Here we work out ideas about generic tools for digitally mediated organising, collaborating and facilitating.
We start from a Trinity of tools identified by Rich Bartlett and Nati Lombardo of Enspiral, back around 2018. Trinity of tools
We elaborate that, drawing on a scheme - evolved by Stacco Troncoso of Guerrilla Translations - of a stack of generic tools for DisCOs (Distributed Cooperative Organisations). We couple that with a category of diverse 'specials' which handle specific kinds of requirements in particular practical domains. This trio of trinity, stack and specials is where we were at back in 2020. DisCO stack Specials
DisCO thinking takes us also into the area of workflow, or 'look and feel' of a multiplicity of tools. Which turns out to be a practice of **design justice** and a politics.Toolstack look and feel
This takes us down a rabbithole of concerns: - what a digital tool is - what an infrastructure is (and what contra-infrastructuring is) - digitally mediated 'spaces' for collective practice in communities, and - what a 'stack' of projects might be, for a Democratic Tech Fund. This is all, in a sense, an extension of the thinking of 'look and feel': concerning the entire practical, inhabited, embodied relationship between **actors in communities** (aka commons) and material **elements of tech**. We approach all of this through the frame of 'a real full stack' - of **capabilities**, in digitally mediated spaces, and in the broader cultural, political and economic practices that those spaces figure in. It's a stack of . . scope . . in digitally mediated practice.
Next: A real full stack
We approach digital infrastructure(ing) through a model of a 'real full stack' of activities in the commons which are, first, mediated by digital means and, second, are mobilised, curated and stewarded in a practice of digital infrastructure(ing). These categories overlap. Here we describe the stack. The stack is important in characterising the fundability of project proposals by a Democratic Tech Fund.
# An extended trinity of digital tools Back to the evolution of 'toolstack' thinking.
Where we were at, OpenCoop2020
Taking into account the way that things have leapt along since 2020, especially during the Covid lockdown which took many people into online working and meeting, we extend the Trinity into three trios of tools. Extended trinity
Going forward, we re-badge the extended trinity as a 'gang of nine': nine kinds of **affordance** that are implicated in digitally mediated organising, collaborating and facilitating. Gang of nine
We also check out some established public offerings of FLOSS collaboration tools, for example the Nextcloud Hub toolstack, and a number of coop- and community-run platforms that assemble a stack of FLOSS tools. - NextCloud Hub toolstack - Framasoft toolstack - MayFirst toolstack - commonscloud toolstack - LURK toolstack
And we think specifically about the tools that will be needed in organising a Democratic Tech Fund: both in 'the back office' (in the work of the Fund) and in 'the front end': supporting collaborations between the Fund and its funded projects, and wider communities of interest. - Back office toolstack for a fund - Front end tools for a federation
Next: Extended trinity
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