[sustran] city bikes/free bikes

[Obwon]

J.H. Crawford wrote:
> 
> I understand that until the 1960s or so, students going to
> Cambridge University bought an old Raleigh 3-speed and
> brought it with them to the university. Everyone had one,
> and they were parked wherever convenient around the
> university. When you left, you simply took the nearest
> bike, not paying any attention to whether or not it
> was yours. This apparently worked without serious problems
> for many decades.
> 
> Such a level of honesty is not to be anticipated anywhere
> these days. It belongs to the time when nobody locked
> his door.
> 
> How sad.
> 
>                                           ###
> 
> J.H. Crawford    Crawford Systems    joel at xs4all.nl    http://www.mokum.com/

 In today's society, with prepackaged foods etc, the family skills have
changed dramatically and so to has the ability and need for the poor to
rely upon one another.  They need money to get the latest goods produced
more effciently and attractively packaged so that handmade homemade has
little if any market left for it.

  As we creep towards a "Gobal Umbilical" society the neighbor holds
less utiltity than they once did and so the sense of community declines
forcing everyone into the mold of the "Modern Business", provide your
seervice and go home. 

  But the poor are excluded from maximizing their participation in the
grand scheme, so with declining community supports they are left to
their own devices to survive.  Survive in a world where the resources
come to them through a 'pipeline', with a 'spigot' that only currency
can open. Where once there was barter and trade.  It's a world that is
creeping towards alienation, with people feeding machines runing faster
and faster. 

  Somewhere we have to stop and take a good look at what we're creating,
if we don't slow down, it will be the demand of the customers
(artificially created) at the other end of the 'pipeline' that will make
us the slaves of the machines we built to serve us.

  Obwon