Open Systems Foundation
Building open infrastructure for a thriving planet.
About | Open Source Ecology
The mission of Open Source Ecology (OSE) is to create the open source economy. An open source, libre economy is an efficient economy which increases innovation by open collaboration. To get there, OSE is currently developing a set of open source blueprints for the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS) – a set of the 50 most important machines that it takes for modern life to exist – everything from a tractor, to an oven, to a circuit maker.
A Research Lab for Open Source ✸ Software Stewardship Lab
Today, we're launching a world-class research lab dedicated to Open Source sustainability with a team of some of the most experienced people in the world.
Open Source infrastructure deserves a business model
Open Source infrastructure is essential, invisible, and chronically underfunded. A more sustainable approach may be to connect the cost of running that infrastructure to the organizations that rely on it most.
Sustainable Open Source: The Maintainers Perspective or: How I Learned to Stop Caring and Love Open Source
Urban problems: nature-based solutions and a Green New Deal everywhere
Nature-based Solutions with localised Green New Deals could save our settlements, and provide a just transition to a low-carbon society
The Missing Middle of Open Source
Why serious, maintainer-driven projects struggle to sustain themselves—and what it will take to fix it.
The Open Stack | LinkedIn
Notes from the field on sustainability, funding, and the systems we rely on
The Unsolvable Dilemma: Open Networks vs. Economic Sustainability - Nightflight
The New Geopolitics Of The Green Transition
The only path forward for tackling the climate crisis hinges on cooperative industrial strategies to coordinate clean energy investment and infrastructure development.
Introduction to Open Science
This course introduces the principles and practices of open science, with an emphasis on reproducible research workflows, transparent reporting, and collaborative scholarship. Students will critically examine reproducibility, explore tools that support openness (such as Git, GitHub, and Quarto), and apply these tools in hands-on assignments and a final open project. Students will also explore how open science practices vary across disciplines, including education, humanities, social sciences, industry and government, and STEM contexts. This course emphasizes applying open science principles to real-world data problems in alignment with the principles of producing reproducible research.
Open source is the electric vehicle of digital policy
Open source is very popular these days, not least due to the open-source strategy that the European Commission announced last week as part of the tech sovereignty package. While there is a lot to criticise about that strategy (exaggerated goals, misleading numbers etc), the one thing I would like to
Open Science Needs Open Compute
Why independent science will depend on compute, not just funding, and why providing it is the best bet we can currently make.
The Matrix of Convivial Technology – Assessing technologies for degrowth
This article introduces the notion of convivial technology as a conceptual framework for technologies suitable for degrowth societies. This paper is inspired by Ivan Illich's notion of convivial tools but reconsiders it in the light of current practices and discussions. Looking for a definition of convivial technologies it uses qualitative empirical research conducted with degrowth-oriented groups developing or adapting grassroots technologies like Open Source cargo bikes or composting toilets in Germany. The basic ethical values and design criteria that guide these different groups in relation to technology are summed up into five dimensions: relatedness, adaptability, accessibility, bio-interaction and appropriateness. These dimensions can be correlated with the four life-cycle levels material, production, use and infrastructure to form the Matrix for Convivial Technology (MCT). The MCT is a 20-field schema that can be filled in. Experiences with the tool in different fields are presented. The MCT is itself a convivial tool as it allows for degrowth-oriented groups to self-assess their work and products in a qualitative, context-sensitive and independent way. It is a normative schema that fosters discussion concerning degrowth technologies in contexts of political education. And it is a research method as it helps collecting data about underlying ethical assumptions and aspirations of individuals and groups engaged in developing technology.
Open technology projects sustaining stable climate, energy supply, biodiversity and vital natural resources