Drupal and Platform Cooperativism

Drupal is an excellent framework for building platforms. Cooperatives have business models that are suited for web building and development.

The Platform Cooperativism Movement needs tools to be successful. It is necessary to develop tools cooperatively that may be shared accross communities. The Platform Cooperative Consortium, founded and directed by Trebor Scholz, Associate Professor of Culture and Media at Eugene Lang College, received a 1 million dollar grant to start building the Platform Cooperative Toolkit in May 2018. Platform co-ops are websites or apps that are owned and democratically governed by workers and/or users. Trebor Scholz states "This Kit will make it easier to start and run platform co-ops." 

New School Announcement - http://bit.ly/2MkYd60

The funding of this Toolkit is evidence that there is agreement on a viable business model to the platform and the cooperative approach, and Drupal is a great framework suited for cooperaive development. Now is a great time to become involved in the merging of many networks to build our own foundations for communicating, marketing, research and development of our own free software tools to share with the community.

This session will cover the potential and sometimes hidden opportunities that movements offer Drupal developers.

* How to get involved  without spending a lifetime attending conferences, events and meetings.

* How to build a software platform that serves the community and where to look for allies.

* Building a small agency as a non-developer and starting it on a platform like Pantheon.

The take away will be knowledge gained in starting a small agency and working with networks, movements and organizations to create value in your community. How to recognize development needs and fill them. Where to look for projects that contribute to your community.

Reference: Ours to hack and to Own - a handbook for the movement: https://www.orbooks.com/catalog/ours-to-hack-and-to-own/