how he sees the CC world.
What are the questions you would most want to explore with fellow movers and shakers in the complementary currency movement?
The comparability of local currencies with digital currency. Systems of intertrade and clearance between all these currencies, with standards of confederation to validate each currency´s integrity and vitality.
What recent developments in the field do you find most exciting?
I became acquainted with Zoltán MIKHELLER, founder of Bakonyi CsereKör a community based LETS circle during my research work, and conducted an email interview with him, that gives some detail about the history and activities of this circle.
If you go around in Várpalota, in a town in Western Hungary with population 23 thousands, you may see 25 km away in the horizon the Lake Balaton and the Bakony Mountains. During socialist era it was a mining town with chemical industry, but the mines and the factories have been closed. Most of the citizens work now in the nearby cities. The socialistic industrial era’s child stepping in an elderly age is looking for a sustainable way of living.
Axiological values, experimental social netsorking and alternative currency
Axiological Economy – redistribution of a finite amount of community currency in assistance of an impartial algorithm that considers daily peer axiological valuations and transactions.
While the Italian state has been moving against African immigration for many years, one small town is welcoming immigrants to replace its dwindling population, and using localised Euros as part of the strategy.
Riace, a small town in southern Italy perhaps best known for the Riace bronzes, two splendidly well preserved life-size Greek bronze statues that were found in the Mediterranean sea off the coast there, is making history of a different kind these days.
While supporting the working classes in the ongoing upheaval in Madison, Wisconsin, USA, the Dane County Time Bank is looking forward to making mutual credit accounting much easier for communities to adopt. Stephanie Rearick took the time to tell us more.
As you may have heard in the news (did you see the one on Fox News where protestors are pushing cops and there are palm trees in the background? That wasn't here during our peaceful protests but they pretended it was) Madison, Wisconsin has its own kind of emergency, this one stemming from a perceived 'fiscal crisis' and draconian power grabs and privatization efforts stemming from it and being repeated nationally and in states, cities and towns around the United States.
John Rogers' regular column.
Some people tell me off for going on about the importance of Governance in getting community currencies to fly. They say a well-designed CC ‘should run itself’. That’s a nice theory, but I don’t know any CC that has stood the test of time without some form of governance at work ie someone making decisions.
In this series of interviews with the movement's pioneers, we take a big picture look at challenges and opportunities in the complementary currency movement. In this second interview, Stephen de Meulenaere...
After 3 years of Transition Towns currency experiments in the UK, how far have we come?
For print only - See attachment
Ripple is a decentralised payment system which finds 'trust' pathways between people in order to clear debts with minimum use of money.
What's the basic idea? Who is it for and what problem does it solve?
A innovative community in Western Australia is about to issue notes on the basis of local emission reduction projects. Each note tells a story!
Maia Maia ERCS, a local Western Australian group, has created a new way for local communities to make their efforts to reduce carbon pollution, which are normally invisible, into a tangible form of ‘community money’. The approach is similar to simple loyalty programmes such as frequent flyer points.
The gold standard was dropped because it wasn't elastic enough to supply ever increasing quantities of money. But many countries now, and US states are voting with their feet, and moving back towards 'sound' money.
FBI Busts Mastermind Criminal For Issuing Silver Currency, Demanding Repeal Of Fed And IRS; Faces 15 Years In Prison
Empowering local communities and unlocking new levels of value creation and representation via digital technologies are the main goals of Dr. Schwartz’s projects, aiming at the re-designing of our relationship to the economic value of imagination and the social control of property.
Renata Lemos-Morais: You have recently produced and directed a short documentary about Creative Currencies in Latin America. Could you tell us a bit about its process and its findings?
The Lyttelton Time Bank played a vital part in the local response to the recent New Zealand quakes. This report is from the ground.
If anyone had any doubts about the huge role that Time Banking can play in holding a community together, turn to the experience of the people of Lyttelton.
Lyttelton was at the epicentre of the recent devastating earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, and is Christchurch’s port town (3000). Its harbour sits on the inside of an extinct volcano linked to the ocean. It is beautiful.
BitCoin, a new decentralised, scarce, anonymous money technology has been getting attention recently. But is generating money the best use of scarce energy resources? And could it scale to underpin an economy?
With the EFF’s announcement that they would being accepting BitCoin donations, the alternative money community began to take a larger interest. I certainly did, and found that there are good and bad things about this form of money. In the end, BitCoins create a perverse incentive to consume energy to “create money.” Here is why.
A small group of entrepreneurs in Sopron (population 57 thousand, near Hungary’s western border) decided in late 2008 to revive the local economy. They created a complementary currency, called Kékfrank. The term means ‘blue franc’, and a famous red wine from the region is called Kékfrankos
During the transition period 1989-1998, Hungary's centrally-planned economy became a free- market economy. State-owned companies, for the most part, ceased trading. The Hungarian economy declined, numbers in work fell drastically and reliance on imports increased. These trends are still gaining pace. Local retailers felt the effects, and multinational retail chains started to gain market share.
My healthcare journey through the US health insurance industry, conventional medicine, and alternative medicine using different means of exchange.
If you think you’re covered by health insurance, think again. According to a 2007 study in the American Journal of Medicine, illness and medical bills caused 62% of all bankruptcies and most of those people were insured and middle class. Meanwhile, “the five largest health-insurance companies racked up combined profits of $12.2 billion, up 56 percent over 2008”, according to a report by Health Care for American Now based on SEC filings. For the drug industry, it's as if the recession never happened.
Here's a story of initiative which takes into part the distinction between scarce and abundant goods and creates a complementary currency to deal with some of the structural flaws of our myopic economy.
In theory, the economy defines value of scarce goods by the rule of supply and demand. In other words, the value of a good depends on the quantity of the good available (supply) and on the appeal of people to the good (demand).
Nonetheless, this model does not apply to an abundant good because if there was enough of the good for everyone, why would you even set a price on it if you could get it for free one way or another?
A photograph, a set of instructions, or even a book may be copied as many times as you'd like if digitalized. By this we may say that every digital good is an abundant good in essence.
Now, why should we contribute to the production of abundant goods if in theory they have no value?
The following case study describes the Universal Digital Currency (UDC), a central distributed digital currency backed on digital goods that mends our relationship to the value of abundant goods and promotes human development marvellously.
The ubiquity of mobile phones and the availability of back-end software should make CCs a no-brainer
It’s easy to talk about how handheld, networked computers (that’s what our cell phones are, after all) promote the decentralization of content creation, file exchange and even culture — but what about the stuff that’s so centralized we stop thinking about it as even up for discussion? That’s right: I’m talking about money.
CCs can be viewed, and promoted in many different ways. This post from 2007 is no less relevant today.
In theory I agree that an elevator pitch helps us focus on the “essence” of a thing, but my experience has been that there really is no single elevator pitch for cc. I now see this experience itself as a clue to the essence of community currency.
Rader puzzles over theSuperfluid, and with a little help from founder Nathan Solomon, understands how 'sloppy' currencies can perform a different function to everyday currencies.
The SuperFluid is a collaboration platform waiting for its users to figure out how to use it. The primary differentiator it offers is a unique alternative currency called Quid. Each user starts off with 200 Quid which they can then spend on services offered by other SuperFluid users. In order to earn additional Quid users must list their own services and thereby deliver value to members of the community.
Analyses of the financial crisis present us with a false dichotomy, argues Greco. We need to look deeper into the systemic issues inherent to the design of money.
In a recent Washington Post article titled "Europe's ominous reckoning", economist Robert Samuelson correctly argued that "Ireland's economic crisis is ... not about Ireland." What he seems to not recognize is that "Europe's ominous reckoning" is not about Europe.
Mellor argues that the debt issued from the public purse, rather than from private banks would more likely be used for public benefit.
Sometimes introducing accounting to a functioning voluntary sphere can actually be counter productive. If the UK government is to support time banking, it must be sensitive when paying professionals to work alongside volunteers.
Having surrendered all the money to banks, the UK government is now turning to communities to provide essential services for free. This is called the 'Big Society'. Increasingly they are mentioning timebanking as a way to encourage voluntarism and build community.
Lewisham is the unlikely homeland of time banking, a revolutionary idea based on mutual self-help.
Rushey Green Time Bank, founded in 1998, was one of the first time banks to be set up in the country and has become a benchmark for others across the UK.
The latest in Transition Towns series of square books is by academic Peter North. It is a survey of different currency models and is full of stories and practical experience.
I’ve really enjoyed the last three books to come out of the Transition Books stable, so I was pleased to see the latest instalment was out: Local Money – how to make it happen in your community. It’s another big square book, following Local Food, and it’s got the same practical, inspiring, can-do approach. This time, it’s all about creating local money networks.
This article is a adapted from the introduction to the upcoming book, Sacred Economics. For more of Charles Eisenstein, and to support his work, Visit the site for his first book, Ascent of Humanity
Planning meeting for local currency in Columbia Basin, in the Kootenays, British Columbia, Canada.
Does anything energize like good synergy? I doubt it. When you share a grand vision with a group of like minded people and work hard together to achieve it, there's nothing quite as fulfilling.
Túmin, which means "money" in the Totonaca indigenous language, is a community currency now circulating among 80 vendors selling their products at an alternative market in the town of Espinal, in the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz.
Market in Espinal where the túmin community currency is used.
Credit: Courtesy of Intercultural University of Veracruz
It is equivalent to one Mexican peso, and each vendor was initially given 500 units, which they are using to buy and sell goods and services.
The US state of Virginia wants to issue it's own money in case Federal Reserve money fails catastrophically. David Boyle of New Economics Foundation argues that they are going about it the wrong way.
Throughout the last 25 years of our existence - the only 25 years that nef has existed - we have advocated the idea of multiple currencies. Open money pioneer Michael Linton spoke at our first conferences. So did the green dollar pioneer David Weston. We have been supporting the Brixton pound experiment, just as we have been cheering on the Berkshares project by our transatlantic partners at the New Economics Institute.
Max Keiser has long been warning that online 'game' currencies will be used to trap people with debt. Here he argues that Zynga's latest move, bringing their in-game currencies together, is a step in that direction.
Paul Citarella describes management systems for time-allocating a resource between many users, and explains the subtleties of the most sophisticated.
So you've seen the light and are thinking about sharing ownership of a boat, vacation home, or some other infrequently used asset. Great! But what happens when you all want to use it at the same time?
Greg from onthespiral.com says its time rethink our attitude towards the realm of professionalism, and instead celebrate can-do amateurism.
I was watching old episodes of Mad Men recently and stumbled upon a conversation that set off my future of money triggers...
At the 3:05 point in the video below the follow exchange occurs:
Don Draper: I think you wouldn't be in the presidential suite right now if you worked for free.
Conrad Hilton: Don, this is friendly...
Don Draper: Connie, this is my profession. What do you want me to do?
Conrad Hilton: I want you to give me one for free...
In this series of interviews with the movement's pioneers, we take a big picture look at challenges and opportunities in the complementary currency movement. In this first interview, Bernard Lietaer offers his perspective about what questions we should be asking and what issues we should addressing in order to build momentum as a movement and gain greater credibility
Actionables
Address the movement's weaknesses and build on its strengths by:
The Timebanking movement needs your help to know what next steps to take. If you know of a Timebank, please encourage them to fill out this survey. Together we are stronger.
We need your help in collecting information that can inform our collective efforts to improve the accessibility of timebanking to all who can benefit from it. As you know from earlier correspondence, we (Marc Brakken, UW; Preston Austin, Dane Co. TimeBank; and Stephanie Rearick, DCTB and TimeBanks USA) have been accepted to present a paper at an upcoming conference in Lyon, France. The topic is “30 years of Complementary Currencies: What next?” and our paper is titled “Deploying Timebanking for Human-Scaled Economic Development"
Following the previous article about COMAL in Honduras, we have received this update from New Agriculturalist, who published the original article
COMAL's offices were raided in November 2009, just before the elections. Last year there was a military coup in Honduras and the post-coup elections were very controversial. COMAL expressed criticism of the role of the army, as part of a wider resistance movement. In this context, their offices were raided, computers removed for scrutiny of information and their guard beaten up. All of this done with the intention of intimidating the COMAL staff.
There are many examples of marginal local currency projects, but this is a far cry from a serious alternative to the global debt-money system which is now expiring.
If currencies worked according to free market principles, they might be much more stable and useful, but so far, they haven't been designed that way.
In the wake of a global meltdown that exposed the fragility of our financial system, it's understandable that many people are suspicious of the stability of our centralized monetary systems.
"We have had 97 major banking crashes over the last 25 years, and we have 178 monetary crashes over that same time period," says Belgian currency expert Bernard Lietaer. "Would you not say that’s a sign of something being repeatedly unstable?"
The Story of a community currency created within a poor but innovative School which implemented a School Government. Funny you start something without knowing the marvelous effects it may bring. Admirable to trust in your people and give it a go!
In Santiago de Chile at Pedro Aguirre Cerda District an Elementary/Middle School by the name of Karol Cardenal de Cracovia became a Kids Independent Republic in 1997. An idea introduces from previous successful initiatives in Rural Schools from Colombia. School Governments is pure innovation in education, it consists in dreaming inclusively (parents, kids and the school staff) a perfect world and bringing it to life by complementing the educational curriculum with a democracy where kids are the main actors in a School.
Jeremy Trudell thinks the US barter networks have become too self serving, and are not doing the best for their members. That's why he has set up an online trading platform for honest money.
One year ago pioneer Jean-Francois Noubel, took a vow of wealth. It's not a very practical way to live, but he's making it work.
More than a year has passed since Sept. 7 2009, the day when the Vow of Wealth entered into my life. Although this vow came as something obvious, it was difficult at the time to have any idea of the path that would lead to its practical implementation, specially in regards to migrating from conventional money towards free currencies.
After doing his service with peace Corps, Will Ruddick stayed on and started a currency in the slums of Kenya
Eco-Pesa is a voucher for the national currency (Kenyan Shillings) which circulates around an informal settlement (slum) in Kongowea Location, Mombassa District, Kenya. It is worth one shilling, and is printed on paper with security features in denominations of 5, 10 and 20 Eco-Pesa.
Could the threat of a peaking oil supply lead to a hyperlocal revolution? A group of Portlanders thinks so.
Seven currency practitioners and theoreticians got together to share our strategies for success. Here are some key ideas.
-Be willing to change direction. Don't get stuck on one particular idea of exactly what the currency should look like. Your target community may push for changes and you should be willing to listen and respond or find a new target. Learn from your mistakes.
Santa Cruz's New Earth Exchange adapts Sonoma Go Local's holistic exchange model to its local culture.
Modeling their currency project primarily after the Sonoma Go Local project in Northern California, Santa Cruz’s New Earth Exchange is set to go. A presentation by Derek Huntington of Sonoma Go Local last week attracted 75 people interested in boosting and transforming their local economy.
Solidarity Exchange Units are designed to ensure that money circulates locally, backed by farmer's produce, and preventing profit and investment being lost to outside markets.
John Rogers, through Value For People is working with community leaders to design currencies appropriate to their goals. In this column, he talks about the importance of design and introduces a favoured metaphor.
CC Central
connecting community currencies
John Rogers
Report from the 6th Annual AMI Monetary Reform Conference, October 2010. Participants and speakers came from Asia, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand to share their understandings and analyses of not only the monetary system but also the larger systems in which finance is embedded that affect the United States and the entire world.
Now, with developed economies sustained only by guile and gullibility, the complementary currency movement needs to pull itself together.
Only the mainstream media and government economists seem not to believe that the Western economy is crumbling before our very eyes. Every economic measure, each more desperate than the last, seems only to enrich to banking and other corporations. Almost no-one is talking about de-growth, and from the mainstream media there is virtually discussion about the design of money, or comprehension about who owns all the debt.
This is a story about how an economist and his buddies tricked the people of Brazil into saving the country from rampant inflation. They had a crazy, unlikely plan, and it worked.
This is a story about how an economist and his buddies tricked the people of Brazil into saving the country from rampant inflation. They had a crazy, unlikely plan, and it worked.
Mulligan Books of Mendo backs its own branded currency with tangible assets: its inventory of 25,000 books. As a double insurance of safety, Mulligan Books also guarantees that it will always return $5 in U.S. dollars for a Mulligan branded $5 coin when requested.
Ithaca hours serves as a model for many nascent community currencies like nearby Ardmore, PA, but founder Paul Glover is not resting on his laurels.
As a result of more requests from time bank members to be able to log in and manage their own accounts, we have now developed a “beta” system which allows time bank members to log onto time online and check their hours and details and also to put in requests.
Local groups stem the flight of capital from their towns and help small businesses through local currencies.
With money leaving local economies across Ireland to service debt and significant drops in local authority revenues, towns such as Dundalk, Ennis and Kilkenny are investigating the possibility of bringing in electronic currencies to keep money circulating locally.
It's a situation that was all too familiar in the 1930s. On the one hand we have people who want to work, and councils that would like to employ them. On the other hand, we have communities, councils and a national government which would like the work to be done. In the 1930s many community currencies were launched, particularly in the US. Is that the solution this time?
This is the first of the innovators updates stream.
Known currency innovators are encouraged to post project updates here once or twice per year to tell the rest of the community what they are up to. This is not a place for discussion, theory, speculation, debate, gossip, links or tweets.
Rather, the intention is to increase efficiency and encourage collaboration between projects as well as telling the rest of us where the leading thinking is.
One of the limitations of mutual credit clearing is that the currency cannot leave the circle, so the usefulness of the currency is limited by the size of the circle. but all that is about to change.
One of the major barriers to achieving scale in a decentralised mutual credit economy is the fundamental inability of credis and debts to leave the system, making exchanges between groups difficult. however it is critical for the usefulness of the network that members be able to trade outside their local groups, across the network firstly with adjacent local groups
You can find a combined photo here;
http://www.coinforums.com/gallery/ .
I think a whole series is being issued.
Aidan.
