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<h1class="display-5 text-uppercase text-center">Ledgerback Digital Commons Research Cooperative</h1>
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<pclass="lead text-center"><small> Ledgerback Digital Commons Research Cooperative (LedgerbackØDCRC) is a nonprofit cooperative association and <!--pluralist--> social innervation network for fostering collaboration between stakeholders and unifying the study of the internet and society through open science, cooperativism, systems thinking, innovation, and collective action to advance towards a global technological commonwealth </small></p>
<h2class="font-italic text-left justify-content-end display-4" id="aboutlcrc" style="color:#f37021">This Site is a Work In Progress</h2>
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<pclass="lead my-3">
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We are currently updating the website so some or all parts of the website may change in the near future.
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If you notice anything strange, please contact us at ledgerback@gmail.com.
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<divclass="container-fluid">
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</p>
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<divclass="row no-gutters" style="">
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<!-- Refer to this Q&A for finding "align-self-start" https://stackoverflow.com/questions/49984241/bootstrap-4-navbar-fixed-top-and-other-sticky-top-elements -->
<h1class="mb-4" style="color:#f37021;"> About </h1>
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<h2> Mission </h2>
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<p> Our mission is two-fold:
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<ol>
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<li> foster collaboration between stakeholders, and </li>
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<li> unify the study of the internet and society. </li>
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</ol>
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</p>
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<p> In doing so, we utilize open science, cooperativism, systems thinking, social innovation, crowdsourcing, hybrid intelligence, emerging technologies, pilot programs, toolkits, participatory models and collective action in furtherance of our activities and objectives.</p>
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<h2> Vision </h2>
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<p> Our vision is to innverate a global technological commonwealth by causing paradigm shifts through the socioal, economic, poltiical, scientific, technical and cultural spheres with sociotechnical systems that incoproate the technological design practices of: </p>
<liclass="mb-2"> modelling on natural biological ecosystems </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> redefining what is considered valuable</li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> allowing for the growth of a cooperative commons </li>
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</ul>
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<pclass="lead-3"> To better understand our vision, please read Dr. Sarah Manski's article, <ahref="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fbloc.2020.00029/full" class=""><strong> Distributed Ledger Technologies, Value Accounting, and the Self Sovereign Identity</strong></a>. </p>
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<h2> Research Themes </h2>
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<p> Our research areas are best understood by the following non-exhaustive list of themes: </p>
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<ulclass="list-bullets">
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<liclass="mb-2"> platform cooperativism </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> complex systems </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> decentralization </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> digital identity </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> data-centric technologies </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> metascience </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> digital infrastructure </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> information security and privacy </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> science, technology and society </li>
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</ul>
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<h2> Network </h2>
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<p> LedgerbackØDCRC is a nonprofit cooperative association based in the United States. Beyond this, we are a global pluralist network of groups and individuals working towards our shared vision in furtherance of our shared values, norms and principles. People who identify with the principles and inspirations of the LedgerbackØDCRC are encouraged to participate in our knowledge commons, and to add their voices to the LedgerbackØDCRC network by choosing one of the roles below. </p>
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<h5class="display-5"> Supporter </h5>
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<pclass="mb-2"> A supporter is someone who shares our work or donates to our efforts. </p>
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<h5class="display-5"> Member </h5>
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<pclass="mb-2"> A member is someone who has officially become a member of the cooperative association and actively participates in its business affairs. </p>
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<h5class="display-5"> Contributor </h5>
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<pclass="mb-2"> A contributor is someone who works on one or more of our projects. </p>
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<h5class="display-5"> Advisory Board </h5>
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<pclass="mb-2"> A non-legally binding, informal assembly that aids the members in running (e.g., advice on decision-making, strategy, research, and member-to-member affairs) the cooperative association. The role is non-intensive and punctual, including only 3 yearly online meetings with the members serving on the Core Team. </p>
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<h5class="display-5"> Core Team </h5>
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<p> Including the Board of Directors who oversee the administrative affairs and the cooperative association's infrastructure, there is also the Core Team that takes on leadership roles in each stream. </p>
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<hr>
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<h2> Name </h2>
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<pclass="my-lead-3">
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Ledgerback is a combination of "ledger" and "back." Ledger comes from the term Distributed Ledgers (which is often used interchangeably with blockchain). Back comes from the slang term "greenback."
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<br>
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<br>
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The word is meant to recognize that we are currently in a transitory period and identifying the paradigm shifts needed to move our current system to blockchain-based systems (though, this can be expanded to the global technological commonwealth).
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<br>
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<br>
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We chose "Ledgerback" based on the history of the slang term "greenback." Greenback as a term arose in the mid-1800s during the US Civil War as the US Federal Government started issuing paper money on green-colored paper (hence the name greenback). There was major uncertainty at the time over whether greenbacks would be recognized as banks as legal tender, how much one greenback equated to a piece of gold, and so on.
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<br>
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<br>
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Though this period caused some turmoil, it was a transitional period that has led to our current time where we accept paper money as money without a second thought.
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<br>
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<br>
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We believe we are going through a similar transitional period, where we are moving from paper (physical) to distributed ledgers (digital), or to ledgerbacked systems, (i.e., systems that are built on top of blockchains and are backed and secured by the blockchain's inherent properties and a society pushed by blockchain values and thinking), and even greater than that, a global technological commonwealth.</p>
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LedgerbackØDCRC is a member-owned, self-directed research and education center for fostering collaboration between stakeholders and unifying the study of the internet and society (i.e., the network society).
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<h2> Mascot </h2>
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<p> Our mascot is our super adorable and quick-witted stork you see in our logo, Scout Stork (SØS). Scout is scouting the world for fellow storks to flock with in gaining and disseminating knowledge to others by delivering ideas and causing paradigm-shifts across the land. </p><!-- need background story for scout stork or someone just to write about the Scout Stork Adventures -->
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<h2> Aspects </h2>
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<p> The LedgerbackØDCRC currently consists of three different aspects:
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<ulclass="list-bullets">
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<liclass="mb-2"> Legal: A formal cooperative association registered in the United States with 6 operational hubs dedicated to organizing, advocacy, research and the facilitation of a knowledge commons. </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">People: A community of activists, scholars, technologists, citizens, and more working at different levels of engagement; a global core team handling daily operations, organizational strategy, and long-term sustainability; and numerous supporters engaging with and contributing to our information commons, including our blog, public Wiki and Loomio groups. </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Virtual: An ecosystem producing and sharing knowledge on the digital commons, the internet and society, and the emergence of a global technological commonwealth. </li>
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</ul>
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</p>
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<h2> Social Charter </h2>
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<p> In accordance with our principles, any member, individually or as part of a collective, may create their own LedgerbackØDCRC local or regional or language-based spin-off, as long as it is in accordance with our mission, guiding principles, and our status as a nonprofit research institute.
<liclass="mb-2"> Decentralization is a spectrum, with our goal to continually decentralize our processes</li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> We are in constant development </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Transparency and Openness is the default </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Complexity, uncertainty, and ambiguity are natural occurrences </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> One-size fits all approaches are unlikely to be helpful </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> The Commons (knowledge, documentation, tools, etc.) should be freely accessible to members </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> We should strive for egalitariansim</li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Technology is a means, not necessarily an ends </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Technology and Society are not separable </li>
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<pclass="lead my-3">
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</ul>
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</div>
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We develop and provide open educational materials that provide background to our research and cover themes in the internet and society.
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<divclass="border-bottom" id="Projects">
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<h1style="color:#f37021;"> Projects </h1>
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<p> The LedgerbackØDCRC conducts various projects to aid in fostering collabroation between stakeholders and unifying the understanding of the internet and society, and how to develop new models and systems that will help move us towards a global technological commonwealth.
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</p>
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<p> Some of our current projects are: </p>
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<ulclass="list-bullets">
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<liclass="mb-2"><ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/">Bikestream</a>: an applied research project focused on how alternative data governance models and Web 3 technologies (e.g., blockchain and smart contracts) can provide user's mobility autonomy, with an emphasis on micromobility modals such as electric bicycles. </li>
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<ulclass="list-bullets"><liclass="mb-2"> Read our <ahref="https://speakerdeck.com/ledgerback/bikestream-litedeck">introductory slidedeck</a> to learn more about Bikestream </li></ul>
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<liclass="mb-2"><ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/">Alternative Governance Metrics Framework</a>: a theoretical research project focused on developing a theoretical and analytical framework for modelling and comparing digital organizations, decentralized digital organizations, and decentralized autonomous organizations based on their organization design and performance attributes to make community governance and organizational design more transparent and actionable. </li>
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<ulclass="list-bullets"><liclass="mb-2"> Read our <ahref=" https://speakerdeck.com/ledgerback/alternative-governance-metrics-framework">introductory slidedeck</a> to learn more about AGMF </li></ul>
<p> The LedgerbackØDCRC partiicpates in many activities to actualize its mission of fostering collaboration between stakeholders and unifying the study of the internet and society. </p>
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<p> Our current activities includes: </p>
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<ulclass="list-bullets">
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<liclass="mb-2">Connecting: Connecting society, policy, citizens, industry, and academia </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Outreach: Promoting work by individuals and organizations and movements going on in the network society helping advance towards a global technological commonwealth, and helping citizens get involved in transformative movements; </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Investigation: Theoretical, applied, and simulation research on how to build a human-centered paradigm for the internet and society that transitions towards a global technological commonwealth; </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Educate: Developing literacy programs and educational materials to better inform citizens, industry and academia of the issues, current practices, and solutions in the internet and society (i.e., the network society); </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Design: Identifying, developing, improving, democratizing and sharing open-source prototypes, protocols, systems, platforms, and tools;</li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Consultancy: Helping change-relevant clients to work through their problems with research commission, content marketing, connecting analysts to clients and vice versa, strategy formulation, and problem statement identification; </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Partnering: collaborating with changemakers on grassroots initiatives in virtual and/or physical communities </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Pilots: Developing pilots (i.e., prototyping) that test community-focused, cooperativism-governed, or Web3-inspired solutions. </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Resources: Publishing resources that support the advancement towards a global technological commonwealth, bring stakeholders together, and unify the study of the internet and society </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Advocacy: Supporting and promoting commons-oriented paradigms</li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Thinklusive Journal: We run and manage the Thinklusive Journal, an open access journal on the PubPub platform for scholarly works and short articles covering organization science, platform cooperativism, and their intersections with Web 3 technologies </li>
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<liclass="mb-2"> Stewardship: Stewarding the use of free and open source (FOSS) technologies, designs, and other materials; and </li>
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<liclass="mb-2">Ecosystem expansion: stewarding the use of Ledgerback trademarks and governance models in Ledgerback-affiliated organizations</li>
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</ul>
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</div>
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<pclass="lead my-3" >
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At the LedgerbackØDCRC, we seek to unify the study of the internet and society
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by bringing scholars together from a wide range of disciplines to conduct interdiscplinary research so we can understand
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how science, technology and society interact with each other.
<pclass="lead-3 text-black" style="margin-bottom:10px;"> LedgerbackØDCRC welcomes you to join our knowledge commons and map the growth of knwoldege on alternative movments and actors
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helping move towards a global technological commonwealth. </p>
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</div>
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<h2> Zotero </h2>
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<pclass="lead-3 text-black" style="margin-bottom:10px;"> Join our <ahref="https://www.zotero.org/groups/2427813/ledgerback_digital_commons_research_cooperative">Zotero group</a> and exmaine the works we are reviewing (and you can add to the group!). </p>
<pclass="lead-3 text-black" style="margin-bottom:10px;">Join our <ahref="https://hypothes.is/groups/mEZ1BXjp/ledgerbackodcrc">Hypothesis group</a> and annotate documents across the web! </p>
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We conduct various projects at the to further our understanding of the interent and society.
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<h2> Blog </h2>
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<pclass="lead-3 text-black" style="margin-bottom:10px;">Follow our <ahref="https://medium.com/@ledgerback">Medium blog</a> to stay up-to-date with our thoughts, findings, and interesting tidbits we find as we continue to study the internet and society!</p>
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For our ongoing projects, please refer to our <ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/"> resources.</a>
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<h2> Thinklusive Journal </h2>
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<pclass="lead-3 text-black" style="margin-bottom:10px;">Follow or join our <ahref="https://thinklusive.pubpub.org/">Thinklusive Journal on PubPub</a> to read about scholarly articles on platform cooperativism and organization science and their intersections with emerging technologies (implications and solutions)!</p>
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</p>
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<divclass="border-bottom" id="Membership">
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<h1style="color:#f37021;"> Membership </h1>
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<p> LedgerbackØDCRC welcomes everybody to join as a member. The community we hope to build is comprised of volunteers, thinkers, activists, radicals, researchers, educators, developers, technologists, scientists, professionals, academicians, students, learners, citizens and more. </p>
As a cooperative, members are our lifeblood and our rasion d'etre, and that our members are self-defined and self-motivated
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enough to self-manage their work and how to collaborate with each other.
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<p> We do not have any membership fees. However, members are subject to a non-refundable annual fee of $100.00 or equivalent in resources (as determined by LedgerbackØDCRC), or providing 40 hours of labor. </p>
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Apply today and work with us to develop the knowledge and skills to advance the transition towards ledgerbacked systems and thinking.
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In exchange for participating in the cooperative's core and administrative activities and work towards its mission, we offer our members governance rights, access to our private library, member-only services, and more.
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For more information, please refer to our <ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/"> resources.</a>
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<h2> Why join? </h2>
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<p> Our mission is to foster collaboration between stakeholders and unify the study of the internet and society. In doing so, we believe we can grow a more democratic world at all elvels,a healthier, freer internet, and sociotechnical systems that support, rather than harm, our society and our relaitonships. To do this we need not only funding but also volunteer effort. </p>
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<code> The key actions in furtherance of our mission are discussed in our <ahref="#">activities</a>. </code>
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<h2> How to join </h2>
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As a legal association we keep a member list as per our rules. We take privacy seriously and will not share the data you have given to us to third parties. Please see our privacy policy.
To join as a member, please fill out the <ahref="https://forms.gle/FNH4zE7xrWod7ke39" class="font-weight-bold text-monospace"><strong>membership form</strong></a> and submit it to us.
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If you need help with your research or just have an inquiry or question about the internet and society, the LedgerbackØDCRC is here for you.
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Alternatively you can also send an email to <ahref="mailto:ledgerback@gmail.com?subject=Membership">ledgerback@gmail.com</a> with the following details:
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We offer research commission, problem statement identification, and strategy services to anyone in the public who needs them.
<p> All members get one vote in our Annual General Meetings, which are held once a year. Additionally, as a self-directed cooperative, our members are at the forefront of shaping how they work and how they govern the cooperative via a proposal system. This way you get to shape the direction of our association, how funds are spent and how our work is managed. Association members are also eligible for positions on the Board of Directors and leadership positions. </p>
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For more information about our services, please refer to our <ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/"> resources.</a>
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<h3> Good feeling </h3>
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<p> Knowing that you are helping us support the activities we conduct and the services we provide in making it possible for us to help push society and the web forward. </p>
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</p>
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<h3> Member services </h3>
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<p> Access to our web infrastructure and funding (if available), and assistance with fundraising, publishing, analysis and more. For more information on our planned services, please refer to our Cottage Program. </p>
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<h3> Interesting Work </h3>
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<p> You will get the chance ot collarboatievly work on cutting edge research on the internet and society and develop insights that will influence the decisions of stakholders for years to come. </p>
<h2> Can I still help even if I do not want to be a member? </h2>
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<p> No problema! You can also support us by donating on <ahref="https://opencollective.com/ledgerbackcoop">OpenCollective</a> or <ahref="https://donorbox.org/ledgerback-digital-commons-research-cooperative-community-funding-initiative">Donorbox</a>, following us on social media, participating in one of our surveys, adding to our knowledge commons, or letting your friends know about us! </p>
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For more information, please refer to our <ahref="https://docs.ledgerback.coop/"> resources.</a>
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