more important to have democratic practices and accountability in the culture
legal entity can be there to support, but can also centralize power
seems important to have members to hold board accountable
could we write in the constitution of the legal entity
foodsharing sweden contributor [R]
someone replied to the ad
we have a scheduled call next thursday with them
hope they’re still interested
bruno had a call with them (Jann), explaining the projects
he likes the cause, been involved in soup kitchens
background is philosophy, has done some python programming, data science, NLP
probably not in a position to jump right into the code, quite some learning
willing to learn some backend/frontend coding
offered nicks support
made it clear there should be some kind of commitment
questions:
were talking about a wordpress site and karrot before?
different alternative pathways
standard wordpress site foodsharing sweden project
preferred version is to build what looks like a website inside karrot instance
this is in the intersection of “karrot work” (e.g. plugin system) and “foodsharing sweden work” (using whatever systems available and project identity inside karrot)
wondering what is needed to change landing page
needs are not just a landing page, although could be a solution, using a long scrolling page
but there is more content than really fits in one page, so needing a menu, and how it fits in with existing menus
need a section on presenting the foodsharing project, how co-operations would work, what it takes to start a local group, section to find your group
split between static site and dynamic site
onboarding could be inside the application
here the plugin system can come in
modify the landing page would need fork and special build of karrot
working out what would be a good system, ideally both for Sweden and Luxembourg
foodsharing town is using grav cms, flat-file system
do we notice when someone sets up an own instance?
not really, but thinking about it
maybe add an option to deployment that sends an anonymous message
Date: 2024-02-27 on Karrot
Facilitator: Bruno
Minutes:
Participants: Vasilis, Nathalie, Bruno, Nick
1. Opening
10 min Check in
5 min ADMIN
attendance (write down participants)
duration: until 11 CET (1:12h from now)
information: any (non-karrot) announcements? unavailabilities?
next meeting:
coworking: yes
next tuesday: yes
pick facilitator for next week: Vas
2. Consent to agenda
2 min
3. Review last week’s Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
poke vas to fill out MoU form thing [Nick/anyone]
poke vas/butze about joining next week to talk money/entity [Bruno]
update excalidraw timeline with updated MoU [Nathalie]
wrote to Open-source Collective [Nathalie]
4. Discussion points
discussing about the need for all of us to get together and plan the nlnet tasks, together with the questions about money distribution + fiscal host/legal entity [E]
liked how a fiscal host can be an interim solution
don’t somehow see the fiscal host seem involved in the ownership management of user databases, but can be worth exploring
missed the story about dave
“open source” collective sounds relevant
yes, email is a bit bland, would be happy to hear more comments about what they mean by legal things
bruno:
a bit surprised by the reply, that they also do legal guardian stuff
not sure if it would be useful for Karrot, but it could be
nice to look at the alternative, e.g. the one dave mentioned
more positive towards a fiscal host as a “solution for now”
esp. given recent experience with paperwork and bureacracy…
want to avoid that stuff
forgot to mention: can be useful that they have the professional employer option
nathalie:
appreciate thinking about the reply
reply didn’t solve all the questions, still open questions
wonder how much we’d embrace the fiscal host more widely, or is it just about finances
main thing, would be worth to contact the fiscal host we would actually consider
open collective fiscal host has high fee, and US-based
would be OK to just solve the financial question, and leave legal questions for later
data privacy stuff bothering me, maybe is a block to bringing Karrot to wider world, unsure how the fiscal host would help there
appreciate collective solutions, and less so peoples names there
have generally been more in favour of fiscal host solutions, as less willing to do the paperwork
erasmusplus thing came up, with somebody suggesting Karrot…
vas:
question opens if we have a fiscal host will we become eligable for EU-funded things [outcome!]
makes sense what nathalie suggested, currently we don’t have data agreement on Karrot, wondering how fiscal host could solve that
nathalie:
from foodsharing.de, there is an association which is formally running the platform, and have agreement with the servers, very relevant if somebody has a complaint, etc. board of association - always the discussion how much individuals in the board are liable. a collective solution is better here, to share out the responsiblity/risk/burden, otherwise it would legally go down to one person on the papers, not sure how a fiscal host would help, not even sure what to ask
nick:
Kanthaus is responsible for the server
need a privacy policy on the site
funny it never actually came up
recent issue with trustroots makes him think about that
default thing is just copy a default privacy policy. One solution but not good
another solution is create our own, but time consuming
Kanthaus is quite stable home for that, ultimately legally responsible for the server
likes the idea of having more distributed and decentralized power and legal entities
best solution of all is to have groups self-host
nathalie:
kanthaus has two associations
non-charitable one that owns the housing/construction/renting
charitable one (Wandel Würzen e.V.) used for funding applications and initiatives - everything not housing related, legal text is quite wide, and kanthaus used to have a strong tech focus, so karrot sort of fits, although it’s still more wurzen focused
any way to get e-mail adresses for them to do voting
that’s a about using our database policy, good to get an e-mail from an official account linked to fs warsaw
oh btw can they self-host?
proposal: if fs warsaw e-mails from a fs adress, we could send a document, and include a caution around privacy with it
bruno: sounds reasonable, consent
vas: same
nathalie:
comment: gdpr context has come up recently, wondering if it’s OK to use email addresses, would they comply with privacy expectations, maybe worth adding a comment to them, quite unsure here
proposal passes! nick can share with Karolina
wondering why they don’t use Karrot for that purpose
there was a code change to make email address visibility optionally, some groups want it required, and other things like phone number
everyone in chorus: what are the expectations/obligations on us if we joined?
who had the idea? They asked Nick
a lot of other tech collectives
siegen hackathon [E]
nick looking at trains…
looks more plausible, 4 maybes!
19-21.04.
bruno:
towards end of april? getting some motivation! if I can find good prices, if I can get some days… depends on kids and schedules, will investigate
nathalie:
still 4-5 hours on train, will be in braunschweig, so less time than from wurzen
3 topics
april is quite full, moving, maybe don’t have mindset, but could!
wonder, as it has a strong foodsharing hackweek, and karrot is invited, wondering who is going to be there, wondering how much karrot would do it’s own thing there
what would I work on?
generally nice idea, if we managed to plan something ourself, would be super motivated, and would be nice to see people
vas:
just checked driving, really long way, flying to dusseldorf is super cheap, going and coming is £170
was going to spain for 3 weeks, but cancelled it and othes are still going, so don’t feel so great going to something else in that time
technically could work, more about responsiblity
side note: nick, nathalie, bruno would be super happy if you all went, would be very happy to use karrot funds for it
nick:
would need to happen quite soon to commit, budget and time planning
deciding next week is reasonable
onboarding new developers
bruno:
got 3 replies for ad for tech volunteer to help out
jp: a german guy in sweden, we had a walkthrough together with nick
jennifer: indian living/working in stockholm, showed interested, haven’t done tech walkthrough onboarding yet
alina: from china, exchanging student living in stockholm, was very interested in frontend development, onboarded her with project needs, joined Karrot group
aiming for tech onboarding for second two and nick together
mix of karrot work and foodsharing sweden work, will depend on their interest, focused on foodsharing sweden, and may contribute to karrot directly too, plugins, content management, etc, alina might be more focused on frontend tasks for foodsharing sweden
interesting to think about the governance aspects of this, assuming it’s our goal to bring more people into this team/membership thing, so it’s a distributed team, see potential to bring people into the team, but would be quite overwhelming to join this call, but maybe start to have another circle? to have more focused areas, self-hosting part seems like a subgroup forming? would be happy to outsource some of that from this call to that group, and we could take this into account when looking at legal structures, etc.
structure to relate with other projects, e.g. fs lux, shared futures, fs sweden…
inc shared futures update from meeting
really enthusiastic arund karrot and potential to do funding
do pilot of how it could work together
knows all the different funding pots
release in shared futures in March
how do this orgs come together? also applies to fs lux and sweden etc
drawing ven diagrams
orgs having their own centre, but there is an overlap
teams working in this overlap
put shared futures work in this model
potential future vision
karrot is a toolkit that people can make use of for their network and customise it to their needs, if they want to adapt it, it might be enough to play with the options or do plugins or find devs who do the changes
potentially give money to karrot so we can do changes for them
projects have their own devs who can do changes aswell
karrot is a general enough tool so projects can take it
specific plugins vs plugins that are core to karrot
suggestion a solution to shared futures
what Nick wants
work on karrot and distribute money through karrot
karrot is a long-lasting project - that’s a really good base
projects should keep their own visions, it’s not about merging all
point from above: self-hosting circle would make sense
karrot considered as backbone structure, are we talking about a shared libray?
in this concept karrot would be base platform and sf(shared futures) builds it on top of karrot
karrot as a toolkit: build own platform on top of it
plugins can exist for everyone
‘karrot as wordpress for community organizing’
only closer relationships with the projects and not that big of an ecosystem
shared futures is a seperate code-base
fs lux uses karrot code
but use same governance model for both
build a vision for karrot from there
[lost connection for a moment]
go to groups and be a platfrom provider
more questions?
hear feedback
nathalie:
reminds me of 1/5/10 visions, which we didn’t follow up on yet
goes back to vision headspace, of what karrot is
one way could be this is specific agreements, saying what we’ll provide/receive, defining relationship without merging governance, how does value/money flow, feels quite formal way
other way I was thinking about is “who decides about what”, if we do a self-hosting circle, the way I think about it, we give some of the decision powers to the circle, e.g. which plugins do we promote as “karrot plugins” (is this even a way we’d go about it?), bring the people in who care about self-hosting to co-decide, which means getting people into our governance, still in the karrot sphere, getting people not into the core, but the self-hosting group
if we don’t do this, everything is in the karrot team, and it builds up, so a good starting point to have fewer things we decide on, and give them away
so in sociocracy, still having the link between circles, could be one or two link people
would the group take on the decision making method?
always lots of questions when things grow
take it as an opportunity to grow the governance body
vas:
definately hear what nathalie was saying, headspace was not going towards governance, but it makes a lot of sense to explore
from what nick was saying, thinking big! makes total sense
karrot has been going for 8 years, with not much funding, esp. compared to some startups that got lots of money and died, so using this as a base to think bigger makes sense
wanting to get all of work/money through karrot makes sense
from the scheme described, got the vibe of centralized decentralization maybe this is where the governance issues should be discussed
definately reminded me of juntagrico CSA project, features of this project are less rich, but operates as a federation of 20+ CSAs, that run their own instances, and share a repository of plugins, blahblahblah
nick
governancen and federation layer on top of each other
fslux has legal entity and org, clearly seperated, but there is an overlap
daniel might become member of Karrot team, already is part of karrot community
defining relationship could be useful, like MoU, non-legally binding agreement of serious intend
have that with fslux could be good
build on existin trust
‘do you want to have a fslux model?’
or other models
promising suite of collaboration options
how do orgs really collaborate, esp in a non-capitaslistc model?
we don’t want to buy fslux
how do we work together effectivly
cooperate better with other projects with similar vision - still big open question
one thing coming out it: form new circles e.g. tech circle
humanity project building a platform, focused platform for initial bit
fs sweden devs went through many conversation on karrot already
primarily there for fs sweden
but we don’t have all the features already
inter-organisation thing
there a two dimensions
people sit in different areas and overlap
daniel made contributions to the code in the past
unlikely that all 5 devs will join and start coding for Karrot
glocal idea, connect with local project makes more sense that connect with ‘global’ Karrot community, motivation to develop features comes from being attached to the context/ local group
outcomes or next steps
hear report how onboarding of new devs looks like
clarify role of ‘new devs’
do more processing what this might mean for us (e.g. growing the team)
wait for more tangible proposal with shared futures (or continue conversation)
continue thinkiing about MoU with Luxembourg/ Sweden
nathalie:
wondering about the role of the karrot team in these visions, and the strategy
worried that if we don’t get to a point where we are sustainable and healthy in the karrot team we could end up having core people who are taking on too much. well, maybe we don’t want to grow as a team, and give things away
seems like two paths:
staying small team, but trying to work on lower how much we do, giving it more for the groups. wonder what is left in the core team in this model.
distribution by getting more people involved, with more circles, getting more people into the project
“what is the karrot team for” as main question
nick
this two paths are the same thing to me, it’s a both-and-model
standing topic: check the board! [E]
standing topic: organizational structure [E]
what ways of organising are we looking to support? where isn’t karrot a good fit(reverse exercise) [E]
5. Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
will we become eligable for EU-funded things with the OSC [who?]
look more at all for climate and contact them, maybe at discord? [Nathalie]
chat with wandel wurzen about legal state with karrot [Nathalie]
share email export decision with Karolina [Nick]
think about hackaton in siegen until next week to reach a decision [all]
write to Butze and Leoni to ask about the hackaton [Vas]
co-working Nick and Daniel, data exported, imported
now they have control over their instance and database
a comment from Bruno that we went from a non-hierachical on the admin level to sth that can be seen as more traditional admin
karrot.world instance
thinking about roles, maybe a predefined “web server admin” role
could clarify how our governance structure is around data
new features become availabe as updates but its on the hands of those running an instance to incorporate them/deploy them or not
siegen hackathon [RED]
1st hackathon in a chain of hachathons we want to run
15 people who can join, sleeping in a fablab, more comf we make some flats available
Leooni and I doing want to push the agenda much
there is not clear schedule yet
we ll now the agenda in some 4-6 weeks from now
see what serendipity brings between fs and karrot ppl
Nick: Karrot ppl are coming a lot further, needs to work out if its go or no go. I d like to get that spoted out soon if and how Karrot can come into play, does karrot fit there, are we an ‘afterthought’. if all Karrot ppl and Lux we ll be 5 more or less. I like all the spaces between the sessions. It’s quite a long way to travel, potential to hang out longer? Having 5-6 days would be nice
Nathalie: I dont have anything to add, I ll be nearby on the map. How OK would it be if we had a little Karrot corner?
Bruno: interested to focus on Karrot, most def connect with ppl from foodsharing, I m willing to go if logistics work, other Karrot ppl join, do a bit of gathering/working occasion. have been checkign train tickets, get the traveling costs covered
Butzer: will look for ways to maybe cover some expenses through Uni
Nick: possiblity to extend hackathon?
the idea is not to make it very dev centric, but blend the community side with the dev side
What’s the role of Karrot? It’s up us to define it. Can’t predict it. Hopefully we do more hackathons in the future, extend it
Nick: limit of 15? what is the nature of this number? Responsibility from the ppl running the space we ll use. Maybe we can push the boundaries a bit
idea to make a thread and ping ppl about the hackathon and who is up for joining and think through what we want to work on?
Progressive interface - possibilities for a students work
sometimes Karrot feels too sophisticated, hard to understand it rightway, young communities, start small/simple and in a kind of a modular way the interface could be also progressive
resonates as a concept with ppl we chatted with
there is quite a lot in that idea
two directions:
as a whole group, when a new group is starting
a user wants to help a bit so its not drown up to the neck with everything that goes on
we might be able top-up some funding
how attached are you Alan in this idea? topic? concept?
Alan: get with Butzer to discuss,
a round
bruno: (veeeery sleeeeeppppyy) see the potential for working on progressive interface if there is motivation and time, usually divide tasks into design process with community and team (sketches, prototype, etc…), development, and then documentation. could do the first part, the design process. a very promising feature
nathalie: unsure of how many tasks we can open on the same time…might take capacities from other tasks
butzer: you been engaging with free and opsource, if u like the community here you could focus on the progressive interface, still up for debate
nick: i can agree with everything, give Alan overview of the four things we have on our NLNET things and to put them in context as well so might be sth else that is very interesting to you. But self-motivaton is key.
nothing much to add, but well done, functionality sounds good
Nathalie:
question: new repository or embedded within a karrot one?
either could make sense, leaning towards having a standalone one
question: what role for myself (Nick)?
setting it up
theming/ customizing
help anyone that want to contribute
writing documentation for self-hosting and dev documentation
vacancy for user documentation
Nick:
unsure if people engaged with wider docs site considerations or want to contribute
but makes sense just if using as an updated tech docs site, like the current one, as need somewhere to write the self-hosting docs that is nice!
bruno:
was wondering about what to do with user documentation, would try to imagine how it would look on vitepress, and how to connect it better to karrot itself
time will come when we’re needing to do some communication
then good to have a clear decision on where to put the documentation
would be nice to have it at the same place, if it’s not too confusion having it need the tech documentation
nathalie:
this is good helped to understand the need for self-hosting documentation
still interested in user documentation, but would need some more thought, and maybe moving things from the forum
interested to look into vitepress, but pretty sure I can use it
a bit unsure when to tackle this, maybe motivation will come if it’s easy/nice to use
more topics, where do we link it? (as current docs site is quite hidden), if it was more for users it should be more findable
about blog… wouldn’t merge it all into one thing, didn’t really know about the blog or where it’s linked, ok to keep it… maybe would need to talk about the blog on its own, don’t really have energy in this circle for blog posting, lets leave blog out for now
proposal: Remake https://docs.karrot.world site using vitepress with some of the existing tech content, initially self-hosting and dev. Leaving space for building user documentation.
full consent
siegen hackathon?
bruno keeping an eye on prices, although still can’t book for his route, when the tickets become available would need to be quick
looking for temperature check
should we make decision regarding funding the trip
round
Nathalie:
I can come!
would also visit parents
can stay a bit longer
esp. combining with dortmund
have it on radar, kind of planning it in
willing to say yes!
Nick:
counting on others energy
willing to make it happen, spend time with others
would like to stay a bit longer
hopefully no boat trouble
funding trip makes sense
should we fund FS Luxembourg?
Butze:
very happy to host us here, getting excited about event
good thing helping with serenity, don’t have a lot of projects locally at the moment
only event in planning at the moment, so have capacity
I think we can co-create some activities, indoor/outdoor, etc…
karrot will fund all karrot team members (travel costs). People in karrot groups or related projects can request funding which we will decide by consent in a meeting. We can also request funding from the university.
bruno: consent
nathalie: consent
butze: can still try for funding from university, if it doesn’t work, pay from karrot.
question: when would that happen? need to ask overwhelmed secretary, will ask today
nathalie: we could book tickets, and present tickets for reimbursement
consent!
progressive interface with Alan [R]
met alan last friday in office, had nice chat
really interested in the topic
needs to learn more about the context, willing to learn
planning to start somewhere in mid-April, as has other exams, then would like to engage
was quite fascinated about this culture and working environment
bruno: let us know when it’s time for a meeting, etc, or whatever is appropriate, or more dedicated session on it, can play and sketch, fun sessions
nick: did focus stay within progressive interface or wider?
explained not so goal orientated, but walk towards horizon and see which fruits to pick along the way
sound good to support them, how much would it be formality rather than actual connection? but maybe a bit deeper connection as nick is already connected
not very clear to me what participation means in practise, which voting, or decisions
good in general
butze:
up for you all to decide, I’m fine
nathalie:
sounds good
would be nice to engage different people from the karrot team, is there general meeting? or maybe it’s all online as it’s just tech people
would be nice if there was a video conference to build different connections
it’s nice, would go for 60EUR/year
nick:
interesting for us to see how this federated model works
already a conenction
would like to join
proposal: We apply to join federation for 60€/year and ask for a video call with them to welcome karrot.
bruno: consent
nathalie: consent
butze: consent, and will join
nick: consent
tech update [R]
lux
codeberg, docker, releases
plugins
catalyst chat [R]
standing topic: check the board! [E]
standing topic: organizational structure [E]
what ways of organising are we looking to support? where isn’t karrot a good fit(reverse exercise) [E]
5. Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
chat with wandel wurzen about legal state with karrot [Nathalie]
ask overwhelmed secretary about funding for Karrot people [Butze]
Date: 2024-03-26 on Karrot
Facilitator: Nick
Minutes: all
Participants: Nick, Rafael, Nathalie, Vasilis
1. Opening
10 min Check in
5 min ADMIN
attendance (write down participants)
duration: 11 CET
information: any (non-karrot) announcements? unavailabilities?
next meeting:
tomorrow co-working: Nick, Nathalie
next week meeting: Nick
pick facilitator for next week: Vasilis
2. Consent to agenda
2 min
3. Review last week’s Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
chat with wandel wurzen about legal state with karrot [Nathalie]
wrote a message to them about it in KH slack
so, maybe they’ll chat and return
sit and wait
ask overwhelmed secretary about funding for Karrot people [Butze]
4. Discussion points
commons management sofware/funding
how it started: ppl attached in the commons com, had some contant with foodcoops, foodsharing, not so much with bikesharing, fablab ppl in hamburg, 3d pritners and soldering equipment. we found that soft available might not be adequate, improve things:
links to examples: So funktioniert's | depot.social (not open source not federated, cannot make an instnace) https://commonsbooking.org/ another one os, to make a bike sharing operation work, hard to mantain, work to replace frot-end (merged recentlty) from UX not ideal, lots of work to be done, dont have tasks that karrot holds, mostly focuisngo n the time slot booking
would want to request sth for a certain period of time
limit usage or the time ppl can book
communicate bookings, a calendar overview or sth like that
Maintenance Task functionality
tasks in karrot, but havent used them yet, we d have to play around with that on karrot, one thing would be reccuring tasks, a saw that needs to be cleaned regulary, a 3rd printer to be calibrated regularly
Search for shared things
look for sth outside of a group context. Where can i find an item? outside of a group. that’s sth we are interstesd in exploring
Group openness
on karrot you can interact with groups only if u join, good model as a default, can we find a middle ground, to be able to approach withough joining
Federation
saw on smedia that u r working on federation, we d like to have federation basically, contribute to that, working on a project to build sth new, doing that with django
Nick:
sounds so fitting, topics are quite familiar, a feel of good fit, oh my god this is amazing for the project feeling, pace of change of our slow steady approach…finding a way to work with that, fits with my sense of how to free the Karrot, self-hosting, less stuff channeling to me, in some way becoming a facilitator of otehr ppll working on karrot is nice. It sounds that you got knowledeg and skills and if there is funding on rails that might mnean things will move forward,
how we colaborate, bring things to the core or work on a plugin system
vasilis:
we’ve been discussing all these things
have been looking for years looking to de-foodify karrot from foodsaving
personally involved in a makerspace, so interesting on personal level
would like to hear a bit more context of the case, sharing all kinds of resources, and a makerspace, and equipmenet
got a bit confused with the bikes? so an everything sharing platform? is there a physical space that is involved in the project that want to use it
how attached is it to reality?
exciting!
like the idea you want to look into federation, assuming having an instance of karrot, hard to get people on karrot, but easier to say we have our own software with an instance with the name of the project, so karrot fading in the background, with nick as faciliator of process
nathalie:
agree with many things, exciting, on our list of ideas, idea commmons, using karrot for sharing resources, a project i was involved was around shared bikes, for foodsharing pickups for example, karrot is very group focused, I use commonsbooking, so question is how much we want to push the idea of commomning vs more individuals sharing resources.
main questions on the level of colllaboration, curious how u found karrot, share a bit of the overwheming status,
about tasks, we dont have tasks on karrot, not sure what u were talking about when refering to tasks
Rafael:
mistook issues for tasks,
who are we actually: a loose association, someone else (robert) is the facilitator well conected with acitviists organisations, ton of concrete use cases in mind, 3-4 dif locations where they wanted to try this out, I m mostly a dev myself, getting more into see how soft works and get in touch with real ppl. We have a group on matrix where other ppl are involved, depends if we ll get other ppl onboard.
regarding the working together: application is ddline is the end of this week basically, we have a draft for an application, if u d like to try that, we d write that we ll work on karrot speciffically, or built software for commons sharing, if application gets accepted, 30/40% chance (relatively low). the dev starts around fall this year, around oct and goes for half a year, called a prototype fund, have a tight working style, very active working style, not nessesarily have to impact the karrot project a lot, good starting point to build a plugin, good way to get in touch with each other
network of indy sites that interoperate (instances I guess)
sudden thing and a lot of stuff coming in advance
another round:
if succesful its good news that it starts later on, its not a growth oriented mingset,
sounds like a nice case for the plugins, I love the idea of deep plugins, next cloud: isolated apps, interaction between the plugins is someties very seperated, using django singals,
one thing i like about Karrot, critical pedagogy, discuss things a lot, the political implications, dialogue process, I want to do doing not talking ← weaving of these is a nice process
the idea of debranding Karrot, what the hell is this karrot thing? makes more sense that the url of a project has its name, its not signing up for karrot, fs sweden now will move to their own instances
federation staff: always comes down to how the groups will make sense, use, enabling cross-collaboration between groups
the inside outside of the group: breaking the silo, permeable boundaries, doors not walls, public activities a tangible example of using the public activities
trying to think of next thinngs
wondering what happens if funding doesnt go through
funding comes and goes, build resilience on that, css where ppl contribute in money, be accountable to users and less to funders
Vasilis:
you covered everything nick, you went on a rant!
very practical, transparency, how much is funding, how is karrot involved in that? directly involved?
mentioned about submitting application by the end of the week, and on fence about building from scratch or within karrot
like the idea to mention karrot, and building on top of something already there
that’s it
nathalie:
more practical now… how to continue?
same question as vas, regarding funding, did you thought about contributing to karrot with the money?
how to go about it, given the time and that we barely know each other
going with plugin option sounds fine, as it’s more contained work, is the plugin system feasible
how easy would it be to move code from plugin to the core?
could be like a separated project, and report back from time to time
could be a usecase for a helping circle, like one person with their team, so don’t need to join all calls, can have a bit of separated work structure
could try it out for 6months/1year
in the future, interested putting karrot in a sustainable position, financial and team
potential to start with this, and potential for people to move into core team, so would prefer some communication or linking, but could also agree to just delivering a plugin, but prefer linking
can bring to proposdal today
thanks nick will take over again soon, ah sorry yeah I was in auto-minutes-mode
-Rafael: would be up for having some close communication as well, do thins together, someone who knows the project t b availalbe for calls, transfer knowledge in both directions, question regarding karrot be involved in the funding, not sure about the legal framewrk, u declare a team that forms a company, only exists for the timeline of the funding, they disperse it anywayy they want to it, hours-based funding, this is how this is received, happy to have one of karrot in the team and give some of the money this way to the project. not sure if u can have german citizenship, would have to talk to robert with this as well. Regarding what happens if we dont get the fudning, robert has been working on this vision for longer, I m sure that we ll continue to look for funding to workk on this, myself and rob have a lot of other volunteer projects we contribute on. vibe is matching,
-Nick: would be happy to input things for the funding bid. like the idea of building sth on top of existing stuctures, some funders might like that more ecological approach as well
now thats the main place, all deloyments, migration is complete, removing some of the old CI infrastructure, closing the issues and linking them to codeber, make a mirror site to github, some messy bits left, encourage you to make accounts, happy to show you around, has its own nice open governance stuff
server maintenance
nick and tilman chatting
restart server, server upgrades, restart the new kernel
Date: 2024-04-02 on Karrot
Facilitator: Vas
Minutes: all
Participants: Nathalie, Nick, Vasilis
1. Opening
10 min Check in
5 min ADMIN
attendance (write down participants)
duration: 11 CEST
information: any (non-karrot) announcements? unavailabilities?
Nathalie less available next week
next meeting: 03/04/2024: Vas, Nick, Nathalie
pick facilitator for next week: Nick
2. Consent to agenda
2 min
3. Review last week’s Actions/Outcomes
4. Discussion points
updates Vasilis PhD chapter on Karrot (management, dev, governance)
3 big topics/themes
unnamed as yet
a lonely programmer (nick) having a silent partner (tilmann)
safeguarding mechanisms, multiple doors to get into Karrot, having to knock the door, removed some of the more public information, reflecting experiences of people joining calls without connection, so more onboarding
accordian structure of team, making it a bit more official, roles of faciliator, giving space, collecting consent
selective growth, removing from up-for-grabs, not on maintstream social media, mastodon account, gender imbalances
karrot team and karrot users collaboration, hits, misses, and challenges
karrot team & feedback group, and how this played out
navigating superadmin-like requests, e.g. fs lux
potential of having higher level administrators, with self-hosting
design negotiations, majority of features come with conversations from groups, but karrot team also has own agenda, e.g. logging in with social media accounts, middle ground of public activities
breaking the silo, community cafe and karrot days
cultivating a counter-culture
checkins/checkouts as community rituals
beyond capitalist norms and startup culture, karrot vs startup values
equity-driven distribution of karrot funds, not time shifts, money distribution calls
towards opensourcefullness, open source being hollow/abused, how karrot is positioning itself within opensource ecosystem, critique towards hollow open source
will share document
tech updates
server upgrade
nick and tillman debian 11 - debian 12. scared and happy to do it with someone else
hackweekend prep call next week? e.g. tuesday evening
space to share things about hackweekend
a good idea to have a call
good to do it this week
co-ordinate siegen hackathon [Nathalie]
every potential cantidate replied, Dan mentioned to have a planning call
there is an activity on Karrot on the 19th of April for the actual event
Nat not sure how much time I can spare, decomitted a bit atm
gender imbalances on Karrot
more like: feminist take on karrot
breaking cis-male culture
not secret that tech is male dominated
usually dont notice so much but more when ppl join who are also male
selective ‘growth’ interesting
we do have measures to prevent more toxic-masculinity, mansplaining
had little uplesant moments
comments or jokes
someone draws a penis, these jokes was more frequent in the last months
centering care
we do that already to some extent, focus on emotional health, we can improve
gender diversity, welcoming queerness
in the team
as a team
in the software?
as a software
who is doing what?
gender roles
stereotypical female roles but having quotas
breaking roles
a project more focused on fem ideas and queerness
I dont look karrot being the queer project I m imagining of
no clear plan on how to go forward
I really welcome the discussion
there is a realm of theory of books and podcasts, when it comes to a living practice, there might be a gap on how
to incoporate these values, dialogue rather than conclusions
wondering if we can do sth like a book club to build on that
centering care is a lot in my life atm, getting it bigger than numeric imbalances, what does it mean to bring in some feminist practices, tick we got some women in the team, we can still have dominated culture, with queer to me there is a whole range of definitions with sexuality and more broad challenging conventions
diversity becomes broader as well, whiteness, neurodevisty, disability, fit into care and feminist practices
i m happy with the input
idea forming: a workshop that do things with this topic, engaging sth more practical, leipzig has a huge queer community, maybe I will look around
mostly men attending calls, including call visitors who drop in
also a few things noted about male-ish behaviours on calls
chatting on personal level about gender
could find ways within design to not reinforce stereotypes
how to make karrot more queer-friendly
we talked about the tokenist version as well, having quotas, gender diversity but all the women are doing sevice roles and men eng work,
we don’t look into ethnicity topics, neurodiverisity
connect with an org to do a workshop to explore the topic deeper
Butze: is worth exploring
Bruno: interested in propositions, what can be done
NLnet updates
everything is sorted, a bit to check
got an email saying that it is all signed
Nick’s work (Karrot’s haircut and more)
obv doing a lot of work atm, would like karrot to be the only soft project I do, in my morals makes sense to work on Karrot, only one put that amount of time, work on a team, doing work on the detail, calls and work outside, I m mostly pushing through requests on my own, I d like that in Karrot, we have nice disucssion philosophy layer, higher level topics is nice exchange, material work gots a gap in there, for me I enjoy doing work, get stuff done.
redesign
should it be an experiment or go forward with it?
proposal: go forward
reactions:
it’s pretty!
like it too
like it, consent!
official consent round:
check in with Nathalie
would like some beta-testing to see if it’s working, it affects a bit functionality
michigan student joining
no-one had replied to their application, wrote on the forum during the call, reached to Butze as well,
Nick has no capacity to give assistance at this moment unfortunately. There’s also a bad past experiene with university students looking to engage and disappearing later and not delivering anything
change policy:
change getting started guide to give the right message for undergrad students
review it next week
siegen prep
Nick communicating to Elisa and making her feel welcome
what are our intentions?
Nick: see what others are into and start a design task for NlNet
Butze: would like to know when Elisa is coming and get a room for her
Bruno, Daniel and Nick would get Butze’s flat, Nathalie at Leoni’s and find a place for Elisa
Daniel stated what his intentions are
defining with foodsharing team what they want to work on and doing a more fixed schedule
there is space for open discussions, communal events, so it doesn’t feel like Karrot and FS are working totally separate
have a pre-hackaton call with Karrot people
brunso intentions
spend time together bonding
do some nlnet related tasks
have a nice collective sense of plan, orientation for Karrot
connect with foodsharing people, getting to know each other, maybe something more solid might come out of it
Next meeting:
co-op cloud federation
policy/rules/agreement library
chatting with ntnsndr (Nathan Schneider)
5. Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
membership payment coop-cloud [Nick]
put the fully signed MoU somewhere [Nick]
check in with Nathalie on Karrot’s new design [Nick]
tell student we can’t take anyone on for now [Butze]
change getting started guide to give the right message for undergrad students [?]
organise a pre-hackathon karrot-focused pre-prep meeting [?]
Date: 2024-04-16 on Karrot
Facilitator: Vasilitator
Minutes: all
Participants: Nathalie, Bruno, Jay, Butze, Nick, Vasilis
1. Opening
10 min Check in
5 min ADMIN
attendance (write down participants)
duration: 11 CEST, Nick, Jay and Butze leave at 10:30
information: any (non-karrot) announcements? unavailabilities?
next meeting: weekly meeting and co-working
pick facilitator for next week: Bruno (tentative)
2. Consent to agenda
2 min
3. Review last week’s Actions/Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
work on forum post comparing/contrasting foodsharing/karrot [Nathalie]
did not work on that. I would like to involve the fs ppl so added that to the hackweekend schedule. free slot sat aftenoon, 45mins. finish the draft
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
membership payment coop-cloud [Nick]
put the fully signed MoU somewhere [Nick]
put it in the discourse chat randomly, it is somewhere
prev made a public post
check in with Nathalie on Karrot’s new design [Nick]
try some co-working on it during the siegen, work in progress
tell student we can’t take anyone on for now [Butze]
sent a message
2 questions from Nathalie:
open application on the KTaF group we should do sth with
refered to a task assigend to me, shortcuts task and got a bit unsure how much they ve started to work on that
I dont remember chatting, not very responsive to communication [nick], created more confusion, havent seen any code, indication of ‘progress’, nothing we can do atm, if there is some com u can ask [butze] if they started working on anything
look at it in Siegen
change getting started guide to give the right message for undergrad students [Vasilis]
summary is that we dont have capacity for dev contruvutiosn but HCIish things yes
4. Discussion points
Siegen hackathon last questions
what to bring
refers to sleeping bags, sleeping mats
arrive and then allocate
try to make things as flexible as possible,
everyone can stay in Butzer’s apt and the fablab works
flexible with multigen house
Nathalie can also stay at the multigen house to avoid cat allergy
time schedule
thursday nothing scheduled yet. Do we wanna do something?
Vas prefers morning sessions. Quite flexible except Friday 1pm
Jay works in the morning and a couple of hours after lunch (Thu, Fri, Mon)
thursday as an arriving day
nick will get some tech things to make vas present more convinient :D! thanks nick!
karrot ritual? initiate the congregation
co-op cloud federation
latest decision:
Large Decision 022: Budget 10: Abra integration suite automation - 2024-04-04
Deadline for votes is Thursday, 18th April – let me know if you need more time to vote than that.
we joined, we ll pay the money, participate in the votes, all disc, negotiations on a matrix chanel, if anyone wants to be another person from Karrot (except for Nick).
how are we deciding and voting?
there is a specific vote
incomprehensible tech things mostly
suggestion would be: everytime there is a vote I put on the Karrot group
nick as a delegate on the coop cloud fed [Nathalie].
not much to add [bruno], agree with Nick’s proposal
check in after a few months
have an overaching summary of what coop-cloud is and
policy/rules/agreement library
a disc on the main wall, down down scroll scroll,
discussion with Nathan Schneider
on the topic of governance,
policy rules with an open API, for example we got the agreements feature which we want t furhter develop, with Katie
now interconnecting projects, and platforms, library of some kind
templates, existing agremeents, projects, adapt, prefilled forms
was talking about where to get started with development
had own ideas, also would like to know what are priorities
went through the feedback forum section and how to choose something
using own motivation to choose something
have a little process for choosing development tasks in the weekly meetings
previously nick went through tasks, then based on some criteria would choose something
maybe it would make sense to do that process, or is there something in mind already? or focus on nlnet tasks
proposition:
my tasks can have two sources
nick assigns to jay that seems relevant
I come up with idea and talk to developer team (aka nick) to make sure it makes sense
reflections on the process (how to assign tasks to development team):
bruno:
from governance perspective and also design and values
where are the boundaries of deciding on tasks and assigning compared to others outside the development team
some things are clearly questions for developers, e.g. updates, without direct repercussion on usability and how users experience it
on the other end of spectrum, developing a whole new feature, need to work through with community, maybe a design process, and weekly meeting discussion
we had criteria, all took a look at the board, not just for development, but other kinds of tasks, good to keep the process and the clarity
maybe thinking in sociocractic ways, teams/circles, a certain mandate for a circle/working group/subteam, etc. important for them to keep that autonomy, and some things might be a bigger scope involving others
been a long standing topic, how to organise karrot, and governance system, would be nice to define for other people contributing in non-development tasks
nick:
also thinking about the sociocratic circle, a clear mandate to the dev circle, and what is to the general circle
fine defining a task for Jay now
also liked the process to define the tasks
we’ve also got the NlNet tasks ahead, so maybe no need to do that process now
jay:
not much to add
everything said sounds good
butze:
seems to be summarized well, thanks for bruno for bringing it up
Nick’s contribution
one epiphany is that need to activate burnout avoidance mode
works a bit frenetically some times
needs to spend a bit less time, but more focused time
be a bit more clear on what needs to do
what are his responsibilities? maybe a process for everyone
for example taking care of the server or responding to e-mails
ongoing responsibilities and tasks, loads of them!
could use board on forum for the tasks, but also codeberg, where it could be more detailed
more focus on the “Ready for development”
round:
bruno:
thinking
would create some more structure, maybe it’s needed
gives a bit more support and focus for all of us
up for trying that
not sure on details or how to proceed
could look at codeberg
board on discourse is quite full and could do with some organising
maybe codeberg is useful for more development detail
could be once moving tasks into ready for development could go to codeberg?
butze:
very good to come to this ephipany, honest and vulnerable, have to take care of self
have to figure out how to support you in this, and get some of the tasks more distributed
see some more capacities for myself coming up, end of june onwards after thesis is submitted, then need new tasks!
jay:
really good idea to keep track of the tasks that are currently being developed and who is working on them, esp. if wanting to expand team of developers
nick:
likes to recognize the limitations in capacities
would like solve everyone’s problems but also needs to say no
looking at codeberg features
currently github for operational things
maybe a working session to figure it out
also to make clear for others whether we want to prioritize something
could work more during co-working…
started time tracking karrot work
want to only work when on a specific/assigned task
What to do with github repo?
was wondering what’s up with that? Do we keep pull requests? Usefullness in keeping it? Any thoughts?
Nick can give some useful info/context: everything is migrated to Codeberg, mirrored with Codeberg to update, turned off the issues, but all the links broke, got links all around the forum (important context), makes the project look active atm, you can archive the project on Git, was thinking to replace/have a message saying that “move to codeberg”. Sometmes ppl say dont’ open issues here but on Codeberg. Asked to chat with some prof to ask to take us out of their student assignments list.
Proposal: stop mirroring, replace it with a msg saying its migrated to Codeberg
bruno:
yes, also brought it up as I was away when the move to codeberg happened
doesn’t look like it makes much sense to keep the GitHub repo
see the history point
consent to the proposal
confusing to have both, just have one official one
vasilis:
hear what nick is saying, record of issues, and removing it leads to broken links
did issues migrate? yes issues in codeberg, but still lots of links to github
accept proposal, maybe also archive it
if we add a note on readme page? maybe worth writing a line explaining the reasons we move, that is to some extent a political decision
butze:
all fine
jay:
agree to archiving, better to have it all in one place, easier to find
nick:
stop mirroring, put warning messages, and archive the repo on Github
vasilis:
would love to manually replace the github links to codeberg links, and look through the issues too in the process
next time:
review money amounts
check notes what we said last time
for when butze is back from hawaii:
membership for butze process
5. Actions and Outcomes
continue work on navigating upcoming activities [Bruno, Nick]
write feedback and reflections on suggesting Karrot to parents coop [Bruno]
write to gerben and ask about follow-on eu funding potentials [Nick]
membership payment coop-cloud [Nick]
change getting started guide to give the right message for undergrad students [Vasilis]
summary is that we dont have capacity for dev contributions but HCIish things yes
summarize design session on polls [Bruno]
notes and actions items from Siegen on the forum [Nathalie]
continue working on draft for a vision [Bruno]
do mine and Jays travel cost payments [Nick]
start evaluation of task/board system, maybe adding other topics/tasks [Nick, maybe Jay]
a good general text, easy to comprehend for people in Karrot project or used to alternative circles
for people not in alternative circles, maybe hard to comprehend what it actually means, e.g. “what is the money circle?”
says describe an agreement for each contributor, but what would it look like? amount of money, could make it more tangible
in second paragraph there is an explanation of how we see money, would move that into the beginning, “How do we perceive money”, so add some headings, preface, process, how we get to outcomes. with the goal to help outsiders to understand it better
Nathalie:
I like it a lot
saw we made a few amendments from initial draft
feel like it makes sense
like this second paragraph, feels quite honest, e.g. within our financial capacities
two minor points:
practicalities of money circle, usually takes place in the weekly meeting, not after it
a bit more tangible about how we do things, could mention opencollective, e.g. “all money is collected by our fiscal host and visible on our opencollective”
like the sense we have one collection of money, and we had some confusion before about whether to have extra agreements
nice sense to collect all the money from all the sources (not thinking about who brought it in), and then redistributing it
agree with butze, as the agreement could just be amount of money
Nick:
likes it
balance between dreamy vision (working from our hearts) and lived realities, we touch both parts of that
broadly made sense to me
guideline: what do we mean by this, e.g. the 3 categories for contribution, we’re open to have discussion about others
guideline could mean different things to different people
external work not reflected here, difference between core work and ‘external’ work, nothing to add here, but reflecting that not all situation are covered (where there is an overlap in projects)
‘in the meeting’ could just edit that
tangible is good, but could be prescriptive instead of descripive
example section could be nice, based on previous examples
once we get fiscal host, we can include it in there and link it
not about who brings it in, support making that explicit
adding headings, would be happy about this: ideoligical background, what we’ll discuss, facts/ how it happens, examples - but not too motivted to work on headings myself, as it’s not a very long text
Butze:
also stumbled on the word “guideline”, not sure a good other word
it also says “people who use Karrot”, so users of karrot could come and ask for money?
also don’t see the need to structure to the text, but would be happy to
Nathalie:
also not so motivated to structure the text with headlines, as it seems not too long
am motivated to add a sentence here or there:
opencollective
one money pot
and in the weekly meeting, not after
openness of money circle? didn’t advocate for it to be so open, but happy with it, currently we only give money to karrot team, open to some flexibility, in reality mostly people in karrot team
Nick:
openness, just leave it, but how do people know? they would need to be aware of it and somehow active
we did pay travel costs to karrot users, could be worth having a section, making it clearer for other people
next steps
bring back a new version of text to a meeting (maybe after fiscal host?)
(not sure if will attend calls), away until 2nd april
[R]
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