October 7, 2009, we began our sixth year of ongoing, expansive, free, open source content management and global knowledge sharing, community building, social networking and collaboration on REALNEO. See posting Number 1, REALNEO Development Plan, from October 7, 2004, here, for links to many source documents from the planning and development of REALNEO, since 2004.

Congratulations to all REALNEO members, from day one to today! We've come a long way, since 2004, and our outcomes run far deeper than is seen on the surface of REALNEO. Six years is an eternity, in the world of social computing - we're about 8 months younger than Facebook, and a paradigm beyond - we are Real Co-op!

Realneo - Regional Economics Action Links for North East Ohio - is owned and operated by a Real Co-op of real citizens - the originators of all content on REALNEO - and we transform our physical community, through our virtual community. REALNEO is an action-oriented network of action-oriented people, who are the members of Real Co-op.

As I feel is our legacy, purpose and destiny, in action, I have proposed specific action-oriented physical community transformations through REALNEO and Real Co-op, described in "For REAL COOP Members, Draft Executive Summary of INFO FOOD Initiatives for Cuyahoga County".

The origins of the INFO FOOD Initiatives for Cuyahoga County go back long before 2004, and before REALNEO and Real Co-op, and build upon over a decade of development work with Utility Management Services Group (UMS), Spectrum Telecom, the Information Technology and Infrastructure Management Exchange (InT+IME), Information Community Earth (ICEarth), and learning work at University School, over 30 years ago, and ongoing network relations there (shown in the pictures top and bottom).

I am posting here links to source documents core to the concepts and development of REALNEO, Real Co-op, the INFO FOOD Initiatives for Cuyahoga County, and our use of technology, and I encourage discussion on our background and current planning as we look at how we develop our physical community - our Earth - in the future.

I developed the core concepts behind REALNEO and Real Co-op over a decade of providing UMS and InT+IME global information systems, telecommunications and other consulting to senior management of Fortune 50 companies, in utility and high-tech sectors, and first published these concepts in 2001, as a strawman called "ICEarth - Information Community Earth - Conceptual Framework - normALST 02/07/01: The Emergence of “Info Mediated Enterprise”... re-posted to REALNEO this year.

In the excerpts below, You'll see how REALNEO, Real Co-op and our Co-op Info and Food proposal are all part of developing our information community Earth:

"The concept underlying infomediation is that an individual should 'own' his or her own data and that only trusted parties should broker individuals’ data as allowed and authorized by the individual."

Infomediation will pay for itself and make individuals (and technology and application services providers) money. For example, if Kylie maintains a database of her personal preferences, perceptions and buying activities (e.g. what products she buys and likes, her opinions on movies, her favorite Internet resources) that have market value (which for all people they do) she can sell that data to those that care (and the people developing products and services do care what we think). If she allows detergent companies to know her preferred brand of detergent, by allowing them access to her grocery store buying data now locked in the stores IT, they can offer to buy her business through eCoupons for their brands that will be integrated into her preferred stores information and register systems – never hitting paper but worth much in savings. Perhaps they’ll just send her free samples. In any case, she will be compensated. Companies like Nielsen may still exist, but we will own our preference data and they will become ASPs that will work for us rather than the other way around.

For all these concepts to work, we only need effective data management technologies/services/capabilities, common standards, and fair, reliable, secure brokering/access processes, which we have today and is why all these ASP models are rapidly developing. This InfoMediation revolution will put many powerful businesses out-of-business require survivors to realign their business practices, and offer entrepreneurs and established enterprises a wealth of new opportunities to prosper by doing IT right. An eRevolution has begun and for Kylie and the rest of us the realignment of individuals' data ownership, management and rights represents a new world of great opportunity.

To allow people to leverage universal access, I/ME, and USEIT, we need to put all people in synch with today’s optimal economic opportunities. To see where all individuals fit into the evolving global economic system, consider some perspectives from a May/June 2000 Harvard Business Review article titled "Syndication: The Emerging Model for Business in the Internet Era," which puts good terms and understanding around very real and important global business developments for us all.

Using the authors' terminology, anyone developing enterprise in an internetworked environment can be an 'originator' (which means they create original content), a 'syndicator' (which means they package content and manage relationships between originators and distributors), and a 'distributor' (which means they deliver content to consumers).

In my words:

As an originator, I can use the internet to sell whatever I create or have the right to sell; pictures, ideas, buying preferences, opinions, songs, masks I carve, diamonds I dig, and the trees in my backyard (this takes the model beyond HBR's intent, as I must). 

If I want to sell my trees, I want to be a creator of tree transactions and could put a sign in my front yard proclaiming "trees for sale" and hope a logger happens by, or I could post a notice on the internet with the same compelling message. Unfortunately, even though my Internet 'for sale' sign may be accessible to 30+ million potential customers, the odds of a logger stumbling over my lone sign in cyberspace are about as remote as a logger driving by my front yard. Even if one does lumber by, under today's circumstances I'm unlikely to receive the best price in such a remote, closed market because I probably don’t know what they are optimally worth.

That is where a syndicator offers value. In a simple model in place today, I could use the Internet to auction my trees to the highest bidder. While e-bay may not offer a good market for my trees, some syndicator probably already does or should/will. All I need to find is the best tree syndicator. Considering the $600 billions spent on wood products world-wide  each year, someone should want to take a cut of my action by helping me sell them and, like me, they will want the best price offering them the best cut.

An effective internet tree syndicator will offer me applications and capabilities to promote and market my trees to all the people and organizations that want to buy them - loggers, paper companies, nurseries, landscapers, gardening and firewood burning individuals, and even mask carvers as the case may be. To whoever buys trees, I want my syndicator to 'package' mine for me to sell in the optimal marketplace under optimal terms.

The syndicator needs to work effectively with distributors, who get the word out about my trees to the best markets and buyers. If I have mature, paper yielding trees, I want the distributor to get word out to Champion paper and all their competitors. If I have dead firewood trees, I want to reach loggers in my area selling firewood or, if I'll cut them, to wood-burners. If I have dogwood saplings, I want to reach gardeners, nurseries, and landscapers in my region and, if they ship well, even worldwide. For all these markets, I may use the same syndicator and basic applications, but my distribution networks to consumers will be very different.

As such, I want to be part of the optimal 'community' of tree syndicators and distributors to market to the optimal buyers, whatever they may be. I want to reach my highest possible Syndicated Community Horizons. My community may be local – all the tree owners in my area – or global – tree owners world-wide – and via internetworking they are all members of a virtual eTree community seeking their peak value horizon.

Consider the tribesman in New Guinea. Today, the logger comes to his village and offers to remove his trees for a dollar a tree (actually, he probably buys the land out from under the tribe and ten others for a dollar per acre, but now we're talking real estate - which we eventually should). Without optimal SynCH, a cheap deal is cut, the logger exploits the originator and pays as little as possible (as it's been done for centuries), and cuts the trees, floats them down river, and the tribe’s natural resources are gone forever. Welcome to today's marketplace, third world.

Under a USEIT model with SynCH, the tribesman would turn the logger away, having syndicated his trees to a fair bidder at market rate. With an effective syndicator and optimal SynCH, the deal the tribesman cut would probably even require a nonexploitative logger to plant new saplings to ensure more trees, natural resources and revenues for future tribal generations. This is the optimal paradigm and it is not remotely like the closed, exploitative market for most tribesmen of today. Hopefully it will be the model for all tribesmen in the near future – in many tribes it is already developing.

A tree is a rose is a tomato is a poem, in the infomediated world we live in - all virtual and physical things have the greatest value through optimal use of information technologies.

Our proposal to Cuyahoga County, for local Co-op Food and Info, takes cooperative infomediation beyond trees to the eco- and info- system of local foods, through: "For REAL COOP Members, Draft Executive Summary of INFO FOOD Initiatives for Cuyahoga County".

In our proposal, I explain a vision you shall see is the implementation of the ICEarth vision explained above, through REALNEO and Real Co-op:

In December, 2008, REALNEO founder Norm Roulet met with leadership of the government of Cuyahoga County to explain the value of REALNEO and Real Coop for Northeast Ohio, and to introduce the importance and growth potential of our sector of the economy... open source information systems and technology.

Real Coop drives significant innovation in Northeast Ohio, and draws the attention of millions of virtual visitors to here, from world-wide.

Real Coop intends to expand our value and impact by leading further global innovations in open source information systems and technologies here, and the benefits to the community will be revolutionary, in a very good way.

Through REALNEO.US, Real Coop leverages and demonstrates the power of cooperative open source social computing, knowledge management and community development to better our region and the world.

Through our REAL COOP INFO initiatives, Cuyahoga County government will help drive open source innovativeness worldwide, by contributing to global open source software and standards initiatives, and locally, by adopting open source information systems, standards and technologies in government and in the community, as means to transform our economy and better the quality of life of citizens.

Our cooperative proposes that Cuyahoga County government promote open source innovativeness locally, and invest in workforce and infrastructure development, to make NEO the free open source capital of the world.

Norm Roulet has also presented to Cuyahoga County leaders and the REALNEO community the case that there is need for Cuyahoga County to invest in cooperative development of our local foods economy, for our regional food security, social equity, economic development and environmental benefit for all.

Through REAL COOP FOOD Initiatives, Cuyahoga County will help revolutionize the local foods economy of the region, which has $ billions in growth potential, in statewide cooperation to make Ohio the Brightest Greenest State of Earth.

Through REAL COOP FOOD Initiatives, Cuyahoga County will make strategic investments in developing facilities and capabilities for everything from composting and greenhouse construction to food warehousing and distribution; workforce development and education; soil analysis and development; permaculture and vertical farming; water management and watershed protection; new urban infrastructure reengineering; remote monitoring and geographical information system innovation; material and food handling, sorting,  pricing, marketing, packaging, logistics and transit; food processing, entrepreneurship and commerce; wireless communications and data acquisition... revolutionizing concepts and practices leading to real “food security” everywhere on Earth, for world benefit for all.

Real Coop proposes Cuyahoga County leadership plan to develop the open source local foods and information systems economies of Northeast Ohio together, changing our landscape forever.

Cuyahoga Government leadership has been supportive of this vision, leading to development of a series of cooperative proposals for initiatives supporting our mission:

To Make NEO the Open Source Capital of the Brightest Greenest State of Earth

To truly understand the origins of REALNEO, and so the potential of your REAL COOP, I strongly encourage you to review "ICEarth - Information Community Earth - Conceptual Framework - normALST 02/07/01: The Emergence of Info Mediated Enterprise" from the perspective of "For REAL COOP Members, Draft Executive Summary of INFO FOOD Initiatives for Cuyahoga County".

I will link to this book page other documents explaining the origins of ICEarth, REALNEO, REAL CO-OP, Real Info and Food, and how they all fit together in real NEO, and offer the region global competitive advantage.

Feel free to post any questions and comments here and to source documents... you are writing the origins of the future.