[sudo-discuss] Gittip spinoff seeks advice on democratic governance & bylaws for web applications

Mon Jul 28 20:56:57 PDT 2014

Knowing _why_ people weren't invested in the project would be the natural
first step, I think. Whether it were personal life circumstances or, say,
being completely ignored upon first speaking up in the community on
controversial grounds.

Jenny
http://jennyryan.net
http://thepyre.org
http://thevirtualcampfire.org
http://technomadic.tumblr.com

`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`
 "Technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories."
-Laurie Anderson

"Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it."
 -Hannah Arendt

"To define is to kill. To suggest is to create."
-Stéphane Mallarmé
~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`

On Sun, Jul 27, 2014 at 3:15 PM, Sonja Trauss <sonja.trauss at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Ok - so you're talking about people who are in fact invested in the
> project, but are not invested in the idea of regularly helping manage the
> project.
>
>
> On Sunday, July 27, 2014, Rabbit <rabbitface at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> About this "not very invested" thing, I mean:
>>
>> -- In large democratic organizations, participation can be low even
>> though decisions affect all the participants.  This happened in the
>> Berkeley Student Coops, for example.  How can everyone be encouraged to
>> participate and be informed when that takes time and effort and wading
>> through lots of boring stuff?  And problems can happen when suddenly the
>> other 90% of people show up to vote during a controversy but they're
>> under-informed, but of course we want their voices too.
>>
>> -- If democratic participation requires a large investment of time (going
>> to all the meetings, reading every email), this disadvantages people who
>> don't have the privilege to spend all that time because of childcare, jobs,
>> etc.  How can they become informed and listened to?  The Gittip spinoff is
>> trying to focus on marginalized people and this issue has been mentioned a
>> few times already.
>>
>> I expect that, like with a credit union, the vast majority of users of a
>> website like Gittip will just expect it to be well-run by other people and
>> won't put any effort into participating.  We want to make sure that there
>> are obvious on-ramps to participation and that participation is possible
>> for busy people.
>>
>> More practically, the question is what legal and governance structures
>> meet these goals?  Who gets votes, how are they counted, etc.  Should
>> people who are receiving more donations through the site get more votes
>> because they might be depending on that income?  Can people create 50
>> accounts to get more votes?
>>
>> I'm only slightly involved in this project; just signal boosting for
>> them.  If you have ideas or resources or want to get involved, share them
>> with the people on IRC at freenode.#atunit
>>
>> -Rabbit
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Jul 27, 2014 at 12:51 PM, Sonja Trauss <sonja.trauss at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi that's fine!
>>>
>>> What you're describing isn't what I would have thought "not very
>>> invested in the project" describes.
>>>
>>> An example of what you're describing sounds like someone who is in fact
>>> "invested" in the project - uses it, has ideas about it, is affected by
>>> various possible configurations, HOWEVER, is dissuaded from giving input.
>>>
>>> Is that right rabbit?
>>>
>>> from my examples before you can tell I was thinking "not very invested"
>>> meant that the person wasn't affected by decisions about configuration,
>>> hadn't spent (invested) time on the project, doesn't have ideas about the
>>> project (didn't invest time in thinking about it), and doesn't have any
>>> financial investment in the project or its outcome.
>>>
>>> Now part of the reason I asked is that in some systems, say, a
>>> neighborhood, you might have a class if users each of whom are only in the
>>> geographical area for a short time - transients. I think you could say that
>>> any one transient is "uninvested" in the neighborhood, however, a
>>> neighborhood can be more or less comfortable for transients, so if one is
>>> interested in protecting the interests of that class, she would have to get
>>> information (and self advocacy) out of a population made of individuals
>>> - each of whom does not consider herself "invested" in the particular
>>> neighborhood. ("What do I care, I'm leaving soon.")
>>>
>>> I was wondering if there is some analogous group for something like
>>> gittip or task rabbit, looking for a description of that dynamic.
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>>
>>> On Sunday, July 27, 2014, Jenny Ryan <tunabananas at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Thanks for responding, Sonja, and sincere apologies for the targeted
>>>> inquiry on my part for the sake of proving the point. That is, all forms of
>>>> participation comprise the social dynamics of any given system.
>>>> Understanding all of these forms of participation (or lack thereof) reveals
>>>> inbalances, power structures, and opportunities to iterate on the current
>>>> model.
>>>>
>>>> I think what Rabbit is speaking to boils down to the problem sudo room
>>>> is tackling in its own offbeat experimental way, which is, how do we
>>>> develop a culture that encourages especially the disempowered to feel they
>>>> can be equal participants in and take ownership of the community? To not
>>>> strive for individual profit and power over, but rather, to endeavor toward
>>>> mutual aid and self-motivated responsibility? It is a very hard problem,
>>>> because most of us have grown up embedded in a culture of hierarchy and
>>>> oppression.
>>>>
>>>> We need to develop better models, and open source software communities
>>>> are a fascinating grounds of experimentation and exploration in that
>>>> regard. Really excited about this project. Thanks Rabbit!
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, Jul 27, 2014 at 4:16 AM, Sonja Trauss <sonja.trauss at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I participate in the part of the community called "the mailing list."
>>>>>
>>>>> I never comment on the threads about sudo room mechanics - I chat on
>>>>> threads about general interest topics - porn, gentrification, now this
>>>>> mysterious line in the gittip email.
>>>>>
>>>>> I don't think the analogy is sound. What rabbit was talking about was
>>>>> "what if the users of task rabbit owned it," yes, sounds good.
>>>>> Now I know there are lots of people who have signed up for task
>>>>> rabbit, but never got around to using it. They have a log in, they forget
>>>>> what it is. Those people sound "not very invested in the project." My
>>>>> question is, why would you need their input? They never log onto your site.
>>>>> Or take a less extreme case. Someone who uses the site, even regularly, but
>>>>> is "not very invested in the project." This person doesn't actually care
>>>>> what happens to the site, they has some other site they also
>>>>> uses, or they is about to move away so they doesn't care... Why do you need
>>>>> this person's input?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sunday, July 27, 2014, Jenny Ryan <tunabananas at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> I might ask the same of you, Sonja, wrt why sudo's mailing list would
>>>>>> need input from people who don't really participate in our community?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>  On Sun, Jul 27, 2014 at 1:53 AM, Sonja Trauss <
>>>>>> sonja.trauss at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Why would you need input from people who aren't very invested in
>>>>>>> the project?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Friday, July 25, 2014, Rabbit <rabbitface at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Hey all!
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Recently there was a controversy at Gittip which resulted in a
>>>>>>>> project to fork or rebuilding it with better governance structures and more
>>>>>>>> focus on the needs and safety of marginalized users.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> They are figuring out how to run a web application in a cooperative
>>>>>>>> democratic way that focuses on the needs of the users, as opposed to a
>>>>>>>> TaskRabbit like model where a central corporation controls or extracts
>>>>>>>> value from their users and makes unilateral decisions.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> They're working on bylaws and legal structures for this, and would
>>>>>>>> appreciate advice or connections to people with advice.  Talk to them in
>>>>>>>> IRC at #atunit, particularly @adrienneleigh, or send me resources to pass
>>>>>>>> along.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> This is an exciting frontier for the cooperative movement.  What if
>>>>>>>> TaskRabbit was owned by the rabbits?  Websites have very concentrated power
>>>>>>>> structures compared to the number of users; what are effective ways to get
>>>>>>>> input from so many people who might not all be very invested in the
>>>>>>>> project?  What other models can we draw from -- credit unions?  What
>>>>>>>> lessons can be learned from Wikipedia?  Etc.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> This especially matters for this particular use case, recurring
>>>>>>>> donations, because some people will be making their living off of proceeds
>>>>>>>> from the site and it's important that their voice is heard.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Sudoroom may be one of the largest users of this site when it
>>>>>>>> launches, like we are now with Gittip.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> -Rabbit
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> sudo-discuss mailing list
>>>>>>> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>>>>>>> https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>>> https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>>
>>>
>>
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