SENSORICA is an expanding open collaborative enterprise, designed for a rapidly changing environment, tuned for the know-how economy. It is an open, decentralized, and self-organizing value network, a living system.

The SENSORICA community is designing, producing, and distributing high tech solutions in the sensing industry. We are thriving on open (source) innovation. We implement commons-based peer production system.

Context

The new digital and information technology have brought new possibilities that are very transformative, and are operating fundamental socio-economic changes.

We now have very efficient, effective, and low cost tools that allow many-to-many communication, coordination and collaboration. Communication, coordination and collaboration have been released from spatial and temporal constraints. We are also developing powerful information processing tools, and we are automating logistics. These new tools and processes have a profound impact on our systems of value production and distribution.

Triggers

Looking at the set of new possibilities introduced by the new digital and information technology, we can imagine that radically delocalized systems of production and distribution of goods and services are now possible. Moreover, the size and the scope of these systems can, in theory, reach unprecedented proportions. We believe that classic organizations, such as corporations, are outdated, and cannot take full advantage of the newlly introduced possibilities. We are building a new type of organization, operating in the high tech field, which is in tune with the new reality.

Classical organizations show clear signs of being stressed by the rapid advance of technology. Structurally, they cannot keep up with the speed of innovation and lose their relevance on the market. Large firms fight this problem by acquiring innovative startups. Our goal is to create a hyper-innovative organization that can also adapt to fast changes in the new environment.

After the collapse of communism and its associated economic system, we are now withnessing the collapse of capitalism. The corporation, essentially a feudal and a tyrannical power structure, is totally miss-aligned with our core modern values. It is factually responsible for wars and environmental disasters, for depleting our natural resources, for destroying social cohesion, and for decreasing our creative capital. We need to build an new type of work environment, and a new system of production and distribution of value.

Key Innovations & Timeline

We treat SENSORICA as a living system. Viewed from this perspective, our task is to put in place the proper constraints in order to make the system self-organize into a dynamically stable pattern that exhibits a set of desired characteristics. This is a departure from the engineering approach to business design.

The SENSORICA open value network (OVN) must be able to process information and materials very efficiently, in order to solve problems in effective time, using a reasonable amount of resources, and to sustainably produce and distribute goods and services that improve our lives and help us to move collectively towards a better future. The term "sustainably" is used to vehiculate the concept of rewards and remuneration, instead of using terms like "costs" and "profits".

SENSORICA is designing and implementing a network resource planning and value accounting system (NRP-VAS), which is similar to an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, but designed for network-type organizations, and augmented by a module that allows every contribution to a project to be accounted for and translated into equity. Anyone in the world can contribute to projects, which are open like any other open source (hardware and software) project. All contributions of different types (time, monetary, materials, etc), small or large, are logged. Revenue from projects is distributed to all the contributors based on a value equation. An OVN operates in the long tail mode of production.

The SENSORICA OVN can be seen as a mix between a gift economy and a free market economy. Our contribution-based revenue model allows us to eliminate friction between passion-driven members and revenue-driven members.

SENSORICA is built on 3 main pillars: value, roles, and reputation. Inother words, the system makes transparent who (agent) is doing what (role), how well (reputation) and how much (value). See more on the Role system and the Reputation system.

All the processes within the SENSORICA OVN are very low barrier to entry and entirely transparent, not only to SENSORICA affiliates, but also to the rest of the world. This insures a high rate of exchange with the environment.

Challenges & Solutions

The solutions proposed to the challenges listed bellow reflect our experience and our understanding at this particular moment in time. SENSORICA is an emergent entity. As we continue to develop we will encounter other challenges, our understanding will grow, and we will continue to adapt. Please come back to the documents linked bellow to get the latest state of things.

Communication, coordination, and collaboration infrastructure

Most of our curret infrastructure is built by integrating Google services, which are very user friendly, but not so versatile. Access to create content and structure is key to emergent organiztions. Therefore, we have decided to sacrifice the look and feel over ease of use. Having all the content on Google's platform, all in one place, constitutes a risk and it is not fully compatible with the peer-to-peer nature of our organization. New development in peer-to-peer infrastructures like Ethereum and MaidSafe will allow us to improve our situatuin in the near future.

Virtual working space
All important activities revolve around our website. This might change in the future, as our network builds bridges with other open communities.

Central communication
At this moment, we are using mailing lists, forums and social media outlets for communication.
Some communication is notshared with the entire world. This constitutes a membrane around SENSORICA. We also interface with other open value networks; most of them being gift economies. We are using their communication systems in conjunction with ours to allow inter-network many-to-many communication.
To address the general population, we use social media (mostly Twitter, Facebook), and video sharing websites, like Youtube.

Shared coordination tools
We use Google Calendar, which is also integrated with our website. To schedule meetings we are use Doodle.

Shared project management tools
We have experimented with a variety of free online tools for project management like Trello, Cyn.in and others. In 2014 we started to transition to our own tools, which are part of the NRP-VAS.

Shared database & knowledge base

At this moment, we are using Google Docs and Diigo (see our Diigo SENSORICA knowledge base) to co-create content and to share it within the network. MaidSafe might will allow us to move away from the cloud into the p2p space for content management.

Governance and decision making

SENSORICA is a open value network. It is an environment in which ideas, initiatives, and projects compete with for resources and individuals cooperate. Decision making processes within SENSORICA are distributed. See more.

Value accounting and exchange system

The NRP-VAS allows SENSORICA members to record their work and to evaluate it. This informs our contribution-based reward mechanism, which redistributes revenue according to everyone's contribution.

Reputation system

All open and decentralized organizations need reputation systems. It is important to have access to members' activities and to how every member is viewed by other members. This is a key ingredient for self-organization and for maintaining a creative and productive environment.

Role system

This system describes roles of community members. It automatically pulls data from the value accounting system, where members record their activities, analyses this data and outputs visuals (charts, etc.), displaying important functional nodes within the network. The role system is critical to incite voluntary subordination and to inform decision making.

R&D and design

SENSORICA is pushing the limits of online collaboration to eliminate geographical barriers for shared scientific experimentation. We are building an open labonline network.
A labonline is a physical lab containing instruments that can send data over the Internet in real time and can provide remote real time access to control instruments. This enables individuals (a team of experts with different skills) from different locations around the world to share experiences in real time. An open labonline network is a network of open physical labs. This network relies on an infrastructure for data storage and exchange. We are building an open labonline network by networking a SENSORICA-facilitated open lab oriented towards optics, lasers, and optical fiber sensors applications, with other complementary hackerspaces and fab labs. See more.

The open nature of SENSORICA also allows us to interface with open software and hardware communities, to integrate their creations into our products and services, and to drive/influence new developments.

Manufacturing

We get inspired from distributed manufacturing systems implemented by Wikispeed and Local Motors, making heavy use of digital fabrication like 3D printing and CNC.

Services

We are designing and implementing a p2p service system. We want to provide as much control over our services to our customers as possible, and to give them the chance to play an active role in shaping/improving our products and services. Read more and follow the development.

Cost reduction

SENSORICA is a revenue-based, commons-based peer production system. Our ability to interface with open software and hardware communities, as well as with hackerspaces around the world allows us to increase the speed of innovation and the speed to market. By integrating opwn source technologies and by using open source design methodologies we reduce costs and offer better quality custom products, with a better lifecycle.

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July 19, 2011 at 1:25pm

Jay Standish

You should know about www.bettermeans.org which is a web app specifically designed for Open Enterprises that offers solutions to many of the challenges you name (project management, governance, collective value-accounting, etc.)

July 21, 2011 at 10:07pm

Tiberius Brastaviceanu

Jay, thank you for taking the time to formulate this comment. We are familiar with BetterMeans. Some of their tools are wonderful. But SENSORICA is more than just a project nesting within BeterMeans. We are an organic, emergent entity. We chose to build SENSORICA on Google's platform because we wanted to give access to all members to shape its infrastructure. We believe that by giving members the power to change the very structure of the organization we make SENSORICA organic. We don’t want to be just a group of users, forced to operate within a predefined setting.

In order to make it possible for users to change the infrastructure, according to some rules, we need to distribute ownership over the infrastructure to all members. Moreover, the tools used to build our infrastructure must be user friendly, accessible to almost everyone.

We actually don’t own and control everything using Google’s platform, this is why we are looking for open source communities to build a free and open source infrastructure for value networks like SENSORICA. But at least we own and have control over our processes (social, of creation and production, etc.) supported by this infrastructure, and our data, which can be easily exported from Google in a variety of popular formats.

July 18, 2011 at 4:22pm

Pamela McLean

I like this. The conceptual context in which I like it is this. It seems to me that at present it is as if we are living in two parallel realities. Your model fits well into my perceptions and experiences of "the second (i.e.post-web) reality". I'll explain a bit more about my perception of the realities, then offer some suggestions related to your model.

One reality is the "how it has been" reality - pre-web, 19th and 20th century structures and systems, typically top down, and with an emphasis on competition and material value.

The other reality is post-web, 21st century structures and systems, typically flatter and with an emphasis on collaboration and wider value systems - not just the easily quantifiable material ones. The flatter structure isn't a matter of keeping things more or less as they have been but with minor tweaks (ie top down but with some bottom up added as a gesture towards change - things as they were but with some emailing and web 2.0 things added on). Post web is a complete shift - like a 90 degree rotation, so there is no top or bottom but information is flowing across between people who are at the same level, holding each other in equal respect regarding their contributions. Post web is best seen in organisations or collaborative networks that could not have emerged pre-web. The emphasis on collaboration isn't just idealistic dreaming, It is practical good sense - as is argued elsewhere (in groups related to peer-to-peer, the commons, and so on). With knowledge creation the more you share the richer you get. (Also it's said that in the material world you give away 1% in order to sell 99% but in the digital world you can give away 99% in order to sell 1%)

I see your model as fitting the post-web reality. All that you describe makes sense to me according to my experiences of online communities - but your model is more advanced in its emphasis on production.

The area I would challenge is your use of the idea of a "gift economy", as the alternative to the traditional material payment economy. I believe that in post web world the economy is not a "gift economy" but a win-win economy where people decide for themselves what their win-win is - i.e they contribute according to personally defined (perhaps almost un-defined) non-tangible rewards that they recognise as "making it worth their while" to collaborate even if there in little or no traditional material payment. Materially it may look like a "gift economy" - but it is more subtle and is not to be confused with traditional unpaid work or volunteering.

Other than that "gift economy" detail, and assuming I have understood correctly all I have read, I agree completely with the reality and practicality of your vision for SENSORICA.

July 9, 2011 at 11:21pm

Aaron Brook

You have an interesting idea.
Maybe I can recommend you a three-stair management.
Three-stair management is a new model (or a new system) based on Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
The model is the same as ordinary stairs. The first step is called the management of regulations with special implication (discussed more fully in the part of solution). I use it to establish a high productive organization that can meet employees’ existence needs.
The second step is called the management of emotion with special implication. I use it to meet employees’ relatedness needs.
The third step is called the management of innovation with special implication. I use it to meet employees’ growth needs.
Then integrating first, second, and third create a new model of three-stair management. I use it to meet all employees’ needs (or Maslow's hierarchy of needs).
So three-stair management can be briefly summarized three points: First, I use the management of regulations to establish a company. Then I use the management of emotion to let employees love this company. And then I use the management of innovation to continue to improve this company.

Please note! A new model means at least two aspects of meaning (they are the key of this hack). On the one hand, every one of these three types of management is Indispensable. On the other hand, these three types of management must be complied fixed order, that is, bottom-up.
A new model,
A simple model,
An orderly model,
A dynamic model,
An open model,
Of course,
It is also a very useful model for various organizations!