Bachelors Button Cornflower: Want to stay in Berkeley for free, While Traveling?, People's Park, Jimmy Wales Talks about Wikipedia

Want to stay in Berkeley for free, while traveling?

Camp out in People's Park ...


Camping out in People's Park occasionally, as part of an anthropology of counterculture and information technology sounds like a good idea, and fascinating ... there must be a cast of characters living there, and some of whom have been around since 1969.


Park in front of the tree house 1 and 1/2 miles away, and head to the park with camping gear ... get to know folks there ... Learn ...


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"People's Park: Still Blooming, 1969 - 2009" a book edited by Terri Compost, tells the ongoing story of people of Berkeley taking over this park from the UC Regents ... and reclaiming it as public space ...


http://slingshot.tao.ca/displaybi.php?0100005


I just came across this book in the worker-owned Berkeley bakery cooperative Nabaloms.


"People's Park still blooming - 1969-2009
New Book about People's Park!

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the construction of People's Park in Berkeley, local author and activist Terri Compost has compiled "People's Park: Still Blooming," a 200 page full-color coffee table book that documents the Park's evolution from 1969 to the present day.

People's Park, located between Haste Street and Dwight Avenue, half a block East of Telegraph Avenue, is in many ways the spiritual and inspirational nexus of radical activism in the East Bay. Since a diverse coalition of activists seized a vacant lot to build the Park in 1969, the Park has been a model for do-it-yourself direct action. In the years since 1969, generations of activists have fought to permit the users of the Park to decide how it should be developed, operated and maintained -- embodying the principal of user development -- in the face of constant police repression. Amidst all the riots and protests, the park still blooms.

As the silent narrator, Terri weaves together interviews, news clippings and book excerpts to tell the story of the Park's past, present and future. The book features hundreds of historical images and photographs of the Park's present uses: as a community garden and native plant repository in a dense urban area; as a liberated zone for concerts and political rallies; and as one of the few places open to all people -- rich and poor, homeless and housed -- in an increasingly consumer-dominated Berkeley. Daily free food provided by Food Not Bombs and others draws a constantly shifting band of punks, travelers, artists and marginalized people to the Park.

It is fitting that "People's Park: Still Blooming" is the first book published by the Slingshot Collective. Slingshot traces its roots to the Park -- the ideas that inspired it and the street protests that have kept it alive. The book is not a dry historical text nor mere picture book -- its conception and actualization are intimately tied to a living struggle with implications far wider than just Berkeley or just a Park. The struggle for the Park is the same as the global struggle for freedom, cooperation and ecological balance over hierarchy, corporations and a throw-away world.

Look for People's Park: Still Blooming in your local indy-bookstore or infoshop, or order from the slingshot website: slingshot@tao.ca. "



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"Jimmy Wales: How a ragtag band created Wikipedia" TED Talk

Jimmy Wales on Wikipedia - TED Talk - "Jimmy Wales: How a ragtag band created Wikipedia" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQR0gx0QBZ4&NR=1








(http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2009/10/bachelors-button-cornflower-want-to.html - October 19, 2009)