[liberationtech] Plan for a New Liberationtech, 2.0

Sat Nov 10 09:55:53 PST 2018

Hi All,

It seems that I may not have emailed Hapee and Sacha at their seldom-read
email addresses. Hapee and I have already exchanged emails, so we'll
hopefully start the process soon with Greenhost.

Thanks,
Yosem

On Sat, Nov 10, 2018 at 8:49 AM Hapee de Groot <hapee at hapee.org> wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> according to me Greenhost is absolutely not out of the running, so I
> contacted Yosem directly and hope you will give us some more time so sort
> this out.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Hapee from Greenhost.
> On 10-11-18 17:22, Yosem Companys wrote:
>
> Hi All,
>
> I'm in the process of migrating Liberationtech from Stanford to a new
> independent site, but I have run into a difficulty.
>
> Most of you recommended Greenhost for hosting services, but I have yet to
> receive a reply from Greenhost despite multiple email attempts.
>
> Is there another hosting service you'd recommend? Please remember that the
> criteria are the following:
>
>    - The host should operate from a location that has the privacy- and
>    security-friendliest laws in the world;
>    - The host should also be the most privacy- and security-friendly host
>    in the world (or the second most, assuming Greenhost is #1 in this area);
>    and,
>    - The host should offer great customer service.
>
> Our original plan (described below) was to ask Greenhost both to host and
> develop our new website. Now that Greenhost appears to be out of the
> running, I intend to explore the other options you suggested below for
> website development.
>
> Thanks,
> Yosem
>
> On Thu, Sep 6, 2018 at 8:55 PM Yosem Companys <ycompanys at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Below is the amended plan for the new Liberationtech based on your
>> feedback. Should you have any questions, please let me know.
>>
>>    - *Corporate Governance: Fiscal Sponsorship, NOT Legal Status*. Most
>>    of you recommended that we not incorporate legally as a 501(c)3 at this
>>    time. Instead, you recommended that we use a fiscal sponsor instead. A
>>    number of fiscal sponsors were proposed including Creative Commons; the
>>    Electronic Frontier Foundation; Freedom House; the Free Software
>>    Foundation; the Information Ethics and Equity Institute; Mozilla; Oasis;
>>    the Open Source Institute; the Public Sphere Project; the Puerto Rico
>>    Science, Technology, and Research Trust; the Renewable Freedom Foundation
>>    in Germany; Software Freedom Conservancy; and Wikimedia. There is also the
>>    Tides Foundation. The advantage of fiscal sponsors is that they can accept
>>    charitable contributions on behalf of Liberationtech and take care of the
>>    legal and accounting requirements needed to maintain the organization,
>>    thereby freeing Liberationtech to pursue its vision and mission. We have
>>    decided to find fiscal sponsors for different legal jurisdictions to ensure
>>    that we have a global presence. [Down the line, the Sustainable Economies
>>    Law Center was proposed as an organization to help Liberationtech
>>    incorporate as a 501(c)3.]
>>    - *Vision*. To research, design, and implement technologies for
>>    social good, especially for privacy and security.
>>    - *Mission*. To create and support a community of practice around
>>    technology for social good that incorporates privacy and security by
>>    design.
>>    - *Hosting Service*. Most of you expressed concerns about hosting in
>>    the U.S. and asked that Liberationtech use the most privacy- and
>>    security-friendly legal jurisdiction instead. Most of you also
>>    recommended Greenhost.
>>    - *Website Design and Development*. Some of you kindly offered to
>>    work on a pro bono basis to design and develop the Liberationtech website.
>>    Others suggested contacting groups such as the Agile Collective, Aspiration
>>    Technologies, CoTech, Digital Life Collective, Equalit.ie, and Greenhost
>>    for these services. What should the website have? You asked that we keep
>>    the Liberationtech website simple. Beyond a basic description and a list of
>>    the board of advisers, you asked that we do the following:
>>       - *Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS)*. Most of you asked that we build
>>       a site that is as simple as possible so that it may be viewed even by those
>>       who have slow devices or weak bandwidth.
>>       - *Just a mailing list, please*. Most of you also asked that we
>>       only use open-source mailing list software that has been around for a long
>>       time for convenience (i.e., you get the email in your inbox) or security
>>       reasons and to make it easier for any list subscriber to download the list
>>       or port it from one device to another.
>>       - *Use Matrix and/or Discourse*. Enough of you feel passionate
>>       enough about using Matrix and/or Discourse beyond the basic mailing list
>>       capabilities that we've decided to do so.
>>       - *Let me create my own list, please*. Many of you asked that we
>>       allow list subscribers to create their own lists around specific subjects,
>>       whether by chapter (read more below), geography, sector, or topic. For
>>       example, some of you asked that Calls for Papers (CfPs), jobs, and
>>       announcements be moved to separate mailing lists.
>>       - *Make the site mobile*. Self-explanatory.
>>       - *Mirror it*. Many of you asked that we mirror the site at a
>>       number of locations for security reasons.
>>    - *Incubation*. Because we've decided to continue to research,
>>    design, and implement technologies for social good that incorporate
>>    privacy- and security-by-design, we aim to raise funds to become an
>>    incubator of technology for social good, where the funds would go to
>>    support the development of projects based on the ideas the community likes
>>    the most. We'll also try to incubate student projects on tech for social
>>    good that could be sponsored by companies to help students get jobs
>>    post-graduation.
>>    - *Directory*. Some of you suggested that we create a wiki (or
>>    similar) with tips, good practices, tools, and apps for secure
>>    communication and digital privacy, along with a list of the organizations
>>    and platforms that work in the technology for social good space.
>>    - *Funding*. Some of you suggested that Liberationtech contact
>>    foundations such as Omidyar and the Open Technology Fund. Others suggested
>>    that Liberationtech engage in crowdfunding. Yet others suggested charging a
>>    yearly fee for people to create their own Liberationtech chapters in
>>    geographies around the world.
>>
>> One question that lingers is the following:
>>
>>    - What is the key differentiator of Liberationtech vis-a-vis other
>>    existing groups, organizations, and/or sites in the space?
>>
>> If any of you want to take a stab at answering the question, please do
>> so.
>>
>> Otherwise, Gonzalo and I will be more than happy to do a review of the
>> field and try to answer that question in a more explicit manner.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Yosem
>>
>
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