Community Exchange NewsCommunity Exchange News is the Newsletter of the Wellington Talent Exchange group of the SANE Community Exchange System
| Community Exchange News |
| No.1, 8 July 2006 |
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Community Exchange News is the Newsletter of the Wellington Talent Exchange group of the SANE Community Exchange System |
Contents:
Welcome to the first Newsletter of the Wellington Talent Exchange!! The newsletter will go out regularly from now on, once a month. It will be small to start with. Any contributions from you and the other members in the exchange will add to the variety and depth of the material. Please consider writing about your experiences in the exchange and any thoughts you have about how the exchange works.
In this first newsletter I have included the stats for June 2006, a brief assessment of where we are in the process of building the exchange, and a few other thoughts. My aim now is to help you to be at ease and comfortable with the workings of the exchange, and I want you to feel inspired to meet with and trade with the other partners in our enterprise.
Russell Bishop
Administrator
We 'opened our doors' on the 17th March this year. Trading to date has been T2 911. In June we traded to the value of T588. We now have 26 member accounts. I believe this is a good start. I believe that I need to put more time into promoting the exchange. To do that I need to go out and talk to people about the exchange. Going to particular organisations may be useful. People in the non-profit sector, for instance, will tend to be most open to what we are trying to achieve. I do also need to find a way of involving businesses in the exchange. The question of tax must be addressed. I need also to do more in making you and the other members comfortable and inspired. Trading events and workshops will help with this. Social events will also help.
The work I mention here is likely to happen slowly. I am not finding the time I thought I would to do the work. I hope it's OK with you that the process will be slow. We are different to more conventional enterprises in that we do not have high overhead costs. (There is a low level of ongoing cost, as I am now charging the administration a fee for my work.) What's most important is that there is no great disadvantage to moving forward slowly.
3. The Astronomy Wonder Session
I want to let you know that I ran this event as planned on the 1st July. Five adults and three children attended. Four younger children were taken care of by my wife Laura. All those present seemed to have a very good time. I believe they gained some exciting scientific knowledge about our place in the heavens, and about 'what's out there'. I spoke briefly about the Wellington Talent Exchange during the session and we have four new members as a result. I hope to run a similar session again some time.
4. Keeping Your Offerings 'Live'
When I bring a new person into the exchange I generally set their offerings up to stay current for a period of 6 months. As a result of this there are a few offerings due to expire in September, and quite a lot in October. Please just have a look at your offerings and consider resetting them to expire later.
5. Improving Security with a Personal Password
I'm worried about the security of your account if you still have the password given to you by the automatic system when you joined. That original password is sitting in my Yahoo site on the email and I imagine a very determined person could get in there and see it. Please do go in some time and give yourself a very personal password and ensure the security of your account.
6. Making your Offerings Attractive
Please think of the exchange as a way to let people know what you can do that would be of great value to them. You need to think of your offerings as 'adverts'. Please have a look at how you've worded your offerings and see if you can make them 'sing'. That is, can you make them show the high quality of your work and skills, and the goods you may be offering.
7. 'Substituting' Day-to-day Purchases and Work Activity into the Exchange
Some time ago I coined the term 'substitution'. By this I meant the shifting of buying and selling from the national currency system into the local currency system. I think it is good if you can get things that you normally buy for dollars, in the exchange. It's also good if you can do work you normally do for dollars and receive local money in payment for it, or of course sell goods that you would normally sell for dollars, for local money. In line with this I am keen to reach a point where we can all buy the things we most value, on which we currently spend most of our Kiwi Dollars, in the exchange. Those items we spend most on and which we can't really do without are: food, clothing, cleaning materials, accommodation, practical services (house maintenance, plumbing, ...), transport, financial advice, business advice, child care, labour, entertainment. Quite a bit of this is already on offer to us in the exchange. Please think about ways of 'substituting' purchases and work activity into the exchange.
8. 'Indulgent' or Special Offerings and Wants
The exchange will, of course, sometimes offer those rare 'exotic' or special or 'indulgent' things, which we mostly prefer not to buy, mainly because they just cost too much. It also allows for us to be a little 'indulgent' in what we offer - to offer to do things, just because we enjoy doing them. My 'Astronomy Wonder Session' was somewhat in that category. While I was at Carter Observatory there were opportunities to teach this fascinating subject. Now I have few such opportunities. I am using the exchange to create the chance to talk to people about the 'heavens above'.