Decentralized platform for indie creative professionals, advocates, activists, etc.

What problem are you trying to solve?

Independent creative professionals and advocates depend on existing social media platforms in order to connect with each other and publish their work. Said platforms are designed to exploit the creators and consumers of media and information for profit in well-documented ways that cannot be succinctly voiced here. This project seeks to create a nonprofit platform that puts the power and profit in the hands of the creators, not in the hands of the publishers. (TL;DR data and information is the most valuable commodity we have, the power and profit should go to those who create it)

Who will benefit (directly and indirectly) from your project?

Indie creative professionals, advocates, activists, and media consumers who don't want their personal data exploited for ad revenue.

What other resources/tools are currently serving the same need? How does your project set itself apart?

I certainly believe the technology exists for such a platform, and I'm currently looking at using any number of decentralized technologies ranging from Ethereum, democracy.earth, to Cloudflare's IPFS gateway.

Where can we find any research/data available/articles?

Well... that's sort of what I need help with.

What help do you need now?

Well that's convenient placement. I need research help in plotting a development path and more finalized plans. UX designers who want to design something new, and anyone with technical experience in decentralized technologies and building on top of them.

What are the next steps (validation, research, coding, design)?

This project is in its very early stages, and I'm hoping to introduce it and start forming a team around it. Next steps do include validation, research, coding, design, and then the fun part: marketing.

How can we contact you outside of Github(list social media or places you're present)?

Personal website with all relevant links is aninaser.com, reach me on twitter @naser_ani and instagram @ani_naser

Project management

Checklist for NEW ideas :baby:

Hey, you're official! You're now part of the growing civic hacking community in Austin. Here's a few things to get started (a couple you've probably already done).

[x] Create this idea issue
[x] Flesh out the who, where, and what questions above
[ ] Start the conversation about this idea on Slack Replace this link to the #general channel with your project's preferred channel.

Checklist for ACTIVE projects :fire:

Let's get this project started! When this idea starts taking off, the Projects Core Team will start helping this project's lead(s) out with project management and connecting you to resources you may need. To get there, please complete and check off the following:

[x] Post an update at least once a month to this issue. Use BASEDEF for ideas, but it's ok even if your update is just "nothing new happened this month" or "we saw a small increase in traffic to our app this month". If there's no activity for two months, that's no problem, life happens. We'll just label this as backlog so others know you'll get back to it when you have the time. If nobody hears from you at all in more than two months, we may mark it as abandoned so that others can pick up this idea and run with it.
[ ] Take 30 minutes to complete Open Leadership 101
[ ] Create a GitHub repository. Ask for help setting up permissions if you want your repository to be within the Open Austin Github organization.
[ ] Create a README file in your project repository. This file should help newcomers understand what your project is, why it's important, and kinds of help you're looking for.
[ ] Create issues to describe each task that you plan to do or need help with and how a contributor can get started on that task. You might start and stop a lot, so consider issues as your to-do list.
[ ] Create a team for your core contributors
- This will make it easier for you to manage your github repo access. People on a team have the same level of access. Admin access will allow your trusted contributors to make changes as needed.
- You can remove and add people to your team as needed.
- View some of our teams: https://github.com/orgs/open-austin/teams
- Note: You can also allow collaborators outside of your team and give them more limited access.
[ ] Create a user group in Slack so you can "@" your core contributors all at once, without bothering other people who use the Slack channel. You'll need permission from a Slack admin, so just mention @leadership on Slack to get this set up.
[ ] Create a Google Drive, Dropbox, or other cloud storage to share larger files. Github and Data.World are good for code and data, respectively, especially when you need version control. But they're not good for very large files, documentation, articles, etc. A cloud storage option will allow you to easily share, create, and collaborate on documents with your team and help organize ideas and thoughts.
- Doing this early on can help your team stay organized and to onboard new contributors who wouldn't have access to files you all have shared over email.

Checklist for FEATURED Projects :tada:

To have your project FEATURED on Open-Austin.org, complete the following documentation. In past projects, well-documented featured projects have more contributions than other projects.

[ ] In your README, link to the Open Austin Code of Conduct or write your own code of conduct.
[ ] Create file: LICENSE to give your project an open license, allowing for sharing and remixing.
[ ] Create file: CONTRIBUTING.md so others know how they can contribute.
[ ] Create an easily shareable project management artifact, like a Civic Tech Canvas or Open Canvas
[ ] Create an issue on the open-austin.github.io repo with the title Add [my project] to projects page. An Open Austin leader will review this issue and post your project :balloon:
[ ] Tell the City of Austin. If your idea is in a shareable format and can benefit people around the city, go to that site and follow the instructions on the bottom of the page to showcase your work there.

If you get stuck at any point, feel free to reach out to the leadership team on Slack by adding @leadership to your message. We're here to help you make real changes to our city.

open-austin / project-ideas