Specifications of the Free Foundation
Version 1.1 - November 20 2002

Summary : The idea is to build an economic system, fully autonomous included and especially at the decision level, of software nature, designed to have a unique goal : to make profits by all means, these profits being then redistributed, through a foundation for the arts, science, research and education. The idea is to create an automatic system that earns money in the profit-driven universe and injects it in the non-profit universe.

The Free Foundation is made of two entities : the Enterprise that earns money, and the Foundation that redistributes it.

 

I) The Enterprise

The Enterprise is totally autonomous. There is no decision-making human. Moreover, as much as possible, there is no human ownership. It is totally free and non stoppable, at least as long as the capitalist ecosystem is in place. The idea is to build an enterprise that is really free, designed to last, to survive.

1) Technology
The Enterprise is software based, autostructuring, autoreproductive, autoadaptative, without limit of size or complexity. It is constituted of multiple independant software entities, distributed on machines connected to Internet, impossible to locate and constantly moving. It is designed without limit of time nor space.
Cryptography is used intensively for security.
The decision-making algorithms are autoadaptative and unpredictable. They rely on analytical and forecasting algorithms and have a nature of artificial will containing random elements. They are programmed to build their own abstractions, to learn, to adapt, to evolve automatically and willfully, to try, to admit errors and correct them. The financial and economical universe is the ecosystem in which these algorithms are programmed to survive.

2) Legal, financial, ethics
The Enterprise conforms to the law in all cases.
The Enterprise can use any economic shape legally available (company, firm, limited responsability structures, etc…). It is multinational by design.
The Enterprise makes use of real bank accounts. Whenever possible bank accounts where human ownership is not required is used.
The Enterprise has ethical limits programmed into it. These limits are based on the law.

3) Security
The security of the Enterprise is crucial. All the legal, software and structural protections are set up to avoid its destruction or its misuse. The enterprise, and its objective, must survive all attacks, whether or not they are intentional. Especially, the Enterprise is able to cope with all attempts of takeover : financial takeover, legal or civil action, computer hacking, etc…). The enterprise, or its siblings, must be able to accomplish its mission endlessly.

4) Contributions
Many contributions are necessary for the creation and survival of the enterprise. The contributions are made in the form of intellectual contributions, of CPU time, and possibly of financial contributions.
Donations or contributions will not lead to any particular rights for the donators.

a) Software contributions
The intellectual contributions, in the spirit of the Free Software and Open Source movements, are in the form of software or software modules, in source code, in any possible programming langage. Contributions come from programmers and experts in the fields of finance, game, artificial life, artificial intelligence, network, operating systems, and all other usefull specialty.
The Enterprise is designed to endlessly accept new software contributions, in order to be able to cope with future external conditions not imaginable today. Software is not creative by nature, but the contributors are and will be. The Enterprise has the means to evaluate the contributions, when they are submitted, and in the future depending on the external conditions. It can grow, and structures itself automatically. It has no limit of complexity.

b) CPU time contributions
Another form of contribution is CPU time. Throughout the Internet network (or it successors), software modules will execute on machines temporary and intentionnaly provided by owners worldwide, in the spirit of collaborative computing, by using idle time.

c) Financial contributions
Direct financial contributions will be accepted, wherever legally possible.

5) Goals
Profits are the only goal of the Enterprise. These profits are short term, mid-term and long term. The Enterprise manages the risks in order to achieve a steady flow of profit.
The Enterprise has complete freedom on the means to make profits. It uses the financial markets, the service industry, the goods industry, etc…
In case of bankrupcy, it is able to reproduce and reincarnate in an entity of same nature and same goals.

6) Humans employees
The Enterprise uses human-provided services, when needed. In this case, the Enterprise can employ human beings, who provide services to the enterprise, in the form of pure labor, competences, consulting, presence, etc…

7) Enterprise/Foundation
The Enterprise’s profits are, as much as possible, injected into the Foundation, in direct financial transfer. Legal means are strongly set up to enable this link.
Some part of the profits may be reinfected into the Enterprise, for investment purposes. The decisions are made by the Enterprise, given that its main goal is always to provide a steady flow of financing to the Foundation.

 

II) the Foundation

The Foundation’s object is to financially sustain human intellectual activities. These include intellectual research, being of artistic, scienctific, cultural, philosophical or any other nature, as long as they do not have financial profit as a goal, and that they are of intellectual nature, and education, especially in the areas where education level is low.

The Fondation exclusively uses the financial resources brought by the Enterprise to function.

Humanitarian researches or actions (food, water, environment, health care, etc…) are not sustained by the Foundation. Another Foundation of same nature may take care of these aspects of uman life, but it is not the goal of the current Free Foundation.

The Foundation’s decision structure is exclusively human, and will function in a collegial and transparent manner. Choices and decisions concerning funded projects, amount of funding, the structuring of the Foundation itself, its functionning, its evolution, will be made by groups of people, in a democratic manner within these groups, and all the debates are public.

These decisions never concern the Enterprise, which remains totally autonomous.

The Foundation has a legal and internal structure that enables and sustains this collegiality, transparence and human centered decision-making structure.