It occured to me recently that, in spite of the seeming expense of college, $10,000 per year apparently isn't much for what they provide. My idea is to have a service which, like colleges, gives it's patrons "free" access to a number of utilities in return for a fixed periodic payment. In my case, I'm getting a room (small, but well-hooked-up), food (including choice of burger joints, an all-you-can-eat low-budget restaurant, and grocery stores), internet access (via speedy Ethernet LAN), gym membership, cable TV, bus transport, local phone calls, electricity, water, heating/AC, and numerous other things, all without worrying about individual bills or directly paying for it. Oh, and that education stuff, too. A patron would also be given the ability to customize amounts of stuff, such as the number of meals per week and the room style (single room, double room, or suite in my case).-- nick_n_uit, Mar 18 2001 Codefarm http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/codefarmA related possibility. Some housing co-ops and condos do come close to this, I think. Also hospitals and prisons. [Monkfish, Mar 18 2001, last modified Oct 17 2004] http://www.uchicago...dm/ihouse/ihww.html [GusLacerda, Mar 18 2001] You're still going to pay more than for all those things separately. The big advantage the college communities have is network effect--not being wired, but having all the other students in a similar social and academic situation around. You probably won't get that again until retirement.-- bookworm, Mar 18 2001 i'd totally go back to living in a dorm. apartments / houses are too isolated, and co-ops are hard to find and often have a lot of overhead.-- strider, May 16 2001 [Mephista]: So I'm paying you to do as you like, without you ever doing a useful day's work?-- angel, May 16 2001 [Mephista]: Sorry, I was assuming that I was on your planet as well. So are you a publicly-funded consultant, a philanthropic intellectual, or something else? And still, if your loan is low-interest as long as your income is low, you have little incentive to work. If you're at university for any length of time, surely you're becoming sufficiently learned that a well-paid job should be available, enabling you to repay your debt. 'Permanent student', in the context of publicly-funded education, equals 'slacker'.-- angel, May 16 2001 actually, collective communities called cohousing are being built all over the U.S., on a model imported from denmark and the netherlands. small private residences are built in clusters with a "common house" where residents share meals and free time. financed like a condo or co-op association, these homes are often priced comparable to similar houses that do NOT have the amenities - residents can afford to wire their common house with high speed internet, or instance, by sharing the cost, when they might not have been able to afford it individually. they also share things like lawn and power tools, clothes washer and dryer, sports equipment, rec. boats, etc, etc. a lot of energy and money is saved by preparing meals collectively. these are NOT communes - while the common space is owned as a slice of each home, the homes themselves are autonomous. check out www.cohousing.org for more info. over 300 such communities now exist in the united states and canada.-- zwackfu, May 16 2001 When do the beer-related annotations start?-- thumbwax, May 16 2001 [Mephista]: 1) The people who make profits, of some of whom you do not approve, are also paying taxes. 2) I'm perfectly happy for you, with your good job, to support someone without a job. What I am *not* so keen on is that I am obliged to support those who not only do not have a job but have no inclination to get one. I offer this as an explanation of my comments, not as an invitation to get further into what is tending towards flame/rant-territory.-- angel, May 17 2001 Wonder how the cohousing model will work in the U.S. given the "I'll do what I want to regardless of what my neighbors think" attitude of many Americans. Hmmm.. one neighbor playing Eminem on the subwoofers at 1 a.m., another piling up their garbage outside their house, another with 5 noisy Rottweilers... I may be broadbrushing but last time I was in Denmark I didn't see much of this going on.-- mrnesbit, May 17 2001 I thought one of the benefits of graduating from University was not having to live in the shabby, smelly, old sardine can they called a dorm...
All my bills are paid automatically by Visa, and I pay my Visa bill once a month. (*And* I don't have to eat dorm food... ;)
I get to choose what services I want, I don't end up paying for services I never use, and I don't have concrete-block walls or fifty people on my floor.-- MrWrong, May 17 2001 I would love to go back to living in an apartment-style dorm. A great advantage of living in a residential college community is that you can easily meet people and make friends, which you probably want to do if you're new in town. If someone lives on the same building as you, you're more likely to hang out, have dinner together, etc. Of course this also creates cliques, etc. just like in a college.-- GusLacerda, May 21 2001 Such a scheme did exist. It was called the Soviet Union. And it didn't work.-- kanes, Mar 10 2004 random, halfbakery