(see all of Proposals)
At the start of the 2025-2026 Committee year, we agreed to focus on on LoRes approaches so that we moved quickly to delivering value without losing out focus. So far, we have a working tech stack for the Multi-node Wikipedia process, with approximately 15 volunteers working through setting it up, but progress is slow. None have completed the process in a two month period, several are close.
We have a lot of energy from interested volunteers this year, particularly after the first Solarpunk meetup which attracted about 70 people who were excited about either climate resilient tech, or getting off big tech.
We have a grant application in focused on the educational angle of training people to setup and run servers.
The process of setting up a LoRes mesh is currently bottle-necking at Node Stewards. There are ways that we can improve that situation. Perhaps more direct hands-on training is needed. Perhaps a more simplified setup would help. Perhaps better instructions for volunteers using Windows or Mac on their computer. We have discussed that one of the goals here isn't just to get nodes setup, but to empower volunteers to understand nodes so that they can become community node stewards, and also so that some of them (the more technical ones) can get involved in developing and maintaining Co-op Cloud recipes and/or FOSS software.
Meanwhile, I (Jade) have been focusing on laying the groundwork for the next milestone, Static Websites. This is already looking like it's going to be a big and difficult technical challenge. Hosting stuff on Co-op Cloud is well understood, getting things like user identity, website files, domain name management and so on syncing across nodes in a way that is compatible with internet outage conditions is a large technical challenge. I understand this space very well, and am working on it professionally as well, and am well positioned to deliver on this, but am largely doing this solo at present.
The Digital Justice Society is a group on Kaurna Country (Adelaide) which has been focused on moving individuals and progressive groups off big tech, regardless of how far along that journey they are. They have had particular success with a few programs:
I believe that the Digital Justice Society is taking an approach that is different to MBT, and complimentary. Their approach lacks the focus on building the perfect system for climate resilience, and is more of a scrappy “let's get something in people's hands that works now”. I think we could benefit from influencing each other here.
In particular, this opportunity exists more strongly in the hosting space that it has before, as after much deliberation the DJS has settled on using Co-op Cloud. This shared approach means that in theory their systems could support an expansion into LoRes approaches, and our systems could benefit from taking a “just install stuff with Co-op Cloud” approach.
In terms of organisational capacity, MBT has built more technical capacity, and DJS has built more activist & community organising capacity. Our approaches could compliment each other.
I'm proposing for consideration changes to our work on two fronts.
We have people in our group interested in this area, and I believe we could probably run some of the DJS workshops or lounges. Using material like their “get off spotify” workshop, or their Tech Radar or Skill Tree, could be deployed now.
This could also work well in combination with our Solarpunk meetups, particularly if we consider the connection to Melbourne Uni (students are good candidates for this area) and/or with Catalyst as it re-opens.
This work may take additional organisational labour, but it may also use different skills to the LoRes work. I'd suggest that we don't embark on this unless we can find a few interested volunteers.
A specific approach to this is that if we had a couple of volunteers interested to learn how to run the Digital Lounge format, the DJS folks would be happy to come to Naarm, run a “train the trainer” session and run our first lounge to show us how it's done (if we do venue, promotions, etc).
LoRes approaches are going to take a while to deliver much value. Meanwhile, as a group we're still using google for most of our work, as are most progressive groups in the area. We talked briefly about running a larger server when we hoped that it could be at Balam Balam, and then shelved that idea.
If we run a larger server and install open source apps that are not ready for a LoRes setup, there exists a risk that we make it harder to move people onto LoRes later, but there are steps we can take to mitigate this. In particular, using Co-op Cloud for both means we can take a hybrid approach where some services stay up when the internet is down, and some don't, and we just try and make this clear.
I propose that we go back to planning a centralised server in conjunction with the Raspberry Pi nodes. It'd be part of the LoRes mesh, but it'd install and run FOSS software that really wasn't offline ready. It'd use Co-op cloud.
I don't know where this server would go. I think it'd be better if it was physically within Merri-bek, not in a datecenter. We could move towards getting it on solar. I think Catalyst might be the easiest option, but CERES would be great (it's just been really hard to achieve). The focus of this software might be more on FOSS software for groups rather than individuals, so that progressive groups don't need to organise on big tech.
I met with DJS folks today and we agreed to keep the conversation going in a shared loomio group. There are some clear areas of technical overlap. For example, if we pick the same platform for user management on Co-Op cloud, we'll be better able to work together. I'd like to bring a few other MBT people into this conversation to help drive it forward.