Platoniq interviews Dmytri Kleiner, from Telekommunisten (1)



1. What are the origins of your project? When did it start? What were the main goals?

The Telekommunisten project was launched on May 1st, 2006, the main goals of the project to create a worker's collective to serve as the first "venture communist" company, putting into practice the results of my research in to alternative economics.

We want to launch a worker-owned company that provides internet and telephone service and earns enough to employ us, provide the financial basis for our political and artistic production as well.

We have had one product, Dialstation, in beta-testing all year, and May 1st, 2008, two years after we announced the project, we hope to start to building our user base and working towards self-sufficiency.


2. What needs does it address, what sort of problems does it try to solve?

Various forms of funding artistic and political work are all deeply flawed, being limited in availability and often with strings attached that prevent genuinely radically critical work from being funded.

I believe that only worker-self organisation can provide a solution, only by producing and sharing differently can we change our socio-economic condition.
 
As a software developer and cultural producer, Telekommunisten is an effort to find a new way of producing and sharing in my own production, to remove dependency on selling labour to Capitalist organisations and/or depending on grants, etc, but to create exchange relationships directly.


3. What's the geographic scope (local/international) of your project?

We are based in Berlin, but quite international, currently we have stakeholders in Germany, France, Canada and Spain, and hope to involve more people and places as we move forward.

The Dialstation system is usable from anywhere in the world, however local numbers are only availabe in Germany and Toronto, Canada, so other places need to pay a little more for the call-back to their own telephone.


4. Often, day to day practice and community use can shift or reshape the goals and needs. How has this everyday praxis changed the project since its kickoff?

We have learned a lot since we have started, and have a lot more learning to do. In terms of praxis, the difficulty of communicating about our products and in incorporating contributors into the flow are probably the biggest challenges.

Other simply things include the fact that Germans don't really make any long distance phone calls, and that people from Spanish-speaking countries relate more strongly on average to worker's self organisation as a form of class struggle, whereas people in Germany and the UK tend to focus on political organisation. This, along with the fact that English speakers seem to have trouble remembering the name "Telekommunisten," means that we may rename the collective to the Spanish "Telecomunista," as well as offer other products such as simply webhosting and mailinglist services, since many people do not make long distance phone calls yet still would like to be telekommunisten (or Telecomunista!) customers.


5. Is there a specific timeline planned for your project? Future plans?

Yes, I want to launch "for real" on May 1st, which will include a new version of Dialstation, as well 12€ per yer simple webhosting services and a service for hosting mailing lists, free for <500 mails per month, 1€/1000 mails for lists that send more than 500 per month. The mailing list service will only be available for art, education and activist projects.


6. How many people are involved in your organization?

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