Community Networking - Barter Exchange
Tanya Z & I had this conversation last eve at Woozday, and I want to make note of it before I forget. The gist of the conversation went, how can we utilize our Burning Man community's resources to better help one another? So many of us are out of work. We have tools. We have skills. We haz internets!! We can better network with one another to really help one another out. Community is more than just a party now & then. Seriously. The time to do it is now.
But how in practical terms do we do it?
Has anyone checked out Bright Neighbor?
From their site:
"Bright Neighbor is a Portland community system that helps Portlanders discover our neighbors, coordinate community projects, share, lend, sell, and barter stuff, network better, save money, learn new things like growing and preserving food, find people with similar interests, ride-share, and much more. With Bright Neighbor, we have an opportunity as Portlanders to help one another out - the more things that we collectively add to our shared pool of stuff, the easier it will be for us to locate what we need."
This is the kind of site I am imagining, but for burners or friends of friends perhaps? Or do we need a closed group? It's more immediate and the trust factor of lending you my tools and such is already there for acquaintances. Do we need to reinvent the wheel? Why not get to know your neighbors and through out a wider network possibility?
I like the idea of including an inventory of what I have that I can share, along with a wishlist of what I could use. Maybe I am willing to barter childcare for organic veggies. Maybe I can cook for a large group in exchange for Spanish lessons. What can you do that you are willing to barter for? Are you willing to carpool? Is your work posting a job that isn't all over craiglist already? What are the other possibilities?
Could we do this on tribe? on facebook? how?
Thoughts? Feedback?