Would involve like a massive amazon like website where you would request whatever products you needed and you would have them delivered, and if you started acting weird and hoarder-y (like requesting 200 boxes of cereal, which an algorithm would alert someone to) someone would phone up and ask you what was up and just check on things (eventually that bit could be eliminated as people got used to post-scarcity) so that way you have only use values and no silly exchange values. There’d also be a website where you can sort of “pre-order” things and say what things you might want or need, so that people have a better idea of how many to produce.
You’d also be free to make your own things, or suggest products to be made on a kickstarter like website where you can “like” ideas for consumer goods you’d like to see produced.
Education would be free, and there would also be “stores” (no cash) where people could either curate products for people or stock things people might need in a hurry and not be able to wait for shipping on because I think some people like running stores and if we can spare people to do it now and still make more than enough stuff for everyone I’m sure we will be able to then.
And of course really then most things would sort of run on appreciation, like people write fanfic and make art because they like making things that other people appreciate and the same would go for most other things I think, like some people like building cars or fiddling with computers or what not and some people like to sew and so basically you’d do or make what you liked and were good at and receive what you needed
Can 100% confirm that if you give people of a certain temperament the skills to repair things, the tools to repair things, and plenty of free time&energy, THE THINGS WILL BE REPAIRED.
Also have to say, there’s a limit to how much you can automate certain things like sewing… like, yes, sewing machines are an enormous labor-saver, but they still need to be individually operated. The current cheapness of clothing (of some kinds) is only that way because of enormous amounts of exploitation, both in terms of low pay and the working conditions. Put the organization of production in the hands of those actually doing the work, with “make things people want/need” rather than “make a profit” as a goal, and I can almost guarantee that we would see a lot more variety of clothing, and a LOT more clothing being custom-made to order. And everything being designed to be durable, repairable, and alterable.
I mean I think eventually we’ll be able to develop a machine that allows you to input a pattern and a robot arm guides it through and so on, but until then yes (and of course once we have the robot we can have the machine whip out whatever we want)
Oh shit they’re already working on robot sewing machines
http://softwearautomation.com/
http://www.hendersonsewing.com/page.asp?p_key=b1f3d4f2d10346119ebe96cc0ad409a2
OH MY GOD THIS IS SO COOL
This is military but fuck them the tech is cool
Thoughts From The Peacock Angel 