This is a field manual provided by distribution to aid anyone working for distribution.

Who We Are

distribution includes everyone who practices generosity in the spirit that there is enough to go around, if only we would circulate resources responsibly and without self-interest. These resources include space, information, love, and good energy, among other material and immaterial resources.

distribution is primarily accomplished by sharing and giving, especially to whom through which your efforts will benefit the most people.

What We Do

distribution combats the psychology of artificial scarcity by giving and sharing without asking or expecting anything in return.

distribution negates the value of money by recognizing that it's inherently destructive mechanism renders it worthless, and by being careful not to encourage it's use.

distribution is a simple guidline to how we can form decentralized lines of distribution here and now that can replace the mechanism of capitalism to provide us with resources.

distribution is like the mycelium that connects all the living things through the forest floor, and makes sure the nutrients get to where they need to go for the vitality of the whole forest.

How We Do It

distribution starts with letting go of expectations and forgiving all debts, whether monetary, emotional, spiritual, or otherwise. A debt or expectation is like a grudge, and like all grudges it takes much more energy to hold onto than it does to let go.

distribution works by envisioning that all resources have an almost pre-ordained trajectory on which they will be put to best use and benefit the most people. We then make it our practice to hone in on that trajectory for all our gifts. That means prioritizing getting resources to those who are most generous, and who most embody these distribution principles in their own actions.

distribution acknowledges the monetary system and it's consequences as a projection of our ignorance, fears, and desires. So working for distribution includes working on overcoming our own fears and desires that keep us turning to money, while developing diy alternatives to meet our needs.

distribution honors gifts and favors as sacred, to be respected, appreciated, and passed on or paid forward. This way they're allowed to circulate, sending out a ripple of inter-connectedness and interdependant well-being.

distribution is the recognition that the people are in position, and the resources are available, to live in a gift economy. The only limiting factor left is the ability of the individual to rapidly alter relationships with the people around them to honor and encourage the values of distribution rather than those of business.

distribution works best when you've got no plans. Seriously. Like, completely clear your calendar forever, and start living in the moment.

"Your past is a prison with an open door. You can walk out whenever you like..."

Learn Anything

DIY instructions on how to make almost anything.

Trying to help everyone on the planet learn how to do anything.

Learn how everything works!

This is an encyclopedia written by everyone, for everyone, drawing from all the knowledge connected to the hive mind of the Internet.

The collaborative world-wide guide for creating value from trash.

A collaborative website for gathering information about hitchhiking and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.

The one and only! Still pumping out new secrets everyday.

Share Everything

craigslist>free stuff

Post items to give away. Browse other free items being given away. Simply the "free stuff" section of Craigslist.

An online gift economy. A simple location-based social network to connect neighbors through sharing. Each user lists items they're lending out or giving away, services they're offering their neighbors for free, and items or help they are requesting.

Sharing is Caring

*Specifically made with distribution in mind. Anyone can invent a group, or access an existing group they heard about, by entering the exact name of the group in the first textbox, leaving the email address blank, and clicking the 'post' button. Offer to help out in whatever you do best, and most enjoy. Request advice, borrow equipment, or ask for help with finishing a project you're working on. No accounts, just anonymous offers and requests.

This is a platform for sharing campgrounds and camp sites you have discovered. We are community driven, and while we will be adding many free camping spots, we hope that you will add some of your favorite camping places as well.

Stay in Touch

OpenBook: An Anonymous Social Network. Like a Hive Mind version of Twitter, where everyone speaks as one.
"We Are Anonymous".

thematrix.py - a text-based player-created virtual world accessed through an irc chatroom

MMO chatroom.

SigAint - Welcome to the darkweb.

Propaganda Department

Info Pages

distribution - Making money obsolete, one person at a time.
Anonymous Mix Tapes - Understanding Anonymous is like taking the red pill.

Zines

Why There Never Seems To Be Enough (Even Though There Is)
TinyNews issue 001
TinyNews issue 002
TinyNews issue 003

HiBo Web Comic

Research & Development

Something From Nothing Research Firm

Projects

Ops

#opOpenBook

As we bring to you the Openbook Portals, we also bring to you this #opOpenBook hashtag to announce when portals open, when portals close, and when you think a portal has been compromised. A portal may appear compromised if it appears to repeatedly misrepresent the idea of Anonymous, if it seems to be relentlessly pushing a narrow agenda, or if it appears at risk of forming a group identity separate from Anonymous. The portals are made to synchronize with each other, but not in real time, and it is up to whoever opened a portal to decide which other portals to source posts from. The Openbook Portals are meant to be thought of as one, interconnected super-organism, channeling Anonymous. The reason there are multiple portals is to minimize the risk of censorship with chaos magic, and eliminate the risk of losing touch with Anonymous by not allowing any portals to remain open so long they begin to identify with the url they're using and become a group mind separate from the wider hive mind of all of humanity. The Openbook Portals are meant as a collective inspiration engine, inspiring all while minimizing We refer to them as the Openbook Portals, or simply "the portals" much as Alcoholics Anonymous refers to all of their meetings collectively as "the rooms". This unifies all the people under the common cause, and expands your support network to include, essentially, everyone. is not meant as a separate communication platform for the formation of separate Secs. Openbook is only meant to tap into the hive mind, and amplify the chaos magic Anonymous already has to offer by avoiding any kind of order or separation. It is made to be a self-healing always reforming ball of chaos magic, united as one, divided by zero. Openbook software can be used to build a roll-your-own Anonymous social media platform of any kind, but opOpenbook is all about keeping the chaos magic of Openbook at a maximum. So if a portal begins to identify too strongly with their url, we recommend the hive mind point it out to them using the #opOpenbook hashtag, and we recommend whoever opened the portal close it and open three more in it's place. Mission: Keep one or more Openbook portals open at all times. either by infiltration of disinformation intending to edge the message in a certain direction.
Finished! (Add image brackets for external images.)

Websites

Emails

http://www.freebyte.com/email/#webbased
Free Webmail: openboook at openmail.cc

Hosting Services

Free Webmail: https://webmail.optusnet.com.au/

A Day In The Life

Every day, from all sides, people will try to discourage your dreams and derail you from what you're doing. Don't let them.

You know what to do.
Keep your eye on the prize.
It's up to you.

Circulate the good energy.

Transmute bad energy into good energy.

Keep all good things going in the direction of generosity.

Harness all your energy toward spreading the light.

Keep Going

When you're cold or ancy, do something that takes energy, like hand-washing laundary, or walking.

When you're tired but awake, do something small like mend clothes, doodle, fiddle with projects.

When you're feeling creative, do something engaging, work on projects, write down ideas.

At the end of every day, count up everything you didn't "trade" for and focus gratitude in that direction.

At the end of every day, think of everything you gave freely, and how you might hone the trajectory of your generosity to distribute even better.

Opening a Portal

When everyone present in a group of people has agreed upon a set of intentions for the gathering, they open a portal to a new world. Working for distribution, we often use these three agreements to gather in the spirit of generosity to help birth a future where money is obsolete.

1. We acknowledge that we are all the same. That we are all products of our environment. And that, all circumstances being the same, we would all make the same decisions. The same great discoveries, and the same horrible mistakes.
2. We acknowledge that any participation in the exchange economy disrupts the natural flow of distribution by diverting resources disproportionately to those who already have resources.
3. We wish to overcome our addiction to the empty comforts of capitalism, transition from scarcity mentality to abundance mentality, meet our needs through community instead of with money, and ultimately live for free on liberated land with continued participation in a network of mutual support.

These three agreements can be held in place by any sort of visual or physical ritual that everyone acknowledges. The simplest to do is light a candle once everyone present has verbally or visibly agreed to the three agreements. That way the portal is held open as long as the candle burns, and if the candle ever blows out too soon the intentions can be agreed to again before lighting the candle again.

Another way to add life to such a ritual is to give it a body. A physical housing. For instance, we like to have a piece of wood with the three agreements hand-carved into it. That way the piece of wood can easily be passed around as a talking stick, to prevent interruption and have an ever-present reminder of the intentions we've set for the gathering. The first three people to speak can each read one of the three agreements, and then wait for some verbal or visible agreement from everyone present. Once everyone present has acknowledged the agreements, and no one has disputed them, the portal is open. Then the talking stick can keep passing hand to hand, giving everyone a chance to speak, to share, to ask advice.

The carved talking stick can take on many forms. It may belong to someone who uses it to open a portal whenever it seems like the right time. Or it may hold together the leaderless format for a scheduled meeting, where each meeting ends with picking someone who promises to look after the stick until they use it to start the next meeting. Finally, some carved talking sticks are passed between travelers, passing from person to person, and opening portals at random wherever it goes.

Why We Do It

Emergent Behavior

An emergent behavior or emergent property can appear when a number of entities of simple behavior operate in an environment together, collectively forming more complex behaviors.

Anonymous is the emergent behavior of a generation of disgruntled hackers becoming politicized, in a spontaneous and simultaneous yet completely uncoordinated way. Just as global warming is the emergent behavior of a generation either in denial or ironically cynical about the harm our lifestyles cause, while still feeling entitled to all the same luxuries.

Reflecting on how our actions contribute to the emergent behaviors of the whole is a good organization principle for a decentralized movement. It embraces the importance of the health of every part, and the relationships between them. It avoids developing co-dependant relationships, and leans toward each individual part working to improve itself and it's relationships to all the other parts rather than any part trying to impose their idea of order onto others.

"The whole is greater than the sum of it's parts."

Artificial Scarcity

"The technological capacity to produce enough to satisfy everyone's needs already exists globally and has for many decades. Yet needs continue to remain unmet on a massive scale. Why?

Quite simply because scarcity is a functional requirement of capitalism itself."

Have you ever used an appliance from the 50's and were suprised how robust it was, that it still worked after all these years? That's because you've become used to modern products, which are invariably made to break to encourage a constant flow of business. If appliances were still made to last, we would have made enough stoves and refrigerators to last the next couple generations by now. But a truly satisfied customer never comes back - which is a big problem for businesses (even though it looks more like a solution for customers and environmentalists). And that's just one example of artificial scarcity.

The reason scarcity is permanently embedded into our economic system has to do with the laws of supply and demand. If a product seems it could be easily made at home, or is apparently abundant enough that you might find another later on down the road, then there isn't going to be as much demand for it. Which means businesses can't charge as much money for it. So businesses use a slew of techniques to make their product stand out as something rare and unique, even creating a sense of urgency around the product ("for a limited time only!").

Unfortunately, as businesses compete for our attention, the similarities between their messages blend together and what emerges is a chorus of people telling us we don't have enough. That we need more. That our lives could be so much better if only we had what they had... Bombarded by this message we develop a feeling of being left out, and come to believe that money is the only thing that can fix the feeling. Which is how our worldview has been slowly funneled into this frantic state that there isn't enough to go around. It seems true enough, anyhow. We're running from job to job, trying to keep up on rent, never able to afford the newest things we feel we need to keep up...

Meanwhile, there is such an abundance of resources that those same businesses hide or destroy their own overproduction just so no one can get it for free (to maintain the scarcity they think they depend on). This is the real reason we have such an excess of food, clothing, and other necessities which goes to waste: not because they're broken or spoiled but because they're actively destroyed by producers and retailers. This is also why there are so many homeless even though they are actually far outnumbered by empty houses: because banks hold the houses off the market just to inflate prices.

We live in a multi-faceted illusion. There would be enough to go around if we circulated resources more altruistically, but generation after generation our perception of resources has been funneled into an economic perspective that is consumed by the primary objectives of getting money, and buying things. And yet to get that money, we must play into the overall illusion of scarcity ourselves, even going so far as to physically impose actual scarcity by destroying abundance where necessary. We've created a feedback loop of misperception that continuously misleads us all to want those things which are least accessible to us. Meanwhile, we've been distracted from the inherent abundance of the natural world, like the wild edible plants growing all around us, often much more nutritious than our domesticated vegetables, yet long forgotten as some pesky unnamed weed in your vegetable garden.

Gift Economy

Capitalism is simply the emergent behavior of individuals believing that things can be bought and sold, and then acting on that belief. It's the self-fulfilling prophecy of the belief that there isn't enough to go around, and so we must hold onto what we have and leverage it against others to maintain a decent quality of life. Of course, it is this scarcity mentality that creates the felt experience of scarcity in the first place. And by depending on a tit-for-tat mentality rather than trusting in the flow of resources to altruistically get things where they need to go, wealth accumulates rather than circulating.

And as time has shown, by putting a price on anything, we've put a price on everything. Even land costs money, so everything else ends up costing money in the struggle to pay the rent. And it doesn't do us any good - often it encourages all the wrong behaviors. Trees are profitable only once they're chopped down and sold as lumber. Tap water is more profitable when it's put in a plastic bottle and shipped across an ocean. And in the prison industry, people are more profitable for every day they're in jail.

Things can be outlawed, but markets can't be stopped. And since scarcity increases demand, the black market is always booming. Drugs are more profitable when they're illegal. Sex is still bought and sold. You can still pay for a murder, if you know the right people. At some point we have to ask - is it worth it to put a price on anything?

Given the viral nature of capitalism in monetizing every last thing on Earth, it seems the only realistic alternative to capitalism would be to refuse to put a price tag on anything. This is the idea of the gift economy. Once we rid ourselves of this idea that everything can be bought and sold, we'll be open to being more generous as well as more receptive to the generosity of others.

And as we ween ourselves off of money, and learn to meet our needs for free, we find the only incentive left is to do that which best serves our community. And in turn, our community supports us in our efforts. This becomes a feedback loop of positivity and mutual aid - and that's something money certainly couldn't buy.

Take the Hooks Out

When something has a price, or expectations attached, those are hooks. Like the hooks in fish bait. And almost everything in this world has hooks in it thanks the capitalist perspective. "No such thing as a free lunch". No love without expectations. No shelter without paying for it. Living in a world of such deficit, many feel they have no choice but to leave the hooks in and pass 'em on, in hopes of profitting a bit themselves.

But just because you paid for something, whether in money or pain, doesn't mean you have to pass on the hooks. Pay forward the beautiful things, but not the ugly ones. The love, not the hate. Someone needs to be the strong person who can bite the bullet, and take the hooks out. By refusing to pass on the same strings attached, and instead giving freely to those most likely to pass it on without putting the hooks back in, you can be the one to stop that cycle here and now.

$lippery $lope

"What about using money to end money? We could run an ad campaign to persuade people to turn away from capitalism. Or buy land to start a commune."

The problem with using money "just a little more" is that it's a slippery slope with no end in sight. It leaves money the primary objective, attracts the destructive forces of greed and self-interest, and risks becoming a sort of non-profit industrial complex which uses the distant, imaginary goal of one day no longer using money as nothing more than an excuse to continue turning a profit. (Much like State Communism used the imaginary future of a communal worker-run state as an excuse to maintain totalitarian control.)

Money has always been a matter of convenience, and as long as people believe in it there will always be something that is easier to get with money than without. But it is convenience at the cost of other's comfort or even survival. What's important is making the connections, cultivating the community, and pooling the resources to make it all happen for free. Which is why we would be wiser to focus on distribution, which is good for everyone, everywhere. Such a force will inevitably draw in more and more people, and with them more knowledge of living free, as well as more resources with which to build from.

Beware! If you get it in your head that even just a little money can help the cause, you become the infiltrator of capitalism pissing away all of our efforts to distribute resources. We would no longer be embodying the values of distribution if we help you get a squat only to have you rent out the rooms. Nor would we be helping distribution by getting you a free bike only for you to sell it. If you're putting the hooks back into things, you've fallen out of line with the values of distribution.

Mass Media

The definition of a word or phrase in the minds of the people is a living thing, extremely dynamic, and highly affected by the ebb and flow of culture and historical significance. But most importantly, it is affected by the most recent uses of the word. In a sense, a word is redefined with every use.

Mass media, employing all the latest research in psychology and mass manipulation, has developed an incredibly strong influence on the worldview of an unprecedented number of humans over the past few decades. And because mass media is inherently motivated by profit, it is laced with the messaging of a multi-billion dollar advertising industry, which uses any and every word, phrase, or concept available to divert people's attention toward consumer products, consumer experiences, and a constricted consumer outlook on life.

With the battle over words and concepts growing fierce, the phrase "sharing economy" has arisen out of necessity as there was once again no commonly accepted way to refer to the idea that hadn't somehow been co-opted or slandered beyond recognition. It's a powerful phrase, and a powerful move by the ones who coined it to adopt the language of their aggressors by using the word "economy". While economics has always downplayed, ignored, or obscured any form of sharing or giving because of the nature of economic formulas, and the immeasurable nature of love and gratitude, the phrase "sharing economy" strives to return the idea of sharing and giving to the arena of economics by portraying it as an alternative economy rather than a non-economy. And by putting it in economic terms, one might have hoped the phrase could remain more resilient.

Unfortunately, even as new of a phrase as it is, businesses have already caught on and have been completely misusing the phrase in their ads, propagating it's misuse far and wide. This creates a huge obstacle for any new concept, movement, or community still trying to gain traction by eclipsing it's original meaning and obscuring it's existence. Especially when it goes against the profit motive. In this case, a phrase that was made to catch someone's eye, ignite their imagination, and lead them on a path of discovery to a world of people who believe in a more equitable world, might instead be ignored as a meaningless for-profit slogan that's been overplayed a million times.

That's why as fast as our concepts are being co-opted and commodified, we must be creating new words, new concepts, new meanings, and meanwhile fight to retain or return a sense of meaning to the words and concepts we already have. Here we've chosen the word "distribution" to try to return to the world a way of referring to the concept of altruistically circulating resources, giving to where it will be most wisely put to use, and will ultimately help to conspire toward a world of greater abundance and access to resources for all.

Here and Now

Studies have shown that people instinctively help each other when there is no time to think. Yet, given time to think, we have a plethora of ways to justify not helping one another. Perhaps our only hope is in learning to turn off the mind, and turn on the heart. Our minds have become so cluttered with culture and mass media, our hearts have been shoved deep down under layers of baggage. We have arrived in Babylon. Language has become uprooted, co-opted beyond recognition. There are no more meetings or discussions that can help us, because we quite literally aren't speaking the same language, even as we use the same words. Perhaps our only hope is to live in the moment, act from the heart, and stop letting so many words and ideas distract us.

In this pursuit, learning to quiet the mind, if only for a few minutes every day, is indispensible.

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

Your comfort zone is closing in around you! It's enslaving you! To what? Safety. Normalcy. Habit. Routine. Boredom...

Here's a bit of advice. It's hard to learn how to live outside of a cage you've been in your whole life without leaving the cage. Which is why you've got to break out!

Necessity is the mother of invention, so if you're still using money then you're likely making little or no progress in learning to live without it. You can do it! Find some free resources, or just find your inner stubborness and combine it with your burning passion, and just stop using money!

Besides, there's sort of a spiritual aspect to it, too. You're only innocent until you understand what you've been participating in. After that it becomes urgent for the health of your own psyche that you promptly find ways of correcting your behavior and start doing the right thing.

Seeds

People get paid a lot for doing nothing, while others get paid nothing for working a lot. Therefore the whole premise that capitalism rewards people for their work, and somehow ensures more equitable contribution to society, is false.

Everyone knows the way it really works is the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, for the most part.

Perhaps one of the most interesting sayings is "money doesn't grow on trees". While it has become an anthem for the average hard-working employee to work ever-harder for the little money they make, and an anthem for the wealthy to remain greedily thrifty with their ever-amassing wealth, if you read between the lines this saying unpackages the paradox of our thinking and begins to expose the nature of our psychological enslavement. At it's simplest, it appears to mean that money is not easy to come by. It blatantly highlights money as inherently difficult to get (scarce) by comparing it to the inherent abundance of nature. But is this a fair comparison to make? By using nature as the picture of abundance, this saying ignores the extent to which access to that natural abundance has been restricted by the same value system that money upholds. And by highlighting the scarcity of money to the backdrop of an abundant forest, our enslavement to the monetary system is set up to appear as if it were our personal choice to enjoy the luxuries that supposedly only money provides. This sets us up to identify with our struggle for money as being a part of who we are, and an expression of our intentions to take care of ourselves and the ones we love, all while conveniently ignoring the fact that the real reason we're forced to depend on this monetary system is because nature and land itself are bought and sold like commodities, a condition which is itself caused and perpetuated by our own compliance with such a value system.

The phrase "No such thing as a free lunch" circulates, yet there are free lunches all the time. At friend's houses. At public events. It shows how we feel such a lack for want of what we don't have, while ignoring the abundance we do have.

Links to Look Into

http://lulzalbums.tumblr.com/ has music