Lote as a process, an open source project -- Lote3.1 alpha and Making #Lote4

[dorotea]

Lote as a process, an open source project – Lote3.1 alpha and Making lote4

Lote ( Living on The Edge ) event is the space where the edgeryders community meet, “usually” once or twice per year. lote3 was a community based effort. Making Lote3 has taught us a lot of valuable skills how to coordinate all the ingredients of the live meeting, mostly via an online collaboration. It was few months of preparations to make Lote3 happen. We have had regular meetings once or sometimes twice or more times per week to keep all the preparations going smoothly. We have built many things collaboratively, like the event site, the program, sometimes fixing many ‘little things’ behind the scenes, and making sure everything works fine. And with the joint effort we made it happen.

What we have learned is that making the event is a process, that is not only focusing on the event itself, but also on how we are actually making it. It’s a collaborative process. This is why this time I’d like to experiment in treating the preparations to the live event lote4 as an event in the process.

More benefits of emphasising the importance of the process come from the fact that some of us participating in the process of making lote3 could not make it to come to the event, so if we make the process equally important and valuable, their contributions will also be appreciated and with mutual benefit for everyone.

Kicking off from lote3 we can keep improving and building together – just like in an open source project, so that lote can be viewed not only as a one-time event, but also as an open source collaborative project, that continuously offers value to it’s contributors and participants.

While developing lote as a process, we are also building lote4 - a real-live event of community get-together, and talking about what we have learned during the process.

The ingredients of lote event can always be improved and we can always add value to it at any time. This is why we “release early”, and we aim to “release often”. *

So we release  lote3.1 with knowing what we want ( as we learned a lot in the making of lote3 ) and also knowing what we want to improve ( what is even more important in the development process ) we still have to collaboratively decide on many other details (for example when and where we want it) but this is a journey that we can pleasantly enjoy together.

This journey starts early, with a lot of time to lote4 (probably few months) as we want to take our time to make everything work well.

At this stage we release lote3.1 alpha (Lote version 3.1 alpha) and we’ll be developing it until we’ll get to the improved version : lote4. Maybe we’ll have major improvements (new versions) on our journey and we’ll always look for constructive feedback from the community about our open source project in the making.

This year’s journey of making lote is accompanied with a great project the  #unMonastery and many interesting and meaningful projects as being part of it.

So the process of making lote4 and the #unMonastery as a co-working and co-living space will have the opportunity to learn a lot from each other.

Making lote4 is an open source project and it is also a journey and the path that we have to travel together. Let’s enjoy it

I’m taking a (co) lead on coordinating this journey and making the lote3.x a beautiful process leading to the lote4, and beyond.

Soon I’ll post more details of how we can get started, and the proposals we can consider.

[alberto]

Way to go

Great stuff. Let us know how we can help.

[dorotea]

I have lots of ideas

Thank you [Alberto]  :)

I have lots of ideas how to involve the community into enjoyable process so that everyone is happy to participate

We’ll have some call about is sometime soon.

Meanwhile everyone is welcome to join the group here

[dorotea]

Welcome Claire

Welcome [Claire]

it’s good to have you here

We had a welcoming hangout today with [Claire] , [Noemi] , and me

you are welcome to join the next ones as well!

and I hope you’ll join us also at our next Real-Life Get-Together! 

but first we’ll design our next meeting together in the next weeks and months… so we’ll have lots of opportunities to chat more ! :) 

[claire]

Thanks Dorotea! It was a very nice welcome, and I can’t wait to start helping!

Talk to you soon, I hope

[dorotea]

When I was writing this I was especially thinking about …

When I was writing this I was especially thinking about some Dear Edgeryders who did not make it to Lote3, but contributed a lot into making it, especially [Auli] , David [Vidrij Da] and Michael [mishek] .

Also [Bembo Davies] brought a lot of magic into makng Lote3 and there is so much bigger potential to bring even more magic into the real life get-together as well

So all those contrubutions can be re-cycled :) into making lote4

Let’s think Big we can make it Happen

and let’s keep being motivated

[bembo_davies]

post Matera LOTE#4 ??

sounds promising DoMa – when do you descend upon the unMo?

[dorotea]

let’s hope we meet there soon

actually #Lote3.x will be in Matera at #unMon probably I hope to see you there soon [Bembo Davis] when do you go there ?

I will probably come after February, possibly March, how about you ?

[aden]

Materializing LOTE4 a global event

“Simplicity is the Key, and the key to simplicity is being profound” 

I like this quote a lot and so I want to start my post from this expression to share my views in organizing LOTE4

I really like the idea  [Dorotea] pitched in establishing lote 3.x as a build up to lote 4.

I have been also going through the literature of edgeryders, lote3 documentation and lote3 aftermath, even though it is overwhelming it is also very exciting to see rich texts generated over the issue of new models of complex social, economic, political and other segments of lifestyles transactions among the people in today’s time.

So, in that respect I propose a roadmap here which I am willing to also collaborate and become active in bringing lote 4 to the global public spheres.

On a very broad level My thinking process about the event, can be viewable here at the Popplet

I am proposing to organize lote 4 during August/September 2014 at Öresund Region

I have also been engaged with locals (municipalities), hubs (media evolution - malmo, Cph labitat, Nordic Transmedia producers and a like) and other many grassroot/open source groups across Scandinavia … hope to get Pirate party people (both the party and piratebay people), Anonymous group, wikileaks groups, gaming/programmers communities,

This is what I wanted to post regarding materializing Lote 4 , i have been sharing my willingness to [Noemi], {UnMonestary Radio, Formstorm, Viral academy and GameRaid crew} in order to engage lote 4 on a global scale and promote this “MINDSET”

 I hope ive done justice in being simple in my idea and profound … lets schedule some meetups from next week (date, timing, venue and availablity can be discussed in this thread) to take on this endevour and come up with to do lists, A list priorities and improvized creativity process

[dorotea]

sounds good

sounds good,

looks like a nice place

let’s see what we’ve got until now and let’s start to put the puzzles together …

for now we have two proposals of locations,

but we can think how can we use both in the best way !

we can think Big and think Long Term as well

[noemi]

Off to a great start!

Woohoo You guys, I’m so excited to hear this, a couple of more or less concrete ideas is all we need to get started.

I guess we already have at least two proposals for location, and with you two scouting the north, respectively the south of Europe this couldn’t get any better. I guess where it will eventually take place is a decision of those involved and doing the work, right?

If you want to hold LOTE4 in July-August, this gives us just enough time to organise - last year it took 5 months to get everything in place, although it surely can take less. Especially if one of you is on/near location and connecting the work online with field logistics. Actually I would say this is crucial, it would have made things much easier for us in the beginning, before [Rita O] stepped in.

Adding to the resources we have so far - the “literaure” to quote [Aden] :)) - is a Lote pack we can keep building on, and where those involved last year can summarize our thoughts on event planning and tools. Hangout sounds great!

[phm]

LOTE pack? hmmmmm

What form might a ‘LOTE pack’ take? Just like a how-to for organising an event? A checklist and stuff?

What thread can I read where the pack is discussed?

[phm]

Fundraising

Can someone give me a quick summary of LOTE3 fundraising?

How much did you raise?

How did you do it?

What did you use the money for? What kind of internet access did you have at LOTE3? Were all the meals shared?

Is there a target for LOTE4?

[noemi]

Lote3 Fundraising

The whole infrastructure in Matera: unMonastery building, tables and chairs, sanitaries, cutlery, coffee and tea maker, flipcharts and markers, projectors, and wifi included were provided with the help of Comitato Matera 2019, those funding the unMonastery. Some of the stuff was paid for, some was borrowed from the people and organisations there. I think [Rita O] might have an idea of the exact amount. We got this support because most of it can be accounted as support for the unMonastery. For example, contracting an Internet provider and having routers installed was in the unMonastery budget rather than the Lote3 budget, and something that they needed to have done anyway eventually. So more than fundraising this was a little bit like cat herding to make sure it happens faster, by the time we needed it.

And then we managed to secure a 1000eur schlarship for Dutch participants.

And this is pretty much it. Fundraising for Lote3 went like: ok, let’s kill 2 birds at a time - promote the unMonastery and secure a venue for the community event. everybody wins. What else do we need? Let’s see who can help and go grab it. This process tends to get messy, but luckily our main partners onsite, Matera2019, were a dependable resource and coordination was the main effort. 

Meals were shared, as you can see below, we took turns in shopping and cooking light mediteranean food… or we ate out.

[phm]

mmmmm

So how much money do you think we need to raise? Does anyone have ideas/contacts to repeat the LOTE3 route and try to get support from a city/concil?

I’m guessing EdgeRydersTheCompany doesn’t have anything in the coffers? BTW, is there a difference between saying ‘EdgeRyders are doing this’ and ‘EdgeRydersTheCompany is doing this’? I’m guessing yes. When I say ‘edgeryders’ now, I just think of a bunch of cool altruistic people. The whole ‘get money from selling ER as a thinktank/boutique’ confuses me a bit. Has ER ever been paid money for work that was truly done by the whole community in a distributed fashion? Suppose I want to hire ER as a thinktank, how much does it cost? What would I expect as an end result? A report similar to the youth survey thing that was the original impetus for this community? Do I get any guarantees about who exactly will do the work? If EdgeRydersTheCompany does ever get money from this thinktank thing, who decides what to spend it on? Is there an ER manifesto/mission statement? What is the political structure? Is it democratic?

[noemi]

Whatever the form

I’ve started the pack in the task I have linked to above, I thought of it as a recap of processes and tools we used for Lote3 - textual form. It could also be a more visual kit? sort of an infographic? Whoever will end up doing the task or helping with this can decide on their prefferred format. Why do you ask, got suggestions? Perhaps it’s in the end not even necessary to build a pack, having with us [Dorotea], who’s already experienced with organising Lote…

[phm]

just curious

I was just curious. I don’t have any ideas, cos I wasn’t involved with LOTE3. Are there any good threads/links I might not have seen that you recommend reading? (Anything that might have useful info concerning organising an event like this.)

[noemi]

re: fundraising and support raising letter

Perhaps this post will give you an idea of how we made contact with the community in Matera - which ended up channeling a lot of resources our way, and made our life easier. A dozen participants ended up being hosted for free, we also went to co-design event sessions with Materani, calculate ingredients and costs for the Pasta Party, get hold of fabrics for the session on codesigning unMonasterians uniforms and many more. Looking forward to share more of these and touch base in a community call next week also with Aden and Dorotea.

And big thanks for your interest, I cannot help but wonder how your work is planned this year and how come you can spare a few months to get involved in all this. See, this is where I’m missing the Share your Ryde posts we used to have in Edgeryders Year 1 (later imported on this platform) where everyone introduced themselves quite lengthy, it was a great way to meet one another :)

example: This was my story as a recend uni grad (no longer accurate I think), Alberto’s, and this is another example of a story which spoke to many in the community. Would be great, if and when you had the time, to give this a shot so we can know each other better. The Agora group is a good place for that.

[phm]

fish

‘Share your Ryde’ -Awesome. I’d say link this on the front page or something,.It should be one of the first things that people come across when they’re wondering ‘what the fu*k is edgeryders?’. ((BTW, can I swear on the platform? …,mmmyep I just did. Now I’m gonna grep your entire platform for swears. hmmm. Is it discouraged? Is it banned? I won’t do it again, cos I know Dorotea isn’t a fan. But the anarchist in me is saying ‘Who the fuck are you to tell me which words to use?’. Anyway.)) …wondering ‘what the heck is edgeryders?’. I wondered this once, and I actually got put off when I saw that it was a company, then it dropped down the research priority rankings and was forgotten about… until I kept seeing people I like mention EdgeRyders and that they all had profiles here. It’s people. Is that stressed enough? Maybe I missed it, dunno. I’ll use magic empathy constructs to build a noob and check this when I have time. I even watched a video intro I think and I was like ‘huh. too much jargon/buzzwords’, but that issue is probably unique to me. I get put off when I hear anything that sounds like corporate talk. Because I’m an anarchist. But now I think it is cool that ER has these business orientated people, too. mmmmm. I’ll think about this more later.

“I cannot help but wonder how your work is planned this year and how come you can spare a few months to get involved in all this.”

ehhh. I can’t promise anything. I’m just helping Dorotea. I have my own motives, it just so happens that we’re in

at the moment. I can’t be responsible for anything. I’m like a child.

[dorotea]

Time-Space of Lote

I think we are both near the locations we want to make Lote at

My proposal for now was Sintra, Portugal in Autumn this year, possibly October, as from the experience I know It can take some time to put everything together for the event,

but we can consider Lote Summer Gathering as well .

we could actually consider both Summer Gathering in August and Autumn unConference - EdgeRetreat.

If anyone else has any thoughts on this to share - please share