Open Co-ops

Defining a shared purpose for the progressive movement

*In this article I use the term ‘progressive movement’ to mean all the people and organisations that are working, or would like to work, on creating a world in which people and planet come before profit. If the term does not sit comfortably with you please substitute ‘solidarity economy’ or whatever term you prefer that …

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OPEN 2019 joins IWGB boycott of University of London in solidarity with workers

The exploitation of temporary, freelance and out-sourced workers is a serious issue. As companies get bigger and more powerful, and operate through platforms which distance them from their stakeholders it is getting easier for them to abuse their workers. This abuse manifests in a number of ways but one which is very close to our …

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OPEN 2019 – Lightning talks – Solutions for the regenerative economy

The Following talks took place at OPEN 2019 where The Open Co-op community tackled the calling question: How can we support each other to take more effective action to catalyse the collaborative, regenerative economy? Cooperation among Cooperatives: How to foster an Ecosystem of Platform Coops Inter-cooperation, as one of the core coop principles, is more …

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OPEN 2017: Platform Co-ops

Watch the videos from OPEN 2017 – The two day conference on Platform Co-ops, organised by The Open Co-op on the 16 – 17 February 2017. OPEN 2017 – Introduction Oliver Sylvester-Bradley introduces the OPEN 2017 – Platform Co-ops conference, highlighting global temperature rise and increasing inequality as issues our failing political institutions are not …

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Re-writing the core code of business: A Q&A with Douglas Rushkoff

Douglas Rushkoff is a writer, documentarian, and lecturer whose work focuses on human autonomy in a digital age. He is the author of fifteen bestselling books on media, technology, and society, including Program or Be Programmed, Present Shock, and most recently Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus. He recently authored a chapter of the new …

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Democracy spreads like a virus: A Q&A with Nathan Schneider

In 2015, Nathan co-organised “Platform Cooperativism,” a pioneering conference in New York, which kick started a wave of global discussion about online democratic platforms. He recently co-edited the book, Ours to Hack and to Own: The Rise of Platform Cooperativism, a New Vision for the Future of Work and a Fairer Internet. In the run …

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Toward an Open Co-operativism

NOTE: when I first re-launched this blog is was because people like @edmayo1 and @mbauwens had started to talk about ‘Open Co-ops’.  Now even more people are getting in on the game, it’s fantastic! Also, big thanks are due to the wonderful peeps at @GuerrillaTrans for turning the pdf report into html which I could easily copy/ paste from the@Commons_Trans site …

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Why We Need a New Kind of Open Cooperatives for the P2P Age

this article originally appeared on the P2P Foundation Michel Bauwens: “The cooperative movement and cooperative enterprises are in the midst of a revival, even as some of their long-standing entities are failing. This revival is part of an ebb and flow of cooperativism, that is strongly linked to the ebb and flow of the mainstream …

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Open Co-ops: Inspiration, Legal Structure and Tools

this article originally appeared in Stir Magazine illustration by Daksheeta Pattni In 2002 I described United Diversity as “a member owned and stakeholder governed network of mutual advantage.” In truth, it was aspirational. At the time, the flexible off-the-shelf legal structures and open source tools needed to make such a network a reality simply didn’t …

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