ant village and the ant village challenge

Pretty plese on the vlog thing, they could then have sponsers like real life "Hunger Games" players. Although hopefully not too hungry. I am also old (i.e. encumbered) but would love to help adopt-an-ant.

For people interested in donating to these sorts of thing I have started a "Fund for Earnestness" thread.
https://permies.com/t/41989/labs/scholarship-fund-earnestness

jim forster wrote:Would it be possible to be an ant without a car?

I suspect that 80% of the ants will be without a car. I like to think that the folks with a rig can make a little money with carpools or shopping/delivery.

We have a pickup truck here that we call "ranger doug". I mentioned an idea to rick in the past for renting that out. Maybe it can even be something that is traded or maybe if I need something from town, I'd supply the truck if you supply the fuel.

How bikable is the nearest grocery and hardware stores (within 10miles seems good to me)?

Less than ten miles. But they are ... insufficient. We tend to go all the way into missoula for the lion's share of stuff.

Does UPS deliver?

To basecamp.

Eugene Rominger wrote:
would Ant's be able use the lab's earth moving equip. on property?

I have put some thought into this.

I think I am willing to make use of the excavator + driver depending on some things. Like up to 16 hours. It would need to be things that I want to see, like wofati and hugelkultur. There are other possibilities.

(x hours of gapping = 1 day of rental {including a qualified operator})
Or the lumber mill (x Hours gapping = 1 tree milled) Um, you should set a max % of the trees cut on each arce.
and to be clear is this part of the lab allow the use of power tools, generators ect.

I like the idea better of putting some sort of dollar value on it. And then saying "I will pay $xxx for a fence I need built."

So... despite having listened to all 300+ Podcasts.
I have no idea how you feel about the use of cargo containers on the property.

visible by satellite photography. Riddled with flaking off paint.

I would rather see something made of natural materials.

I think there are some things that we do for now that are stepping stones to the future that will be removed later. But a shipping container seems like the sort of thing that would be a long term eyesore.

I would rather see a berm-shed built.

Julia Winter wrote:Right now it seems like you want $800 from any ant to show up and whether you stay or go, Paul is keeping the $800. This might weed out some smart people who would otherwise be a good fit.

Obviously the 300 podcast thing will help, but I would suggest that there be a brief "getting to know each other" period during which the ant can decide this isn't going to work and be able to leave with the majority of their money.

Like, if you leave in the first 4 weeks, you give up $100, or $200 or somesuch. Maybe even $100 per week, so if you leave after 3 weeks, you get $500 back.

I think that it should be the other way around.

Some ants dig right in and get mountains of stuff done and work hard. They stay. They take up almost zero of my time and accomplish epic shit.

Other ants come and ask an endless stream of questions, cause lots of problems, screw things up, possibly even cause damage. They discover that they are more like a grasshopper than an ant and decide to leave after two months.

The ant that left after two months consumed three times the resources/time/peace as the the ant that stayed.

I think the ant village and the ant challenge are for people that are debt free and have worked up a grubstake of $5000 or more. For them to purchase land would cost something on the order of $50,000 for raw land (complete with neighbors that love to spray). And then they would need the means to build and to get building materials on site. I think this is an extremely rare and cheap opportunity. Much easier to get into. Plus, rather than working some soul-draining job, they can build their own future with neighbors that don't spray.

If somebody arrives with residual incomes streams, like what I use and advocate, then those people will be able to stay for decades. If somebody is willing to work for ten hours a week, they will also have (I suspect) ample income - especially if they have a bit of skill.

Stephanie Meyer wrote:Pretty plese on the vlog thing, they could then have sponsers like real life "Hunger Games" players. Although hopefully not too hungry. I am also old (i.e. encumbered) but would love to help adopt-an-ant.

Stephanie,

Would you like to adopt one ant or more than one ant?

What might be the attributes of the ant you wish to adopt? What does your adption smell like? Covering the fee? Covering them getting here? Covering project materials? What do you want in return?

Here is how I think this would go down:

ant shows up and picks their spot (first come, first serve).

build a fence. If you don't build a fence, the deer and turkeys will eat all of your garden.

build/plant your garden.

build your winter shelter.

- - -

I think there will be some barn-raising like stuff happening. Something where seven ants will gather one day to help an eighth ant to erect something. And later, the eighth ant will return the favor. Or, maybe, ant #8 will hire ant #2 and #11 to help for a few days. And later, ant #8 will be hired by some other ants for a bit of help.

- - -

I am already thinking of all the projects that *I* want to have done for my stuff. And how I would be glad to pay somebody for these tasks. Most of these tasks are for infrastructure, so they would benefit all of the ants.

paul wheaton wrote:

Stephanie Meyer wrote:Pretty plese on the vlog thing, they could then have sponsers like real life "Hunger Games" players. Although hopefully not too hungry. I am also old (i.e. encumbered) but would love to help adopt-an-ant.

Stephanie,

Would you like to adopt one ant or more than one ant?

What might be the attributes of the ant you wish to adopt? What does your adption smell like? Covering the fee? Covering them getting here? Covering project materials? What do you want in return?

I was thinking along the lines of a "sponser the children" type thing, I would be willing to pledge (say $25- 50 a month I can get away with without my husband having kittens) for an individual ant to use towards supplies/feeding/whatever they determine it needs to go to. Personally, I would prefer they should be able to take care of getting there and the fee so they have a more vested interest in things. In return, maybe a general weekly/biweekly vlog to their adoring audience. They would get some financial support and general support, I get some vicarious experience. I wish I could come do this, but I can't without exploding my family, helping to contribute to someone else making a go of it is the next best thing.
As far as attributes, I am only a small part way through your podcasts but think that someone who has listened to and "gets" 300 plus is probably somebody I can get behind.

Tallying the votes for documentation, especially videos:

Shaz Jameson wrote:Awesome! I think there should be 1 point for documentation, so that we can learn from experiments/what worked/didn't work. Doesn't need to be extensive, can be a more tick-box affair, but at least some kind of record so that at the end of the ant-challenge you have something to show for the process rather than just the end result.

Alex Ojeda wrote:This is crazy, exciting stuff. Should be filmed and turned into a Documentary! Race for the Deepest Roots!

Joshua Myrvaagnes wrote:This sounds really generous. <snip>
I think a lot of people would go for a kickstarter connected to this too, though that's a little more complicated in what you have to guarantee out of it.

Craig Dobbelyu wrote:This would make a neat documentary/vlog. An interactive online audience might help spread the permaculture bug a little further.

Ryan Barrett wrote:Documentation would be nice.
Permies thread, Blog, vlog, etc.

Stephanie Meyer wrote:Pretty plese on the vlog thing, they could then have sponsers like real life "Hunger Games" players. Although hopefully not too hungry. I am also old (i.e. encumbered) but would love to help adopt-an-ant.

And these are just the folks who took the time to write! I'm perhaps twisting Joshua Myrvaagnes' meaning a bit, though I think his intent is also a documentary, and even if it's not a kickstarter, perhaps the "ant" could get a good leg up on some residual income with a popular YouTube channel.

I'm with Shaz that I'd also recommend a vlog (or regular video postings of the experience) as qualifying for bonus points in the wheaton ant village challenge.

It would be easy to "pay" an Ant for each Vlog entry using patreon

paul wheaton wrote:
I think that it should be the other way around.

Some ants dig right in and get mountains of stuff done and work hard. They stay. They take up almost zero of my time and accomplish epic shit.

Other ants come and ask an endless stream of questions, cause lots of problems, screw things up, possibly even cause damage. They discover that they are more like a grasshopper than an ant and decide to leave after two months.

The ant that left after two months consumed three times the resources/time/peace as the the ant that stayed.

I totally get that some people are an epic waste of time/energy, but, even them, if you are wishing they would go, getting most of their money back could be an incentive for that! "You know, I really don't think this whole thing is working out. Paul is never going to go for your shipping container village idea, and Tim has called you things I don't even want to repeat. However, there are lots of ways to learn about permaculture. If you leave the ant program now, you can get $XXX back."

Really though, that's not the sort of people I was thinking of. I'm thinking of people who are a bit more deliberative in their decision making and careful with their money. These (to me) seem like good attributes. This sort of a careful person may carefully read throught the description of the ant village challenge and be unwilling to jump in without some sort of escape hatch.

If someone has made it 300 plus podcasts through, they should have a pretty good idea what they are getting into, not as if their host is a shrinking violet about his belief system. Plus I think there is also an aspect of " I paid for this, I'm getting my moneys worth" that may help people get through the rough days. An easy escape hatch is not always a good thing in these situations IME.

Hi Paul

Have you thought of the possibility of a kind of permatourist. It might be a lot of work up front but maybe a couple of lodges for people willing to pay to come work and be guided through what it's like to be on a a permaculture reality. The clientel may be a little needy but it seems like you are all ready dealing with that. Take advantage of the fact that people want this kind of thing and have them pay for it. One week room and board 1200.00 give them a place to stay with a couple of meals them put them to work in a sort of tourist learning hands on kind of thing. Give them a sort of certificate to put on their wall and they can go back to what ever money making job they were doing feeling like they were a less distructive force in nature while they went on there vacation. It would probably break as many tools as the ones that say they are going to help but actually bring in some money. You may have to play a role which is outside your comfort zone but it might be worth it. The ant village sounds great but it seems many of the dedicated just can't scrape together the cash and effort it might take to give up the job and build somewhere else. I have seen ecotourist resorts with some of the eliments, people paying to experience a "green" vacation so why not a permatourist.

Mikael

Yeah, Totally what Mikael just said.

I mean dealing with people and the accommodations business is a full time job for someone (speaking from extensive experience)

But even just something like Glamping in the early years will do lots to bring in people and infect brains. Totally something worth thinking about.

Stephanie Meyer wrote:I was thinking along the lines of a "sponser the children" type thing, I would be willing to pledge (say $25- 50 a month I can get away with without my husband having kittens) for an individual ant to use towards supplies/feeding/whatever they determine it needs to go to. Personally, I would prefer they should be able to take care of getting there and the fee so they have a more vested interest in things. In return, maybe a general weekly/biweekly vlog to their adoring audience. They would get some financial support and general support, I get some vicarious experience. I wish I could come do this, but I can't without exploding my family, helping to contribute to someone else making a go of it is the next best thing.
As far as attributes, I am only a small part way through your podcasts but think that someone who has listened to and "gets" 300 plus is probably somebody I can get behind.

Once upon a time, I set up some of my articles with "tiptheweb." -- the thing I wanted to encourage was that each time that I read a great article, I would throw a nickle to the author. And so I set up something similar on my site. But it didn't work the way I hoped, so I let it go.

I wonder if we could set up something similar for such ants. Then, every time you see something that you like, you can put something in. It would be like apples or thumbs up, but it would be bits of cash.

Julia Winter wrote: and Tim has called you things I don't even want to repeat.

A deep roots person was out here a few weeks ago and went for a drive about five miles from here. And got stuck. He called AAA and after many hours, AAA said they would come, but didn't. So they callled .... BATMAN! No, wait .... they called Tim.

I now think of Tim as a lot like batman*. When you are in need, and the proper channels aren't working ... the ultimate solution is batman. The dark knight.

But here is the best part: they came to a price. Tim drove out to where they were stuck and got him unstuck. They then got stuck twice more and Tim stayed with them until they got to pavement.

The ants will be doing everything on their own. And so they won't be receiving any guidance from Tim. Of course, if they have a Tim-task, they could hire him.

Tim gets to the point where he dislikes certain people because he works with them and finds that they fall short of his standards. This is great when you are a construction foreman, but not the best in a teaching environment.

I guess the point I am trying to make is: I suspect that Tim will not develop any opinion of most the ants. At the same time, I suspect that Tim will have an extremely high opinion of ALL the ants because they are making a go of it on raw land. Tim refers to the people at basecamp as "living at grandma's house."

(*= and his wife alfred. and his kids, robin, robin and batgirl)

Mikael Long wrote:Have you thought of the possibility of a kind of permatourist.

Yes. I was calling them "pebbles". I think we will expand that at some point. I even think it would be great to have a dozen ants around and I could hire and ant or two to help with that.

Tim says that if he arrives at a site that has had the earthworks done and has a pile of logs ready to go, he can build a wofati in two days (with a good helper). Then comes the earthworks for the umbrella.

I am now thinking that each ant package will come with 16 hours of excavator and (probably) driver. Provided that this 16 hours is applied to wofati stuff and/or hugelkultur stuff. I would need to approve anything else.

Each plot will be roughly 300 feet by 145 feet. One acre. So the permimeter is a little less than 900 feet. A fence will be the first order of business (to keep deer and wild turkeys out of your food systems). And if you have two neighbors, you might get away with building a bit less fence.

So, maybe a few hugelkultur beds, then a fence, then a wofati. It seems like the whole thing can easily be squeezed into a couple of months pretty easy. But I also think it will be easier for some folks than others. And a smaller, more humble design might be a lot faster to build.

An ant is welcome to have their own wwoofers or friends helping. And I kinda wonder if the gappers might be more fulfilled working side-by-side with ant than with whatever projects I have lined up. In other words, an ant is free to poach my gappers - but then the ant must provide the food and bunk (on their acre). And, of course, the gapper must be willing. Maybe the ant is providing something better than I am. Until I get a permaculture project leader, I suspect that poaching gappers would be pretty easy. In fact, maybe until I get a permaculture project leader, we should just tell incoming gappers that they might want to meet the ants that are open to hosting gappers.

It is even possible that I will come up with paid projects that an ant might take on with their gappers.

Metrics so far:

40 points for the amount of food to get through the winter
30 points for quality of shelter / winter warmth
15 points for art and aesthetics
20 points for contributing to community infrastructure
20 points for community glue
10 points for documenting your progress on permies.com

Anything else I should consider?

It begins.

I am now closing this thread.

Based on the discussion in this thread, I am now opening two new threads:

Ant Village

Ant Village Challenge