Nethood is a Zurich based non-proft organization working on and with communities, cooperations on tools and infrastructure for community-driven organization of living. Including incorporates housing, neighborhood organization, networking, exchange, and learning. Nethood is a partner of diverse interdisciplinary international projects.

It was founded in 2012 by Panayotis Antoniadis, Ileana Apostol, and Jens Martignoni.

Self-description:

Its [Nethood’s] current activities include the facilitation of information exchanges and collaborations between researchers, practitioners, activists, and citizens around its objectives; the participation in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, education, and action projects; and the development of Do-It-Yourself tools and methodologies for empowering local actors to build networked localities that can support each other without suppressing their differences.

The vision of NetHood is to plant seeds of collective awareness, critical listening, long-term thinking, social learning and refective action toward sustainable social life.

Mazi

Mazi is a research-initiative working on alternative technologies for communities, running from 2016 to 2018, in collaboration with University of Thessaly (GR). Its aim is to foster hybrid networking to empower local communities. It is conducting four pilot studies in Germany, Greece, the UK, and Switzerland. In this course, it developed the Mazi-Toolkit.

Self-description:

MAZI means “together” in Treek and the goal of MAZI is to provide technology and knowledge in order to:

• empower those who are in physical proximity, to shape their hybrid urban space, together, according to the local environment and context.
• generate location-based collective awareness as a basis for fostering social cohesion, conviviality, participation in decision-making processes, self-organization, knowledge sharing, and sustainable living
• facilitate interdisciplinary interactions around the design of hybrid space and the role of ICTs in society. MAZI is working on alternative technology, what we call “Do-It-Yourself networking”, a combination of wireless technology, low-cost hardware, and free/libre/open-source software (FLOSS) applications, for building local networks, known as “community wireless networks”.
  By making this technology better understood, easily deployed, and configured based on a rich set of customization options and interdisciplinary knowledge, compiled as a toolkit, MAZI will enable citizens to build their own local networks for facilitating hybrid, virtual and physical, interactions, in ways that are respectful to their rights to privacy, freedom of expression and self-determination.
  MAZI takes the perspective of existing grassroots initiatives, whose goals are social and political in nature, and explores ways that DIY networking technologies can help pursue them.

Interview

Hybrid Spaces. Interview with Panayotis Antoniadis
conducted by Felix Stalder, 6 December 2018:

Goteo was founded in 2011 by Platoniq, an media design and arts group, focusing on democratic participation in the digital realm, based on Barcelona, active since 2001. Funding members are Olivier Schulbaum and Susana Noguero, Co-directors Cristina Moreno and Mauricio O’Brian.

Self description:

“Goteo is a platform for crowdfunding or collective financing (monetary contributions) and distributed collaboration (services, infrastructures, microtasks) for projects which, apart from giving individual rewards, also generate a collective return through fomenting the commons, open code and/or free knowledge. As a member of the network you can have one or various roles: presenting a project, co-funding, or collaborating on one.“

“Crowdfunding is a form of cooperation between a lot of people to gather a sum of money to help in the development of a specific project. Goteo is a new way, based on this model, to stimulate collaborative projects of an open and/or free nature. As an alternative or complement to financing from public administrations or private companies, Goteo reactivates the co-responsible role of civil society.”

Difference to other crowdfunding plattforms:

• Commons, open and free: we promote projects working for the commons, open code, and/or free knowledge, putting the accent on the public mission and favoring free culture and social development.

• Free and/or open licences: projects that wish to be co-funded with the help of Goteo must permit, through the use of licences, the copying, public communication, distribution, modification and/or use of part or all of each creation.

• Collective return: Goteo seeks the social return of investments and for this reason apart from individual returns, the system is based on collective returns for the development of the commons.

• Social investment market: We manage a feeder capital (Matchfunding > capital riego) with contributions from public and private institutions and businesses for co-responsible investment with a multiplying effect in projects that rely on the support of civil society.

• Distributed collaboration: In Goteo, apart from monetary contributions, it is possible to collaborate through services, material resources, infrastructure, or by participating in specific microtasks needed for the development of projects.

• Two crowdfunding rounds of 40+40 days: There are two cofunding rounds, each with a duration of 40 days. The frst is an “all or nothing” round for the minimum essential budget, while the second is for an optimum sum to carry out additional improvements.

• Community of local nodes: Goteo is a community of communities, a network of local, independent, inter-coordinated nodes which serve to localise the digital, contextualising it.

Goteo is governed through the Goteo Foundation, a non-proft organization which unites all the agents committed to the development of the project, and which is in charge of managing a public-private social investment fund of Matchfunding.

Sources:
https://www.goteo.org
Goteo Fundation: https://fundacion.goteo.org
Platoniq: https://platoniq.net/en/

Interview

Crowd Benefits. Interview with Mauricio O’Brian
conducted by Felix Stalder, 15 September 2018

Mauricio O’Brian is a co-founder of Goteo.org, a crowdfunding platform foregrounding collective return. The platform was founded in 2011 and is one of the pioneering platforms. It was developed by Platoniq, an arts and media design collective working on participatory culture in the digital realm, working since 2001 and based in Barcelona, Spain.

Goteo is different from other crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter in the way it conceptualizes crowdfunding as a participatory project. Central for Goteo is the social return of the projects. It promotes projects working for the commons, open code and/or free knowledge, putting the accent on the public mission and favoring free culture and social development, allowing only projects available under a free and/or open license. Apart from the usual monetary contributions, Goteo includes collaborations like services, material resources, infrastructure or participation in specific microtasks needed for the development of projects. It is thus as well fostering a network of local communities. It has always put an emphasis on local events, working together with local communities, organizations and public institutions and has sought to involve the community through local workshops and other means in developing new features. Goteo has put a lot of emphasis on partnering with a wide range of public and private institutions, primarily municipalities in Spain. The principle of “co-responsibility” is also touching on public decision-making processes.
Goteo is managed by the Goteo Foundation, a non-profit organization that unites all the agents committed to the development of the project.

Mauricio O’Brian talks in this interview about the social dimension of crowdfunding and explains the concept of crowd benefit and social return in crowdfunding. He discusses the vision of a culture of co-responsibility, and how this is also linked to decision making processes when it comes to partnerships with public institutions.

Interview with Mauricio O’Brian, conducted by Felix Stalder, 15 September 2018, HeK (House of Electronic Arts, Basel).