yours2share - sharing stuff & collaborative consumption » website business

New yours2share website

sophie — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 16:23:08 +0000

After many months hard work, we’ve now launched the new yours2share website. Please have a look!

Many thanks to Ruth Cheesley of Virya Technologies for her help with this Joomla based system.

The new yours2share has a forum and directory dedicated to everything related to private syndicates and all things sharing. Over the next few weeks I will be developing these.

The new yours2share website now charges members to post ads. I’ve reluctantly had to accept that it is better for members if we charge a reasonable fee to post an ad and use this revenue to promote the website more widely.

The cost of posting a new ad, which is then valid for one year, from now on depends upon its category:

Aircraft, boats, cars, mobile homes, property and “what else” – £29.50
Horses, dogs, Monday to Friday lets – £9.50
Landshare – FREE

Existing ads will continue to be displayed without charge until they expire.

Facebook – sharing websites

sophie — Wed, 25 May 2011 16:23:33 +0000

I’m developing a list of all the websites related to sharing I know about on yours2share’s Facebook page. As you’ll see sharing and collaboration take many forms including:

private syndicates
peer to peer rental
rental
swapping
getting rid of stuff that is no longer wanted
peer to peer lending

This is a work in progress. If you know of a service that isn’t mentioned, please let me know.

The Mesh by Lisa Gansky

sophie — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 19:21:46 +0000

The Mesh: Why the Future of Business is Sharing is an interesting book, Lisa Gansky obviously knows a great deal about the many threads that are coming together to create what she calls the Mesh. If you are looking for ideas about where business is going in the future, this is well worth reading. There are some good examples given.

Having said that, even though the subject is dear to my heart, I didn’t find it engaging to read and the constant use of the phrase The Mesh and meshing was irritating. I also didn’t findthe argument as to why sharing is so fundamental for business in the future came through clearly and coherently (I am convinced that it is, but not by this book). As I write this, I’m flicking through the chapters to remind myself of the structure which kind of implies that the framework of the book isn’t as strong as it should be.

There are very few books about sharing so I’m well disposed to any that come along, but I think that Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers book, What’s Mine Is Yours: How Collaborative Consumption is Changing the Way We Live is both more readable and coherent with many more relevant examples – here’s my review of it.

Newsletter archive

sophie — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 14:03:23 +0000

I’ve been writing a newsletter for yours2share for nearly four years now. Except for the first few months all of them have been managed through the excellent ConstantContact. I only recently realised that I could have an archive of newsletters. So here is the yours2share newsletter archive.

Click here if you’d like to subscribe: you can unsubscribe at any time if you wish.

Floating offices

sophie — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 15:08:49 +0000

Not a straightforward sharing proposition, but these novel floating offices could enable people to make much greater use of marina space. And what a great place to have an office.

I’m busily working on my new office for yours2share at the moment and offices with a great view are close to my heart. Fortunately yours2share’s new office overlooks a very pretty garden: I’m looking forward to moving in.

Meet me @ WREF

sophie — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 17:18:59 +0000

yours2share is taking a stand at the WREF (Women, Research and Enterprise Forum) Showcase being held at the Forum in Norwich on Wednesday 17th March from 10am til 4pm.

The Showcase is part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science, held in collaboration with the National Science and Engineering Week and the John Innes Centenary.

If you’d like to find out more about yours2share, come and see us there.

Facebook Fans

sophie — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:26:38 +0000

After much fiddling last night, I managed to get the Facebook fan box into the widget on my blog. So now you can sign up to be a fan of the yours2share page on Facebook. Please do!

Just click “Become a fan”.

Facebook has improved greatly recently, it used to drive me mad every time I touched it. You’d see something one day, go back the next and find it impossible to get back to that interesting section. I’ve not had that sensation for about six months, but yesterday as I was amending the page, I saw the link to the fan box. I did a little more work on the page, and went back to find the Fan Box. I went round and round in circles.

In the end I Googled and found this great explanation of how to set up the Fan Box. The link I was looking for was buried in the page.

Growth does not equal happiness

sophie — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 14:11:16 +0000

I read with interest this post on the monbiot blog I’ve recently discovered about an interview with Lord Turner in the Guardian. Lord Turner is the head of the Financial Services Authority and is quoted as saying: “All the evidence shows that beyond the sort of standard of living which Britain has now achieved, extra growth does not automatically translate into human welfare and happiness.”

For the last 50 odd years we all appear to have been enslaved to the view that the only true measure of success is growth. Growth of individual companies, the stock market, the economy is taken to mean growth in our standard of living and our happiness. In the last 20 years it has become increasingly obvious that once you get to a certain level, this isn’t so. One can only consume so much.

On a small scale, I had become aware that something was out of kilter in my own life. I run a local networking group for women (WIRE – Women in Rural Enterprises). All the literature and emphasis of the national bodies tend to focus on conditions for growth of small businesses. But speaking to a great many owners of small businesses, most simply want to achive a certain level and stay there, or maintain the perfect level they have already attained. Many don’t want to employ staff: they just want to take people on contract when they need them. Growth beyond a specific point simply means that they no longer have time for their family or the rest of their life, and why would they consider trading this for money they don’t actually need and can’t actually spend, because they no longer have the time.

In yours2share world, the increase in sharing and private syndicates is further evidence that people are shifting from the long held view that ownership is king. People are starting to consider only buying what they need. At the same time, many syndicate owners also get to own part of a better asset than they would enjoy if they bought outright. As sharing becomes more established, people will also realise that the community of like-minded syndicate partners is a further benefit.

I think that once you have reached the standard of living that Britain has now achived, the route to greater human welfare and happiness is about strengthening communities and environmental harmony. Sharing has a role in this.

Come and meet me

sophie — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 11:51:44 +0000

If you live in East Anglia and would like the opportunity to meet me and find out more about yours2share, I shall be at the WIRE Autumn Fair at World Horse Welfare (formerly known as the International League for the Protection of Horses (ILPH)) from 10am to 5pm on Saturday 31^st October 2009.

As well as running yours2share, I have been a network leader for the WIRE Norfolk group for the last year, which is why I’m involved in this Autumn Fair.

There will be a wide range of products for sale all representing businesses run by women in the Norfolk area.

World Horse Welfare is located at Hall Farm, near Snetterton, just off the A11. You can walk around the farm where over a 100 horses are kept. There is a good café and play area. It’s heaven for any horse-lover!

There are still a few stands available for WiRE members and the stand fee is very reasonable. Please contact Sue Brewer on 01493 393256 or 07747 861243 for information and to book a stand.

Please vote for me!

admin — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 20:49:45 +0000

This is a shameless plea for a little help!

I’ve been shortlisted for the O2 Grazia awards and the winner will be the one who gets the most votes.

So please vote for me here: http://o2-business.com/business/Vote.aspx You need to click on “East” to see me and then click the button “Vote for this Grazia candidate” for yours2share.

You will need to enter your email so they can (attempt to) stop multiple entries. I was surprised that there was no statement saying that the email address wouldn’t be used for direct mail purposes and emailed the organisers to ask them. They have assured me that it won’t be used for this. I’d probably also tick the box under the repeat email address as well.

Please forward/blog/tweet/facebook or distribute to any friends, family, children, colleagues who know me, or might vote for me any way.

Voting closes at midnight on Tuesday 8th September.

Many thanks!

Thanks you and kind regards