We (a not for profit socio-educational initiative) are raising funds to acquire a domain name for our blog, https://studycirclelokayata.wordpress.com/, the recurring cost of which will be around Rs 3000 per year. This will help us reach more people. In view of the public-facing nature of our blog, we think it would only be fit if this expenditure is borne jointly by the members of the Study Circle and the general public — our readers, that is you. In that way, it will be easier for us to remain accountable, and you to remain informed. Please note that this is not the creation of a paywall by other means. Your contribution will be discretionary and your access to whatever we publish, either on the newsletter or on the blog, will remain unfettered. Whatever we do as a Study Circle is a voluntary collective effort and it will always remain that way. Since we are reaching the milestone of the 50th blog post in July — the outcome of our/your perseverance over the last four and a half years and an ode to the intellectual communion which, we believe, has been mutually nourishing — we thought that we should seek your support at this juncture. We are not asking you to compensate us for our time and labour, but to help us access a technological resource that is required for the blog to become an archive of our work and times. It is a small step, but a necessary one. If you like our politically informed critical analysis, our translations from Indian languages, our ground-up reports, or the rare texts that we revisit and publish occasionally, we ask you to contribute whatever little you can and claim the blog as yours too. A Letter in solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub starts with the following passage:
'In Antoine de Saint Exupéry's tale the Little Prince meets a businessman who accumulates stars with the sole purpose of being able to buy more stars. The Little Prince is perplexed. He owns only a flower, which he waters every day. Three volcanoes, which he cleans every week. "It is of some use to my volcanoes, and it is of some use to my flower, that I own them," he says, "but you are of no use to the stars that you own".'
It was written by a collective of online custodians. We are asking you to become the co-custodians of Lokayata with us. We are asking you to water the flowers and clean the volcanoes.