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Overview
A team of volunteers has come together to completely overhaul the CES system. The core of the new system will be a state-of-the-art mobile app, and the CES website will also change to embody the functionality of this app. This is a huge undertaking that will require ongoing fundraising and a phased introduction of enhanced capabilities over the course of 2025 and 2026. Please read on for further details.
Why the upgrade
It’s been over 22 years since CES was launched. With over a thousand exchange groups in more than 100 countries, CES has grown to become the world’s foremost moneyless exchange system. However, CES is still running on its original software. Technology has advanced to such an extent that the opportunity presents itself to take CES from a still somewhat small system to global mass adoption.
The timing of this opportunity coincides with a heightened change in consciousness toward money and its role in creating inequality and separation among humans. We now have the wherewithal to take a quantum leap toward a post-money society. Global mass adoption will enable our shared vision of relating to each other in the spirit of the gift, thus serving as a catalyst for a broader realignment of our social fabric.
Evidence for this includes the fact that we have seen over six hundred new exchanges registered in South America alone over the past four months (July to October 2024).
What will change
Imagine yourself at a local market transacting instantly on your CES phone app via a QR code. Or, perhaps you receive an app alert at home from your local farmer for your favorite vegetables, as you had saved various alerts on the CES, AI-assisted search engine.
With an emphasis on speed, simplicity and functionality, we envisage the average size of CES groups going from less than a hundred today toward a critical mass of thousands, if not tens of thousands, thus enabling members to satisfy much of their day-to-day needs without money. Not only will this require the development of an app, but also the CES website itself will be redesigned to embody the functionality of the app. Of course, all of this will not only require a huge amount of design and programming work, but also new backend enhancements. Furthermore, governance and ongoing support structures will be put in place.
Running alongside all the work happening within CES, we are partnering with global organisations that are leading the way in the decentralised, open source, collaborative and regenerative fields to enable all CES users everywhere to share in the exciting developments happening within this space.
Partnering organisations: MetaProvide, Open Coop, Credit Commons, Murmurations, Ivan Casco consulting
Our approach
Over the past seven months, a team of highly-skilled and motivated volunteers have been diligently working on the CES upgrade project and are daringly targeting a Q1 2025 rollout date for an initial beta version of a CES app. During the balance of 2025, we envisage introducing various other upgrades in a phased manner. The scale of the work involved is very extensive, including a re-writing of all CES software to open-source protocols with an emphasis on privacy, security and decentralisation. To progress so rapidly will require hard currency (we get the irony!). So we are now raising funds in a phased manner. Please stay tuned for further updates as the CES upgrade progresses.
Support the project
Progress update (October 2024)
For the past six months, major work has been completed on CES to add new administrative features and automation to allow mass adoption of CES at the national level, following Ecuador’s surge in the creation of new groups. At the same time, CES code has been migrated to a new managed server for improved reliability and speed. All the CES features, both on the desktop and mobile site had to be tested. All the tests are complete now and we have migrated the whole platform to our new server. The CES mail server was also configured to improve email deliverability. The CES Team has also moved to Nextcloud, an open-source, self-hosted file sharing and collaboration platform designed to provide a secure and private alternative to cloud storage services like Dropbox, Google Drive, or Microsoft OneDrive.
In the near future, work to improve CES will feature: Content Distribution Network (CDN) adoption, migration to cloud email delivery services, interoperability with Murmurations network to open CES resources to the outside world, setup of tools for software developers and teams to manage the code and collaborate on projects, API specification for connecting the future mobile app with the CES database, and the mobile app design.
Core team members
Tim Jenkin
CES Global Founder
Cape Town, South Africa
Alex Krenz
CES Director, Upgrade Project Lead
Cape Town, South Africa
Daniel Chen
CES Taiwan Founder, Upgrade Project Compliance Consultant
Taipei, Taiwan
Olivier Riche
CES North Coast Community Exchange, System Upgrade Lead
Coleraine, Ireland
Mark Lewis
CES Grand Union Terra, Upgrade Project Facilitator
Hertfordshire, England
Hamish Murphy
CES Awa Jungle, Upgrade Project Communication Lead
Chiba, Japan
Bjorn Cakka
MetaProvide Founder, Upgrade Project Consultant
Mostly Anywhere
Ivan Casco Valero
System Architecture Upgrade Consultant
Dublin, Ireland
Manuel Hernandez
CES DINEC Super Admin, Latin America
Loja, Ecuador
Contact
For further information please contact:
Alex Krenz
CES NPC Director, Upgrade Project Lead
Cape Town, South Africa
Email: alex@ces.org.za