Category: #coop

Open Source Motivations

Have you ever contributed to an open source project? If so, what was your motivation? My Co-op is working with Greenpeace International to help take their Planet4 project to the next level. You can read all about it in this blog post – and let us know about your motivations in our very quick survey.
Here may lie an Open Badge programme. Time for a pre-mortem…

Last week I was facilitating a Think-a-thon with a WeAreOpen client in Edinburgh alongside co-op member Grainne Hamilton. We were helping our client to think through the integration of an Open Badge programme into their current offering. The Pre Mortem is an extremely helpful way to air intuitive spider-sense discomforts amongst the team, without anyone…
Embed Practice

Whilst prepping for a design-a-thon for a digital literacies MOOC for teachers with my We Are Open colleagues, we talked briefly about the importance of embedding practice…
It’s not the only way…

If you look around the tech sector, it would be easy to think that this was the only model of generating wealth. And generating wealth for whom? A Co-operative is a business that exists for the benefit of its members (as opposed to its shareholders), and is built around a set of co-operative principles. As I’ve found…
The Innov-A-team

In 1972 a team of open workers was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn’t commit. This team promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the global underground. Today, still wanted by the bad guys, they survive as members of a worker’s co-operative. If you have a problem, if no one else can…
The Seven Co-operative Principles

You may not know that there are Seven Co-operative Principles. Yesterday, I was at Mozfest, hosted by Ravensbourne College in Greenwich, facilitating a visual conversation all about co-operatives. In fact, Mozfest is so chock-full of conversations, you can easily spend an hour getting to the right floor, bumping into interesting people you half-know. And that’s not because…
Open Badges from Dialogue

It’s one thing to decide how to badge a group of people on your own terms. It’s quite another to catch potential badges as they appear like apparitions out of dialogue with the people. What is that? … and what would it look like? This thinkery is from the We Are Open Co-op meetup.
Co-ops: Spread the word…

I really enjoy being in a Co-op (WeAreOpen.coop), especially when we get together to make something, or think about something. As a result, I’m really keen to spread the word…
The unwritten books of Dr Belshaw

Conversational thinkery is where it’s at. Armed with a pen and paper, there are gems to be uncovered and captured. Recently, with my WeAreOpen comrades Doug Belshaw, Laura Hilliger we thought (online) through the overlap between Digital Literacies and Employability and before long I found myself capturing these book titles which ultimately helped us frame what we…
A co-operative state of mind

When a friend of mine asked if I’d be interested in forming a Co-op, I had to admit, I’d never considered it as a viable vehicle for business. Having come to the conclusion that there was no reason not to be a part of the adventure, I jumped in. I’d come across co-ops briefly having…
Co-ops & Commons

One of the highlights of Mozfest this year was the privilege of being able to sit in (with my sketchbook) on a conversation between Ryan Merkley, CEO of Creative Commons, and John Bevan from the We Are Open Coop. They explored the commonalities and parallels that exist in the worlds of Co-ops and Commons.
Transparent and Open

I’ve been thinking about Cooperative business models recently, thanks to Doug Belshaw and John Bevan. Engaging with different ideas means playing out scenarios, and like splitting light through a prism, you can’t quite imagine how it will be until you shine it through.