Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!dali.cs.montana.edu!milton!hlab
From: esz001@cck.coventry.ac.uk (Will Overington)
Newsgroups: sci.virtual-worlds
Subject: Re: Teleutopia of Virtual Reality Objects
Message-ID: <1991May3.190209.20784@milton.u.washington.edu>
Date: 3 May 91 18:08:02 GMT
Sender: hlab@milton.u.washington.edu (Human Int. Technology Lab)
Organization: University of Washington
Lines: 267
Approved: cyberoid@milton.u.washington.edu



[MODERATOR'S NOTE:  I regret that the last posted article in this series
did not bear the correct subject header.  This can happen when I juggle
articles not sent via a reader.  Unfortunately, some people do not have
access to USENET or reader's.  My apologies. -- Bob Jacobson]


3rd May 1991

Will Overington
Department of Electrical, Electronic and Systems Engineering,
Coventry Polytechnic,
Priory Street,
Coventry CV1 5FB,
England.



Teleutopias

I am wondering, as interest in the Teleutopia of Virtual Reality
Objects grows, whether readers might like to know a little more
about the theory of teleutopias that I am developing.

A teleutopia is designed to be a transitory sort of thing, such
that it could forever remain a teleutopia but could become
something else.

Ideally, it would be nice that there were established some sort
of incorporated legal entity to henceforward carry out the work
of organizing a knowledge base of software and sending it out to
people, with a staff of people to do the work.

The problem that I have sought to solve is how one goes from
nothing to that situation.

May I digress for a while with a view to conveying my thinking
partly by analogy?

In England, we used to have steam locomotives as the motive power
on the railways.

That era has long since passed, for everyday transport
infrastructure purposes, and electric and diesel systems are
used.

However, several hundred steam locomotives have survived, and, by
a curious chance of history many smaller branch lines were closed
within a few years of the end of the era for steam as the main
line method of motive power.

The result, gradually achieved over the last quarter century, and
still developing, is a system of small, independent railway
companies using the redundant routes and running steam
locomotives on trains.  This is very much a hobby sort of thing
and a tourist attraction, to the extent that people often travel
by the main line railway to visit the steam lines.

However, many of the companies now have full time staff as well
as enthusiast supporters.

The way that many of these companies got going is that groups of
people, steam enthusiasts, lamented the passing of the days of
steam locomotives actually pulling trains and did their best to
conserve something of that era.

There is inevitably a lot of early work establishing credibility
and so on.  However, when dealing with a piece of track bed in a
local area by people who know each other and can easily meet face
to face, given the desire to get things done, things can happen.
Today, such ventures find it easier to get started, simply
because there is an accepted belief that such things are
credible.

Now in the context of a world wide thing, such as my desire for
fee-free education using telesoftware transmissions across
continents, there are different considerations, as people who may
be interested are distant from each other.

Thus far, I have not discussed the financial aspects of
teleutopias.  The concept of a teleutopia is that any money
deriving from the distribution of the package of teleutopiaware
by the mechanisms of shareware are independent, and SEEN TO BE
INDEPENDENT, of any of the participants, including the initiator
or initiators of the teleutopia.

I envisage this being done by there being, as well as a document
specifying the scientific requirements of software and data for
files in the teleutopia, a document showing that a trust with an
independent trustee and a bank account has been set up, and
details of the duties of the trustee.

I have it in mind that the trustee should typically be a bank
with no interest in the teleutopia, other than carrying out the
duties of the trust, and that those duties should be specific and
have hardly any discretionary aspect to them.

For example, the duty of the trustee might be to keep a note of
how much money is in the bank account and, if it ever reaches a
certain figure, to use the money to incorporate a small company,
to act as company secretary for five years and to mail everybody
who has deposited their work with the teleutopia and offer them a
share in the company for a very nominal amount. I am no expert on
company law, but know a little about it. Hopefully, this document
will reach someone who knows a lot more and who may like to
improve on the idea of what will need to be specified.

I happen to know that, in England at least, and maybe elsewhere,
a bank account can be opened free of charge.  The only thing that
concerns me is as to how much money, if indeed anything, a bank
would want to act as trustee until such time as any action
pursuant to having got a fair amount of money into the account
was needed.  Clearly, if I can get my idea for this way of doing
things to become accepted, for example by someone seeing this and
printing it in the financial press, where people with the
expertise to knock it into shape, and who may be willing to act
as trustee, will see it, then getting it done will be that much
easier.

What money?  Well, I understand that as well as the registration
aspect of shareware where one pays money and gets a manual or
whatever, there is a mechanism whereby some shareware
distributors will pay the author a small fee for each copy of the
disc that they sell.  I have no idea how much this is, but
suppose that it were 50 cents.  In the case of a teleutopia the
shareware company would send the money to the trustee.  The
shareware itself would be zero fee as such as there would be no
organization as such supporting it.  Of course, once the
teleutopia had been replaced by a company, the shareholders could
vote to use any further money as they wished, subject to the
legal constitution of the company, which constitution may well
contain requirements set out in the original trust document.
This would provide some measure of protection to potential
contributors to the teleutopia that their work would not be
unfairly exploited.

A company formed from a teleutopia might be a non-profit
organization or an organization that is free to make profit and
issue dividends.

There is, of course, a gap between a company that is
constitutionally permitted to make a profit and one which
actually makes one, but, although I am not against non-profit
organizations as such I feel that I must mention that I am
concerned that in seeking to establish new educational
opportunities with fee-free distance education, I do not create a
situation where only people who have money already or who can
make money in another way can benefit all the way.
For example, if someone in an African village can be distance
educated to the extent that he or she sends in software to such a
company, and could write so much of it of such quality that they
could live on the proceeds, then I want this to be
constitutionally feasible in the rules of the company.

Now that may be years ahead, and in practice I expect that it may
well be possible to get a company formed by means of a teleutopia
such as I have described, but that any dividends will be very
small once running costs have been paid, though my idea of
issuing trading stamps to contributors of software and having
educational materials, including specially produced books, as
redemption merchandise is clearly a far closer target.

With the Teleutopia of Virtual Reality Objects there is no
trustee and no bank account.  Money does not come into it, as it
is an experiment to see if I can actually get people interested
in the aggregation of knowledge bases in this way.  I have many
matters to sort out before a teleutopia, for any subject, could
be started off with money being involved.

One of the considerations is that there needs to be demonstrated
that there is interest in the idea itself.

Faced with the enormous problem of trying to get my fictional
Telesoftware Institute, or something like it, implemented in real
life, I have devised the method of a teleutopia as a stepping
stone to be able to get something going.

It will be interesting to see whether, in a few years time, the
various catalogues of shareware that are available have a section
labeled TELEUTOPIAS with discs for a dozen or more teleutopias
available.

It will be even more interesting to see whether any teleutopias
have transferred to becoming incorporated companies.

For the moment we are at an initial stage, with the theory of
teleutopias still being researched, yet with steady progress
being made.

+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+
Will Overington
Department of Electrical, Electronic and Systems Engineering,
Coventry Polytechnic,
Priory Street,
Coventry CV1 5FB,
England.
+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+
Putting forward new ideas is like being a quarterback.
First of all you will loose a few yards by even starting the
play.
Then there will be people trying to put you down.
Sometimes it's best to hand the football to someone who is better
at running, sometimes it's best to forward pass in a controlled,
planned way, but at times, the only thing to do is just hurl it
up in the air in a long forward pass attempt, and hope that
someone out there catches it and RUNS!
+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+-*-+


























































--