r/cooperatives • u/zagadocious • 5d ago
Tech user co-op?
We are developing a community tech co-op in Chattanooga, TN, for people to completely control and fully own their apps and data via free open source software (FOSS). The essential idea is to jointly procure services to deploy, maintain, and provide basic support for FOSS for members' purposes. Rather than paying license or subscription fees, we'll pay local technologists to work on and with our software. It gives us an economical alternative to Big Tech, keeps our data to ourselves and our money in the local economy, and strengthens our community. Does anyone on this subreddit know of other such co-ops, especially in the US?
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u/coopnewsguy 4d ago
Check out comp.coop for some good partners:
"comp.coop is a worker cooperative that brings world class tech consultation and software development to worker-led organizations. We exclusively serve cooperatives, ESOPs, pro-worker nonprofits, unions, and other labor oriented organizations. High end technology has traditionally been reserved for the rich and venture-backed, but through our cooperative business model and fair pricing principles, we aim to help worker-led businesses remain competitive with VC-funded counterparts."
Sounds like a good fit.
As for other shared services tech co-ops like you describe, I can't think of any off the top of my head.
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Thanks. I'm aware of comp.coop but as a worker coop that builds app they aren't really relevant to our purpose which is to deploy off-the-shelf FOSS for members.
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u/PlayfulGovernment325 4d ago
There is a few we are not allowed to talk about on this sub because they use Cr*pto infra but you can find them if you look
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u/MartinSWDev 4d ago
Interesting does coop Reddit not recognise DAO as cooperative?
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u/PlayfulGovernment325 4d ago
explicitly banned by subs rules even if D AO is structured by cooperatives sadly. it’s the last rule.
think it’s especially sad because censorship resistance is important and that can be a benefit of a D AO structure
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u/coopnewsguy 4d ago
All DAOs rely on crypto, and crypto posting is banned. If you want to discuss DAOs, go someplace else. The internet is a big place.
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Interesting. While we most definitely aren't a DAO, we see blockchain as a powerful, useful technology, specifically for micropayments and smart contracts... and avoiding proprietary, exploitative "solutions." It seems counter-productive to ban it as a topic but maybe that we necessary to keep the tech bros at bay. Is discussion of AI also banned? We plan to provide both as services to members. Indeed, we see those as a core part of the "why" for members.
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u/PlayfulGovernment325 1d ago
discussion regarding generative AI is also banned. whatever your building sounds interesting any links or resources i can check out?
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u/markchand 4d ago
You might want to check out the platform cooperativism folks: https://platform.coop/
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Thanks for the suggestion. I've connected with them but seem very academic, not practical. We're looking for collaborators and models to address some basic business and technical issues. BTW, we also connected with https://www.start.coop/, which is more applied and practical but very general purpose.
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u/Bluenoser_NS 1d ago
Unfamiliar with similar projects (though I've never looked).
Is the technologist compensation funded through annual membership rates?
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Frankly, we're still figuring that out. Only work on core and community apps/services — those used by everyone — would directly compensated by the co-op, and that would primarily be in the form of free service. Credits might be converted to cash, if members vote for it. Beyond that, members would cover the costs of work on or with their software. The co-op would act as owner-agent/project manager to jointly procure services so "customer" members get what they need and "provider" members can do one large project instead of multiple small ones.
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u/Bluenoser_NS 1d ago
Well, I'm Canadian, but Chattanooga seems to be a pretty happenin' place. I'm sure this would be of interest to and perhaps even of use to your local urbanist society.
If service is compensated by in-kind compensation, it might be a good idea to pursue non-profit or even charitable status for your co-operative if you register it. Annual audits aren't cheap and funding / grant eligibility is unlocked with either in quite a few places. Of course, if you forgo that in favour of a structured mutual aid society you don't have to worry about it, either.
My personal recommendation from working in member-based non-profits is making fee-based memberships recurring by default if you ever do pivot to that route. It's infinitely easier to help someone cancel their membership if they're having difficulty than devoting volunteer or working time to membership drives to engage with members that have naturally forget that theirs has lapsed. Huge unexpected capacity thing.
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u/Archi_penko 4d ago
Not fully sure, but check out NET fund, they are a co-op loan fund and developer in TN, as well as Throneless Tech in MD.
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Thanks for the suggestion! I was aware of SCCD. They seem firmly entrenched in traditional coops so I hadn't reached out to them. I took your suggestion and did so. Throneless Tech is interesting but, as a worker coop, is a different beast. We're really all about aggregating and increasing consumer demand for open source as an alternative to Big Tech.
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u/benjaminbradley11 4d ago
Agaric is a heavy open source enthusiast: https://agaric.coop/initiatives
Other tech co-op resources: https://github.com/hng/tech-coops https://www.usworker.coop/tech-peer-network/
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u/zagadocious 1d ago
Thanks! Agaric is more in-line with our purpose although they're clearly a worker coop. For example, their Find It app has functionality we plan to provide as a community app... there are several options for this. Also, we will deploy Drupal and other websites. We just don't work on or with them. Our objective is to create opportunities for local devs.
The Github resource is really interesting, in part because its on Github. One of our goals is to provide an git platform for our community as an alternative to it. It's really interesting that there are a lot of worker coops but few buyer/user coops. My personal/professional background includes a lot of work with electric coops, which is the general model we're building on, along with the Open Source Program Office model.
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u/erkiferenc 4d ago
Seems like a great initiative to me 👍
I only know about Limeleaf as “a worker-owned cooperative, based in Upstate New York”.
Happy hacking!