An Open-Source Think Tank (By Accident)
Someone said it offhand while we were talking business over coffee:
“You talk like your company’s an open-source think tank.”
I laughed at the time, but the phrase stuck.
Because that’s exactly what this whole thing has become — not a secret lab, not a startup incubator, but an open notebook where design, ethics, and industry get worked out in public.
Thinking in Daylight
Most firms hide their thinking until there’s a contract attached.
I’ve never had the patience for that.
I write it.
I sketch it.
I send it out into the wild — half invitation, half experiment.
If someone picks it up and builds on it, good. That’s proof the system works.
If not, it still adds one more piece of connective tissue to the regional conversation.
That’s the open-source part: the belief that ideas aren’t diminished by being shared — they’re refined.
Copying Nature, Not Each Other
People sometimes assume “think tank” means I’m chasing novelty.
I’m not.
I’m a copier by nature — a collector of patterns that already work.
Nature’s systems don’t reinvent themselves every season.
They iterate.
They reuse structure.
They re-route flow.
They reclaim waste until balance returns.
Bright Meadow borrows that logic:
Observe.
Design.
Intervene.
Copy the pattern, not the branding.
That’s the philosophy hiding under every plan, sketch, and concept I drop into the public feed.
The Accidental Model
Somewhere between posting free advice and field-testing half-built ideas, the model evolved on its own.
• Cernunnos Foundation became the root — the moral and ecological frame.
• Bright Meadow Group became the branch where systems talk happens.
• Blue Ribbon Team became the publishing ground — the open forum.
Together, they formed something rare:
A public-facing consulting ecosystem that grows through transparency instead of exclusivity.
It’s messy.
It’s fast.
It sometimes exposes more than I planned.
But it works.
Why It Fits This Era
We’re living in an age that rewards sharing the process, not just the product.
Every business wants to talk sustainability.
Few want to show their work.
An open-source think tank flips that.
The work is the invitation.
By laying the reasoning bare, you build community — not just clientele.
The people who get it become collaborators.
The ones who don’t quietly drift away.
That’s efficient filtration.
Natural selection for partnerships.
And in a circular economy, the same principle applies to materials:
Reveal the flow.
Invite reuse.
Build loops instead of lines.
Why It Still Matters to Keep Talking
This region needs ideas that move faster than bureaucracy and feel more human than policy papers.
If we can model transparent problem-solving here — in steel, waste, energy, food — it can happen anywhere.
That’s what an open-source think tank really is:
A regional conversation engine disguised as a company.
Closing Reflection
I never meant to start a think tank.
I just started thinking in public.
And the tank filled itself.
Some people build factories.
Some build followings.
I build frameworks.
Open-source ones, if we’re lucky.
Bright Meadow Group
Systems Analysis and Solutions Consulting
A Division of the Cernunnos Foundation
Published on Blue Ribbon Team —
Where design, systems, and place come together.
