August is upon us. And that means we’re just a month and a half from launching the Digital Life Collective proper, and there are many ways you can help, even with just a little time.
Join us at chat.diglife.com (see the Welcome guide) and you can get involved in reviewing website copy, owning some technical or design work, welcoming new members, finding communities with shared interests, and more.
Here’s our five launch goals.
// Goal 1
Find other co-founding members (i.e. those joining this side of the launch). Given our homophilous nature, we’ll all know many people for whom our mission is bang on target. No need to ‘hard sell’, just share the love, pointing to diglife.com.
// Goal 2
Get our first ‘proper’ website up and looking good. Joachim Stroh is leading this team effort, and that team is most receptive to anyone wishing to contribute their skills. Maybe you’re a dab hand with javascript and CSS, or perhaps you just have a feel for sourcing the right photography to portray the intangibles we’re grappling with here.
// Goal 3
Developing the web copy and associated communications. From the budding copywriter to the full-blown poet, we need all the help we can get. Here’s where it’s coming together. And if you’ve ever fancied yourself an in-house journalist, there’s a vacancy with your name on it. An hour a week. Newsletters, blog posts, and whatever you think best documents our mission and encourages mutual understanding and mutual influence.
// Goal 4
Get organised. We can’t rely on any old-fashioned command-and-control structure for this journey. That would be easier, sure, but doomed to fail. No. We have to be a collective of self-starters, self-organising to nurture Tech We Trust. Our associated organisation principles are in final draft, informed by some of the best organisational thinking … watch this space.
// Goal 5
Our onboarding team aims to make sure that the path from initial interest to full participatory membership will be as smooth as smooth can be. Being the earliest members you’ll be only too aware of the current shortfall in this respect, and well placed then to put your oar in here.
In short, more hands make light work. And also, the more the merrier … it’s fun to change the world for the better.
LINKS
// We need robots to have morals. Could Shakespeare and Austen help? By John Mullan, in the Guardian.
// Tech and the fake market tactic. By Anil Dash, CEO of Fog Creek Software.
// Surveillance is the business model of the internet. In openDemocracy, by Agne Pix and Bruce Schneier.
// Your Roomba Is Also Gathering Data about the Layout of Your Home. In MIT Technology Review, by Michael Reilly.
// Cryptographically-secure change feeds in the Dat protocol, and on the Web. By Paul Frazee, the leader of the Beaker Browser project.
// Participatory Community Network Mapping as a Crucial Methodology for Social Innovation. An interview with Aldo de Moor.
Best regards, Philip and the Digital Life Collective member relations team.
HELP
How do I join the conversation at chat.diglife.com?
The welcome email included login details, otherwise please email tech@diglife.com.
Where’s the welcome guide?
Just click here.
Where can I find all the newsletters?
Right here.