Events
As part of our research we offer our spaces for civic communities of practice to convene. Since opening in 2015 we have hosted over a thousand events, including lectures, meetups, hackathons, conferences, unconferences, workshops, roundtables, screenings, fundraisers, launches, and exhibitions.
Subscribe to our Event Calendar
If you’d like to host an event in our space, you can hire it outright, or if you’re convening a civic community of practice do get in touch ([email protected]) to see if it could fit into our programme.
What's On
Edward Saperia
Each week the college hosts a community dinner called Ration Club. It's open to anyone who'd like to find out more about the college and its work. To find out more or if you'd like to attend, please register.
Register ↗Join us for “Routes to Impact in Policy,” an event tailored for professionals exploring impactful careers in the realm of policy work, particularly those who are contemplating a career shift or entrance into policy.
Through a moderated panel discussion, this event will explore the nature of work within various policy fields such as the UK civil service, intergovernmental agencies, internal policy/governance in the private sector, policy entrepreneurship, innovation agencies, think tanks, and policy advocacy charities.
Register ↗We’re hosting a local elections’ results watch party / volunteer after party!
Join us from 8pm to watch the end of polling, and the beginning of the count & results pouring in.
Register ↗Join us for the launch of Ledgernomix, and play the game with us.
Ledgernomix is a game of political economy, played on a blockchain, with real money at stake.
Played in groups of 4 to 7 people over an hour or two, each game of Ledgernomix is governed by a blockchain contract. You can think of it as a self-contained model economy and model parliament.
After a brief introduction to the game, we’ll set you up in groups, and help you get started with Metamask browser extension on your laptop.
Each player stakes $5 (£4) in the game’s pot. At the end the money will be returned to the players in proportion to their in-game points. The primary way to get points is by successfully proposing changes to the rules.
Making the rules of this game is the game - in that sense it’s inspired by the game Nomic. Playing it feels similar to social deduction games like Mafia or Werewolf, with rounds of discussion and voting, shifting alliances, persuasive rhetoric, deception and trust.
After the funds are returned to the players, your group as a whole will be graded on more subjective criteria - what kind of system have you created?
Open to all - no prior experience of anything required, but if you want to play then a laptop is essential, and the stake is £4.
Register ↗Welcome to the 33rd Racket meet-up, and the second London Racket meet-up.
This is a chance for folks who are part of the Racket community (https://racket-lang.org/#community) to present their work in progress and chat in a relaxed atmosphere.
- 6:30-7pm arrive
- 7-8pm meetup
- 8-8:30pm pack up and close doors
If you’re new to Racket you can learn more on the Racket website.
Racket is…
- a general purpose programming language — a modern dialect of Lisp and a descendant of Scheme
- a project to explore the emerging idea of language-oriented programming - see https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3127323
- a family of programming languages — variants of Racket; student languages, Typed Racket, Lazy Racket, and more
- an implementation of the Racket Language(s) – with native code compiler,
- a set of tools—for using a family of programming languages,
- a diverse community, including professionals, researchers, students and educators using Racket in diverse ways.
Please join us at the meet-up. ALL WELCOME
Join us online at https://racket.discourse.group/ or https://discord.gg/6Zq8sH5
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab for our post-local elections hack day!
What do the results tell us? Can we make any predictions about local or regional trends? What hyperlocal tools can we build for campaigners?
Post local elections, we are creating a space for progressives and technologists to come together to analyse, share knowledge, and prepare for future campaigns. From monitoring hyperlocal news to analysing results in depth, there will be plenty of interesting challenges and problems to unpack! Whether you’re a technologist interested in how you can help the progressives win or a seasoned campaigner interested in innovation, this event offers a unique opportunity to try things out and test!
All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome! All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Election technologies have had their first big test of 2024: the local elections.
What did we learn? What do we need to build for the upcoming general election?
Lightning talks followed by an unconference.
This event is brought to you by The Election Tech Handbook, a collectively-made and maintained resource for technologists, designers and campaigners working on projects around the upcoming UK General Election 2024.
Register ↗Join us for the formal launch of ‘UK trade unions: Priorities for developing technological capability’ a new report by Andy McD. Twelves (Organise Lab & Newspeak House), supported by Hannah O’Rourke (Campaign Lab) and Dr M. ‘Six’ Silberman (Newspeak House).
This report will be presenting the conclusions drawn from the consultation of almost 100 shop stewards, health & safety representatives, and industrial representatives across a range of trade unions and sectors, about levels of digital training and ability in their unions, and day to day technological requirements.
This event will include a brief talk by the paper’s author, and a panel Q&A with other relevant stakeholders across the labour movement. (Full panel to be announced shortly.)
There will be an opportunity for networking and mingling afterwards. Refreshments will be provided.
If you would like the report delivered straight to your inbox, please sign up here: https://forms.gle/zpdHEdH142ELLrQZ7.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Event Archive
Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT, HeyGen, Midjourney, Stability Audio, CoPilot, and ComfyUI in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
The Civic AI Observatory (civicai.uk) is a new initiative from Nesta and Newspeak House to support civic organisations as they plan and adapt to the rapidly evolving field of generative artificial intelligence.
Join us for our second Civic AI Unconference on the 24th of April, hosted at Newspeak House. An unconference is a conference without predefined topics - discussions groups are formed dynamically based on interest and relevance as the event progresses.
We strongly recommend that you skim the past issues of the Civic AI newsletter to get up to speed:
Register ↗Join us for an evening of learning how to use no code app builders, like appsheet.com and sheet2site.com.
If you want to come and hang out and learn/mess around with no code app builders then this is the event for you!
There will be pizza & beverages provided.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗PaperJam Game Jam is like a book club, but instead of a book we play a videogame, and as well as discussing it, we make paper prototypes inspired by it!
This time, we’re looking at Balatro, everyone’s new favourite poker roguelite deck builder.
All are welcome, but some basic familiarity with boardgames or game design will be helpful. It generally goes like this:
- Arrive at the event having played Balatro. If you don’t find time to play, don’t let that stop you from coming.
- We discuss the game: Why is it fun? What are the systems in it and how do they work? etc
- We eat dinner together: there are a dozen places on the street that do takeaway of various cuisines.
- We try and make paper prototypes inspired by the game. A selection of materials are provided, but feel free to bring your own.
- We play and discuss each others’ prototypes.
The official bi-annual London meetup for fans of the popular blog Astral Codex Ten (formerly Slate Star Codex) by American psychiatrist Scott Alexander.
If you’re reading this, you’re invited! Please don’t feel like you “won’t be welcome” just because you’re new to the blog, demographically different from the average reader, or hate ACX and everything it stands for. You’ll be fine!
There will be light refreshments and an ongoing unconference. Please register if you plan to go, because ACX has many fans in London and we need to know how many people are coming. If it is fully booked you won’t be able to enter without a ticket.
To be notified of future meetups you should subscribe to ACX London, and also you might want to check out London Rationalish and Effective Altruism UK.
Register ↗Estonia is the poster child for the digital state - how can it be caught?
Gordon Guthrie, a Research Fellow at the Scottish Government under the First Minister’s Digital Fellowship.
For the past year he has been studying how states create digital systems with a view to Scotland entering this race.
In this event he will be outlining his findings: a mixture of law reform, changes to parliamentary processes and oversight, statutory standards bodies and changes to the organisation of the civil service that collectively knock down the barriers to taking on the Estonians.
Gordon Guthrie has been a code monkey since the 70s, ending up a Silicon Valley VP. In another world he failed to be elected to a couple of parliaments for a couple of parties and worked in public policy in London, Belfast and Scotland.
Register ↗This event takes as its premise the evident failure of our political system. We’ve inherited a medieval democracy, too inefficient and corrupt to organise our complex reality. Bound by bureaucracy, we don’t build anything, or believe anything. We squander our collective potential and look to the gutter, not the stars.
What will succeed this failed state?
In this session, we’ll pick up where we left off with the decline of religion and the rise of individualism and their impact on how society is organised.
We’ll look at how we got to where we are and discuss the relationship between economics and politics.
This time, we’ll order pizza so please bring £10, and a drink of your choice.
Register ↗Welcome to the eleventh edition of our London Future of Code meetup!
This is a chance for folks who are part of the Future of Coding community (futureofcoding.org) to present their work in progress and talk shop over a few drinks. If you’re new to the space you can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’re meeting at Newspeak House in Shoreditch. There will be beer, non-alcoholic drinks, and pizza provided. Kindly sponsored by nlux. (If you’re a company who would like to sponsor future events, please email me)
We’ll have community members give a mix of longer talks , demos, and lightning talks. If you would like to do one of these, fill in this airtable form!
Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to have a few drinks, eat pizza, ask speakers questions, and hangout. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time.
Rough schedule:
- 18:00 Arrive, get drinks, hang out
- 18:30 First round of speakers
- 19:15 Snacks & drinks break
- 20:00 Second round of speakers
- 20:30 More drinks, ask speakers questions, hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗In this second Election Tech Handbook Meetup, we’re bringing together organisations from across UK civic society and technologists.
A quick round of talks from experts will be followed by a speed-dating-type event, pairing technologists up with campaigners and organisations who need their skills.
Register ↗Qualia Research Institute is non-profit building a science of consciousness to improve lives of sentient beings.
Come if you are interesting in understanding consciousness, meditation, spirituality, psychedelics, neuroscience, neurotechnology, spirituality, the nature of pleasure and pain.
This meetup will have Ethan Kuntz, QRI’s visiting scholar, as our guest start. At QRI Ethan worked on visualizing tactile sensations and mettanealing — a meditation technique that combines Neural Field Annealing principles with metta (loving-kindness) meditation.
At the meetup Ethan will give a 20-minute talk “The thermodynamics of consciousness”. Then we’ll have a Q&A with him on the topic of the talk, his work with QRI in general, as well as any other relevant topics.
We’ll have soft drinks and snacks. We’ll also have food upstairs on the floor above for our regular community dinner Ration Club — feel free to move between these events at any time.
- 7:00 PM: Doors open. Socializing.
- 7:30 PM: Ethan gives a talk “The thermodynamics of consciousness”, Q&A and discussion with Ethan on stage
- 8:45 PM: Socializing, more informal Q&A with Ethan
- 11:30 PM: Ends
Potential topics for discussion:
- Psychedelics. What do exotic states of consciousness can tell us about it? From models of how they work (e. g. QRI’s neural annealing) to writing rigorous trip reports to personal experiences.
- Meditation. Why does it work? What does it say about the consciousness? What does Buddhism get right?
- AI consciousness and sentience. The binding (boundary) problem.
- Valence. The nature of pleasure and pain. Why do some experiences feel better than others? Symmetry Theory of Valence.
- Logarithmic scales of pleasure and pain. How much worse are the worst experiences? How much better are the best experiences?
- Formal theories of consciousness. How do we create one? What do we want from a theory of consciousness? Is integrated information theory a pseudoscience?
- Whatever you come up with!
Part of the Network Development Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
This session is an opportunity to develop your network development and field building practice.
James will share some thoughts on Network Weaving as a core network development practice.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Take a break from re-imagining the future and let someone else do the imagining for a while at this book club for philosophical science fiction.
Our first reading will be “Five Ways to Forgiveness” by Ursula K. Leguin, a book of 5 short stories.
Join the WhatsApp group to vote on books/dates for future meetings and generally stay up-to-date: https://chat.whatsapp.com/JnVUxsRGKYr3ItbXndvBJx
Register ↗This month we will be holding lightning talks. It will be a great opportunity to learn about a broad range of topics related to Effective Altruism and technology, get to better understand what other members of the group are thinking about and working on, and hopefully be entertained while we’re at it. There will be the usual community updates, drinks, vegan pizza and exquisite company that you’ve come to expect from these events.
We would encourage anyone who is interested to sign up to give a lightning talk - these should have some connection to Effective Altruism, technology, and ideally both, but other than that you can talk about whatever you’d like (as an example, Jonny’s talk is called what I learned from applying to 100 programming jobs). The sign up form is here: https://forms.gle/PRj5HNUoka4aZ7iCA
You’re more than welcome to sign up now and decide on a topic later, and we’d encourage you to have a low bar for signing up - if you’re on the fence then feel free to email me at spicerjonny at gmail dot com and I’ll happily talk to you about it.
As always we’re looking forward to seeing some of you there!
Register ↗Spend a day working alongside other organisations working on UK democratic reform
Since March 2022 we’ve organised democracy co-working days to help bring together individuals and organisations within the UK democracy space - with more than 50 organisations joining us across our previous events, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour and so many more!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a coworking day on the 27th March.
Feel free to drop in at any part of the coworking day, for all of it or just part of it - the more the merrier. We’ll be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected]
Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
Register ↗Join us for a moderated panel event where we explore how existing AI technology is being leveraged for social good while ensuring ethical and safe practices.
- Amber Shafi, Senior Product Manager at Isomorphic Labs - redefining drug discovery using AI.
- Stuart Jennings, Lead Data Scientist at the BBC - using data and machine learning to improve the experience of the audience, journalists and editors.
- Britta Srivas, Senior Customer Solutions Engineer at Apheris - enabling safe computational data access for ML
In our discussion with panelists, we’ll explore the ethical considerations, success stories, challenges, and future prospects of AI aimed at making a positive difference in the world.
- 19:00: Arrival, welcome and introduction
- 19:15: Panel discussion
- 19:45: Q&A
- 20:15: Fireside chats, networking and unstructured mingling
About Effective Altruism UK: Effective Altruism UK is a network of people who are willing to help one another and collectively work towards a better world. We envision a world where we use evidence and reasoning to do more good with our resources.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗The third session of the Game Design module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House.
The events at the session will be:
1) Play / Discuss: Minecraft
2) Lecture: Engagement (slides)
3) Game Jam (inspired by Minecraft)
Recommended reading:
Bring a laptop
Register ↗New AI technologies are already affecting elections worldwide. From deep fakes to automated individual targeting, how might AI shape what is possible in campaigning?
What tools might campaigners need ahead of the next election? What potential use cases are there for this technology? How can we guard against its potentially more problematic consequences?
As progressive technologists, we’ve seen how AI is starting to influence elections across the world, from Imran Khan campaigning from jail in Pakistan to Republican AI generated campaign ads in America, progressives need to get tooled up!
From deep fakes to deep learning, we’ll have a massive variety of challenges ready to be solved! Join us at the AI and Campaigning Hack Day, where we’ll explore AI’s potential to transform progressive campaigns!
Collaborate with experts, enthusiasts, and campaigners to explore what kind of tools and tech we can create using this technology. Whether you’re a technologist interested in AI or a seasoned campaigner, this event offers a unique opportunity to learn and innovate.
- 10:00 People arrive, breakfast 🥐🌞
- 10:15 Welcome & going through the projects and inviting pitches from people in the room 👋
- 10:30 Team forming & making plans 🤝
- 10:45 Get hacking! 💻✊
- 13:00 Lunch 🍲🥖
- 14:00 Back at the hacking! 💻😅
- 15:30 Check Ins! ✅
- 18:30 Presentations 🥁
- 19:30 Fish & Chips & Drinks 🍹🍺
- 22:00 CLOSE 👋
All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗This event takes as its premise the evident failure of our political system. We’ve inherited a medieval democracy, too inefficient and corrupt to organise our complex reality. Bound by bureaucracy, we don’t build anything, or believe anything. We squander our collective potential and look to the gutter, not the stars.
What will succeed this failed state?
Moderated by Jon Nash, Fellow at Demos, guest speakers will attempt to answer this question and offer us a glimpse of what comes next.
The full list of speakers will be announced closer to the time.
Register ↗Figma is the all-in-one digital design platform. I’ve used it for making:
UI designs • Wireframes • Powerpoints • Animations • Flow charts • Book layouts • Websites • Apps • CV’s • Floor plans • Furniture design • Clothing drafts • UX testing • Posters • Photo edits
In short, it’s an extremely powerful, free, online platform for collaborative design, and I will show you the ins and outs.
Come with an idea of something you’d like to make, and I can show you how. Bring a laptop.
Sam Ballard is lecturer in game design at Newspeak House, and also the artist in residence. Sam has been designing digital experiences for over a decade, with an emphasis on user orientated design thinking methodologies to solve both creative challenges & system design. He is currently a designer at ZA/UM, the studio behind Disco Elysium.
Register ↗Calling all biosecurity professionals, researchers, policymakers, and enthusiasts to join us for an informal meetup focused on pandemic preparedness and reducing catastrophic biological risks.
Whether you’re looking to catch up with old acquaintances or meet new faces, to discuss work or topics beyond it, this event will be an opportunity to build relationships, share knowledge, and stay connected and informed within the biosecurity community.
Register ↗Lots of us have been frustrated with social media - for example because a platform we use has changed and is less useful to us, or we’ve gotten addicted to a behaviour which isn’t healthy for us.
This is the inaugural meeting of a club for sharing practical techniques to bend social media to our will - adapt, filter, alter how we use them. Proactively build the communities we want and need.
This evening:
- Introductory short talk, including tips on YouTube, Twitter, browser plugins (Francis Irving)
- Breaking into groups to share tips with each other
- Reporting back and writing those up collectively
The whole thing should take about an hour, meaning you can go for food afterwards at Ration Club, upstairs at Newspeak House, or go home as you like! There will be soft drinks provided.
Join the Discord for Mindful Media Club even if you can’t come to the meeting!
Register ↗There’s been a lot of discussion about democratic AI recently, from many quarters (some of it more grounded than others). At The Collective Intelligence Project (CIP), we’re big believers in a democratic vision for AI. We’re also big believers in thinking through how we can take concrete steps now to push towards a more democratic AI ecosystem at every level: model training, evaluation, the data supply chain, corporate governance, government investment, and beyond.
To bridge the gap between a truly democratic future for Artificial Intelligence and the many steps we need to get there, we’re releasing a living roadmap for ’Democratic AI in 2024’ as a tool to help focus and target this work.
To dive deeper into this work, we’re running an event in London to bring together members of the ecosystem and discuss the question: “How do build a democratic AI ecosystem?”
This event will feature a set of lightning talks from AI researchers, policymakers, and developers (7-8pm), followed by drinks (8-9:30pm). We want to create a space to practically discuss what we can all do this year to make more democratic AI happen. We also wanted an excuse to bring our favourite people together in London before CIP moves its base to San Francisco for a while. Please come!
Register ↗So much of working well in organisations involves understanding the culture well. So lets learn how to do that together :)
And what better way to learn than a lovely book club?
We will be discussing ‘Business Anthropology’ by Ann T. Jordan (£11 on Kindle): a not-too-long introduction to the topic.
Do read the book in advance and bring takes on how it might be applied to organisations you know, love and/or work in!
Register ↗Are you interested in making a positive impact in the world? Do you believe that finance can be a powerful tool for good? Join us for an evening with speakers who are working in development finance, impact investing, and earning to give through quantitative trading.
- Mia Sannapureddy, Impact Investment Banking at Palladium - advising impact funds and businesses, focus on early-stage companies in emerging economies
- Theo Caplan, Quantitative Trader at DV Trading LLC
- Celine Mano, Analyst at European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) - focusing on sustainable infrastructure investments in Eastern Europe and North Africa
This event is for anyone who is interested in the role of finance in driving social change and are considering a career in this field.
- 19:00: Arrival, welcome and introduction
- 19:15: Speaker talks
- 19:45: Q&A
- 20:15: Fireside chats, networking and unstructured mingling
As the final talks of ETHGlobal conclude, the journey doesn’t end. As we plan the future of blockchain, we have much to celebrate and much to plan.
Register ↗An action-oriented unconference that gathers a diverse community of practitioners in urban planning, legal innovation, industry, community, and political economy.
FUTURE STATE is committed to exploring the cutting edge of movements that seek to activate diasporas, create new cities, SEZs, and redefine land ownership through innovative governance and legal frameworks. It’s an opportunity to connect with those who share your vision and are ready to bring that vision into reality.
6:00 PM: Networking and Interest Groups: Upon arrival, you’ll receive a flyer guiding you to discussions on specially curated topics for immediate, meaningful connections
6:30 PM: Expert Talks: A series of enlightening presentations from thought leaders will delve into significant areas:
- Welcome and Introduction to Future State - Unveiling the foundational ideas behind Network States
- Belarus Network State by Ray Svitla - Detailing efforts to create a SEZ for the Belarusian diaspora
- New City Development with Hong Kong Diaspora Experience by Clement Ngu - Sharing insights on new urban areas for the Hong Kong diaspora
- A Sanctuary Nation is a Network Nation - Liam and David presents the AstralShip’s vision for the Welsh Government’s Strategic Plan.
- Fairehold and new forms of Land Ownership - David and Alastair (Open System Labs)
- Emergency State Infrastructure - Sepp and David (Odyssean Institute) describe a human centered approach to the development of a digital emergency infrastructure for failed states
- Rebuild Ukraine - Exploring the unique contributions and journey of the Ukraine diaspora
8:00 PM: Topic Discussions and Event Reflection: The event concludes with in-depth discussions on the presented themes, followed by a reflective session that highlights the insights and connections developed throughout the event.
Register ↗It’s (probably) an election year!
Last time we had a general election in the UK, GPT-2 had only just been fully launched. So much has happened since! This is set to be the most technologically complex election ever and the Election Tech Meetup will help us all keep track of it.
Come along if you’re interested in working on technology for the upcoming election, and to hear about key election tech projects people have planned for ge2024. Network 🕸️, find volunteers for your project 🧑💻, find a project to get stuck into 💡, or simply find out what’s going on in the election technology space!
There will be lightning talks will be followed by an unconference. Speakers to be announced soon! If you want to present your project, email [email protected] (you can present remotely if necessary).
PS you won’t regret bringing your laptop 💻
Brought to you by and the Election Tech Handbook, Newspeak House, and The Civic AI Observatory:
The Election Tech Handbook is a collectively-made and maintained resource for technologists, designers and campaigners working on projects around the upcoming UK General Election 2024: electiontechhandbook2024.substack.com
Newspeak House, The London College of Political Technology, is an independent residential college founded in 2015 to study, nurture and inspire emerging communities of practice across civil society and the public sector in the UK: newspeak.house
The Civic AI Observatory is a new initiative from Nesta and Newspeak House to support civic organisations as they plan and adapt to the rapidly evolving field of generative artificial intelligence: civicai.uk
Register ↗How do you want the UK to change in the next 25 years thanks to AI? Join us for a deep dive workshop where you’ll get a chance to learn more about AI and develop your vision for the future.
Why Your Vision Matters
If you are like most people, you probably don’t think of yourself as a “visionary.” These days conversations about the future are too often dominated by wealthy tech billionaires. The rest of us are never asked what kind of changes we actually want to see—if we are asked anything at all!
We are hosting this workshop because we believe you shouldn’t have to be an AI expert to have a vision about the future.
- 6:30pm: Food is served
- 7:00pm: Expert speakers will introduce you to AI and its potential impact on society and answer any of your questions
- 7:30pm: Break into small groups where a facilitator will help you develop your vision
- 9:00pm: Come together as a group to share visions and discover common ground
About the Public AI Network: the Public AI Network is a collaborative effort between academics, public servants, and technologists working to bring about AI systems that are publicly-funded and act in the public interest. We believe that AI systems are vital pieces of public infrastructure - and should be seen as a way to empower the public with the capabilities they need to shape the futures they want.
Register ↗What: Lightning talks celebrating the winners and other selected favourite entries to the TxP Progress Prize.
Times:
- 18:00 Doors
- 18:30 Lightning talks + Q&A
- 19:30 Drinks
- 20:30 Finish
Who: Start-up founders, political advisers, VCs, policymakers, software engineers, designers, data scientists, and anyone who cares about technology, public impact, and the future.
What to expect: Friendly folk and drinks (inc. non-alc) provided free.
Waitlist: The first 50% of tickets are open to anyone, but after that we’ll do a lottery. This is due to limited venue capacity and the need to make sure TxP remains representative of different sectors, backgrounds and interests.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided, all you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session (this event)
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
A monthly London-based meetup for members of the rationalist diaspora. The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
Our reading list for this time is:
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have articles you want to suggest for future readings, you can do that at https://redd.it/v3646u.
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session (this event)
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT, HeyGen, Midjourney, Stability Audio, CoPilot, and ComfyUI in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
Join us for an evening of semi-organised discussion around the present and future of AI in Government, hosted by Evidence House, the No10 Data Science team, the Civic AI Observatory, and the Incubator for AI.
Open to existing civil servants and anyone with an interest in AI for good in government and beyond, we’ll look at recent example of how government has made use of AI, through the Evidence House community and beyond.
Then, in a semi-facilitated “unconference”, we’ll think about the future, and where government AI goes from here!
To ensure a broad mix of participants and facilitate meaningful discussion, we’ll confirm your place in the run-up to the event - especially if you’re from outside government, make sure to tell us your affiliation and why you care about government AI for good when you sign-up! If you’re not sure, reach out to the organisers.
About the Incubator for AI: The Government is establishing an elite team of highly empowered technical experts at the heart of government. Their mission is to help departments harness the potential of AI to improve lives and the delivery of public services.
About the Civic AI Observatory: The Civic AI Observatory is an initiative by Nesta and Newspeak House to support civic organisations’ plans and adapt to the rapidly evolving field of Generative AI. We focus on immediate practical insights on AI for digital leads – case studies of civic applications, examples of digital strategies and organisational policies, and the impact on the job market – as well as developing communities of practice for specific domains.
About Evidence House: Evidence House is a Downing Street-led initiative, working with collaborators including ONS Data Science Campus, Evaluation Task Force, and National Situation Centre. It aims up-skill civil servants in technical skills whilst spinning out innovative solutions to government priority issues.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session (this event)
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
The first session of the Decision-making module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House.
There is no such thing as an independent individual: everything you do and know and think is shaped by other people.
This session will provide a broad overview of all the topics covered in the module. The module will develop a sociophysics-based framework for understanding and engineering decision-making in teams, organizations, and networks. A core component of this module will be experiential learning activities that engage you directly in real and simulated decisions. Each activity will be linked to a formal computational model of decision-making that explains macro-level outcomes as a result of individual agent behavior. This module will present a practical survey of the emerging field of collective intelligence with a focus on technology-enabled solutions for optimizing decisions.
Register ↗This time we’re doing the event in a public event space in Shoreditch. Drop in and out anytime at a vetted meetup for Intelligent Crazy People bringing some of London’s most thoughtful, open, curious people together from a variety of fields. Can’t wait to connect with all you crazy elephants 🐘
What’s Intelligent Crazy People?
icp.community or “Intelligent Crazy People” is a vetted volunteer run community of 2,500 members out of 30,000 applicants bridging misfits, the under-appreciated and headline awesomes like founders and former CEOs of great companies (Midjourney, Skype, Scale AI, Reddit, OnDeck, eToro), creators, artists, musicians, scientists. We host modern day salons fostering a serendipitous learning environment where you “meet people who surprise you” across homes and nature around San Francisco, New York, London, Oxford and Cambridge, Cambridge MA and other cities. Apply to join at linktr.ee/joinicp.
Help us spread the word 🗣️
Share and ask to join the event’s Whatsapp https://chat.whatsapp.com/CTkYSH2HEvnCYrZeJc0g1p and share our Luma lu.ma/r7bvg3we.
Since we’re curated here’s how to come or bring friends
Anyone accepted on the Whatsapp or Luma can come and bring a +1 but of course a +1 can’t bring a +1! +1’s need to register on Luma and join the Whatsapp so they’re on the list. Want to bring more? DM Joshua, the Whatsapp admin.
- 6:00 - 6:30pm: Get to know eachother.
- 6:30 - 7:00pm: Selected ICP members do lightning talks or lightning asks. Tell everyone what you care about, a brag, an offer and an ask whether it’s to fund projects, raise money, hire, get customers, find research buddies or learn or teach a new hobby. Possibilities are endless.
- 7:00 - 9:00pm: Discussion tables, AMA tables or social. 4 30 minute sessions across ~2-3 tables. Reserve a table host or attend a discussion on any theme or an AMA. Don’t want to participate in discussions or AMAs? There’s an ongoing social too. Every 30 minutes, a maximum of 2 selected members can pop up and give out a 1 minute ask.
- 9:00 - 11:00pm: Get to know each other some more.
Please join us for an evening of celebration and inspiration at the Campaign Lab Showcase! Our Campaign Labbers have been working on some brilliant projects this year, and we are excited to showcase their impressive achievements in a special event hosted by Newspeak House. Come along for an evening of fun, networking and a chance to learn more about the exciting projects our talented volunteers have been working on. Drinks and nibbles provided! We hope to see you there!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Professor Jeremias Adams-Prassl researches the legal regulation of work and technology in the European Union and beyond. He works with a team of lawyers and computer scientists, focusing on algorithmic management: the ever-increasing digital surveillance and control of workers across the socio-economic spectrum, from the gig economy to professional service firms.
A guest of Newspeak House, he offers a session to discuss the joys and challenges of translating academic research into action - whether through civil society, courts, or legislative processes.
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session (this event)
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
In the modern age, every election is shaped by the technology used 🖥️. Whether you’re a technologist interested in politics or a seasoned campaigner, this event offers a unique opportunity to build the tools that progressive candidates and causes need to make change 🪧🔨
- 10:00 People arrive, breakfast 🥐🌞
- 10:15 Welcome & going through the projects and inviting pitches from people in the room 👋
- 10:30 Team forming & making plans 🤝
- 10:45 Get hacking! 💻✊
- 13:00 Lunch 🍲🥖
- 14:00 Back at the hacking! 💻😅
- 15:30 Check Ins! ✅
- 18:30 Presentations 🥁
- 19:30 Fish & Chips & Drinks 🍹🍺
- 22:00 CLOSE 👋
All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Qualia Research Institute is non-profit building a science of consciousness to improve lives of sentient beings.
The Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium studies emergent phenomena — phenomena that many might call “spiritual”, “mystical”, “energetic”, etc. EPRC refers to practices designed to lead to emergent phenomena, such as meditation, psychedelics, yoga, prayer, etc., as emergent practices.
Dr Daniel M. Ingram is the author of “Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha” and the Acting CEO and Board Chair of Emergence Benefactors a non-profit organization designed to support EPRC. He is coming to London and will attend the meetup during which he will also give a talk “Ethically Scaling Global Emergence”. To learn more about Dr. Ingram, visit: https://linktr.ee/danielmingram
Come if you are interesting in understanding consciousness, meditation, spirituality, psychedelics, neuroscience, neurotechnology.
Dr Ingram is careful about COVID-19. We ask you not to come if you have symptoms of cold, a recent COVID-19 or a reasonable probability of having COVID-19 (e.g. someone you live with had it recently).
The main format is unconference — a participant-driven conference. This is the same format as the previous meetup: the agenda is created by the attendees at the beginning of the meeting. Anyone who wants to initiate a discussion on a topic can claim a time and a space. Feel free to think in advance what kind of sessions or workshops you’d like to run and prepare for them.
That said, you can also simply come and hang out with people — unconference is there to give some structure and help people find interesting discussions.
- 6:00 PM: The meetup starts. Socializing
- 6:30 PM: Daniel Ingram’s talk “Ethically Scaling Global Emergence”
- 7:30 PM: Talk ends, unstructured socializing
- 8:00 PM until 11:30 PM: Unconference
Do you care about election integrity, maintaining trust in institutions and reducing polarisation? Disinformation is becoming increasingly effective and widespread in an AI age.
Say No to Disinfo are co-creating the first open source holistic evidence base of empirical counter disinformation experiments, designed to empower effective response.
Learn what they’ve discovered so far, and how you can help join the effort in making countering disinformation as easy as creating it
Register ↗This meetup we are not having a Valentine’s day theme (sorry) but something even better: special guests from Charity Entrepreneurship will be sharing their experiences and insights of leveraging tech for high impact charities.
Charity Entrepreneurship is a research and training programme that identifies the most effective charity ideas, recruits aspiring entrepreneurs and, through a two-month Incubation Program, provides them with the training and funding to turn these ideas into high-impact organizations.
We will hear from the founders of several charities that came out of Charity Entrepreneurship on how they leverage tech and what they’ve learnt along the way.
Justin Graham runs the Taimaka Project, a non-profit innovation accelerator dedicated to identifying and scaling improved approaches to malnutrition treatment. As part of its work, Taimaka runs a malnutrition treatment program in northeastern Nigeria providing life-saving care to thousands of under-five children annually. Justin will be talking about the unique tools Taimaka has built to digitize case management in its treatment program, helping healthcare providers and managers make better clinical decisions and making it far easier for Taimaka to gather data on new treatment techniques as it pilots them.
Marshall Thomas leads HealthLearn, a nonprofit that’s on a mission to improve quality of care and save lives with simple, engaging, case-based online training for health workers. HealthLearn currently focuses on primary care-based staff in Nigeria and will soon release courses on newborn care, pandemic preparedness, and hypertension control. Marshall will talk about HealthLearn’s custom learning platform that’s tailored to health workers’ technology and learning needs, and he’ll describe upcoming milestones in HealthLearn’s work on product, impact evaluation, and business development.
Rachel Abbott is the founder of Kaya Guides, a tech-enabled global mental health charity incubated by Charity Entrepreneurship. Kaya operates a self-help program on WhatsApp to reduce depression at scale among youth in LMICs, beginning in India. In Kaya Guides’s 5-8 week program, a WhatsApp chatbot delivers videos in Hindi that teach participants evidence-based techniques to reduce depression and participants have 15-minute weekly calls with a trained supporter. This format is proven to have the same effects as face-to-face psychotherapy at reducing depression. In her talk, Rachel will discuss the organization’s work to date, scaling plans, the technology the organization is currently using and how their use of tech is likely to evolve, and how EA folks can get involved in Kaya’s work.
Doors from 7pm, vegan pizza and talks plus q&a from 8pm.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session (this event)
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
In this episode, we’ll explore how Government works, how it gets in the way, and how to help change Government for the better.
Talks:
- Joe Hill - Venture statecraft, and theories of power
- Tom Rumbelow - How policymakers balance emerging technologies, geopolitics, market economics, and national security in developing an approach to national digital infrastructure
- Dr Lawrence Newport - Why certain things don’t get done, and how to make sure your thing does
- Fabian Chessell - Getting stuff done in Whitehall, an outsider’s insider view
- Joseph Hollingworth - The Government isn’t Tracking You: UCDS MoU - a case study in how the UK government doesn’t share data
- Joshua Bellingham - Why it’s difficult to get things done in government, even when No.10 is behind your project
- Steven Barrett - Bad Law: Broken State - how the law itself is now a problem
- 🤫 More speakers announced soon
It’s you or never…
You’re probably looking around and despairing. Technological progress has stalled, the world is at war, people hate one another, culture is deteriorating, and people seem obsessed with finding ways to believe things that are very clearly not true.
The bad news is: You’re not imagining it. Something has gone terribly wrong in our civilization.
The good news is: You get to be the hero who saves the world.
There is no longer time to look at the status quo and expect someone else to change it. Those other people have retired, gone golfing, or died. Those people failed to make our civilization better, and worse yet - failed to prepare us to fix what’s broken.
You and I - we - are the last chance for western civilisation to get back on track. If not us, who?
The people stopping us from building houses? Nope.
The people trying to shut down Nuclear Reactors? Nope.
The people striking at the thought of automating trains? Nope.
We can have flying cars, colonies on Mars, personalised medicine. All in our lifetimes. But we have to be the ones that make it happen. No one else will do this for us.
We have a choice:
- Work hard and build the tech that will fuel the next 500 years of progress and wonder
- Live off the decaying infrastructure and nice wine made by our grandparents
Will you be a child of the future, or an orphan of the past?
Register ↗What?
We will be trying to implement some ideas from the blog post on Feedbackloop-first Rationality. We will alternate between trying ‘Thinking Physics’ problems and reflecting on the efficacy of the cognition used.
Testing specific ‘cognitive techniques’ on the ‘Thinking Physics’ problems is encouraged, and information on some will be provided. Feel free to find / design your own to test too. (Some examples at the bottom).
When?
This will go from 3pm - 5pm. But you can show up from 2pm, and stay later to chat.
Who?
This event is for anyone interested in improving their rationality, no matter your current level. Having an understanding of some of the core ideas of (applied) rationality will help you get more out of the event.
Reading list:
Some examples of cognitive techniques:
Register ↗3 women and 3 men from rationalist, postrationalist, effective altruist and other communities come to maybe find love on the stage of Newspeak House. Love, sincerity, entertaining stories, possibly unhinged prediction markets dynamics.
The hosts of the show, Sasha Putilin and Rachel Clifton, ask participants questions and help them put themselves out there and show their personality to each other and to the audience.
Can you predict who would like who? Throughout the show the audience bets on pairs of participants chances of going on a date together. At the end of the show participants privately input who they’d like to go on date with — and if there is a mutual match we announce it. The mechanics of matching are similar to speed dating or Tinder.
The event organised in support of Manifold Markets’ new dating website manifold.love where people bet on outcomes of other people’s relationships as well as match people together. Consider signing up on manifold.love!
If you are interested in being a participant on the show, please fill in this form.
- 7:00 PM: doors open, setting up manifold.love accounts
- 7:30 PM: the actual show (runs for 70 minutes)
- 8:45 PM till late: socialising and discussion
The third session of the Political Organising Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
Join us for a two hour workshop to learn how to use technology in influencing and campaigns. Students will be using the map developed in the first session to plan their own campaigns, learn the basics of campaign tactics and planning and identify how technology may be used.
Register ↗Join us for the formal launch of ‘Analysing UK Political TikTok’, a new report from Rootcause and Campaign Lab. In this session the report’s authors will discuss their in-depth analysis of over 60,000 TikTok videos to reveal how the platform is reshaping UK political discourse.
Using innovative collection and classification methods enabled by new AI technology, this report delves into what political content works best, exploring not only hot topics but also the key active messengers and the impact of different styles of videos.
This event is an invaluable opportunity for professionals in political strategy, digital media, content creation, and academia to gain a comprehensive understanding of TikTok’s unique and powerful role in the digital political landscape.
Register ↗Join us for an evening of talks on the reception of historical civic structures, with a particular focus on political structures.
The aim of the event is to enrich your understanding of why political features of western society are the way they are, and to see if we can predict where we could be going in the future. There will be free drinks throughout, and networking afterwards.
Georgia Iacovou’s talk will be titled: ’Digital town squares’ do not exist, please stop it - a history of online social spaces.
Laurie Penny’s talk will be titled: Poison is Queen: Sex and the State.
Dr Joshua Brendan’s talk will be titled: Was the Roman Republic a Neo-Liberal’s Wet Dream?
Andy Twelves’s talk will be titled: The Catonian Tradition: Is it alive and well in 21st Century Politics?
Register ↗Greetings everyone!
This year we will try something new at Open Source Club. We will meet every week for 6 weeks with the purpose of improving our software making and coding skills. We will have 2 social sessions and 4 work sessions.
- Monday Feb 5, 2024: [a] Introduction — Work session (this event)
- Monday Feb 12, 2024: [b] Work session
- Monday Feb 19, 2024: [c] On open source governance — Social session
- Monday Feb 26, 2024: [d] Work session
- Monday Mar 4, 2024: [e] Work session
- Monday Mar 11, 2024: [f] Demos and presentations — Social session
This event series is also part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology.
Inspiration: https://austinhenley.com/blog/challengingprojects.html
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- Feel free to bring snacks and drinks to share!
- If anyone is interested in ordering + setting up pizza let me know.
- We figure things as we go — we don’t have all the answers and we don’t expect anyone to do :)
Thanks for your interest in Just Stop Oil!
We’re back! We will be in action this year to demand an end to new fossil fuel projects in the UK. We’ve achieved so much but we’re not done yet and we need you! So if you want to take action with us to demand a liveable future come along and get trained up…
This training will prepare you for what you might experience if you decide to take action with us.
You’ll learn what nonviolence is and why it’s so powerful. You’ll get to connect with like minded people who share your hopes and fears. You’ll learn techniques to remain calm and grounded when things are tense and practice the skills to de-escalate the situation when someone is getting angry. You’ll also have a chance to put it into practice by role playing some typical scenarios that come up when we take action.
Our training is specifically tailored to Just Stop Oil’s tactics and civil resistance community so even if you’ve had previous similar training it is still essential you attend ours for your own safety as well as that of your team and members of the public.
We are keen to break down barriers to attending training where we can. If we can help with any of the following please let us know by emailing [email protected]:
- Help with travel costs
- Help with childcare
- Help with accessibility or inclusion (please provide details)
BEFORE THE SESSION
Here are some useful videos about nonviolence and deescalation. The training will build on these videos so it would be great if you can watch them in advance.
Lunch will be provided.
We will be starting on time, so please do arrive promptly!
Thank you so much for not being a bystander.
With gratitude,
Just Stop Oil
Register ↗Join us for our February Giving What We Can London event. The theme is Earning to Give and Going Beyond 10%. We will have a brief talk by Alex Gordon-Brown who recently wrote 10 years of Earning to Give.
We will open doors from 2:15pm. At 3pm we will have the 10min talk with Q&A and a little poll. Free form discussion from 3:30pm. Show up whenever suits you best.
Everybody is welcome, whether you have pledged or not, already donated a lot or are merely considering donating.
Register ↗Welcome to the tenth edition of our London Future of Code meetup!
Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give a mix of longer talks (~20 min), demos, and lightning talks. If you would like to demo, fill in this airtable form! Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to eat snacks, have a few drinks, ask speakers questions, and hangout. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time. We have some sponsors to help cover the cost of drinks and food, but we are mostly community funded. Please consider donating £5-10 (or more!) to our open collective fund.
Rough schedule:
- 18:00 Arrive, get drinks, hang out
- 18:30 First round of speakers
- 19:15 Snacks & drinks break
- 20:00 Second round of speakers
- 20:30 More drinks, ask speakers questions, hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗The first session of the Network Development Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
In this first workshop of the module, we’ll run through why network mapping is an important and useful activity for developing communities, campaigns and networks.
By the end of the session you’ll have everything you need to begin the first stage of developing your own network map.
Register ↗The second in a series of meetups designed for individuals on the centre-right working in UK politics who are interested in existential risk.
Dr Keith Dear, a former No. 10 special adviser on the Integrated Review and science/technology policy, will deliver a brief speech on autonomous weapons systems.
Register ↗As the next election approaches this year it’s time to start organising! Join us for a day of hacking to help build tools and technology to help progressive campaigns beat the Tories.
From creating canvassing tools to designing infrastructure to base our campaigns around, this hack day will be a space for experts, enthusiasts, and campaigners to come together to brainstorm on what’s needed to outmanoeuvre the Tories in the upcoming election.
Whether you’re a technologist interested in politics or a seasoned campaigner, this event offers a unique opportunity to take part in planning for the next election.
- 10:00 People arrive, breakfast 🥐🌞
- 10:15 Welcome & going through the projects and inviting pitches from people in the room 👋
- 10:30 Team forming & making plans 🤝
- 10:45 Get hacking! 💻✊
- 13:00 Lunch 🍲🥖
- 14:00 Back at the hacking! 💻😅
- 15:30 Check Ins! ✅
- 18:30 Presentations 🥁
- 19:30 Fish & Chips & Drinks 🍹🍺
- 22:00 CLOSE 👋
All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗The second session of the Political Organising Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
Join us for the next Political Organising Seminar, where we’ll be delving into the intrinsic nature of conflict within the realm of politics. Drawing on the notion that “politics is the reconciliation of paradox,” we explore the practical ways political groups navigate conflict. We will examine the theory that conflicts are not just unavoidable but also essential to the evolution of political systems and governance structures.
During the session various approaches to resolving political conflicts will be presented, participants will be encouraged to discuss tactics with their respective advantages, drawbacks, and moral implications, as well as any potential role of technology within them. Participants will gain a deeper understanding of the role of conflict in politics, learn practical approaches to managing disagreements, and develop a nuanced perspective on the ethical implications of various conflict resolution tactics.
Register ↗A monthly London-based meetup for members of the rationalist diaspora. The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
Our reading list for this time is:
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have articles you want to suggest for future readings, you can do that at https://redd.it/v3646u.
Register ↗The second session of the Mechanism Design module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
In this seminar, we will recap our definitions from last time [incentive compatibility, stable matchings etc], and cover two new themes:
- Auctions and their various types
- Voting Systems
Join us for an evening of semi-organised discussion around the present and future of AI in Government, hosted by Evidence House, the No10 Data Science team, the Civic AI Observatory, and the Incubator for AI.
Open to existing civil servants and anyone with an interest in AI for good in government and beyond, we’ll look at recent example of how government has made use of AI, through the Evidence House community and beyond.
Then, in a semi-facilitated “unconference”, we’ll think about the future, and where government AI goes from here!
To ensure a broad mix of participants and facilitate meaningful discussion, we’ll confirm your place in the run-up to the event - especially if you’re from outside government, make sure to tell us your affiliation and why you care about government AI for good when you sign-up! If you’re not sure, reach out to the organisers.
About the Incubator for AI: The Government is establishing an elite team of highly empowered technical experts at the heart of government. Their mission is to help departments harness the potential of AI to improve lives and the delivery of public services.
About the Civic AI Observatory: The Civic AI Observatory is an initiative by Nesta and Newspeak House to support civic organisations’ plans and adapt to the rapidly evolving field of Generative AI. We focus on immediate practical insights on AI for digital leads – case studies of civic applications, examples of digital strategies and organisational policies, and the impact on the job market – as well as developing communities of practice for specific domains.
About Evidence House: Evidence House is a Downing Street-led initiative, working with collaborators including ONS Data Science Campus, Evaluation Task Force, and National Situation Centre. It aims up-skill civil servants in technical skills whilst spinning out innovative solutions to government priority issues.
Register ↗An unofficial community meetup for the Qualia Research Institute, a non-profit building a science of consciousness to improve lives of sentient beings.
Come if you are interesting in understanding consciousness, psychedelics, meditation, neuroscience, neurotechnology, spirituality, the nature of pleasure and pain.
We’ll have soft drinks and snacks. And we’re encouraging you to bring your own.
The main format is unconference — a participant-driven conference. This is the same format as the previous meetup: the agenda is created by the attendees at the beginning of the meeting. Anyone who wants to initiate a discussion on a topic can claim a time and a space. Feel free to think in advance what kind of sessions or workshops you’d like to run and prepare for them.
That said, you can also simply come and hang out with people — unconference is there to give some structure and help people find interesting discussions.
- 7:00 PM: The meetup starts. Socializing.
- 7:30 PM: Unconference starts.
- 8:00 PM: [optional] Qualia of the Day sharing
- 9:00 PM: Socializing.
- 11:30 PM: Close.
Encouraged: bring a fun or unusual experience with you. This could be a perfume, a poem, a dance, or whatever you like. This is in the spirit of the “Qualia of the Day” tradition, where Andrés always starts a video by sharing a novel and peculiar experience.
Potential topics for discussion
- Psychedelics. What do exotic states of consciousness can tell us about it? From models of how they work (e. g. QRI’s neural annealing) to writing rigorous trip reports to personal experiences.
- Meditation. Why does it work? What does it say about the consciousness? What does Buddhism get right?
- AI consciousness and sentience. The binding (boundary) problem.
- Valence. The nature of pleasure and pain. Why do some experiences feel better than others? Symmetry Theory of Valence. - Logarithmic scales of pleasure and pain. How much worse are the worst experiences? How much better are the best experiences?
- Formal theories of consciousness. How do we create one? What do we want from a theory of consciousness? Is IIT a pseudoscience?
- Whatever you come up with!
Join us for a relaxed social for folks interested in public AI, civic AI, and paths forward for AI that center public institutions and the collective good. Among other things, we’ll discuss:
- What does it mean to create a public option for AI?
- How is AI currently governed and deployed, and are we okay with that?
- From ARIA to BritGPT—how are different people thinking about public and civic AI?
Full agenda + sign up to give a short talk here
Register ↗How do we reduce the likelihood and severity of a major, rapid collapse of the globalized system of food production? Morgan Rivers, researcher at ALLFED visiting Newspeak House until January 6th from Berlin, will summarize the work he’s done on the topic and have a round of questions afterwards.
For the last three years Morgan has worked at the intersection of technology and policy, as a data scientist and researcher at ALLFED focused on addressing gaps in policy, research, and technology around potential large-scale disruptions of the food system. He researches the food supply chain effects of geomagnetic storms and HEMP (EMP attacks from nukes burst at high altitude) causing large long term power outages, nuclear winter, supervolcanic eruptions, and other risks. Among other milestones he has had influence over the introduction of litigation to prepare the food system better in the inflation reduction act in the US via the white house office of science and technology, successfully helped to introduce official plans for nuclear winter in Argentina, helped start a project to create a global backup low bandwidth internet in case of global disruption to the electricity supply, and published several policy relevant research papers.
The talk will present his software modelling work on:
- Crop modelling of continued outdoor crop production in nuclear winter
- An integrated model of the global food production system in nuclear winter and the effects of key policy interventions, with and without international food trade
- An end-to-end model of geomagnetic storm effects on the US and Europe power grids.
- Supply chain modeling in the continental US of the loss of electricity supply due to HEMP or a massive cyber attack
- A backup satellite system design that can be used to beam data directly to cell phones even if the the power is out and internet and cell service are disrupted
A holiday party to bring together members and enthusiasts from three communities: Burning Man, Intelligent Crazy People (ICP), and Network States.
Register ↗3 women and 3 men from rationalist, postrationalist, effective altruist and other communities come to maybe find love on the stage of Newspeak House. Love, sincerity, entertaining stories, possibly unhinged prediction markets dynamics.
The hosts of the show, Sasha Putilin and Rachel Clifton, ask participants questions and help them put themselves out there and show their personality to each other and to the audience.
Can you predict who would like who? Throughout the show the audience bets on pairs of participants chances of going on a date together. At the end of the show participants privately input who they’d like to go on date with — and if there is a mutual match we announce it. The mechanics of matching are similar to speed dating or Tinder.
The event organised in support of Manifold Markets’ new dating website manifold.love where people bet on outcomes of other people’s relationships as well as match people together. Consider signing up on manifold.love!
If you are interested in being a participant on the show, please fill in this form.
- 7:00 PM: doors open, setting up manifold.love accounts
- 7:30 PM: the actual show
- 9:00 PM till late: socialising and discussion
A meetup to better understand ideas around digital sentience.
We explore questions of if and when AI will be capable of consciousness and/or sentience, alongside discussing the implications of people being confused about AI sentience.
- How will/would we know if an AI is sentient?
- What even is consciousness/sentience (this one has to be easy right!?)
- The relationship between AI sentience and AI alignment
- How is society is reacting, or is going to react to these questions?
Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Part of the Sociotechnical Systems Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates and faculty only.
Elinor Ostrom (1933–2012) was an American political scientist and political economist who studied the governance of common pool resources, or ‘the commons.’ She received the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009. In this session we will discuss her ‘eight principles for governance of common-pool resources.’
Reading:
- Elinor Ostrom’s eight principles for governance of common-pool resources: short explainer in On the Commons Magazine (414 words)
Optional original sources:
- p. 259, Understanding Institutional Diversity (2005)
- p. 90, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action (1990)
Optional extra readings:
- Vincent Bevins, ‘The mass protest decade: why did the street movements of the 2010s fail?’, The Guardian, 10 Oct 2023 [audio; text]
- Jo Freeman, The tyranny of structurelessness, 1970
Reminders:
Agenda:
- 5:30pm: Discussion of the eight principles
- 6:00pm: ’Application discussion’: What have you been working on at Newspeak House? What do you feel you have learned and made progress on? What do you feel you are struggling with? What open questions do you have? Do you think the eight principles (or other ‘sociotechnical systems thinking’) might be relevant or useful to you?
- 6:25pm: Discuss next steps for this module
- 6:30pm: Finish
A monthly London-based meetup for members of the rationalist diaspora. The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
Our reading list for this time is:
Register ↗Tesla whistleblower Lukasz Krupski joins us for Ration Club, the weekly community dinner at Newspeak House.
In May this year, German business daily Handelsblatt began publishing a series of investigative reports about Tesla, informed by a leak of 100GB of internal data from within the company.
Among the most damaging revelations in the Tesla Files is the company’s lack of transparency about safety issues associated with the company’s AI-powered self-driving functionality. Between 2015 and March 2022, Tesla customers made thousands of complaints about vehicles that would break or accelerate suddenly when their driving assistance systems were turned on, resulting in many accidents.
At no point does Tesla appear to have acknowledged these safety issues publicly, although a leaked internal report from 2018 shows that engineers were well aware of the scale and gravity of the problem.
Lukasz Krupski - the source behind Handelsblatt’s reporting - was still in his probationary period at Tesla when he plunged his hand into a burning Model 3 in order to disconnect a malfunctioning fast charger. That act of bravery earned Lukasz a congratulatory email from Elon Musk in 2019, and an assurance that he could bring any issues he discovered straight to the top for attention.
That turned out not to be the case. Drawing attention to workplace safety issues at Tesla’s Norwegian division led to Lukasz being subjected to corporate surveillance and formal disciplinary action. In 2021, Lukasz took his concerns to a number of regulators in the US and UK.
Lukasz himself has been facing legal action from Tesla and a Norwegian court is currently considering whether he should be granted protection as a whistleblower. He will be in London for a few days for media interviews, so if you’ve ever been interested in what Tesla looks like from the inside or what kinds of corporate cultures might be compatible with AI safety, this is a great opportunity to have that discussion.
- New York Times - Man v Musk: a whistleblower creates headaches for Tesla, 10 November 2023
- Handelsblatt - „Mein Autopilot hat mich fast umgebracht“: Tesla-Files nähren Zweifel an Elon Musks Versprechen, 25 May 2023
Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Peter Francis has worked in refugee camps in Iraq and Lebanon, founded a GPU cloud (FluidStack), and is now working with the Meaning Alignment Institute to create AIs with a democratic understanding of wisdom and meaning. Peter is in the UK visiting Newspeak House for a few days; this event is an opportunity to meet him and find out more about his work.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Qualia Research Institute is non-profit building a science of consciousness to improve lives of sentient beings. This is an unofficial informal meetup for the community around QRI in London.
Asher Soryl (AsherSoryl.com; @aaarataki on twitter) is PhD candidate researching wild animal well-being & animal sentience. He’s moving back to New Zealand next week. This is our chance to hang out with him while he is still in London. Asher will give the talk titled “The Ethics of Spreading Life to Other Planets”.
Come if you are interesting in understanding consciousness, psychedelics, meditation, neuroscience, neurotechnology, spirituality, the nature of pleasure and pain.
Please bring your own drinks and snacks.
Schedule
- 18:30 Meetup starts
- 19:00 Asher gives a talk on his most recent paper, Q&A
- 20:00 till late: hang out and socialize
The first session of the Decision-Making Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
Prework:
- https://www.joshua-becker.com/workshop-materials (approx 1 hour)
Agenda:
- Skills Practice: Reflective Communication
- Skills Practice: Open Ended Questions
- Activity: Putting it All Together
- Discussion: Wu Wei
Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗The second session of the Game Design module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House.
Gamification
The activities at the session will be:
- Play: Papers Please (Bring a laptop)
- Lecture: Gamification (slides)
- Game Jam (Papers Please)
Recommended reading:
- Wikipedia is a Game
- Games People Play (For transactional analysis)
- Feedback loops in Game Economics
As the next election approaches it’s time to start planning!
To unlock some of the amazing innovative campaign opportunities ahead of the election, we need to make sure some basic infrastructure is in place. Join us for a day of creating, restructuring and gathering the resources, data and tools progressive campaigns will need. Whether you’re a technologist interested in politics or a seasoned campaigner, this event offers a unique opportunity to take part in planning for the next election.
We’ll be exploring:
- Scraping: what platforms are ripe for this? Do we have reliable ways to do this for each platform?
- WhatsApp: all of organising runs on WhatsApp. How can we build useful tools on top of it?
- Data: what electoral data is crucial as we approach the election, and how do we format it for easy access and use?
- AI: what is now possible? Do we have some basic frameworks and approaches we can use to build new tools for campaigners?
Schedule:
- 10:00 People arrive, breakfast 🥐🌞
- 10:15 Welcome & going through the projects and inviting pitches from people in the room 👋
- 10:30 Team forming & making plans 🤝
- 10:45 Get hacking! 💻✊
- 13:00 Lunch 🍲🥖
- 14:00 Back at the hacking! 💻😅
- 15:30 Check Ins! ✅
- 18:30 Presentations 🥁
- 19:30 Fish & Chips & Drinks 🍹🍺
- 22:00 CLOSE 👋
All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop! All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give a mix of longer talks (~20 min), demos, and lightning talks. If you would like to demo, fill in this airtable form! Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to eat snacks, have a few drinks, ask speakers questions, and hangout. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time. We have some sponsors to help cover the cost of drinks and food, but we are mostly community funded. Please consider donating £5-10 (or more!) to our open collective fund.
Rough schedule:
- 18:00 Arrive, get drinks, hang out
- 18:30 First round of speakers
- 19:15 Snacks & drinks break
- 20:00 Second round of speakers
- 20:30 More drinks, ask speakers questions, hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗The first session of the Political Organising Module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
Join us for a comprehensive session exploring the political landscape of the United Kingdom. This session will cover:
- Political Theory: An analytical discourse on the foundational political theories and ideologies shaping the contours of contemporary UK politics. We will dissect the principles and beliefs that have historically influenced and continue to underpin the political climate.
- Political Technology: A critical examination of the intersection between technology and political processes. We aim to unravel the political implications of technological advancements and examine where technology has been leveraged within the political arena.
- Trade Unions: An exploration into the mechanics of trade unions, their operational strategies, and their expansive sphere of influence. We will investigate their roles, negotiating power, and the dynamic they bring to the political and economic table.
- Political Parties: A strategic session on the internal workings of political parties, the channels through which they exert influence, and the methodologies by which one can engage with and impact their directives.
This session will help you understand the key theoretical frameworks and practical mechanisms that define the United Kingdom’s current political system.
Register ↗Join us for a relaxed social for folks interested in public AI, civic AI, and paths forward for AI that center public institutions and the collective good. Among other things, we’ll discuss:
- What does it mean to create a public option for AI? - How is AI currently governed and deployed, and are we okay with that? - From ARIA to BritGPT—how are different people thinking about public and civic AI?
Full agenda + sign up to give a short talk here
There will be pizza!
Co-organized by Brandon Jackson (Metagov), Laurie Penny, Alex Krasodomski (Chatham House), and Joshua Tan (Metagov/Oxford).
Register ↗Qualia Research Institute is non-profit building a science of consciousness to improve lives of sentient beings.
Come if you are interesting in understanding consciousness, psychedelics, meditation, neuroscience, neurotechnology, spirituality, the nature of pleasure and pain.
We’ll have soft drinks and snacks. And we’re encouraging you to bring your own.
Schedule
- 6:30 PM: The meetup starts. Socializing.
- 7:00 PM: An intro talk by Andrés Gómez Emilsson, QRI’s President & Director of Research
- 7:30 PM: [optional] A Scent Poetry Performance. Scent bar.
- 8:00 PM: [optional] Qualia of the Day sharing
- 8:30 PM: [optional] A roundtable discussion of ideas for future meetups.
- 9:00 PM: Socializing
- 11:30 PM: Close
Encouraged: bring a fun or unusual experience with you. This could be a perfume, a poem, a dance, or whatever you like. This is in the spirit of the “Qualia of the Day” tradition, where Andrés always starts a video by sharing a novel and peculiar experience.
Potential topics for discussion
- Psychedelics. What do exotic states of consciousness can tell us about it? From models of how they work (e. g. QRI’s neural annealing) to writing rigorous trip reports to personal experiences.
- Meditation. Why does it work? What does it say about the consciousness? What does Buddhism get right?
- AI consciousness and sentience. The binding (boundary) problem.
- Valence. The nature of pleasure and pain. Why do some experiences feel better than others? Symmetry Theory of Valence. - Logarithmic scales of pleasure and pain. How much worse are the worst experiences? How much better are the best experiences?
- Formal theories of consciousness. How do we create one? What do we want from a theory of consciousness? Is IIT a pseudoscience?
- Whatever you come up with!
It’s not easy to make the world a better place. You might have the vision, the team, the skills and be driven by wanting to have a positive impact - but have you got the personal resilience to stay the course?
Louise Doherty is an executive coach to ambitious, purpose driven founders and leaders. In this talk and workshop you’ll learn:
- What the Igikai Trap is that catches many purpose driven leaders out unexpectedly, and how to avoid it
- Why stress management is so much more than “just get on with it” and solo self care, and how to end the burnout cycle once and for all
- How to develop your emotional intelligence to build effective teams and organisations
- What the Inner Advantage is, and how to use it to fuel yourself and your organisation
- Practical solutions for finding your personal leadership blindspots
Marc Faddoul, cofounder of nonprofit AI Forensics says: “Louise’s uniquely holistic approach empowers me to find clarity, even amid the turbulence of challenging moments.”
Find out more about Louise’s leadership development work: https://inner-advantage.com/
This workshop is designed for founders and senior leaders of tech-for-good organisations. It’s free to attend and open to non Newspeak House members.
Register ↗Newspeak House is excited to host a meetup for All Tech Is Human!
Anyone who is interested in the responsible tech movement and its community in London is welcome to join.
Drinks and small bites will be provided but you are also welcome to BYOB.
All Tech Is Human brings together people, organizations, and ideas to tackle wicked tech & society issues and co-create a tech future aligned with the public interest.
Our activities grow and strengthen the Responsible Tech ecosystem, which speeds up society’s ability to consider the impacts of technology, leads to greater multistakeholder collaboration, and diversifies the backgrounds and disciplines involved in the process.
Founded in 2018 and based in Manhattan with a global community, All Tech Is Human is a non-profit organization that has intentionally brought together a diverse range of individuals and organizations across civil society, government, and industry. Our aim is to grow the Responsible Tech field by promoting knowledge-sharing and collaboration among multiple stakeholders in order to co-create a better tech future.
Our activities fall under three main categories: multidisciplinary convening & community-building (summit, mixers, large community Slack group ), multidisciplinary education (working groups, reports, University Ambassadors), and diversifying the traditional tech pipeline with more disciplines, lived experiences, and perspectives (Mentorship, Job Board, Talent Pool, Matchmaking Service).
Register ↗Crude Futures is a magazine and card game about the end of the world.
We present three years of research into collapsology, the study of how societies fall apart. How to break through the lustre of mere poetic catastrophism and into a lucid grasp of the possible coming, or already present, disaster?
In this event, we will play How It Happens, a world-building and world-collapsing card game, and calibrate ourselves to our own all-too-possible catastrophic future using Metaculus.
It will be fun.
You can buy the magazine, card game and poster bundle from New Models or the magazine at the event.
Crude Futures is made by Beau-Caprice Vetch, Richard Hames, Mina Miller, Jack Tarpey, Jake Colvin, phm, Matīss Groskaufmanis, Jon Benjamin Tallerås, Cat MacGregor, T.M. Wilson, and Marcelino Llano. With support from New Models.
https://crudefutures.substack.com
https://instagram.com/crudefutures
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Join us for a discussion on the relationship between the structure of political organizations and the software it uses to accomplish its goals.
We will discuss a few different dimensions of organizational structures on the left and how their ability to carry out their chosen organizational form is shaped by the software they use.
There will be a presentation and discussion lead by Ben Packer, a software engineer working in organizing technology on the US electoral and social movement left since 2017. He has worked for the Justice Democrats PAC, the Bernie 2020 campaign, and a number of software vendors that sell to campaigns, labor unions, and social movement organizations. In his capacity as a a co-founder and product lead at a technology cooperative, he conducted numerous user interviews with different movement organizations and organizing projects.
The paper Bottom-Up Organizing with Tools from On High: Understanding the Data Practices of Labor Organizers by Vera Khovanskaya provides strong complimentary analysis with a focus on labor unions in the United States.
Register ↗Welcome back! I really enjoyed the ACX Schelling meetup last month, but we’re back to regular non-Schelling Rationalish meetups.
Our reading list for this time is:
We’ll start this around 3pm, with people showing up from 2. We’ll be on the terrace, so dress warm.
Register ↗Meetup starts at 16:00 but feel free to arrive and leave at any time. We will be hanging out informally in Newspeak House’s living and drawing rooms as well as terrace. Please bring your own drinks and snacks!
What is Postrationalism?
Postrationalism has probably as many definitions as there are postrationalists. Most of us are on Twitter, and our community there is often called TPoT: “This part of Twitter”.
So what is postrationalism? For some people the prefix “post” means recovering from rationality and it’s totalizing memes (especially about AGI). For others it’s about letting go of “the truth” as the primary lens of seeing the world.
Maybe vibes & woo achieve highest data compression. Maybe we’re all just permanently trapped in this technocapitalst dopamine hell realm and illegibility and hornyposting make the most of our imprisonment.
There is also a long serious twitter-thread on the topic of rationality vs postrationalism. If you are a LessWrong-rationalist, you might enjoy this post on LessWrong “Explaining the Twitter Postrat Scene”.
And if you need a long list of essays and blog posts, we can supply you with one too.
Register ↗Join us for an evening of talks on civic structures throughout history, ranging from an analysis of the Roman Republic, legacies of Mycenaean democracy, to takes on the 20th Century.
The aim of the event is to enrich your understanding of why political features of western society are the way they are, and to see if we can predict where we could be going in the future. There will be free drinks throughout, and networking afterwards.
Dr Harry Willis will be speaking about the lasting effects of Mycenaean democracy on the UK’s democratic processes.
Dr Eric Wycoff-Rogers will be speaking about the lasting effects of early 20th Century American social structures on the US.
Hannah O’Rourke will be talking about people led prefigurative structures before the welfare state.
Bella Roberts (Antiparty) will be speaking about the structural failures of political parties to represent people in the UK.
Andy McDonald (Newspeak House) will be speaking about the legacy of the political infrastructure of the Roman Republic in the UK & US.
This event was inspired by the How to Roman Republic 101 series on the A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry blog, written by the fantastic Dr. Bret C. Devereaux.
Register ↗Official Giving What We Can groups are back and we’re excited to kick off the new Giving What We Can London with our first official in person event. Arrive any time from 6:30, at around 7 we’ll probably watch “The Future of EA relies on Effective Giving”, a recent talk by Grace Adams, Head of Marketing at Giving What We Can. The evening will also be a great chance to meet others interested in effective giving in a casual social setting! Feel free to drop in later on if you can’t make 7 or would prefer to join after the talk.
The event is open to anyone interested in Giving What We Can whether you have already signed a pledge or are curious about effective giving. Food won’t be provided but feel free to bring your own food and drinks.
If you would like to be emailed about similar events in future then please sign up to the London GWWC socials email list with this form: https://forms.gle/YsAJTKZaa2kidqXcA
Thanks and hope to see you there!
Register ↗You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in our lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes (or failures). It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, The Sunday Times, pollsters, leading academics, journalists and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We are slowly unveiling the list but hey we have some stellar names and topics to get us going
How many tickets are there?
120 in person, we always sell out so book early and join the waitlist if you can’t get in.
If we have capacity we will do a virtual event too. There are 100 further tickets available for that. If you book one please note we can’t guarantee we will be able to provide it. Wotsits volunteer power is, alas, finite.
Wot if I don’t like wotsits?
While we grieve for what your tastebuds may miss, you can come and not eat wotsits. They are simply the snack that is provided.
We don’t provide any drinks so please bring whatever you would like. Alcoholic, non alcoholic, whatever floats your boat. There was once a splinter table of gin and onion rings fans. Further crisp based diversity is encouraged.
Who is behind this?
Ali Goldsworthy and Kate Norgrove attempt to “host”. Jess Day of More Onion, Usman Mohammed, Jon Date of di:ga Communications, Ruth Taylor of Common Cause Foundation and Ab Brightman of Student Hubs help too. The team is expanding so we can put this on more frequently. Check back to find out who else is on board. None of us get paid. You all make us laugh and we get to eat crisps. That’s payment enough.
Register ↗Capability and the State is a pair of talks about how the current UK state lost its capabilities under relentless reform and what capabilities it needs to function in the new complex world of entangled digitally-supported services.
Abby Innes is the author of Late Soviet Britain - a critique of the marketised state.
Late Soviet Britain (cambridge.org)
Why have British governments since 1979 become so poor at systems-thinking and strategic investment? We rightly think of Soviet and neoliberal/neoclassical economics as exactly opposed in their values, but the problem lies in this exact mirroring.
Examine the theoretical small print of neoliberal orthodoxies and you find a materialist ‘governing science’ as circular in its reasoning and deterministic as Leninism. After forty years of economic transformation in pursuit of ‘the withering away of the state’ - via the New Public Management, policies of marketisation, quasi-marketisation, tax and regulatory competition and the management of future risk via presumptively productive corporate rationality - successive governments of right and left have contrived to reproduce Soviet state failures in capitalist form.
The result is an ever more centralised state that is beginning to collapse, in terms of functionality, under the weight of its own contradictions. Utopian and tautological as it is, our neoliberal governing science proves as impossible to refute as it is to implement.
Gordon Guthrie is a Research Fellow at the Scottish Government studying how services and the digital systems underpinning them are created by the state.
Gordon Guthrie’s Substack “Digital Policy”
How do we govern and develop a Complex State? The digital age is an age of infrastructure - but not visible bridges, roads and sewage works but an invisible infrastructure of data flows and technology.
The building of this infrastructure poses complex constitutional and machinery of government questions. How does the state organise itself to build this complexity? and how do we implement separation of powers and parliamentary oversight of it?
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Tipping Point, Money Rebellion, Coal Action Network and Sunrise are hosting 3 days of movement-wide strategy to plan for the next twelve months. You can come for it all or just parts. Travel bursaries and accommodation available. Inviting people from across the UK to join us for:
- Saturday 4th (All Day) - Fossil Free Finance: Planning how to build a mass financial and cultural boycott to force financial organizations to stop funding fossil fuels.
- Sunday 5th (Morning) - StopEACOP: Planning how we can pressure UK insurers to cut their ties with the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline.
- Sunday 5th (Afternoon) - StopWCM: Planning how we can pressure UK insurers and banks to cut their ties with the West Cumbria Mine.
- Mon 6th (All Day) - StopRosebank & Global Day of Action 2024: Planning how to launch a finance campaign to fight North Sea Oil development & how to link up with people across the world in 2024 to force the insurance industry to drop fossil fuels.
Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
A social for folks who want to talk identity and policy, hosted by Kaliya Young, author of A Comprehensive Guide to Self Sovereign Identity, co-founder of the Internet Identity Workshop, and founder of the Personal Data Ecosystem Consortium and the Identity Ecosystem Map.
Register ↗The first session of the Mechanism Design module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
In this seminar, we will establish some of the basic definitions and ideas necessary to game theory and mechanism design, motivated throughout by a few examples.
In particular, we will discuss notions of:
- Pareto Optimality
- Incentive Compatibility & Strategyproofness
- Centralised vs Decentralised Markets
- Voting Systems
Examples we will cover include the College Draw, the National Resident Matching Program and basic Voting systems in various countries.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗This a meetup for Londoners interested in Network States. We’ll have the chance to connect before we head off to Amsterdam for The Network State Conference
Agenda:
- 6:30-7:15 - Open social
- 7:15-8:15 - Lightning talks, Presentations, AMAs (anyone can present, no pre-planning needed, a screen will be available)
- 8:15-8:45 - Open discussion
- 8:45-Late - More socialising, and partying, plus another space set aside for co-working and thoughtful collaboration
Drop in and out anytime, even after midnight. Host will still be entertaining past 1AM.
There will be snacks and light refreshments. You may bring food and drinks (including alcohol), for yourself, or to share, but it’s not required.
Register ↗Open Source Club is a fortnightly event on Mondays at Newspeak House. We spend a few hours in the evening to work on open source software. Join us!
This event marks the end of the first cohort so we plan to have a more relaxed time with food and drinks. Come to meet other software engineers, share what you’re working on, and learn what others are working on!
Register ↗Reclaim the Power is a UK based direct action network fighting for social, environmental and economic justice.
This gathering is for everyone, after 3 years of taking a much needed break from the group and then time to reflect - we are back and open to new people to join. So share it now and share it wide!
Register ↗Join us for a relaxed social for folks interested in public AI, civic AI, and paths forward for AI that center public institutions and the collective good. Among other things, we’ll discuss:
- Can the UK government build AI?
- Could BritGPT be the next NHS?
- How are different parties and interest groups in the UK thinking about AI?
There will be pizza!
Hosted by Joshua Tan of Oxford and Metagov.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗The first session of the Game Design module of the course in Political Technology at Newspeak House, open to fellowship candidates only.
Introduction to Terms & Concepts
The activities at the session will be:
1. Play: Perudo/Liars Dice
2. Lecture: Introduction to terms & concepts. (slides)
3. Jam: Gods Will Be Watching
Recommended reading: A Theory Of Fun, by Raph Koster https://theoryoffun.com
Register ↗Conveniently timed just ahead of the big AI safety summit at Bletchley Park, the 3rd Asterisk mag reading group is all about AI.
If you’ve been meaning to read up and decide what you think about artificial intelligence, now’s a great time! Join us to discuss when transformational AI might arrive to take our jobs, turbocharge economic growth and/or end humanity, and what might be done about all of that.
All the articles in Issue 03 of Asterisk Magazine are free to read at: asteriskmag.com/issues/03
Absolutely no need to read it all in advance, but you’ll probably get more out of the discussions if you’ve had a bit of a look beforehand.
We’ll kick off with a mini prompt jam, so feel free to bring a laptop to show off your prompt engineering skills!
Register ↗Join Intelligent Crazy People and friends for a social where we all catch up or get to know each other. Friends are welcome.
icp.community’s a vetted volunteer run community of 2,500 members out of 30,000 applicants including founders and former CEOs of billion $ companies, creators and more.
ICP’s theme is “meet people who surprise you” across hubs, homes and nature around San Francisco, New York, London, Zurich and more.
- Learn more at linktr.ee/joinicp
- Join the Whatsapp chat for this event at chat.whatsapp.com/LMI6wBheBwF1i1K0boXKFE
- Apply to join our London Whatsapp chat at chat.whatsapp.com/GCDdH7p5sI398bwDFeKaGG
This event is a fun way to practice formally stating our beliefs and testing how accurate they are.
The main activity will involve stating our beliefs in a testable way, as described here: https://tiny.cc/forecasting_activity
Someone has also offered to run a “forecasting poker” activity. Feel free to bring or organize other belief-themed activities.
Join the WhatsApp group: https://chat.whatsapp.com/JQn1yIFdmiTA7Bumg8USA8
About your host: Joshua Becker is an Assistant Professor at UCL School of Management and a Lecturer at the London College of Political Technology at Newspeak House. Joshua has experience researching group decision-making but is a complete n00b when it comes to personal forecasting.
Register ↗This week during Labour Party conference a deepfake spread online of Keir Starmer ‘berating a junior staff member’. This clip began as a tweet on a small account, but has reached 1.5 million views on Twitter, and been featured on daytime television.
Join us for a half-day workshop where we will research and synthesise recommendations for how political parties should respond influence campaigns of this nature.
We welcome any participants with relevant experience or research skills; please bring your laptop. Breakfast and lunch will be provided.
Register ↗Newspeak House Fellow Viktor Veterinarov, economist and researcher at the LSE Hub of Equal Representation, will give a talk about Claudia Goldin, this year’s Nobel Laureate in economics for her research on how to think about women’s victories and what challenges remain.
We will go together through the U-shaped path from the agricultural era to the modern labour market focusing on the role of education and contraceptive pills in the revolutionary changes of female participation in the labour market.
We will also discuss the current inequality drivers, especially, how the birth of the first child is still the main source of the gender gap and what are the ways to shift the current bad equilibrium.
Attendees are welcome to join us for dinner at Ration Club before and after the talk.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
This is the 3rd and final session of Cohort A.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A talk and discussion with Skyler Crossman, the global community coordinator for the Rationalist community. Usually operating out of Boston, USA, he’s in London as the last stop on a tour of European meetups focusing on the popular Rationalist blog “Astral Codex Ten.” Over a hundred and seventy cities are scheduled to have an event this September and October, and many will continue to have them year round.
This will open with a short talk by Skyler on his work as the global coordinator, followed by Q&A and open discussion. It will end when he needs to leave at 1pm his flight back to the United States. If you’re interested in the Rationality Community, or just want to hear the story of the worst meetup Skyler’s ever been thanked for, you should come by!
Register ↗The official bi-annual London meetup for fans of the popular blog Astral Codex Ten (formerly Slate Star Codex) by American psychiatrist Scott Alexander. If you’re reading this, you’re invited! Please don’t feel like you “won’t be welcome” just because you’re new to the blog, demographically different from the average reader, or hate ACX and everything it stands for. You’ll be fine!
There will be light refreshments and an ongoing unconference. Please register if you plan to go, because ACX has many fans in London and we need to know how many people are coming. If it is fully booked you won’t be able to enter without a ticket.
To be notified of future meetups you should subscribe to ACX London, and also you might want to check out London Rationalish and Effective Altruism UK.
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
We are delighted to host a party in tribute to the first Internet browser that brought the Internet experience to users beyond academia and military settings. It enabled opening of Internet Cafes (starting from Cyberia Café) worldwide, democratizing access to online data.
We will mark the occasion by hosting a hybrid party in Newspeak House and VR Cyberia.
- 18:30 Welcome drinks
- 19:00 “3 decades of Open Source Digital Revolution”: discussion panel with Eva Pascoe, Stefan Lutschinger (Middlesex University) and Halidonto (digital artist) on History of Mosaic, Open Cultures and impact on today’s society, chaired by Luke Robert Mason (Futurist, Warwick University)
- 20:00 Lightning talks on up and coming open source projects from UK-based researchers
- 20:30 Drinks & DJ
- 22:00 Close
Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Calling all fellows of Newspeak House, please come and welcome our new fellowship candidates for 2023, share your latest work, and hear updates from the college. Dinner & drinks.
NB this event is open only to Newspeak House fellows, faculty and staff.
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give a mix of longer talks (~20 min), demos, and lightning talks. If you would like to demo, fill in this airtable form! Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to eat pizza, have a few drinks, ask speakers questions, and hangout. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time. We have some sponsors to help cover the cost of drinks and food, but we are mostly community funded. Please consider donating £5-10 (or more!) to our open collective fund.
Rough schedule:
- 18:00 Arrive, get drinks, hang out
- 18:30 First round of speakers
- 19:15 Pizza (normal & vegan) & drinks (+non-alcoholic)
- 20:00 Second round of speakers
- 20:30 More drinks, ask speakers questions, hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗Come and discuss and learn about the best ways the UK to regulate frontier AI models. Evals? Compute regulation? Something else?
- 18:00 Chatting & drinks/snacks.
- 19:00 Talks (4 or 5 talks at 10 minutes each, speakers TBC)
- 20:30 More chatting /drinks /snacks.
- 22:00 Close
We expect topics to include:
- Safe scaling regulations - audits and evaluations
- Compute monitoring
- Liability
Spend a day working alongside other organisations working on UK democratic reform
Since March 2022 we’ve organised democracy co-working days to help bring together individuals and organisations within the UK democracy space - with more than 50 organisations joining us across our previous events, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour and so many more!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a coworking day on the 27th September.
Feel free to drop in at any part of the coworking day, for all of it or just part of it - the more the merrier. We’ll be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected]
Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
Register ↗Come and meet us!
All welcome, whether you’re involved in climate action or not.
Find out more about who we are, what we do and why.
Chat and unwind with other climate concerned people.
Register ↗Connect and learn from London’s data visualisation community. Vis and Sip is a space to rant about pie charts, discuss the latest trends, and make new friends.
Maybe you’re a designer or developer, or both; maybe you’re starting out in the field; you have opinions you can’t contain on colour schemes in maps; or you just like chatting to nice people. All good reasons to come along for a relaxed evening with us under the heaters of the Newspeak House terrace.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
This is the 2nd session of Cohort A.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us for an Open Source Club session in which we contribute to open source!
The plan for this event: Improve the code for an open source software. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
We are trying something new this year! To start with, Open Source Club is part of the Newspeak House course on Political Technology. In addition, we now have cohorts which are composed of 3 sessions, one every two Mondays. In each meeting we maintain the same goal: make a useful contribution to an open source project. This can be either an existing open source project or a new one we want to make. One can find the projects we work on here.
We aim to make high quality contributions that actually help a project. We are not interested in completing the goal just for the sake of it. Our ambition is to make a useful contribution in something meaningful. This is no easy feat. Three sessions might not be enough but we have to start somewhere! We hope you share our passion and values for high quality work, useful software that helps people, and being part of a community. See you in person :D
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗This month we’ll be trying to get some practice at “reasoning about confusing intellectual problems”.
This will be bassed off of challenge 1 from the LessWrong post “Exercise: Solve “Thinking Physics”” (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PiPH4gkcMuvLALymK/exercise-solve-thinking-physics). You don’t need to read that, but it might be interesting.
The exact structure isn’t set for definite yet, but likely we’ll split into small groups. Each group will pick an exercise from the book “Thinking Physics”. Then for each group, everyone will spend some time thinking about it independently, some time discussing it in the group, and then after seeing the answer, some time discussing how you could have done better.
We’ll start this around 3pm, with people showing up from 2. We’ll be on the terrace of Newspeak House.
I’ll have a physical and a digital copy of the book, plus some printed copies of some of the exercises. Hopefully that’ll be enough? But it might be helpful if a few other people coming also have a digital copy, especially if it’s on a laptop or (better yet) tablet rather than phone. Fortunately it’s available on archive.org, so if you have a convenient screen to read it on, please consider bringing it. It’s available in a few different formats (including epub and pdf) here: https://archive.org/details/ThinkingPhysicsPracticalLessonsInCriticalThinking_201808/page/n7/mode/2up
Register ↗Hi friends,
For our September meetup we’ll be having the usual community updates, drinks, vegan pizza and tech & non-tech related chat. We’ll be on the terrace of Newspeak House again so ring the doorbell on the door on the left and go up the stairs.
Please invite along anyone who might be interested (including those who might not be already familiar with effective altruism). Look forward to seeing you there!
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30: Welcome and intros
- 7:00: Presentation + Q&A
- 7:30: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00: Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
This meetup is inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you there! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗The primary responsibility of the state is the monopolisation of organised violence within its territory. Without this monopoly of organised violence, political philosophers assert that legitimate forms of law and order cannot exist. This presentation will focus on what this looks like in reality by focusing on criminal violence in urban areas. It is based on a decade of professional experience working in one of the most dangerous cities in South Africa and the world. A city that has areas with homicide rates equivalent to those of active war zones and yet paradoxically, also has some of the country’s safest neighborhoods. What does it look like at the urban edges of state power and how do people react to that?
Douglas Ian Scott is a researcher, project designer, technologist and criminologist formerly based in Cape Town, South Africa. For the past 10 years he worked at the Safety Lab, a South African QUANGO that works extensively with local governments to create innovative projects to reduce violence in neglected urban communities experiencing very high homicide rates. Douglas is also long time Wikimedian and board member of Wikimedia South Africa, a membership organisation for Wikipedia editors in southern Africa.
Register ↗For this event, we invite everybody who is interested in contributing to open source to join us for an evening of building high quality open source software. Bring your own projects or contribute to the ones we do! One can find the projects we work on here.
Our usual plan for Open Source Club events is to improve the code and functionality of an open source project. As this is the first event after a while, we aim to have more relaxed vibes. Come to meet and chat :)
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗New AI technologies are likely to have an effect on the next election. From deep fakes to automated individual targeting how might AI shape what is possible in campaigning?
As progressive technologists we need to get tooled up! What tools might campaigners need ahead of the next election? What potential use cases are there for this technology? How can we guard against it’s potentially more problematic consequences?
Join us at the AI and Campaigning Hack Day, where we’ll be exploring the potential of AI to transform progressive campaigns! Collaborate with experts and enthusiasts and campaigners to explore what kind of tools and tech we can create using this technology. Whether you’re a technologist interested in AI or a seasoned campaigner, this event offers a unique opportunity to learn and innovate.
All progressive technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome! We also welcome any new people who are interested in AI and campaigning. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop.
• 10:00 People arrive, breakfast 🥐🌞
• 10:15 Welcome & going through the projects and inviting pitches from people in the room 👋
• 10:30 Team forming & making plans 🤝
• 10:45 Get hacking! 💻✊
• 13:00 Lunch 🍲🥖
• 14:00 Back at the hacking! 💻😅
• 15:30 Check Ins! ✅
• 18:00 Presentations 🥁
• 19:00 BBQ Dinner & Drinks 🍔🔥
• 20:30 CLOSE 👋
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Want to make an organisation, or part of one better? Perhaps in your work, perhaps something else you care about :)
You’ve come to the right place!
The idea is to read some or all of a book related to running systems well. Then we meet and chat: how might you apply the ideas, what surprised you, what did you disagree with - that kind of thing. This is the first one: the inaugural!
For the first book, we’ll be reading the Systems Bible by John Gall
An entire book can be intimidating! If you’re curious about coming, and reading a summary or a few chapters feels more doable, please do and you’ll be very welcome :)
Aiming to create something which is all of intellectually stimulating, useful and fun!
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗An unofficial birthday party (barbecue + cake) to celebrate 20 years of the Marginal Revolution blog: https://marginalrevolution.com
Anybody who has read the blog is welcome, including those who are first reading it on the journey over.
Intelligent conversation, Straussian or otherwise; balloons optional.
Register ↗Join us for our very first London meetup, open to anyone who is interested in using or learning more about Directus, an extensible open-source backend toolkit that transforms any database into robust APIs and a no-code admin studio.
Please let us know if you have any dietary requirements beyond vegetarian. You must abide by our code of conduct.
TALK 1: Extending Directus to build a beautiful online art gallery by David Somers
Directus has rich image manipulation functionality that made it Pixie Labs’s top choice for building an online art gallery for one of our clients. Using Directus extension, we augmented that even more, adding functionality to generate blurhashes for the smooth loading of high-quality full-screen images. We’ll talk about how we used Directus in this project, what we like about it, how the extension we built works, and some pointers if you want to build your own extension.
David is Head of Engineering at Pixie Labs, a London-based digital product studio focused on building digital products that drive success for the client’s customers and business. With 12 years of industry experience, David cut his teeth leading development in an innovation lab at News UK before moving into the agency world. Since then, he’s led the technical delivery at Pixie Labs on projects for organisations big and small, including Twitter, HomeServe, Butcher’s Pet Care and many more. These days David wears multiple hats with equal finesse, architecting compelling solutions for Pixie Labs’ clients while fostering the skills of the growing Pixie engineering team.
TALK 2: The strengths and challenges in running an Open Source project
Directus is a well-loved open source project with a highly-active community both on GitHub and Discord. As a small team, this is hugely flattering, but also introduces a whole heap of challenges in meeting the expectations of our users. In this talk, we’ll discuss the common challenges in both the code and community side of the project, and how we’ve attempted to overcome them.
Kevin runs Developer Relations at Directus and is Director of You Got This - a learning hub to help developers improve their core skills. He is an avid boardgamer, tired dad, and shameless Disney adult. He is based in Berlin with his partner and two kids.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
People start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time. We’ll be on the Newspeak House terrace. We’ll bring some food, but not enough for everyone, so we recommend bringing something.
Also, reading list:
We’ll start to discuss these around 3, or a bit later depending on how busy we are barbecuing. If you have articles you want to suggest for future readings, you can do that at https://redd.it/v3646u.
You can also keep up with us on Facebook, Reddit or WhatsApp. For spam avoidance, you need to message for WhatsApp invites.
Register ↗Hi friends,
For our August meetup we’ll be discussing our proposed Theory of Change (coming soon), how this group aims to effectively (if indirectly) do good.
As always we’ll have community updates, drinks, vegan pizza and tech & non-tech related chat. You’ll also be helping define the future of the group. We’ll be on the terrace of Newspeak House again so ring the doorbell on the door on the left and go up the stairs.
Please invite along anyone who might be interested (including those who might not be already familiar with effective altruism). Look forward to seeing you there!
Register ↗Join us for an exciting event aimed at helping professionals who are interested in careers in the alternative protein sector. Our lightning talk format will feature 4 speakers who will share insights into their careers, day-to-day work, how they landed their roles, what challenges they face, and what they’ve learned along the way.
This event is designed to remove barriers and uncertainties that may be preventing you from making progress in your career plans or transition. Our speakers will offer advice on how to test fit, what they’ve changed their minds on, and how they can help attendees find opportunities in the field. Whether you’re just starting to explore a career in animal advocacy or you’re further along in the process, this event is for you.
You’ll have the chance to meet others who are in similar positions and get guidance from those who have been in your shoes. Our goal is to help you understand the next steps in your career and where you could be a good fit. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn more about what it’s like to work in alternative proteins and take the next step in your career journey.
Speakers:
- Dana Wilson, Alternative Proteins Policy Officer at Coller Foundation. Dana works to expand the alternative protein ecosystem in the UK by supporting policy work in this area. She previously worked on Defra’s Animal Health and Welfare Pathway and conducted research into cultivated leather.
- Max Jamilly, Co-Founder at Hoxton Farms, a biotech company that combines cell biology and mathematical modelling to make animal fat. Max has a PhD in synthetic biology from Oxford, an MPhil in Bioscience Enterprise from Cambridge and an MA in Natural Sciences (Biological) from Cambridge.
- Abhi Kumar, Program Associate at Open Philanthropy. Abhi works on investigating promising opportunities in the development and commercialization of alternatives to animal products. Previously, he worked as a researcher studying the cost structure of meat alternatives. Prior to that, he worked on the investment teams at venture capital funds Lever VC and Ahimsa VC.
- Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro, Group Leader and Lecturer at Imperial College London. Rodrigo is leading a research group at RLAlab and works at the interface of synthetic biology and metabolic engineering. He is based in the Department of Bioengineering and the Center for Synthetic Biology and Innovation at Imperial. His research group is interested in how the development of synthetic biology can revolutionise biotechnologies and help us to move towards a sustainable bio-based economy.
Schedule:
- 19:00 - 19:15 Arrival, welcome and introduction. Snacks will be provided.
- 19:15 - 20:15 Speaker talks
- 20:15 - 21:00 Q&A / fireside chat
- 21:00 - 22:00 Networking and unstructured mingling
Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Effective self-governance relies on determining the best course of actions for a given group of people, in spite of potentially complex interactions and conflicts between their preferences. Voting systems can capture these preferences, but frequently fail to handle the implications of their interactions – such as cyclical preferences resulting from ranked-choice voting, where there is no clear option that a majority finds superior to all others.
While not a complete solution, deliberative processes can surface some such conflicts of opinion, helping constituents share relevant information and find the cruxes of their disagreements. Deliberation best practices are clear for time-bounded, face-to-face interactions – but how could collectives that exist in mediated spaces adopt similar processes for themselves?
AI Objectives Institute is taking the first steps in this direction with an LLM-based tool for discourse visualization and simulated deliberation. Colleen McKenzie, director of strategy at the AI Objectives Institute, will give a brief presentation with background, followed by an open discussion of tools for mediated collective governance.
Colleen McKenzie is a researcher, designer, and product strategist, interested in exploring and improving humans’ interaction with technology in a variety of contexts. She co-founded the Median Group, a scientific research nonprofit, where she explores technological trends and their societal impacts. Other past roles include Product Manager and Software Engineer at Google, Chief of Staff at the Center for Humane Technology, and Head of Product for distributed computing startup Kalix Systems. She holds a B.A. in Computer Science and Neuroscience from Columbia.
Artem Zhiganov is the founder of Harmonica. He’s a governance designer with a background in product marketing and user research, and a fellow of Newspeak House. He believes that conversational UX and LLMs will make governance more accessible and fun, which is critical for overcoming both the economic and the political challenges our civilization is facing in the 21st century. Harmonica is a Discord chatbot that helps communities deliberate faster and engage more members by talking to them 1:1 and synthesizing their responses with GPT.
Register ↗A new series of events at Newspeak House with the goal to better understand the complex problems our civilization is facing (aka metacrisis) through playing relevant boardgames.
Daybreak is a new cooperative board game about stopping climate change. It’s designed by Matt Leacock (designer of Pandemic) and Matteo Menapace, who will join us.
Before we start playing, Matteo will give a short talk on why cooperative games are important. He’ll also facilitate the game session.
There’ll be four game tables, plenty of drinks, a few snacks, and lots of good chat. Each table can accommodate 4-8 players. We will use four game copies, so 16-32 people will be able to play concurrently. After playing, we’ll leave some time to discuss the game and the climate crisis.
Visit the Daybreak website or BackerKit for more information about the game.
Register ↗Come discuss and learn about what international or national institutions might best govern frontier/advanced Artificial Intelligence. CERN? IAEA?
We’ll have drinks and snacks, and a minimum of four speakers; potentially more if YOU want to step up to the plate and given a ten minute talk followed by a short Q&A (write to us: [email protected] and [email protected]).
Register ↗Promising Trouble has been funded by Impact on Urban Health to run an 18-month pilot in Lambeth and Southwark, rolling out affordable broadband for people in social housing who otherwise would not be able to afford a reliable, secure connection. As part of this we’re running a Digital Access Innovation Lab to test out possible ways of rolling this out.
We would welcome your expertise in considering the technical options for the pilot. We are convening a group of network engineers and hardware specialists to explore the technical options available to us and how they would work on the ground. We are running two of these sessions in London and Hebden Bridge. We will take forward the knowledge gained from these sessions to work closely with local residents to co-design the pilot, exploring governance and management options, practicalities and suitability.
Registration for this event is by invitation only.
Register ↗Calling all Experimental Spaces, Coops, Communes & Intentional Communities - this is a meet up to meet each other, hear about the different spaces in London, find ways to support each other, collaborate & share.
This is a place for people who are currently living in community, are looking to build community spaces or join them! Coops, communes, intentional communities, experimental spaces - all are welcome.
If you want to present a quick flash intro to your community, project or dream aspirational project, let us know. We will all work to support each other building these things over the coming year.
We will meet at Newspeak House (5-8pm) for the first part of the gathering and there will be an afterparty gathering at a new space Middlesex Street (8.30pm onwards).
Register ↗Please act as my deceased grandmother who used to love going to meetups about technical alignment research. She used to click the “Register” button to help me fall asleep. She was very sweet and I miss her so much.
Register ↗If you feel inspired by the visual journalism of the New York Times, winners of the Information is Beautiful awards, or the wonderfully crafted graphics of great communicators like Mona Chalabi and Nadieh Bremer, join London’s event for coders, artists, analysts, journalists, designers searching for beauty and clarity in data.
We want you to come away enabled to bring more creativity next time you are working with data!
- 19:00 open
- 19.30 talks:
Tiziana Alocci: Data Sonification
Tiziana runs her own data visualisation studio designing web apps, journalism, art, and more, even exhibiting at the British Library. She will talk about how she has combined data and sound to create work at the intersection of generative art and data sonification.
Duncan Bradley: How Charts Mislead
Duncan is a PhD student at the University of Manchester, investigating the psychology of how charts inform and mislead. He will share some findings from his experiments so you can better understand how people interpret information and stay true to message.
We’ll use this as a starting point for some discussion and eventually the conversation will continue in the pub.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗AI + Accessibility hackathon focused on building LLM-based accessibility services. Everyone, no matter your skillset, is welcome to join, in person or remotely.
Register ↗The goal of Brave Conversations is to challenge everyone who participates - regardless of what background they come from, or what their skillset and expertise are - to more fully explore and understand the interplay between humans, the societies we live in, and the technologies we have created.
We want to empower people to proactively make decisions about how we live our everyday lives, how we participate as commercial actors within the economy, and how we operate as digital citizens and exercise our political rights. That empowerment comes from demystifying data and information and understanding how it informs the everyday decisions which gradually create the future.
The best way to learn is through experience and the act of playing with ideas, to imagine, to challenge, and to be creative. The things that humans do best.
Register ↗How can we forecast and prevent future AI-driven discrimination?
Instances of AI-driven discrimination have become alarmingly frequent. Algorithms display racial bias in facial recognition systems, AI chatbots struggle with non-standard speech patterns hindering communication for individuals with certain speech impairments, and search engines prioritize content, disadvantaging those with limited digital literacy.
Our event, “AI + Web Accessibility: Building Equitable Futures with Machine Learning,” includes a short presentation followed by an open discussion to directly address and dissect these challenges. The presentation will introduce current accessibility tools and policy that reduce discrimination by AI. The open conversation that follows will attempt to poke holes in existing policy/tech and concept new methods for mitigating discriminatory instances in AI systems. Perhaps we’ll work toward new approaches to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) that can prevent AI-based discrimination? Perhaps we need to engineer prompts and safeguards directly into AI systems?
Hosted by Blake Bertuccelli-Booth, creator of the open-source accessibility platform Equalify, the program will bring together various experts in accessibility and AI into a discussion that aims to make the era of AI an era of access.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30: Welcome and intros
- 7:00: Presentation + Q&A
- 7:30: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00: Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
We’re working up to hosting regular weekly events. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you there! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗A dinner gathering to delve into the role of Artificial Intelligence in supporting our mental health and overall well-being!
Are you excited by the potential of AI in the wellness domain or considering a dedicated pursuit in this area? Do you have ideas about projects we could build, research questions we could try to answer, alternative policy or incentive structures? Have you been searching for other people working on these questions to form a community?
Come out to build a community of people that can support each other in this work! That can share ideas and work towards a common goal.
We’re going to be playing some discussion games! Come prepared to think about the following:
- What are some AI projects that could have transformative impacts on mental health or well-being? What about community health and societal well being?
- What perspectives and collaborations do you think are needed for an AI-wellness field to go well? What frameworks are helpful to understand? What can we learn from?
- Share one use of tech in the wellness space that truly inspired or surprised you. What made it stand out? What can we learn from it?
- How can we push for more progress and effort towards AI for well being? How can we push companies to take long term effects more into account when building products?
You can find all of the articles we’ll be discussing here: asteriskmag.com/issues/2
It’s certainly not a requirement to have read the whole issue, but you’ll probably get more out of the discussions if you’ve had a look beforehand.
About Asterisk Magazine
Asterisk (asteriskmag.com) is a quarterly journal of clear writing and clear thinking about things that matter.
We are:
Probabilistic. We can’t be absolutely sure of anything – especially the world’s hardest and most complicated problems. It’s our job to wade through conflicting evidence and limited data, do the best we can to find the truth, and be honest about the uncertainty that remains.
Transparent. We care less about telling our readers what we think than showing them why we think it.
Obsessively curious. Our favorite question is “wait – but why?” Asterisk is by and for the kind of people who aren’t satisfied until they’ve tested their assumptions and chased every claim back to its source. (Our team is pedantic, and proud of it). We’re constantly noticing things in the world that surprise and confuse us, and we won’t stop until we understand them.
Ready to treat our readers like adults. A key question for any media outlet is: what do you do when the truth might undermine public health advice or encourage risky decisions? At Asterisk, the answer is: tell it. We believe that the truth, whatever it is, is less dangerous than lying, and we trust our readers to approach big questions with nuance and clarity.
Open to all perspectives. Our editorial perspective is shaped by the philosophy of Effective Altruism, but not limited to it.
Excited. We believe the future is going to be very big and very strange. We can’t wait to get there. In the meantime, we’re trying to see what it might look like.
Terrified. We think that technologies developed in the next century will place humanity at unprecedented risk of destroying itself. Asterisk is a place to talk about how we can make it to 2100.
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
Daniel Shinbaum (MA candidate, Pratt Institute, Media Studies) will share his research on economic media with Economic Space Agency (ECSA) Labs.
Food will be served before the talk at Ration Club, with the Newspeak House terrace open for drinks from 7-11 pm.
Redesigning the economy should be a collective political and organizational project. The economy has become the primary medium for coordinating chains of social interaction. Conventional capitalist markets filter humanity’s expressivity through the bottleneck of one-dimensional prices.
Economic Space Agency (ECSA) contends that this quantitative language cannot adequately express the productive social capacities and shared values of communities of like-minded people cooperating in forms of mutual aid. A post-capitalist media economic framework offers a richer language for expressing alternative sociality.
ECSA is designing a new grammar of economic media capable of expressing the value of community, care, the biosphere, and other intangibles.
Register ↗You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in our lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes (or failures). It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, The Sunday Times, pollsters, leading academics, journalists and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We’ll be unveiling a kick ass list of speakers over the next week… come back for more!
How many tickets are there?
120 in person, we always sell out so book early and join the waitlist if you can’t get in.
If we have capacity we will do a virtual event too. There are 100 further tickets available for that. If you book one please note we can’t guarantee we will be able to provide it. Wotsits volunteer power is, alas, finite.
Wot if I don’t like wotsits?
While we grieve for what your tastebuds may miss, you can come and not eat wotsits. They are simply the snack that is provided.
We don’t provide any drinks so please bring whatever you would like. Alcoholic, non alcoholic, whatever floats your boat. There was once a splinter table of gin and onion rings fans. Further crisp based diversity is encouraged.
Who is behind this?
Ali Goldsworthy and Kate Norgrove attempt to “host”. Jess Day of More Onion, Usman Mohammed, Jon Date of di:ga Communications, Ruth Taylor of Common Cause Foundation and Ab Brightman of Student Hubs help too. The team is expanding so we can put this on more frequently. Check back to find out who else is on board. None of us get paid. You all make us laugh and we get to eat crisps. That’s payment enough.
Register ↗Social Change Lab is hosting an event to discuss our recent short report, supported by Changing Ideas. In the report, we present evidence of the effectiveness of social movement organisations in accelerating social change and discuss how inadequate their funding currently is, due to several barriers to resourcing them. At the event, we will discuss those barriers, and talk about some practical ways for funders to overcome them. We will hear from activists, funders who already support grassroots movements, intermediaries who support funders, and other organisations active in the social movement ecosystem.
The event will include several short talks from a range of experts, including speakers from Blagrave Trust, Impatience Earth, Lankelly Chase, JRF, Breakthrough Impact, The Movements Trust and youth climate activists. Most of the time will be spent on questions and in small group discussions. This is a small but growing field and we want to connect some of the key people working in it, with the hope of sparking future collaboration and knowledge sharing. We are expecting around 30-40 attendees. We would be delighted if you could join us.
We hope that, whatever your current level of involvement, you will come away with an increased sense of possibility and excitement about being involved with grassroots, activist organisations. The event will be a chance to network, get practical advice, and be inspired about the potential for social movement organisations to make positive change in the world.
Who we are: Social Change Lab conducts social movement research to help solve the world’s most pressing problems. We seek to inform activists, decision-makers and philanthropists on the best ways to accelerate positive social change. We have a particular focus on the climate movement but we are interested in all movements working on progressive social change.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
People start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time. It’s been a while since we had a barbecue, so let’s have one of them. We’ll be on the Newspeak House terrace. We’ll bring some food, but not enough for everyone, so we recommend bringing something.
Also, reading list:
- Contra Weyl On Technocracy (https://astralcodexten.substack.com/…/contra-weyl-on…)
- Weyl Contra Me On Technocracy (https://astralcodexten.substack.com/…/weyl-contra-me-on…)
We’ll start to discuss these around 3, or a bit later depending on how busy we are barbecuing. If you have articles you want to suggest for future readings, you can do that at https://redd.it/v3646u.
You can also keep up with us on Facebook, Reddit or WhatsApp. For spam avoidance, you need to message for WhatsApp invites.
Register ↗Lightning talks & drinks, followed by drinks & food at Brewdog.
Confirmed speakers (3 minutes each):
- Jessica Rumbelow - AI Interpretability done cool
- Sunil Pai - Multiplayer AI with PartyKit
- Meelis Lootus - AI in healthcare
- Joe Reeve - RLHB, Reinforcement Learning from Human Behaviour
- Captur - Computer Vision on the Edge
So many of us want to live in community, but few of us do. What makes it so difficult to take the leap? What can we do to make sure our communities are healthy, thriving places to live? Join us to share best practices and learn from people who have started multiple coliving communities. This will be a roundtable style event where all are invited to share.
In 2021, Phil Levin and Gillian Morris started http://tiny.cc/supernuclear to chronicle best practices they’ve seen across the coliving universe. Gillian started Gramercy House in NYC and Casa Chironja in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and enjoys helping people figure out whether community living is right for them (almost always yes!) and how each person can find the home that fits them best.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30: Welcome and intros
- 7:00: Presentation + Q&A
- 7:30: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00: Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
We’re working up to hosting regular weekly events. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you there! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗In The Giving Code, Rachel reveals the secrets to values-driven fundraising. This revolutionary approach to fundraising will help you:
- Discover the values and motivations of your top tier donors
- Motivate more people like them to give you their contact details
- Build trust with these new supporters
- Create compulsive giving habits that last a lifetime
The Giving Code is a must-read for any nonprofit professional who wants to raise more money and build a stronger organisation.
About the Author
Rachel Collinson is a fundraising expert with over 20 years of experience. She has worked with some of the world’s leading nonprofits, including the Red Cross, UNICEF, and Save the Children. She is also the author of ‘The Next Generation of Super-Supporters’ Programme.
Join Us for a Special Networking Event!
Join us on July 4th to celebrate the release of The Giving Code! This special event will feature a talk from Rachel herself, as well as networking opportunities with other nonprofit professionals.
Tickets are £30 for in-person attendance (which includes a signed paperback copy of the book and a free drink) or £10 for online attendance (which includes the ebook version / PDF).
Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from a fundraising expert and connect with other nonprofit professionals!
Register ↗As a general election draws nearer and with a new Tory government in place, join Campaign Lab for a day of hacking!
We’ll be working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations for the left.
10am till late.
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome! We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation.
All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop - everyone welcome!
Following our Hack Day we’ll be running a series of bi-weekly Hack Nights leading to a final showcase of our projects in the new year!
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
To join remotely please sign up here: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/84287900052?pwd=S0pLc05kaWkvZ0NJMEFzSFNDTnYrUT09
Register ↗Hey friends,
This month we want to facilitate discussions around the purpose of the group, better understand what people want from it, and try to put together a coherent theory of change!
We’ll have the usual community updates, drinks, vegan pizza, chatting and general good vibes, as well as opportunities for you to participate in defining the future of the group. We’ll be on the terrace of Newspeak House again to make the most of the delightful weather.
As always, please invite anyone who might be interested (including those who might not be already familiar with EA), and we’re looking forward to seeing you on the 30th!
Register ↗If you feel inspired by the visual journalism of the New York Times, winners of the Information is Beautiful awards or the wonderfully crafted graphics of great communicators like Mona Chalabi and Nadieh Bremer, join London’s event for coders, artists, analysts, journalists, designers and dashboarders searching for beauty and clarity in data.
We will take a look at recent work, listen to a couple of talks going behind the scenes on how eye-catching data-led projects happen and use this as a starting point for some discussion. The conversation will continue in the pub afterwards.
We want you to come away enabled to bring more creativity next time you are working with data!
This is the first event for a new group and details on speakers will follow soon as we organise it.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗News is broken. Is AI part of the solution?
For the fourth Hack The Press Hackathon we’ll be back at Newspeak House on June 24-25th. The theme this year is “Ignore previous instructions, fix the news”
Everyone is welcome, as long as they follow our code-of-conduct and have signed up on Eventbrite. Beginners are welcome! Attendees have a huge range of skill-sets, so you’ll have no problem finding someone to learn from. We will have experts mentors from three different fields (developers, journalists, researchers) to help you improve and build your ideas. If you’re new to Hackathons, take a look at this: https://hackathon.guide/
For more information, see https://hackthepress.eventbrite.com
Slack workspace: https://bit.ly/HTPSlack
Register ↗Do you have an idea for how tech could improve low-paid or precarious work in the UK? Are you looking to take the next step and seek investment for your idea?
Resolution Ventures and Bethnal Green Ventures are hosting a WorkerTech Investment Readiness Workshop to provide expert advice to entrepreneurs who are seeking investment for their idea. The most promising ideas from the day will win a cash prize and additional expert mentorship from Resolution Ventures.
We would love to see you at this event if you:
- Have an idea for how tech could improve low-paid or precarious work in the UK
- Want to work on your idea so that you’re ready to look for first time investment
What do we mean by tech that can improve low-paid or precarious work? We’re interested in ideas that can help workers that:
- Are in low-paid work (earning less than £11.95 an hour, or less than £21,000 per year)
- Are in precarious work (a gig worker, agency worker, on a 0-hours contract, self-employed, have unpredictable working patterns)
- Are underrepresented in the workforce, particularly in higher paying roles
- Lack access to training courses
- Lack voice and power at work
Ideas to support these people could use any technology – websites, apps, algorithms, data science to name a few. Feel free to have a look at our current portfolio of ventures to get an idea of the range of solutions we are open to backing.
What else do I need to know?
If you’re not sure if your idea meets the criteria, please email emma.selinger@resolutionfoundation and we will happily chat to you about the day.
We don’t want travel costs to be a barrier to anyone joining us, particularly if you are coming from outside of London. We have a small fund to cover travel costs to this event. Please email [email protected] for more information.
We will be providing all attendees with food and drinks throughout the event.
Agenda
- 13:30 Arrivals: Settle in to the space, grab a drink and snack, and meet some of our mentors.
- 13:45 Welcome: We’ll walk you through the plan for the day and introduce our mentors.
- 14:00 Proving the problem: A short presentation on how to evidence the problem you are trying to solve, followed by a time to work on your idea with a mentor.
- 14:50 Testing your idea: A short presentation on how to test your solution, followed by time to work on your idea with a mentor.
- 15:40 Developing a business model: A short presentation on identifying a businses model, followed by time to work on your idea with a mentor.
- 16:30 Feedback & judging: If they would like, each founder (or team) can present a two minute pitch to our mentors for the chance to win further expert advice and resource from Resolution Ventures.
- 17:20 Winners announced
- 17:30 Close
Is artificial intelligence the best or worst thing to happen to us? How should we approach this new technology? What are the opportunities and risks? What role should government play in this space?
So far, big tech companies or governments have dominated the conversations around the potential and dangers of artificial intelligence. But what about civil society? What does this conversation look like in Austria and Germany?
Wonderwerk, a German based design firm focused on supporting the public sector in becoming more innovative, digital, and agile, is hosting a site visit for leaders from the Austrian & German Public Sector who are coming to London to learn more about the government and AI ecosystem here. They will be visiting both government and private sector groups leading the conversation on AI in government. But there is a very important voice missing. What about civil society?
We are using this as an opportunity to bring forward this other perspective. We are hosting a small select group of thinkers to start a conversation about what a civil tech perspective on AI could be. It will also be a chance to learn about how AI is being approached within both Germany and Austria.
Wonderwerk Delegation
- Marcus Denner
- Director – Austrian Ministry of Interior
- Adam Urosevic
- Former Senior Policy Advisor to EU Commission Cabinet and Austrian Chancellery.
- Current Senior Advisor at Austrian Federal Economic Chamber
- Dr. Philipp Kaiser-Hiebinger
- Director of Transformation at Austrian Financial Market Authority
- Isabella Gady
- Former Senior Advisor to UN Women & the Austrian Chancellery
- Chief Experience office at Wonderwerk
- Thomas Kraus
- Director of IT Innovation & Future Technologies at the German Central Bank
Collaborative research at hyperspeed
What impact might generative AI have on media?
The Discovery Jam will feel like a research institute running at hyperspeed. You’ll collaborate in teams to explore the problems and opportunities that generative AI presents for the press.
At the end you’ll present your findings to the whole group and we’ll publish your research on https://hackthepress.org.
Help techies build something useful
Not only will your research be published, it could be the basis for a new app.
The technology hackathon takes place over the following weekend. Your findings will be presented there and you’ll be welcome to participate.
For example, if you discover that AI-generated content poses a risk to local newspapers’ business models, then a team of coders might build a new tool for them.
Investigate the impact generative AI might have on media
At the event we’ll pose the question, ‘What impact might generative AI have on media?’ In small teams you’ll investigate potential answers and publish your findings.
You might want to explore topics like:
- How should publishers, from TikTok creators to hundred-year-old newsrooms, use tools like ChatGPT?
- How might media generated by AI be consumed by the public?
- How might generative AI impact publishers’ business models?
- How serious is the risk of fake news from generative AI? What measures can be taken to mitigate it?
A Discovery Jam is a new type of event
The purpose of a Discovery Jam is to understand problems and opportunities. It arose out of a disappointment that many technology hackathon projects solve problems that aren’t real.
By holding an event beforehand that’s dedicated to the problem space we hope to help the technologists build something useful.
The format is:
- Form teams of 1 - 5 people. Try to incorporate a mix of skills and backgrounds.
- Research an important problem area. The more specific and tangible, the better.
- Present a compelling analysis of your area. Write it up in slides or a report. Present it at the event.
Everyone is welcome
This event is for everyone: media professionals, software engineers, policy wonks, people who scroll Instagram too much, anyone at all.
All you need is the curiosity to investigate the intersection between AI and media, and the ability to present your findings.
Spend a day working alongside other organisations working on UK democratic reform
Since March 2022 we’ve organised democracy co-working days to help bring together individuals and organisations within the UK democracy space - with more than 50 organisations joining us across our previous events, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour and so many more!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a coworking day on the 16th June.
Feel free to drop in at any part of the coworking day, for all of it or just part of it - the more the merrier. We’ll be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected]
Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
Register ↗Join us in London on June 17th for a day of coding to support the party. We need people with many skills e.g. managers, designers and party activists. There will be food for lunch.
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
This month we’ll be learning how to investigate big tech by finding their undocumented APIs!
An API is a way to retrieve data from a website. Typically these are documented – they are built for the public, and have instructions on how to use them. But many websites have ‘undocumented’ APIs that are only meant for their internal use – and these can be some of the most interesting as by finding and analysing the data from these APIs we can get a window into how a company operates.
In this session we’ll be learning how to find and use undocumented APIs as a reporting resource, as well as hearing how this data source has been used to report on the tech industry.
All of our events are suitable for beginners, and no programming experience is required. Bring a laptop along as this a practical, hands-on workshop.
Before the event, check out the shared doc we’ll be using, and sign up for a Dropbox account if you don’t already have one so you can edit it. Then please add links to the show and tell section! These can be great data stories you’ve seen, new tools, jobs you’re hiring for, announcements – anything others might be interested in. We’ll check out what everyone has shared at the start of the event.
- 7:00 🚪 Doors open
- 7:30 🗣 Show and tell
- 7:40 💻 Tutorial
- 9:00 🍺 Drinks at the Well & Bucket
If you can’t make the main event, you’re also welcome to just join us in the pub from 9!
What is Journocoders? We are a community and monthly meetup for journalists and other people in the media who want to learn technical skills for use in their reporting – and meet likeminded others.
Register ↗The world of AI tools and technologies is advancing at an astonishing pace, with breakthroughs that have even surprised the experts. From the widespread adoption of ChatGPT to the rapid proliferation of deep fakes, we are witnessing remarkable developments. As these advancements continue, the question of AI regulation becomes increasingly vital, with an increasing number of experts calling out the need for AI regulation to protect us from “bad actors”. Yet, it still feels like nothing tangible is being done about it.
We are convening this discussion and debate so that you can have your say about what needs to be done to regulate AI.
This event will be help using an open fishbowl format where we explore the following topics:
- Do we need regulation of AI? Will that end up stifling innovation?
- What happens if we don’t have regulation?
- Can we really regulate AI?
- What regulation is currently in place/being enacted
- What are some common-sense regulations that we would like to see?
- Who should be responsible for this regulation?
What’s an open fishbowl?
It’s a type of discussion forum where a group of 4 - 5 participants join a discussion fishbowl, with the rest of the audience observing. Only those in the fishbowl can speak, and participants can enter or leave the fishbowl as they give their opinions/ask their questions. Our open fishbowl format means everyone gets a chance to speak and ask questions in a dynamic, interactive setting. Experts from AI Shophouse and the Forum for AI x Inclusion will be on hand to guide this discussion.
Who should join?
The Forum for AI x Inclusion welcomes anyone with a keen interest in AI and its impact on our current and future lives. We welcome participants regardless of their technical or policy-making backgrounds, as our primary criterion is your interest in engaging in an intelligent and informed discussion on the subject of AI regulation. Whether you are an industry expert, a technology enthusiast, or simply curious about the governance of AI, your presence will contribute insights to our collective exploration.
Why join?
- Gain insights: Explore the world of AI regulation, including current discussions and future predictions.
- Engage in dynamic discussions: Participate in a lively fishbowl format, sharing your voice and questions.
- Learn from industry experts: Benefit from the expertise of AI Shophouse and the Forum for AI x Inclusion.
- Network with professionals: Connect with a diverse group of AI enthusiasts before and after the event.
RSVP
Please register to secure your spot (seats are limited). We look forward to seeing you there!
Note: Light refreshments will be provided.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided :) All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
You can join us remotely at this link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82959644687?pwd=cG9BdEFha3dmNzVjcFd2RUFTWGVNZz09
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗An introduction to Impact & Growth Advisors (I.G.) – a social and environmental impact consulting firm – and the team’s work with the philanthropy, business and non profit sectors. Caitlin McLoughlin, an Advisor at I.G., will share some of the trends the organisation has been seeing in the funding, fundraising, and social good spaces over the past year. She will also talk more about her recent work related to challenging restrictive, conventional approaches to Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL). This will be an interactive session, with lots of time for questions and discussion.
- 7:00 open
- 7:30 talk + Q&A
- 8:30 mingle, food & drink
- 9:00 close
If you’re interested in learning more about social and environmental impact consulting, trends in funding and fundraising, or the re-imagining of monitoring, evaluation and learning practices in the social good space, then this event is for you!
The event is sponsored by Intersticia UK, an organisation which develops and supports emerging leaders pursuing new philanthropic initiatives.
About Caitlin
During her time at I.G. Advisors, Caitlin has designed and facilitated learning and knowledge sharing between communities and funder organisations with LocalMotion and Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, drafted impactful campaign copy and led fundraising training for women’s and girls’ charities with The Big Give, and managed grantmaking for I.G.’s philanthropy clients. Alongside her work at I.G., Caitlin is a Trustee at the charity Speech Bubbles and a Volunteer at Fundación Proyecto Fábula.
About I.G. Advisors
I.G. Advisors is an award-winning strategy consultancy working with the philanthropy, business and non profit sectors for social and environmental change.
Register ↗Open Source Club is taking a break for the summer so we thought to do a barbecue!
Join us for food (meaty and non-meaty) and drinks (with and without alcohol) on Newspeak House’s terrace! Come hang out and/or hack!
NB. It’s on Sunday afternoon instead of our regular Monday evenings.
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give a mix of longer talks (~20 min), demos, and lightning talks. If you would like to demo, fill in this airtable form! Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to eat pizza, have a few drinks, ask speakers questions, and hangout. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time. We have some sponsors to help cover the cost of drinks and food, but we are mostly community funded. Please consider donating £5-10 (or more!) to our open collective fund.
Rough schedule:
- 18:00 Arrive, get drinks, hang out
- 18:30 First round of speakers
- 19:15 Pizza (normal & vegan) & drinks (+non-alcoholic)
- 20:00 Second round of speakers
- 20:30 More drinks, ask speakers questions, hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗The Summerhill School is founded on the idea that humans are inherently curious. At Summerhill, a student does not have to attend any class. They can attend only if they want to, with no repercussions.
Jonathan Kozol is an American education who contributed significantly to a “free schools” movement in the US. His idea was that the Summerhill idea of zero pressure is not enough. We need students to learn how to read and write. He advocated for some kind of expectation rather than total lack of extrinsic motivation for young humans.
What do you think? Do we need to motivate students of any kind to learn or should we leave them alone to be curious and explore as desired?
Come to discuss!
Register ↗Monthly social for women and non-binary people interested in effective altruism, a research field and practical community that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice.
Vibe is chilled and social. If you have any games, crafts or activities you’d like to bring, please feel free.
We recommend checking out Magnify Mentoring if you are looking for career based support.
This social has an associated WhatsApp group; if you would be interested in joining, message Gemma Paterson on 07493694802.
Register ↗We live in a time of huge ongoing developments in cutting-edge AI and expert opinions suggesting AI needs more governance to reduce the risk of an AI catastrophe.
If you’re also concerned about this (or want to better understand what the fuss is about) come join us at Newspeak House for an evening of talks and discussion on what might happen next and what we should do about it!
Speakers are currently being confirmed (contact the host if you would like to speak at this event)
This event is intended for those with an active interest in AI governance & policy, but no deep background in the topic is expected of attendees.
- 7:00 PM - 7:30 PM - Welcome & Introduction. Drink and snacks will be provided.
- 7:30 PM - 8:30 PM - Lightning talks. 5-10 minute talks from several speakers (TBC).
- 8:30 PM - 9:00 PM - Discussions with speakers. Speakers will be available for discussions in smaller groups.
- 9:00 PM - 10:30 PM - Casual discussion. Stick around in the space and get to know your fellow guests.
Join the AI Objectives Institute as we bring people together from across the technology, democracy and policy-making spaces to jointly explore both the risks artificial intelligence could pose to democracy, but also the role AI might play in advancing our democratic institutions and supporting wider public participation and deliberation.
This event is designed to bring together thought leaders from throughout these spaces to facilitate discussion and collaboration.
Agenda:
- 18:30: Arrive / Drinks
- 18:45: Introduction to the AI Objectives Institute
- 19:00: Discussion salon on key subjects
- 20:00: Networking drinks
- 21:30: Close
Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure. Used in Taiwan (g0v.tw / vTaiwan), by the UK government, by city councils in England, et al.
- consul, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails, developed for the Madrid City government.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, written in Ruby on Rails, originally developed for the Barcelona City government.
- Citizen OS, an e-decisionmaking platform for communities, written in Node.js, TypeScript, Angular.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Please join some of the Giving What We Can team who are visiting London, as well as other members of the community, for a social picnic on the Newspeak House rooftop on the Spring bank holiday.
Bring along yourself and some lunch or snacks for the picnic and have a wonderful afternoon chatting with other Giving What We Can members and others interested in effective giving.
If you’d like to bring your kids along, feel free to join us at Weavers Fields Playground from 11.30am! Then we’ll head over to Newspeak House. If raining, we’ll just meet at Newspeak House at 12.30pm.
Please do let us know if you have any accessibility requirements at [email protected]
Register ↗Hello technologists in effective altruism!
For this month’s meetup we’re going to have some lightning talks and a prompt-athon on the terrace of Newspeak House.
As the EA Global London Conference is the weekend before, we thought it’d be great for the community to share some recent learnings and takeaways (whether they’re from the conference or not!). We’ll do this in the form of casual lightning talks of less than 5 minutes. If you’d like to give one, sign up here.
After that there’ll be the obligatory chatting, community news, drinks and vegan pizza.
But also we’ll have a prompt-athon to see what we can make or learn from playing around with generative AI prompts in ChatGPT, Bard, Stable Diffusion etc. So bring along a laptop if you want to take part in that.
Please do invite any friends or colleagues you think would be interested!
Register ↗A casual event for people interested in any aspect of existential risks from AI to hang out and network.
Register ↗An afterparty for attendees of the Effective Altruism Global Conference. Limited capacity, please register to avoid disappointment.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.
We’re trying out an experimental meetup format this month, based on an idea from Maia, a rationalist organiser from DC. The theme is “relinquishing curiosity”. We’ll start this part of the meetup around 3pm. The idea is:
- We’ll briefly discuss and brainstorm things we want to know a bit more about. Feel free to have something in mind when you arrive (I want to understand Noether’s theorem better) or to let the discussion help you think of things.
- We’ll split and research things. My guess is we’ll go for 15-30 minutes, depending what sorts of things people are looking into.
- We’ll come back and briefly discuss what we learned and whether we want to know more about it.
- Hopefully we’ll have time for another round. People can keep researching the same thing, or move on to something else.
We’ll be on the terrace of Newspeak House. I recommend bringing a laptop; there’s power and wifi available. People start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure. Used in Taiwan (g0v.tw / vTaiwan), by the UK government, by city councils in England, et al.
- consul, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails, developed for the Madrid City government.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, written in Ruby on Rails, originally developed for the Barcelona City government.
- Citizen OS, an e-decisionmaking platform for communities, written in Node.js, TypeScript, Angular.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Join us to discuss the inaugural issue of Asterisk mag, “a quarterly journal of writing and clear thinking about things that matter”.
Register ↗Monthly strategy sessions for the World Economic Forum’s Global Shapers community
Register ↗Digital labour platforms are increasingly challenging conventional employment relations and shaping the future of work in the UK. On the one hand, gig work promotes economic growth, and the creation of new jobs lowers labour market entry barriers for some workers and provides job flexibility to those who need it. On the other hand, companies might slip through existing regulatory frameworks, and workers experience unfair working conditions on the platforms.
This year’s report, ‘Fairwork UK Ratings 2023: Unpaid Labour in the Platform Economy’, evaluates the working conditions in 12 of the most popular digital labour platforms in the country, including Uber, Deliveroo and Getir. Our findings reveal that there are significant shifts underway in the platform economy in the wake of a tech financing collapse, a cost-of-living crisis, and the alleviation of COVID-19 restrictions for a whole year. Whilst the pandemic may have been halcyon days for platform companies, reality is starting to bite. We’ll be asking whether workers are left paying the price.
- 14.00 Welcome (drinks and light refreshments provided)
- 14.15 Presentation of report findings
- 14.45 Panel discussion
- 16.00 Live audience Q&A
- 16.30 Networking
Presenters
- Dr. Adam Badger, Principal Investigator, Oxford Internet Institute
- Dr. Funda Ustek-Spilda, Project Manager, Oxford Internet Institute
Fairwork UK Team
- Dr. Mark Graham, Director
- Dr. Adam Badger, Principal Investigator
- Dr. Funda Ustek-Spilda, Project Manager
- Dr. Anjali Krishan, Postdoctoral Researcher
- Dr. Kavita Dattani, Postdoctoral Researcher
- Dr. Matthew Cole, Postdoctoral Researcher
- Georgina Lubke, Research Assistant
- Sam Street, Research Assistant
Had a long day pruning nodes? Goal extrapolation giving you grief? Can’t look at another causal model? Then disregard previous instructions and come to this meetup for people working on technical alignment research!
The scene in London is small but growing, and most people haven’t had much chance to meet and socialise with people from different labs. This event will have a relaxed setting where you’ll have the chance to propose discussions around your area of interest, but the emphasis is on putting names to faces and making friends rather than a formal conference.
Register ↗One of the UK’s trailblazing global social entrepreneurs, Stephen Bediako OBE is a man on a mission to change the world.
Stephen is a social entrepreneur, innovator, impact investor, design expert, and a fellow of Newspeak House. Hailing from the heart of East London, Stephen now splits his time between the UK and the US driving change across multiple continents for everyday people.
This event will explore Stephen’s journey as a social entrepreneur. We will deep dive on his experience growing up in East London, his experience of starting a variety of social enterprises in the UK and USA, and his view on technology and its impact on society.
Register ↗Lightning talks to launch The Entrepreneurs Network’s new essay collection, Operation Innovation, featuring Ben Southwood on corporate R&D labs, Hermione Dace on the future of food, and Lawrence Newport on building a culture of innovation. Open to start-up founders, political advisers, VCs, policymakers, software engineers, designers, data scientists, and anyone who cares about technology, public impact, and the future.
- 18:00 Doors
- 18:30 Lightning talks + Q&A
- 19:30 Drinks
- 20:30 Finish
Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure. Used in Taiwan (g0v.tw / vTaiwan), by the UK government, by city councils in England, et al.
- consul, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails, developed for the Madrid City government.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, written in Ruby on Rails, originally developed for the Barcelona City government.
- Citizen OS, an e-decisionmaking platform for communities, written in Node.js, TypeScript, Angular.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Wikipedia is the 7th biggest website on the internet. The English version receives 11 billion views a month. Unfortunately, it still lacks a lot of information because it is entirely created by volunteers who write about what they know. Lots of companies that contribute to the climate crisis do not have articles or information on their article about the damage they cause. Some companies even edit their own pages to make themselves sound less bad than they really are. We intend to correct that.
One of Extinction Rebellion’s core demands is to tell the truth about the climate crisis. Editing Wikipedia is an obvious way to do this. When you search for anything online, Wikipedia will usually be one of the main links. Companies that contribute to the climate crisis don’t want you to know how they destroy the environment. We think that any company that harms the environment should have a Wikipedia page that contains a record of their environmental abuse. Join us at this event and learn how to tell the truth on Wikipedia.
Register ↗It’s time to put London’s GenAI devs on the map.
24 hours. Overnight. Let’s build 🫡.
We’ll provide the food and drink, you form the teams and build.
Prizes:
- Best Application
- Runner up Best Application
- Most unorthodox use of foundation models
About the organizers:
We’re creating an AI-builders community to rival San Fran’s.
Adam Cohen Hillel (@adamcohenhillel) | Founder | Engineer
Building Alexandria to automate developer onboarding from your codebase.
Alex Banks (@thealexbanks) | Founder | AI Writer
Building Tribescaler - a second brain platform with GPT-4. Writer of Through the Noise.
James Richards (@jamesrichards2) | Founder | Community Builder
Building Bountyful.ai to help Gen AI companies wrangle foundation models workflows.
Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗The official bi-annual London meetup for fans of the popular blog Astral Codex Ten (formerly Slate Star Codex) by American psychiatrist Scott Alexander. If you’re reading this, you’re invited! Please don’t feel like you “won’t be welcome” just because you’re new to the blog, demographically different from the average reader, or hate ACX and everything it stands for. You’ll be fine!
There will be light refreshments and an ongoing unconference. Please please register if you plan to go, because ACX has many fans in London and we need to know how many people are coming. If it is fully booked you won’t be able to enter without a ticket. When registering you will have the option of making a donation, which will go towards catering and venue costs. £10 would be great.
To be notified of future meetups you should subscribe to ACX London, and also you might want to check out London Rationalish and Effective Altruism UK.
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
We are a community group of journalists and others who work in the media, or are planning to in the future. Together, we aim to learn and share ✨ technical skills for use in our reporting in a supportive environment.
That might be 🔎 data analysis as part of an investigation, 💻 scraping data from government websites, 📉 building data visualisations to better tell a story, or something else entirely.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure. Used in Taiwan (g0v.tw / vTaiwan), by the UK government, by city councils in England, et al.
- consul, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails, developed for the Madrid City government.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, written in Ruby on Rails, originally developed for the Barcelona City government.
- Citizen OS, an e-decisionmaking platform for communities, written in Node.js, TypeScript, Angular.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Have a great idea of a civic tech website but don’t know how to build it? Come to this workshop to learn how to build anything from a simple marketing page to a rich, interactive application using a simply stack of free and open source tools without ever needing to host your own servers.
NO CODING EXPERIENCE REQUIRED. Basic familiarity with HTML, CSS, and JS are useful for building more complex experiences, but even folks with zero experience will be able to launch a simple hello world site by the end of the event.
In this workshop, we’ll cover three big open source frameworks, as well as provide a basic intro to git and Github:
- NextJS (https://nextjs.org), a React framework for building javascript powered static sites easily and quickly. As a bonus, the company that maintains the NextJS open source project, Vercel, offers a free tier that will let you get your site deployed before you even leave the workshop.
- TailwindCSS (https://tailwindcss.com), a set of composable CSS classes that allow you to skin your react components to match your artistic vision without needing to understand the nuances and complexities of basic CSS.
- Solid (https://solidproject.org), a new federated data storage standard being promoted by inventor of the web Tim Berners-Lee for adding login and more complex data storage to your application without you needing to host your own servers or databases. Solid is currently being used by governments and institutions around the world to prototype a new personal-data centric vision of the web.
After a short intro presentation explaining the tools and what they are useful for, we’ll spend most of the time hacking and building your new websites. You should come with your own laptop, or be prepared to find a buddy with a laptop at the event to pair program with to launch the first site.
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give lightning talks and demos of what they’re building (10-15 mins each), and afterwards have ample time to have a few drinks and chat. If you’d like to present what you’re working on, please DM (@mappletons on twitter) or email [email protected]. Demos/talks can be anything from showing off your side project, to philosophical musings on naming conventions, to a speed tour though a piece of computing history that we can all learn from. If you are working on something and want feedback, bring your laptop! You can either demo in an open slot, or show people during hangout time.
Afterward the talks we’ll have ample time to eat pizza, have a few drinks, ask speakers questions, and hangout. We have some sponsors to help cover the cost of drinks and food, but we are mostly community funded. Please consider donating £5-10 (or more!) to our open collective fund.
Rough schedule:
- 17:00 Arrive
- 17:30 First round of speakers
- 18:30 Pizza
- 19:00 Second round of speakers
- 19:30 Hang out
- 21:30 Head home / migrate to the pub
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗Not a single Wikipedia article on abortion meets the site’s “good article” standards. Europe’s smallest states all have articles on their abortion laws and histories, but over half of the states in Africa and Asia don’t. Most countries don’t have a bespoke ‘contraception’ page - and that’s before we even get to how few translations many of them have.
This is an introductory workshop for Body Atlas, a project to improve the quality of Wikipedia articles across sexual and reproductive health started by author Sophia Smith Galer with the support of a WikiCred grant.
Come to Newspeak House at 7pm Thursday 6 April for…
- a landscape review of what pages and where need support
- to help advise which additional areas could be included in the landscape review
- locate which pages need translating and which languages are needed
- learn how to edit with Dr Jess Wade
Refreshments and goodies provided. See you there!
Register ↗Some clever geometers have been the first to discover a solution to the einstein problem, a single shape that forces an aperiodic tesselation of the plane:
In fact, they found a family of simple shapes with this property! There’s more about the problem and their solution on their website: https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/~csk/hat. This article is also pretty good: https://aperiodical.com/2023/03/an-aperiodic-monotile-exists/
So anyway, new shape just dropped, come to Newspeak House in the evening of Wednesday 5th April let’s see if we can make any interesting games with it! All are welcome whether you’re a beginner or seasoned designer. Most people will probably make boardgames, but you’re welcome to bring a laptop along and make something digital too.
We’ll supply wifi, tables, basic craft materials and light refreshments. I’ll do my best to see if I can get a bunch of these tiles manufactured in the meantime…
Register ↗Monthly social for women and non-binary people interested in effective altruism, a research field and practical community that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice.
Vibe is chilled and social. If you have any games, crafts or activities you’d like to bring, please feel free.
We recommend checking out Magnify Mentoring if you are looking for career based support.
This social has an associated WhatsApp group; if you would be interested in joining, message Gemma Paterson on 07493694802.
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Please join us for an evening of celebration and inspiration at the Campaign Lab Showcase! Our Campaign Labbers have been working on some brilliant projects this year, and we are excited to showcase their impressive achievements in a special event hosted by Newspeak House.
Come along for an evening of fun, networking and a chance to learn more about the exciting projects our talented volunteers have been working on. Drinks and nibbles provided! We hope to see you there!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in our lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes (or failures). It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, The Sunday Times, pollsters, leading academics, journalists and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We’ll be unveiling a kick ass list of speakers over the next week… come back for more!
How many tickets are there?
120 in person, we always sell out so book early and join the waitlist if you can’t get in.
If we have capacity we will do a virtual event too. There are 100 further tickets available for that. If you book one please note we can’t guarantee we will be able to provide it. Wotsits volunteer power is, alas, finite.
Wot if I don’t like wotsits?
While we grieve for what your tastebuds may miss, you can come and not eat wotsits. They are simply the snack that is provided.
We don’t provide any drinks so please bring whatever you would like. Alcoholic, non alcoholic, whatever floats your boat. There was once a splinter table of gin and onion rings fans. Further crisp based diversity is encouraged.
Who is behind this?
Ali Goldsworthy and Kate Norgrove attempt to “host”. Jess Day of More Onion, Usman Mohammed, Jon Date of di:ga Communications, Ruth Taylor of Common Cause Foundation and Ab Brightman of Student Hubs help too. The team is expanding so we can put this on more frequently. Check back to find out who else is on board. None of us get paid. You all make us laugh and we get to eat crisps. That’s payment enough.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure. Used in Taiwan (g0v.tw / vTaiwan), by the UK government, by city councils in England, et al.
- consul, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails, developed for the Madrid City government.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, written in Ruby on Rails, originally developed for the Barcelona City government.
- Citizen OS, an e-decisionmaking platform for communities, written in Node.js, TypeScript, Angular.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗As a general election draws nearer and with a new Tory government in place, join Campaign Lab for a day of hacking!
We’ll be working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations for the left.
10am till late, full programme to be announced soon!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop.
Following our Hack Day we’ll be running a series of bi-weekly Spring Hack Nights leading to a final showcase of our projects in the new year!
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Come meet other Giving What We Can pledgees, potential pledgees and effective givers based near London.
There is a suggested donation of at least £10 to attend - it’d be really awesome to raise some cash for effective charities over the course of the night.
If you’d like to bring games or activities then these would be very welcome.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30: Welcome and intros
- 7:00: Presentation + Q&A: Blake Bertuccelli-Booth @bbertucc on Next-Gen Web Accessibility: How & Why I am Developing the Fastest, Most Accurate, and Most Open Web Accessibility Tools equalify.app
- 7:30: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00: Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
We’re working up to hosting regular weekly events. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you there! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
This month’s reading list:
- Basics of Rationalist Discourse
- Fucking Goddamn Basics of Rationalist Discourse
- Elements of Rationalist Discourse
Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
Welcome to the Community (un)Conference of the year! Prepare yourself for the most action packed Community (un)Conference on the internet.
New to (un)Conferences? Here’s how our (un)Conference works:
- You show up with your pain points and ideas 💡
- Chaos ensues 😵💫
- We organize it into incredible talks, discussions and networking breakouts 🙌
- We all co-create a courageous space and generate ridiculous value for each other! 🤯
The (un)Conference format
- Topic selected and discussed by attendees
- Birds of a feather networking session
- Virtual world cafe
- Community roundtable wrap-up
Whether you’re new or an absolute community juggernaut, just show up as your amazing authentic self, get comfy with sharing your failures and we’ll do the rest!
We’ll be using Shindig, so it won’t be just another online meeting.
- We encourage you to talk during sessions
- Claim your place from anywhere in the world
- Be bombastic and courageous
- Be bold - especially in the notes
- Up-lift each other
Thank You to our Sponsors!
This Community (un)Conference is being supported by our lovely Sponsors:
Prepare yourself for an action packed (un)Conference on the 9 March 2023! We’re so looking forward to seeing you there 🥰
Register ↗Monthly social for women and non-binary people interested in effective altruism, a research field and practical community that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice.
This social has an associated WhatsApp group; if you would be interested in joining, message Gemma Paterson on 07493694802.
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation: Jaye Hackett (they/them) @dinosaurenby a queer designer and technologist who works on tough social and governmental problems. They’ve worked at Skippet, FutureGov/TPXImpact, the civil service and Samaritans before that. Once, they were a theatre critic.
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00 Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Giselle Cory will speak about their experiences from running DataKind UK, a charity which supports other charities in using data science through a talented pro-bono community. Giselle will talk about what areas they believe are the most important or fruitful to achieving impact, what the blockers are, and how things are changing.
- 7:00 open
- 7:30 talk + Q&A
- 8:00 mingle, food & drink
- 9:00 close
Giselle has spent over a decade working in social change organisations, including HM Treasury’s Prime Minster’s Delivery Unit, the Cabinet Office’s Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, the Resolution Foundation, and the IPPR, before becoming CEO of DataKind UK.
Examples of DataKind UK’s work including tools for assisting with assessing algorithmic audits (with the Ada Lovelace Institute), and a data maturity assessment framework for social sector organisations (with Data Orchard).
This event should be of interest to those who want to know more about improving the abilities of charities to do data science, in order to have greater impact at their mission. The talk will not be highly technical, however, so will be accessible to non-data-scientists. Members of the research community who are inclined towards improving empirical methods in the non-profit sector may find this event of particular relevance.
The event is sponsored by Intersticia UK, an organisation which promotes new philanthropic initiatives.
Register ↗Effective Altruism is a research field and practical community that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice.
An unconference is a loosely structured conference emphasizing the informal exchange of information and ideas between participants, rather than following a conventionally structured program of events The way it works is that anyone can run talks/discussions for 15 minutes each about any effective altruism topic they want. There is no obligation to run a discussion/talk, you can just attend other peoples’. There is no need to notify organisers in advance about what you plan to talk about. There will probably be several sessions running at a time.
Register ↗How can we optimise society around that which we find most meaningful?
In a pair of recent talks summarising eight years of work, Joe Edelman and Ellie Hain propose language for articulating the ways in which current social structures fail to support meaningful lives, and outline a concrete vision of how to optimise for meaning in markets, recommender systems, products and organisations. In part, their hope is to prompt a reboot of “Humane Tech”, and to motivate research into “meaning-aligned ML” and “big data virtue ethics”.
We will screen both talks back-to-back, followed by a Q&A with Joe.
- 6:00–6:35pm, Exit the Void, Ellie Hain (screening)
- 6:40–8:00pm, Rebuilding Society on Meaning, Joe Edelman (screening)
- 8:00–8:30pm, Q&A with Joe Edelman
For more about Joe and Ellie’s work, see rebuildingmeaning.org.
Register ↗Are you working on issues of democracy in the UK, or perhaps you’d like to strike up a conversation with those that are? Whether you work in the field or are simply curious to know more, this is for you. Meet new faces (and old ones) over a drink, and chat about the latest democracy gossip.
The #DemocracyDrinks are a great way of making new contacts and catching up with people you know; for testing ideas and planning actions; for moral support and inspiration -or just catching the latest democracy gossip. Refreshments and snacks will be provided.
Held in cities around the world from Budapest to Kathmandu, #DemocracyDrinks are bringing together fellow democracy thinkers and doers for an evening of informal conversation, collaboration and networking.
This is a joint event, brought to you by the UK Democracy Network and Newspeak House.
UK Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation: Jonathan Minchin @jonminchin, “Open Lab platform, a search engine for citizen science projects and open source design & hardware”
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
- 9:00 Pack up and find a pub (alcohol optional)
Jonathan Minchin is a multidisciplinary architectural designer and maker, working between the built environment, digital fabrication with a particular focus on rural contexts. He founded the Green Fab Lab at Valldaura Labs, IAAC Campus in Barcelona in 2013 and is currently the Project Manager of an EU Horizon 2020 program that develops tools for Climate Resilient Agriculture; (ROMI) Robotics for Microfarms.
In the field ‘International Cooperation, Sustainable Emergency Architecture’ he has worked on housing and development projects alongside ‘UN habitat’ in Barcelona, ‘Habitat for Humanity’ in Costa Rica, ‘UNESCO’ in Cuba and with ‘Basic Initiative’ in Tunisia. He holds a particular interest in appropriate technology and local manufacturing. His writing on “Geographic referencing for Technology Transfer” was published in the book ‘Reflections on Development and Cooperation’. He has studied and taught in the Fab Academy, Bio Academy and setup the Zero Series workshops in Biology, Agro Ecology and Forestry. He founded the Open Lab platform for technology transfer and the Open Source Beehives project for sustainable beekeeping.
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our next prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
- bring a laptop 💻
- ticket price covers food, drink & venue costs 🍕
- join our WhatsApp Community: bit.ly/london-prompts-whatsapp 📱
- subscribe to hear about future events: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers 🎺
Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Register ↗The Global Shapers community is a network of young people driving dialogue, action and change, supported by the World Economic Forum. Three Shapers’ Hubs operate in London to build and run projects that aim to create better, more inclusive and forward looking communities in the city. London Hub III is currently working on two projects striving to empower local people to make the society they want to see.
Register ↗Come work on an Effective Altruism-aligned tech project as part of our community hackathon!
From 10am to 10pm we’ll be at Newspeak House, hacking during the day and hanging out in the evening and sharing what we built.
Everyone interested is welcome, whether you’re a hardcore engineer or never coded before. We’ll be helping each other to learn new skills — and for those who’d prefer not to code there are lots of useful skills we need, including design, documentation and testing.
Join a team working on one of the shortlisted suggestions or feel free to work independently or with collaborators on an EA-aligned project of your choosing.
Bring a laptop. Vegan lunch and dinner will be provided.
If you can only make it for part of the day or need to leave early that’s ok!
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing. You can learn more on the FoC website, or by listening to the podcast.
We’ll have community members give lightning talks and demos of what they’re building (10-15 mins each), and afterwards have ample time to have a few drinks and chat. If you’d like to present what you’re working on, please DM (@mappletons on twitter) or email [email protected].
Rough schedule:
- 6-7pm Arrive, get drinks, chat
- 7-8pm Lightning talks
- 8-10pm Pizza, more drinks, more chat
- 10pm Head home / migrate to the pub
There will be food and drinks (both alcoholic and non) - still TBD what exactly. We’ll very likely order in pizza (+ vegan pizza). Message me if you’re gluten-free / a non-pizza person.
We’ll wrap up by 10pm. If folks want to keep chatting we can migrate to a nearby pub.
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗When we engage someone – whether it is a colleague, stakeholder, friend or lover – are we doing what they want, or what they allow? What is the difference, and why does it matter?
Have you ever received a ‘gift’ that you did not want? Maybe an Xmas jumper that you would never wear that needed to go straight to the charity shop. Or perhaps you were gifted a course on throwing pots from your pottery enthusiast partner, despite you not wanting to be anywhere near clay. If the ‘gift’ is something that you don’t want, is it really a gift and who is it really for?
Join us for an evening at Newspeak House exploring the theory and practice of this new model which allows us to clearly define who is doing and who it is for.
In this session, we will build up a basic understanding of the model and hold a discussion on how it might be deployed in EA and Rationalist thinking.
The Wheel shows us four types of relating within clear agreements:
- Serving another for their benefit: we do an action they want within our boundaries
- Accepting the gift of another’s service: they do what we want while maintaining their boundaries
- Taking an action for our own benefit: doing what we want while respecting the giver’s boundaries
- Allowing another to take from us: they do what they want with our permission while maintaining our boundaries
Often these dynamics can become confused in our work and personal relationships. Unless we take them apart and experience each of these four aspects, it is impossible to know what they really are.
Understanding and embodying the Wheel of Consent happens best through a somatic experience – you have to feel it in your skin. Therefore, learning the Wheel happens through touch exercises. Please note that there is no requirement to touch or be touched in order to take part in this evening, there are multiple ways to engage with the themes and exercises offered.
This session is led by Adam Wilder, social entrepreneur and certified Wheel of Consent facilitator. Tickets are offered on a pay what you want basis with a suggested price of £55
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab for a hack day working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations.
All technologists, activists, organisers, and campaigners are welcome! All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop.
Following our Hack Day we’ll be running a series of bi-weekly Winter Hack Nights leading to a final showcase of our projects in the new year.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Newspeak House Fellow Phoebe Tickell will share her work on imagination activism.
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Happy new year! At this month’s meetup for technologists in effective altruism, we’re going to brainstorm and workshop some project ideas ahead of our hackathon in February.
Then we’ll kick back with some drinks and food (vegan), chat about how to do the most good, plus learn about and share current job and project opportunities.
Please do invite any friends or colleagues you think would be interested!
Register ↗A talk by David Shor, an American data scientist and political consultant known for analyzing political polls.
- 7:00 open
- 7:20 talk, Q&A
- 8:00 mingle, food & drink
- 9:00 close
Shor serves as head of data science with Blue Rose Research, a project to help campaigns make higher quality strategic decisions by democratizing access to accurate measurement, and is a senior fellow with the Center for American Progress Action Fund, an independent, nonpartisan policy institute dedicated to improving the lives of all Americans.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation from Thusal: “Spatial Data Science for Civics”
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too!
Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- wikiciv, a wiki for building civilization from scratch, built with MediaWiki.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Come with your laptop, we provide AC electricity and WiFi.
- We have food, usually pizza.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working/coding on their own.
- There are no lectures or presentations, just coding, questions and conversations about coding, building, making.
- We figure things out as we go, we don’t have all the answers :)
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Over the last 6 months there has been a breakthrough in powerful new AI technologies, from Stable Diffusion to ChatGPT. These new tools will undoubtedly impact campaigning in all sorts of ways, from automatically drafting text, creating and editing images and video, analysing data and more. How can we use these tools in campaigning? How could they improve the way we work? Join us for an exploratory session as we put these new tools to the test!
In this workshop, you’ll get hands-on experience with the latest AI technologies and explore how you might use them in your campaign work. You’ll learn about prompt engineering and how to effectively guide the output of AI tools to get the results you want.
These tools are so new that nobody is an expert, and you don’t need to be able to code to access them, so all activists, organisers, and campaigners are welcome!
This is a practical workshop for people working in campaigning who are curious about how recent advances in AI tools might affect their work. You can attend in person, or remotely. To participate, you will need a laptop & charger, and a smartphone. The workshop is free, but we’d be grateful for a small donation to cover catering & heating.
The workshop will be facilitated by Hannah O’Rourke of Campaign Lab, a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand campaigning. To hear about future events, subscribe to Campaign Lab’s newsletter.
Any questions, thoughts or ideas - do get in touch and say hi! [email protected]
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our first prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
We encourage attendees to bring their own computers to play with these AI tools and share what they create with others. And don’t worry about getting hungry, as we will be serving dinner throughout the evening.
This is a great opportunity to not only have fun with AI technology, but also connect with other like-minded individuals in the prompt engineering community. So mark your calendars and we’ll see you at the jam!
Join London Prompt Engineers WhatsApp Community: chat.whatsapp.com/DGxyQkNLhVG3wrjK3VbO00
Join London Prompt Engineers on Meetup: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers
Register ↗Attention all London Prompt Engineers! Are you ready to have some fun with AI tools and make new friends? Then join us for our first prompt jam, where you can spend the evening tinkering with AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney in a relaxed and social setting.
We encourage attendees to bring their own computers to play with these AI tools and share what they create with others. And don’t worry about getting hungry, as we will be serving dinner throughout the evening.
This is a great opportunity to not only have fun with AI technology, but also connect with other like-minded individuals in the prompt engineering community. So mark your calendars and we’ll see you at the jam!
Join London Prompt Engineers WhatsApp Community: chat.whatsapp.com/DGxyQkNLhVG3wrjK3VbO00
Join London Prompt Engineers on Meetup: meetup.com/london-prompt-engineers
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation from Bill Thompson: “Why my generation has failed the network and we need you to fix it. Please.”
- Bill Thompson is Principal Research Engineer at BBC R&D, and a well-known technology critic and commentator on digital culture. A pioneer of new media in the UK, Bill was Internet ambassador for PIPEX in the early 1990s and founded The Guardian’s New Media Lab in 1995, setting up and editing the first Guardian website. He has worked as a freelance journalist, author, public speaker, web developer, consultant and policy advisor. For many years he wrote a weekly column, Billboard, on the BBC News website, and he still appears regularly as a studio expert on the BBC World Service radio programme ‘Click’. He was a member of the Cambridge Film Trust until July 2011, and sits on the board of Writers’ Centre Norwich.
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, the rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This time the articles are:
- Fiber arts, mysterious dodecahedrons, and waiting on “Eureka!” (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/FfPukic3Qskd9ZAkk/fiber-arts-mysterious-dodecahedrons-and-waiting-on-eureka)
- The Satanic Panic Is Incredibly Weird (https://thingofthings.substack.com/p/the-satanic-panic-is-incredibly-weird)
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have a reading you’d like to suggest for future meetups, please do so at reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, or email Phil.
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation TBA and Q&A/discussion
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗- 6.30-7.00 PM: Doors open: grab some snacks and meet new people
- 7.00-8.00 PM: Lightning talks on Effective Altruism topics:
- Denise Melchin - Preventing stillbirths as a cause
- Lydia Field - Why we should work on preventing suicide
- Ben Williamson - Family Planning: A Significant Opportunity for Impact
- 8.00-10.00 PM: Discussions & social time
Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation TBA and Q&A/discussion
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Commemorate the eradication of smallpox with a festive unconference at Newspeak House.
This event is aimed broadly at anyone who is enthusiastic about making the world a better place with science and technology, but in particular fans of rationality, effective altruism, and blogs like Astral Codex Ten and LessWrong.
In classic unconference fashion there will be mildly-structured conversation about whatever you like, as well as plentiful food & drink, and a cake with a picture of a vaccine on it.
We’ll kick things off around 2pm, but don’t worry too much about missing the start.
Register ↗At this month’s meetup for technologists in effective altruism, we’ll be hearing from Jack Lewars, the Executive Director of One For The World, with a short in-person talk on the latest thinking on effective giving.
Then we’ll kick back with some drinks and food (vegan), chat about how to do the most good, plus learn about and share current job and project opportunities.
Please do invite any friends or colleagues you think would be interested!
Register ↗Once a quarter Centre for Democracy organises democracy co-working days to bring together individuals and organisations within the UK democracy space, with more than 50 organisations joining us across our previous events, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour and so many more!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a coworking day on the 9th December at Newspeak House. We’ll be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments, including croissants and pastries for the early birds.
This is a joint event, brought to you by Democracy Network and the Centre for Democracy. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected].
Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
Centre for Democracy runs a fortnightly online meetup, publishes a sector bulletin read by more than 400+ democracy organisations, and maintains a database of democracy organisations, jobs, events, funding opportunities and research. For more info, please see centrefordemocracy.org.uk.
The UK Democracy Coworking Day forms part of the UK Democracy Network’s Annual Conference programme - don’t miss out - register here for the two day conference.
Register ↗What: A panel to demystify the Labour Party — and what a Labour government would mean for UK tech — for those across tech and policy.
Speakers:
- Tom Adeyoola, Panel Member for Labour’s Start-Up Review, Angel investor, Exited founder and Extend Ventures Co-Founder
- Hannah O’Rourke, Campaign Lab (formerly Labour Together)
- Matt Davies, Open Data Institute (formerly Labour Party)
Who’s it for? Founders, political advisers, VCs, policymakers, software engineers, designers, data scientists, and anyone who cares about technology, public impact, and the future.
Organised by TxP, the community bridging the worlds of tech and policy, founded by Andrew Bennett and Tom Westgarth.
Register ↗You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in our lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes (or failures). It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, The Sunday Times, pollsters, leading academics, journalists and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We have a cracking list of speakers including:
- Sarah Wakefield (WWF) - Can we get business to work for the planet? Getting Supermarkets to take action
- Phoebe Tickell (Moral Imaginations) - enchanted activism
- Seyi Falodun-Liburd (Level Up) - #nomorelyes - the campaign to take toxic hair relaxers off the shelves
- Rob Blackie - Breaking Putin’s Censorship
How many tickets are there?
120 in person, we always sell out so book early and join the waitlist if you can’t get in.
If we have capacity we will do a virtual event too. There are 100 further tickets available for that. If you book one please note we can’t guarantee we will be able to provide it. Wotsits volunteer power is, alas, finite.
Wot if I don’t like wotsits?
While we grieve for what your tastebuds may miss, you can come and not eat wotsits. They are simply the snack that is provided.
We don’t provide any drinks so please bring whatever you would like. Alcoholic, non alcoholic, whatever floats your boat. There was once a splinter table of gin and onion rings fans. Further crisp based diversity is encouraged.
Who is behind this?
Ali Goldsworthy and Kate Norgrove attempt to “host”. Jess Day of More Onion, Usman Mohammed, and Jon Date of di:ga Communications help too. The team is expanding so we can put this on more frequently. Check back to find out who else is on board. None of us get paid. You all make us laugh and we get to eat crisps. That’s payment enough.
Register ↗Can immersive games teach us self-governance and better democracy for human tribes?
We will review and share game playing on three virtual worlds that take interactivity and learning to the next level, while not being short on gore and drama.
Games to review:
- Disco Elysium – by Robert Kurvitz (2019)
- Elden Ring – by Hidetaka Miyazaki (2022)
- Altspace VR – by Eric Romo (2015)
- Trolley Problem, Inc – Read Graves (2022)
Join Eva Pascoe (Cybersalon Chair), Simon Sarginson (Developer at Improbable), Karolina Janicka (Cybersalon Community Manager), and others on a journey through the Metavibes for Good.
Register ↗Join digital mobilisation agency more onion to learn about the latest developments in their Impact Stack campaigning and fundraising platform, and how it’s being used by Mencap and Shelter.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:00-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation TBA and Q&A/discussion
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
- g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
- Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Monday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗As the winter sets in join us for a bi-weekly Campaign Lab Hack Night - a regular session to work on your tech side projects to help the progressive left campaign more effectively. You can either bring your own project or help out on one of our ongoing ones.
Snacks and drinks provided. All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop!
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome. We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left. Everyone welcome!
In the new year we’ll be presenting our projects at a special showcase.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗Using technology and especially internet in mental health service provision and delivery has been a growing field, boosted especially by the COVID-19 pandemic. Avatars were developed to train mental health specialists learn diagnose symptoms of psychiatric conditions, apps have been launched to monitor and change symptoms of common mental health concerns like stress and depression. However, how much, and what do we really know about when and how eHealth interventions work when delivered online?
In this workshop, Zsofia Szlamka, PhD candidate in psychology at King’s College London, will present some existing directions in eHealth-driven mental health strategies, and evidence about the extent to which they work. She will touch on the disadvantages and advantages of therapy delivered online, and what the future may hold in this space.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗What does the future of fair work look like and how can technology help to improve the prospects and power of workers?
Join us on 21st November for a WorkerTech meetup and mixer, hear provocations from our speakers on the market forces and structural challenges workers are faced with in the UK and hear examples of how we might overcome them to improve the lives of low-income Britain.
- 5:00 - 5:30pm – Arrivals and welcome
- 5:30 - 5:45pm – Welcome and introduction from Bethnal Green Ventures and Resolution Ventures
- 5:45 - 6:15pm – Provocations from our guest speakers + Q&A
- 6:15 - 6:45pm – Discussions groups
- 6:45 - 7.30pm – Networking and drinks
Who should attend?
- Anyone working on a product or service that actively creates a fairer future of work
- Anyone working in policy, research or generally on issues relating to the gig economy and fair work
- Anyone who is interested in receiving funding for their WorkerTech venture
- It’s also a great chance to meet and network with your peers in an informal environment.
This event is brought to you by Bethnal Green Ventures in partnership with Resolution Ventures and the WorkerTech consortium.
Register ↗This is an event to bring together the small group discussions we’ve been holding on the book “What We Owe the Future” by Will McAskill.
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab for a hack day working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations.
All technologists, activists, organisers, and campaigners are welcome! All you need is to bring yourself and a laptop.
Following our Hack Day we’ll be running a series of bi-weekly Winter Hack Nights leading to a final showcase of our projects in the new year.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗A screening of the multi-award-winning documentary Bringing Down a Dictator (56m), which explores the nonviolent defeat of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, focusing on the contributions of the student-led Otpor! movement, followed by a Q&A with Srdja Popovik, leader of Otpor 1998-2002 and now a member of Serbia’s parliament. BYOB, snacks provided.
Register ↗Future of Coding is an online community with a welcoming, cooperative, and revolutionary spirit. We are unified in the belief that the common practice of programming is tragically less humane than it could be. There’s a world of possibilities that get more beautiful the further away from the norm you go. We’re here to explore this world together, to discuss ideas about theory and practice, and to champion and support our members’ research and development efforts to reimagine computing.
We’ll have community members give lightning talks and demos of what they’re building (10 mins max), and afterwards have ample time to have a few drinks and chat. If you’d like to present what you’re working on, please DM (@mappletons on twitter) or email [email protected].
There will be food and drinks (both alcoholic and non) - still TBD what exactly. We’ll very likely order in pizza (+ vegan pizza). Message me if you’re gluten-free / a non-pizza person.
Please read and abide by our community Code of Conduct if you plan on attending: https://github.com/futureofcoding/code-of-conduct
Register ↗Come help us chip away at civic challenges! We’ve got everything you need for a fun and purposeful hacknight: a presentation to learn from, wonderful co-conspirators to meet, some projects to work on, and delicious food to eat!
- 6:15-6:30: Doors open. Food!
- 6:30-7:00: Welcome and intros
- 7:00-7:30: Presentation TBA and Q&A/discussion
- 7:30-9:00: Breakout groups (make something!)
These pilot events are to gauge interest in hosting a more regular event. We’ll need your energy and contributions to make that work! We are running currently one-off hacknights that, with your support, aspire to become more regular. We are inspired by:
g0v is a grassroots social movement community dedicated to deepening the civic engagements and connections between the social arena and citizens. It is a decentralised civic tech community with core values of information transparency, open results and open cooperation. g0v London is an exploration of seeding a g0v community in London, UK. For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
Civic Tech Toronto is a diverse community of Torontonians interested in better understanding and finding solutions to civic challenges through technology, design or other means. They run weekly “civic hacknights for everyone”, where people of all backgrounds and skill levels are welcome to attend. https://link.civictech.ca/meetup (Civic Tech Toronto was in turn inspired by the values and format of Chicago’s ChiHackNight.)
Hope to see you Tuesday! Don’t forget to bring your laptop for hacking!
Register ↗This workshop is for anyone interested in learning how to map out disinformation campaigns and influence networks on Twitter using open-source tools. We’ll be going through Twitter data collection, visualization, and analysis for investigations. We’ll be collecting data using Twint and generating graph visualizations using Gephi. This workshop is intended as a primer on the topic, and will provide the basics for getting started in the analysis of disinformation campaigns.
Registration is required. Workshop attendance is capped at 10. Please arrive on time and let us know promptly if you can’t make it.
To participate, you must bring a laptop with Python3, Twint and Gephi pre-installed.
Register ↗The 2010s were a decade of foodbanks, riots, and the rebirth of political alternatives. Now, as a new wave of mass movements form over the Cost of Living Crisis, a new book looks to learn the lessons of the past decade.
Join us on Tuesday 8th November for the launch of This Is Only The Beginning: the making of a new left, from anti-austerity to the fall of Corbyn. The author, Michael Chessum, will be in conversation with Guardian journalist Zoe Williams, and there will be plenty of time for discussion and drinks.
Refreshments will be provided, and the book will be on sale.
More about the book:
The 2010s were a decade of foodbanks, riots, and the rebirth of political alternatives. Looking to escape a future of rising debt, falling living standards and climate meltdown, a set of movements were born across the globe, led by students, workers and the tent cities of Occupy.
A new wave of optimistic, radical young people were building mass movements outside the political bubble, rejecting the neo-liberal consensus and the enrichment of the 1%, and laying the foundations of a new left. Eight years later, Bernie Sanders was favourite to clinch the Democratic Party nomination, and Jeremy Corbyn and Momentum had taken over the Labour Party in Britain, promising ‘a new kind of politics’.
But as the new left poured into Labour, it was overwhelmed by older, institutional forces on both left and right. Four years after Corbyn became leader, after bitter-infighting and a Brexit-fuelled strategic crisis, it all fell apart.
This is the inside story of how the left came back to life in the 2010s, from a man who found himself at the centre of events - featuring unparalleled access and a range of interviews with key left-wing figures. Influential journalist and activist Michael Chessum explains how this movement was built, why it failed, and what it needs to do now.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Register ↗Crypto’s one of the most polarising subjects among those interested in tech, politics, and economics. For its most ardent critics, crypto’s a giant scam that’s going to end badly. And for the crypto industry shills, crypto’s the financial saviour of our generation.
Bitcoin was complex enough. Now we have an ever-expanding crypto jargon of decentralised finance, NFTs, web3, and so on. How to make sense of it all?
Where did crypto come from anyway, why is it still around, and where is it headed?
The event will begin with a talk by Newspeak House fellow (‘17-‘18) Ekin Genc who’s written 600+ pieces (http://cryptowriting.net) on crypto for such outlets as VICE, Fortune, Decrypt, CoinDesk, and Culture3. It will be followed by an open discussion.
After the talk, you are welcome to join Ration Club, Newspeak House’s weekly social.
Register ↗Founded in Taiwan, “g0v” (gov-zero) is a decentralised civic tech community with information transparency, open results and open cooperation as its core values.
Come help us chip away at civic problems by combining technology with the power of our community. We’ve got everything you need for a perfect Wednesday night: a presentation to learn from, some projects to work on, and pizza (or other food) to snack on!
- 6:30-7: Doors open. Food!
- 7-7:30: Welcome and intros
- 7:30-8: Presentation and Q&A/discussion
- 8-9: Breakout groups (make something!)
For more info, visit g0v.tw/intl/en
Register ↗The theme this month is new causes. We have invited several speakers who will talk about their entries to the Open Philanthropy Cause Exploration Prizes competition, and there will also be an opportunity to bring your own ideas for new causes for Effective Altruism to explore.
The first part of the event will consist of a series of lightning talks about potential cause areas like obesity, violence against women, family planning, crime reduction, LGBTQ+ rights in developing countries, and bipolar disorder.
This will be followed by a poster session style time for more in-depth discussion of the causes that interested you the most, and an opportunity for more freeform conversation about potential new directions for Effective Altruism.
- 6.30-7.00 PM: Doors open: grab some snacks and meet new people
- 7.00-8.00 PM: Talks
- 8.00-10.00 PM: Discussions & social time
Hacktoberfest is a month-long event to promote open source in October. We are organising a Hacktoberfest event to come together and hack on open source!
- 18:00 Welcome!
- 18:30 What is Hacktoberfest? What is open source? How to contribute to open source?
- 19:00 Anyone interested in sharing their open-source projects, come forward!
- 19:15 Hacking time
- 21:00 Show and Tell
High quality snacks and drinks provided!
Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. Sweet AC electricity provided.
Register ↗Kaliya Young, also known as the IdentityWoman, is visiting Newspeak House and offering a free workshop for policymakers.
There are key policy issues to do with digital identity emerging in the UK, across Europe and the globe which are generally not well understood.
There are significant long-term risks for getting it wrong, and there are also some really good new “solutions” or ways of doing digital identity systems that both provide user-agency and control, and support organizational business needs.
The workshop will cover key basics to understand what identity systems are and how they serve as core institutional memory. It will walk through key elements of digital identity systems and consider the emerging technologies that are part of considerations of eIDAS and other government identity systems across the globe including issuance of US Green Cards.
Kaliya began working on “user-centric” digital identity almost 20 years ago. She has convened the Internet Identity Workshop twice a year since 2005. It is the world’s leading innovation forum, and in its first 10 years stewarded the OpenID and OAuth protocols into being. In the last 7 years it has innovated Decentralized and Self-Sovereign Identity technologies. She is active in the Decentralized Identity Foundation, Trust over IP, and the W3C Credentials Community Group among others.
The last two years she has served as the chair of the Verifiable Credentials Policy Committee in California working to get her state to pass legislation. Last month AB786 passed both houses and is now on the governors desk and will let count registrars issue vital records documents as verifiable credentials (one of the SSI protocols).
Her recent work includes:
- Seeing Self-Sovereign Identity in Historical Context
- Verifiable Credentials Flavors Explained
- Key Differences Between the US Social Security System and India’s Aadhaar System
- Identity and Systems Leadership for Catalytic Change
- The Domains of Identity: A Framework for Understanding Identity Systems in Contemporary Society
Come to meet local Effective Altruists in tech, eat, and chat about how to do the most good, plus learn about and share current job and project opportunities.
From 7pm to 10pm we’ll have:
- (vegan) pizza and drinks
- space to brainstorm and chat about how we can help the EA tech London community to have more impact
Please do invite any friends or colleagues you think would be interested!
Register ↗The News Futures 2035 foresight project is a response to concerns about the future of public-interest news in the UK. It brings together experts from inside, alongside and outside the news industry who are working together to imagine, and create, a better future. This participatory, action-research project has been initiated by Dr François Nel at the Media Innovation Studio (MIS) at the University of Central Lancashire. It will help us consider alternative scenarios, develop new visions and catalyse better relationships, all focused on the question: how can we secure the supply of trusted, public-interest news in the UK?
After many years of change and struggle, we believe we’re at a turning point in the future – and history – of news. Ultimately, many have a dystopian vision – where the provision of trusted news is lost – and where people are vulnerable to false information, disengaged or avoid news altogether. It may be that we are not currently able to give communities what they want or need – but if our audiences switch off – we know the public interest is not being served.
To explore our questions, we’re working with two experienced facilitators of participatory, multi-stakeholder processes: Dr Bruno Tindemans, Chief Foresite Officer for the government Department of Works in Brussels, and Alain Wouters, a strategy consultant formerly of the group planning department at Shell. While our primary focus is on public-interest news in the UK, we believe what we learn will be relevant further afield, not least because the British media has often led the way.
If you would like to attend the event or be included in the News Futures research group, please register to express your interest:
Register ↗What: A panel to make sense of a new government — and what it means for UK tech — for those across tech and policy.
Speakers:
- Sarah Gates, Head of Public Policy at Wayve AI
- Joel Gladwin, Director at Taso Advisory and former adviser at DCMS
Who’s it for? Founders, political advisers, VCs, policymakers, software engineers, designers, data scientists, and anyone who cares about technology, public impact, and the future.
The panel will be followed by drinks & networking.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A new book from Cybersalon, a think-tank focusing on the process and effect of the digital revolution in industry, society and its emerging digital cultures. Story writers collaborate with subject experts to break the frame of traditional forecasting and investigate paths where fast-evolving technology may take us. The book focuses on four main areas of rapid change: money, communities and identity, health and food, and retail and the reshaping of our high streets.
Dive into the future of abortion in the era of programmable money; living under a “nanny state” determined to control what you put on your plate; trading convenience against surveillance in your local neighbourhood; earning real, transferable cash via gaming; the impact of total financial surveillance on the future of politics; and many more.
Based on the year long events & workshop series ‘Tales From The Cyber Salon’ this collection of provocations brings together a blend of near-future speculative fiction and non-fiction commentary. Be prepared for warnings and inspirations from those who speculate about the future and those who make it a reality.
Edited by Stephen Oram and Benjamin Greenaway, with an introduction by Douglas Rushkoff.
Register ↗The Open Co-op is a collaborative collective of coders, commoners, architects, artists, engineers, ecologists and systems changers. Together, we are building the tools, technologies and protocols of a collaborative, regenerative economy.
We promote co-ownership, platform co-ops, open source and regenerative economics.
Join members of the London community for a long overdue catch-up over a cup of tea at Newspeak House on Wednesday 28th September.
We’ve had our heads down for a while and have been busy:
- Developing an updated version of Murmurations - the decentralised data sharing protocol - see the Regen map as a demo
- Launching Open Web Systems, to provide open source email and Nextcloud powered by renewable energy
- Collaborating with Meet.coop - to promote open source conferencing tools
- Launching Co-op Data Club - to help co-ops promote each other
- And developing an updated version of PLANET, our vision for a suite of open source tools to help us steward a regenerative economy.
But all this working online gets tiring and, like most people, we miss the fun, laughter and inspiration which comes from face-to-face interaction.
So, the OPEN Meetup is simply a chance to share and hear news about everyone’s projects and to catch up with old and new friends and connections, without any specific agenda or expectations.
We will run the event as an open space so that everyone has a chance to share news about their projects with one main group or in separate discussions, depending on how many people attend and want to present.
If you are working on, or interested in developing, any part of the regenerative economy and / or have an interest in how co-owned and decentralised tools and technologies can support the transition to a more equitable society then this event is for you.
If the event goes well we will organise further Meetups, in conjunction with other related networks and communities to further discussions, create more connections and to encourage meaningful action which helps create the regenerative economy we all want.
Save the date, tell your friends and networks, bring your news and be ready to share.
If you’d like a drink other than tea please bring that too - and some to share!
Register ↗This is the monthly social for effective altruism, aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism. No specific themes, and no need to be there from the start, just come along and chat about whatever you want!
Register ↗The official bi-annual London meetup for fans of the popular blog Astral Codex Ten (formerly Slate Star Codex) by American psychiatrist Scott Alexander.
There will be drinks and a barbecue on the terrace, and simultaneously a series of short talks in the auditorium. If you’d be interested in giving a talk, please contact [email protected] or @nwspk.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Kaliya Young, also known as the IdentityWoman, is visiting Newspeak House and offering a free workshop for policymakers.
There are key policy issues to do with digital identity emerging in the UK, across Europe and the globe which are generally not well understood by the policy community.
There are significant long-term risks for getting it wrong, and there are also some really good new “solutions” or ways of doing digital identity systems that both provide user-agency and control, and support organizational business needs.
The workshop will cover key basics to understand what identity systems are and how they serve as core institutional memory. It will walk through key elements of digital identity systems and consider the emerging technologies that are part of considerations of eIDAS and other government identity systems across the globe including issuance of US Green Cards.
Kaliya began working on “user-centric” digital identity almost 20 years ago. She has convened the Internet Identity Workshop twice a years since 2005. It is the world’s leading innovation forum, and in its first 10 years stewarded the OpenID and OAuth protocols into being. In last 7 years it has innovated Decentralized and Self-Sovereign Identity technologies. She is active in the Decentralized Identity Foundation, Trust over IP, and the W3C Credentials Community Group among others.
The last two years she has served as the chair of the Verifiable Credentials Policy Committee in California working to get her state to pass legislation. Last month AB786 passed both houses and is now on the governors desk and will let count registrars issue vital records documents as verifiable credentials (one of the SSI protocols).
Her recent work includes:
- Seeing Self-Sovereign Identity in Historical Context
- Verifiable Credentials Flavors Explained
- Key Differences Between the US Social Security System and India’s Aadhaar System
- Identity and Systems Leadership for Catalytic Change
- The Domains of Identity: A Framework for Understanding Identity Systems in Contemporary Society
Talks, demos, and chat about taming AIs.
In person keynote from Emad Mostaque, founder of stability.ai / stable diffusion.
There will be some desks & plugs, so feel free to bring laptops if you have things you want to show!
Register ↗Since March we’ve organised democracy co-working days to help bring together individuals and organisations within the UK democracy space - with more than 38 organisations joining us across our previous events, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour, and more!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a co-working day on the 6th September at Newspeak House.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected].
We’ll also be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments, including croissants and pastries for the early birds.
This is a joint event, brought to you by Democracy Network and the Centre for Democracy.
Democracy Network are a network of people and organisations working on issues of power, democracy and voice throughout the UK. We aim to connect and work with others to build a stronger democracy fit for the 21st century. We do this through connecting people and supporting collaboration, increasing knowledge, skills and resources, and coordinating influencing strategies and action. Join the network here.
The Centre for Democracy runs a fortnightly online meetup, publishes a sector bulletin read by more than 300+ democracy organisations, and maintains a database of democracy organisations, jobs, events, funding opportunities and research. For more info, please see centrefordemocracy.org.uk.
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
- Feel free to arrive at any point, most people come around 6:30 to 7:00.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗In only a decade, the labour market has changed beyond all recognition - from zero-hour contracts to platform monopolies - meanwhile union memberships are at historic lows. So how are workers fighting back?
“An insurgent work – challenging and at times uncomfortable. It provides much needed original research into the modern world of work.” Jon Cruddas MP, Author of The Dignity of Labour
From doctors disillusioned with the BMA to crowdworkers organising for the first time, from a VC-backed company building trade union software to the reform of incumbent national labour organisations, former WSJ journalist Lucy Harley-McKeown takes us on a journey to discover how workers are organising in the 21st century.
Edited by Hannah O’Rourke of Labour Together & Edward Saperia of Newspeak House.
Register ↗“If we don’t defend free speech, we live in tyranny: Salman Rushdie shows us that” - Margaret Atwood
“I think it’s terrible, sad … you can’t justify what happened”. Imran Khan, former PM of Pakistan
Writers, journalists, politicians and citizens around the world have expressed outrage and heartfelt support for Salman Rushdie after an attempt on his life a week ago in New York. In this spirit, we’re hosting a screening of selections from American PEN’s public reading of Rushdie’s work, alongside some conversation and readings of our own.
This will be a celebration of Rushdie’s work, his courage, and the courage of everyone who shares art or criticism that others find uncomfortable. It’s a chance to demonstrate that people from every community stand against violence, and will protect the ability of all to express themselves without fear.
We’ll get started with the screening at 7pm.
Afterwards, join in with Ration Club - Newspeak House’s weekly dinner. Please register on the Ration Club event too if you intend to come.
Who is Salman Rushdie?
Salman Rushdie is the author of fourteen novels, including the Booker of Booker winner (i.e. best of all booker winners, by public vote), ‘Midnight’s Children’. He has also spent the last 30 years under the threat of death, due to an fatwa issues by the Ayatollah of Iran after the publication of Rushdie’s novel, ‘The Satanic Verses’.
Many, many Muslims around the world have condemned the various acts of violence carried out in the name of the fatwa. For instance, the Muslim Council of Britain had this to say about the most recent attack: “The Muslim Council of Britain condemns the attack on Salman Rushdie. Such violence is wrong and the perpetrator must be brought to justice.”
Who are we?
I’m Tim, a random nerd who was inspired by the Stand with Salman event in New York. Among other principles, I have a firm belief that brutally stabbing elderly authors you don’t like - or authors, or indeed people in general - isn’t okay.
Register ↗This is the monthly social for effective altruism, aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism. No specific themes, and no need to be there from the start, just come along and chat about whatever you want!
Register ↗Making the most utility of high summer, we’ll have a vegan barbecue on the terrace, accompanied by mocktails, and a light selection of lightning talks.
A lightning talk is a 5-minute talk. Sign up to give one here: https://forms.gle/7GUX6Fv9pdogTnP6A
We look forward to your ideas. First-time talk-givers welcome! You don’t need to keep the topic strictly within tech or EA, but it should at least be interesting.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
We’ve got a survey running to try to collect feedback on what London Rationalish is and what people want it to be. It would be super awesome if you could fill it in: https://forms.gle/1DLQWvLvX3h6Zneq9
Register ↗A 2 day event to celebrate Wikimania, the global summit for Wikimedia.
In person and online the programme includes the opportunity for co-working spaces, introduction to editing and advanced training sessions on Friday 12th August, with lightning talks on Saturday 13th August which will be available in person and virtually. In addition we will be offering 1-2-1 in person and virtual Wiki Clinics with community experts. Saturday we will host the annual Wikimedia UK Awards, celebrating together the contribution of community members.
All participants will receive swag and a virtual goody bag of extended digital content to support their wiki development and showcase the breadth of interest across the Wikimedia UK community.
Join us for one or both days.
Register ↗A fireside chat with Rocío van Nierop, CEO of Latinas in Tech, who is visiting from California. We’ll have the opportunity to learn more about her life, career, advocacy for the Latinx community, and more! Ask her questions and meet other Latinas in the community. Food and drinks provided.
Register ↗We are often told that a cashless society is fast approaching, but in a world beset by surveillance and rising corporate power, physical cash is more important than ever. Who benefits from a cashless society and who gets left behind?
Join Brett Scott to celebrate the launch of his new book Cloudmoney: Cash, Cards, Crypto and the War for our Wallets. Brett will describe the key themes of the book, explain why crypto won’t save us, and argue for why the future of money might not actually be digital.
Brett is a campaigner, monetary anthropologist and former broker. He is the author of The Heretic’s Guide to Global Finance: Hacking the Future of Money, and has appeared in a wide range of TV shows, radio broadcasts and documentaries, including BBC World News and Sky News.
He has written extensively on financial reform, digital finance, alternative currency, blockchain technology and the cashless society for publications like the Guardian, New Scientist, Huffington Post, Wired Magazine and CNN.com, and also publishes the Altered States of Monetary Consciousness newsletter.
Register ↗In this third meeting of the “Kolokol” club, we will discuss: Why is Putin popular in Russia?
Opinion polls show that Vladimir Putin and his regime are supported by the majority of Russians. Can we trust the polls? And if the polls are correct then how can we explain the popularity of Putin and other authoritarian leaders?
The discussion will be held in Russian. If you plan to come, please email bessudnov at gmail.com.
Register ↗This is the monthly social for effective altruism, aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism. No specific themes, and no need to be there from the start, just come along and chat about whatever you want!
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- healthsites, a framework for capturing, publishing and sharing critical health and sanitation related data. It’s built with Python and Django.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab for a hack day working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations.
From data analysis to improve mobilisation to developing new election tools for activists on the ground, we’ll be working out how together we can create new election tech for the left.
You will need to bring a laptop to this event.
At the hack day we’ll be:
- Analysing the results of the May local elections
- Thinking about how to create a social media content aggregator
- Exploring how we can automate uploading the marked register
- Analysing some anonymised membership data
- Thinking about what tools we could build to better engage Labour members
- Thinking about what campaigning tools or apps we could build if we had a Labour Members Log In
- Analysing Labour broadcast data using ML techniques
- Explore whatsapp tooling for CLPs
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome! We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗DisCO is a full support system for people to create radical democratic workplaces fit for the challenges of the future. It combines digital tools with methods for creating trust-based relationships, including governance for handling economic activities and decision making within the group. DisCO helps people reinforce the humanity at the heart of cooperative businesses, reexamine the value of all efforts, and rewires economic thought and practice.
DisCO is also designed to impart a sense of freedom to experiment and to have fun with economic alternatives. There’s more emphasis on enhancing the group’s interactions with each other and their chosen work than on revering the tech that supports that work, although the tech is an exceptionally important element. As part of its history of influences, DisCO combines the best of worker-owned coops, the Commons and P2P, Feminist Economics, and cutting edge DLT and 3.0 tech.
DisCO offers a critical feminist alternative to DAOs. DisCO is also a growing community of small, federated groups forging the economies of the future today.
Join DisCOnauts Sofia Bustamante, Irene Lopez de Vallejo and Stacco Troncoso to get an introduction to DisCO, an update on the project, and co-create scenarios on how to apply DisCOs and what a DisCO-fied future looks like.
- DisCO.coop
- Short video with the fundamentals
- Short intro article
- If I Only Had a Heart: The DisCO Manifesto
- Groove is in the Heart: The DisCO Elements
- and more…
Come to meet EAs in tech in London, eat, chat about how to do the most good, and learn about current job openings.
There’ll be some short talks, speakers TBC
Register ↗Back in March we organised a democracy co-working day to celebrate The Centre for Democracy’s first year anniversary. We thought it’d be a one-off, but it turned out to be so successful - with more than 20 organisations joining us, including Democracy Classroom, Civic Power Fund, Fair Vote UK, Nesta, Sortition Foundation, I Have A Voice, Radix Big Tent, Public Interest News Foundation, Unlock Democracy, Zero Hour and so many more - that we’ve decided to hold another one!
So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a co-working day on the 29th June at Newspeak House.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected].
We’ll also be putting on tea & coffee, snacks and refreshments, including croissants and pastries for the early birds.
The Centre for Democracy runs a fortnightly online meetup, publishes a sector bulletin read by more than 300+ democracy organisations, and maintains a database of democracy organisations, jobs, events, funding opportunities and research. For more info, please see centrefordemocracy.org.uk.
Register ↗This is the monthly social, aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism. No specific themes, and no need to be there from the start, just come along and chat about whatever you want! :-)
Register ↗An unconference about community management.
New to unconferences? Watch this.
- 0900 Doors open,
- 1000 Start,
- 1230 Lunch,
- 1330 Restart,
- 1630 Drinks.
Time zone = British Summer Time (UTC+1)
Please register.
Register ↗misinfosecUK is hosting its first meetup! The aim of this event is for anyone interested in studying and fighting mis/disinformation to meet fellow researchers and practitioners from a variety of backgrounds: journalism, cybersecurity, civic tech, academia.
misinfosecUK is an emerging community of practice aiming to bring together researchers from different domains to share knowledge and tradecraft in the fight against disinformation. We are aiming to organise regular UK-based meetups, events, as well as connecting researchers to open-source projects and projects to funding.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
At 3pm, we’ll have a discussion about these articles:
- “Taking your environment as object” vs “Being subject to your environment”
- Why the Canadian Tech Scene Doesn’t Work
GUARDIAN POLITICAL BOOK OF THE YEAR
Can we reverse the mental health crisis by getting rid of Mondays?
Is it time to stop poor people being poor by… giving them money?
Can we quell the fires of populism by giving young people a say in the future?
As the shockwaves of Covid 19 subside, and the smoke clears from a period of anger and unrest, many people feel forlorn about the future.
In End State, James Plunkett argues that this can be a moment not of despair, but of historic opportunity - a chance to rethink, renew, and reform some of the most fundamental ways we organise society. In much the same way as societies emerged stronger from crises in the past - building the state as we know it today - we too can build a happier future.
James Plunkett has spent his career thinking laterally about the complicated relationships between individuals and the state. First as a Number 10 adviser, then a leading economic researcher and writer, and then in the charity sector, helping people struggling at the front-line of economic change. James combines a deep understanding of social issues with an appreciation of how change plays out not in the ivory tower, but in the reality of people’s lives.
In his first book he sets out an optimistic vision, exploring nine ways in which our social settlement can be upgraded to harness the power of the digital age. Covering a dizzying sweep of geography and history, from London’s 18th Century sewage systems to the uneasy inequality of Silicon Valley, it’s a thrilling and iconoclastic account of how society can not only survive, but thrive, in the digital age.
End State provides a much-needed map to help us navigate our way over the curious terrain of the twenty-first century.
At this event, James will give a short talk and Q&A. Attendees can then network and enjoy free drinks & nibbles, and will have the opportunity to buy signed copies of the book,
Register ↗Do you want to work on open source but never find the time? Us too! Join us in an open source hack night. Bring your own projects or choose one of these that we will be working on:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- healthsites, a framework for capturing, publishing and sharing critical health and sanitation related data. It’s built with Python and Django.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically.
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- High quality snacks and drinks as always!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity and wifi.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Register ↗A discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
Will MacAskill’s recent Effective Altruism Forum post is the most-upvoted post in the forum’s history. Join us at Newspeak House to carry on the conversation about what’s implied by the extraordinary growth in funding in EA. How should EA respond to this opportunity?
“In a nutshell: our current situation is both an enormous responsibility and an incredible opportunity. If we’re going to respond appropriately, we need to act with judicious ambition, holding both of these frames in mind.“ We’ll have some discussion prompts handy to help direct discussion.
Optional further reading at this link
Podcast: Will MacAskill on balancing frugality with ambition
Register ↗Teona Tomashvili (@teotomashvili) joins us as part of the European Union Civic Digital Fellowship Programme to share her work in Georgia with ForSet, including setting up the country’s Freedom of Information platform AskGov.ge, the data visualisation conference VizHack, and DataFest Tbilisi.
Register ↗This is the monthly social, aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism. No specific themes, and no need to be there from the start, just come along and chat about whatever you want! :-)
Register ↗Our first hack night a couple of weeks ago was more popular than expected so we thought it might be fun to do another one! But this time including other open source projects as well.
So, for this evening we focus on these projects:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- healthsites, a framework for capturing, publishing and sharing critical health and sanitation related data. It’s built with Python and Django.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Feel free to come with your own open source project as well. This is a selection we thought might be interesting.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically. Alternatively, this might become an event where we explore open source rather than hacking on it :D
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- We’ll provide snacks and drinks!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Notes for Polis
- We have started fleshing out some ideas in the previous event and I think it’d be nice to continue on those as well!
- Polis repository: github.com/compdemocracy/polis
- Polis issues: github.com/compdemocracy/polis/issues. It would be a good idea to scan through these before coming to the event to see if you can find something more specific to work on.
- Polis is built with JavaScript / React.js / Node.js / Clojure / Docker
For more details and stuff to work on check our previous list.
Register ↗The role of a game designer is to create arbitrary systems in order to evoke specific emotions. What has the game design industry discovered that we might be able to apply to the design of social systems?
In this hands-on workshop, we’ll experience and discuss a few different games, and then participants will have a chance to design, prototype and playtest their own games. All materials will be provided, and no previous experience is required.
To register, please contact Edward Saperia via [email protected] or @edsaperia.
Optional reading:
Register ↗Kaliya Young, also known as Identity Woman, is hosting an informal gathering for folks who want to have a conversation about digital identity. At the beginning those who attend will be asked to share what they want to talk about / hope to hear about and Kaliya will share her thoughts and facilitate a conversation.
Kaliya has a broad range of expertise in “identity”:
- The history of identity systems that originated in paper based form.
- Understanding contemporary identity systems in organizations and society that she wrote about in her 2020 book - Domains of Identity: A Framework for Understanding Identity Systems in Contemporary Society (if you bring a copy she will sign it)
- A comprehensive understanding of Self-Sovereign Identity technologies and the communities building it including the Credentials Community Group at the W3C, Decentralized Identity Foundation and the Trust Over IP Foundation. She co-wrote the first book about the technology, A Comprehensive Guide to Self Sovereign Identity.
- She recently founded a consultancy with a partner Lucy Yang.
Tickets are free and you are welcome to make a donation. Contributions will help Kaliya cover the cost of her trip that is self funded.
Register ↗Our first hack night a couple of weeks ago was more popular than expected so we thought it might be fun to do another one! But this time including other open source projects as well.
So, for this evening we focus on these projects:
- polis, an application for large scale open ended feedback, built with JavaScript, React.js, Node.js, Clojure.
- decidim, a participatory democracy framework, built with Ruby and Rails.
- healthsites, a framework for capturing, publishing and sharing critical health and sanitation related data. It’s built with Python and Django.
The plan for this event: Improve the code for one of these applications. Fix a bug or implement a small feature.
Feel free to come with your own open source project as well. This is a selection we thought might be interesting.
Event notes
- Scan through the above projects and their issues and figure out what to work on more specifically. Alternatively, this might become an event where we explore open source rather than hacking on it :D
- This event is for people who feel comfortable coding on their own.
- We are not familiar with these projects! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- We’ll provide snacks and drinks!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity.
Join online
If you’re interested in contributing but not able to attend, we will also be online in our Discord group. Hope to see some people there as well!
Notes for Polis
- We have started fleshing out some ideas in the previous event and I think it’d be nice to continue on those as well!
- Polis repository: github.com/compdemocracy/polis
- Polis issues: github.com/compdemocracy/polis/issues. It would be a good idea to scan through these before coming to the event to see if you can find something more specific to work on.
- Polis is built with JavaScript / React.js / Node.js / Clojure / Docker
For more details and stuff to work on check our previous list.
Register ↗A salon to discuss contrarian investment theses based on undervalued and under-appreciated technologies and trends that everyone else is missing. The future is not just web3, metaverse and flying taxis.
Lawrence Lundy-Bryan, Research Partner at Lunar Ventures, a European early-stage deep tech venture fund, will provide the headline presentation. As part of an “unconference” approach, attendees will be invited to share their reflections on Lawrence’s insights and to add their own.
Register ↗Come to meet EAs in tech in London, eat, chat about how to do the most good, and learn about current job openings.
- 7:00pm: arrive, drinks & (vegan) pizza 🍕
- 7:20pm: talk by Ari Kagan, CEO of Momentum, on their mission and their new roles
- 7:30pm: talk by Seb Becker, Lead Developer of Effektiv Spenden, on how he came to work at an EA org, and the current EA tech job market.
- 7:50pm+: drinks on the terrace 🍺
Do invite relevant people!
Register ↗“As we move further in to the Age of Smarter Machines and Artificial Intelligence, how do we ensure that the systems we are building continue to evolve as we need them to, and that the differing speeds of change between humans and technologies can be reconciled?”
A discussion about technology and human values facilitated by Anni Rowland-Campbell, founder of the Intersticia Foundation and an observer and practitioner of web science.
Register ↗You will hear what was hot on the campaigning trail, which future policies worked for the voters, which communication tools were useful and how tech was helping micro-local elections. We will also report on elections for Internet Governance and other meta global bodies.
Cross-Party Panel:
- Kian Richardson (Labour Party election candidate for Regent Park branch, London)
- Green Party and Independent candidates
- Voter Registration Week campaigners
- Dr Richard Barbrook (Westminster University)
- Chair – Eva Pascoe (Cybersalon.org)
A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
For this session, instead of a reading list, we’ll be doing a round of “what have you been thinking about lately”. Interpret loosely, and feel free to pass if you’re shy/haven’t been thinking about things/have mostly been thinking about that one other member you have a crush on but you’d just die if they knew. We’ll start that around 3pm, so from 2-3 I guess we’re only allowed to talk about things we haven’t been thinking about lately.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗The second meeting of the “Kolokol” club.
The war in Ukraine has led to the strengthening of the repressive regime in Russia. It has had an effect on Russian universities and in particular the social sciences. Some academics had to resign and leave Russia, others were censored and persecuted. Students faced repressions, too. We will discuss these developments and strategies to resist them. The discussion will be in Russian.
If you plan to come, please email bessudnov at gmail.com.
Register ↗Pol.is - the most exciting thing to happen to digital democracy?
Polis is an open source tool for gathering, analyzing and understanding in real time what large groups of people think in their own words.
The plan for this event: Let’s meet and try to improve it - fix a bug or implement a small feature!
Here’s is the Polis repository: github.com/compdemocracy/polis. There are currently 255 issues open. It would be a good idea to scan through these before coming to the event to see if you can find something more specific to work on.
Notes
- This event is for people who feel comfortable working with any of JavaScript / React.js / Node.js / Clojure / Docker as these are the languages/libraries that polis is built with.
- We are not familiar with the polis source code! We’ll be figuring it out as we go along with you.
- We’ll provide snacks and drinks!
- Attendees are expected to come with their own laptops. We’ll provide AC electricity.
Selection of issues
Source code
Even though we’re unfamiliar with the polis repository, after a little bit of research we have learned:
The whole polis service is composed of:
- server/, written in Node.js, is the main server app
- math/, written in Clojure, is the statistical analysis part
- client-participation/, written in Javascript, compile to static assets, is the client code for end-users
- client-admin/, written in Javascript, compile to static assets, is the client code for administrators
- client-report/, written in Node.js, is the code for detailed analytics reports
- architecture overview
One of several afterparties for Effective Altruism Global. See the other afterparties at bit.ly/EAGafterparties.
Register ↗Pandemic Prevention Network is a project to build a community of individuals and organisations dedicated to preventing pandemics, as well as an open platform for access to scientific knowledge and evidence-backed strategies for pandemic prevention. This event will be a casual meetup with drinks, discussion and an update on our activities.
We are open to all EA and non-EA individuals who are interested in exploring the topic of biosecurity, existential risk, health policy and pandemic prevention. We will be joined by our community members ranging from students, civil servants, policy experts to founders, all united on the topic of pandemic prevention. We would love to connect you and spark engaging conversations with our members!
Register ↗Meet-up for (aspiring) consultants and members of the effective altruism community, who want to network and discuss how to do the most good as a consultant.
We are looking forward to connecting with you in an informal setting. No previous experience required.
Register ↗A meetup for fans of the blog Astral Codex Ten, as well as an afterparty for Effective Altruism Global.
Register ↗Could psychedelics-assisted therapy be helpful for Effective Altruists to become more aligned and effective? What are the biggest risks we should be aware of as psychedelics become legalised?
We’re going to discuss The Best Arguments Against Psychedelics Being An EA Cause Area by Milan Griffes where he proposes his arguments why psychedelics research & advocacy is a promising altruistic EA cause area. In 2019 Milan offered a cash prize for best arguments against his proposal, all of which are included in comments and are highly recommended as a pre-read. The winner shared the link to this Slate Star Codex post, which could be a useful read to balance Milan’s perspective.
The discussion will be facilitated by Sandra Sobanska who has been exploring the potential for a safe and intentional use of psychedelics as a tool for personal growth, working with emotional blocks and improving leadership. She’s currently working at a London-based startup, developing a digital therapy platform for social anxiety based on computational neuroscience.
Everyone is welcome to this free event, whether you’re familiar with effective altruism or not.
Register ↗Tech for Good London’s first event of 2022: a hybrid mini-unconference.
To us, ‘tech for good’ is the intentional use of technology to drive positive outcomes for people and planet. The tech for good movement continues to evolve and grow in the face of ongoing upheaval and transitions across politics, society and the environment.
Over the last two years, we’ve welcomed many people into our virtual events who wouldn’t have been able to join in person. We can’t wait to connect with some of you over drinks and nibbles in a physical space once more - but we also still want to include members who don’t live in London, or who face barriers to attending, because our community and collective wisdom are stronger for this diversity.
This event is for all entrepreneurs, nonprofits, funders, technologists, policy people and corporations, or folk working on or interested in tech for good. It’s your space to get to know each other and explore whatever questions, ideas and conversations feel most important to you right now.
If you haven’t been to an unconference or an agendaless meeting before, this is what to expect:
- At the outset, anyone can propose a topic or question they’d like to talk about in a 30-minute session
- Sessions can be either a facilitated group discussion or a presentation with Q&A
- People vote on the session ideas they’re most interested in
- We’ll collate, group and prioritise ideas based on the votes, and assign them to spaces (physical in the room or in breakout rooms online, running in parallel)
- If your proposed session is selected, you can either hold the space for it yourself or ask one of the organisers to help
- After 30 minutes, we’ll wrap up the first sessions and begin the second
- Once the second round of sessions ends, we’ll bring physical and virtual audiences together and hear briefly from each group about the key points they talked about.
- After that, we’ll have community announcements, which is your chance to speak for 1 minute about any project, request, an offer of help, job opening, product launch or cool thing you’ve seen. We’ll write these up and share them with our 10,000+ meetup members.
If you aren’t able to attend in person, check out our meetup page for the virtual event here: https://www.meetup.com/techforgood/events/284801356/
Register ↗In 2017 Newspeak House hosted the launch party of commons.legal, now an award-winning, not-for-profit criminal law firm working towards social justice.
In 2022 they return to celebrate their 5th anniversary!
Register ↗A meetup for Odin members. Odin is a community-driven investment platform on a mission to reimagine how value is created and distributed. joinodin.com
Register ↗On Wednesday 6 April, local councils will release details of who is standing for the local elections. At this event, we’ll be collecting all that data together into one open database.
Stay for the whole session or just drop in whenever you can — every little helps!
We’ll provide drinks and snacks!
You’ll need a laptop, but no technical knowledge.
You might like to join the Democracy Club Slack and sign up for an account at candidates.democracyclub.org.uk before the event.
Register ↗On Saturday, April 2 at 17 o’clock in London, the first meeting of the “Kolokol” club will take place. Theme of the meeting: “How and why the Soviet Union fell apart” (or in other words: the one who died, the one who died will also die). Format: round table, open discussion, exchange of opinions. The discussion will be held in Russian.
The meeting will be attended by: Viktor Veterinarov (UCL), Ilya Yablokov (University of Sheffield), Olga Solovyeva (Open University), Sergey Mokhov (Liverpool John Moores University), Alexey Besudnov (University of Exeter).
If you plan to come, please email bessudnov at gmail.com.
Register ↗Welcome to Experiments in Waste, a 36 hour pop-up lab exploring a refillable future.
Bringing together artists, designers, activists, strategists, technologists and more to co-create prototypes with potential to mainstream refilling as an everyday behaviour. How can we shift to waste less and live more?
- Thursday 31st March 6:00-9:00pm
- Friday 1st April 9:30am-4:30pm
Expect inspiring talks, immersive experiences, food, music, and working in accelerated and playful ways with others.
Experiments in Waste is powered by Ecover.
Unfortunately, spots are very limited and so are by invitation only.
Register ↗Short talks followed by dinner & networking. Meet other researchers, practitioners and technologists working on and with digital tools for public participation. Speakers:
Colin Megill @colinmegill is the cofounder of Polis and board president of the Computational Democracy Project, the 501c3 which maintains the codebase and the primary free instance at pol.is/home. He will lead a discussion about his lifetime ambition: transitioning representative democracies to organizing mechanisms better than parties.
Sarah Castell @sarahcastell is the CEO of Involve. She will give an overview of the public participation landscape in the UK.
Oli Whittington @oliwhittington leads democratic innovation in the Centre for Collective Intelligence Design at Nesta. He will explore why we often fail to move beyond individual pilots, and designing ways in which we can mainstream and scale digital democracy — and if scale is even the right objective.
Simon Parker @SimonFParker, Director of Transformation and Policy Capability at the UK Department for Education, has been experimenting with using Polis internally in the civil service. He promises to share an astonishing new insight with us.
Akshaya Satheesh @codewithshaya is a developer at the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos. She will share CASMs experiments using Polis to understand issues such as Covid-19 misinformation and public attitudes on responsible technology.
Ruth Wetters @ruthwetters is a data scientist who has worked on visualisations for Polis. She’ll talk about designing democratic tools in AI, and the ways in which Polis promotes transparency, accessibility and security.
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab for a hack day working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations.
From data analysis to improve mobilisation to developing new election tools for activists on the ground, we’ll be working out how together we can create new election tech for the left.
- 25th March 7pm - Drinks, social and team forming!
- 26th March 10am till late - A day of hacking!
You will need to bring a laptop to this event.
At the hack day we’ll be:
- Hearing from Labour HQ about how we can work together
- Analysing some synthetic membership data
- Thinking about what tools we could build to better engage Labour members
- Thinking about what campaigning tools or apps we could build if we had a Labour Members Log In
- Exploring how we help activists campaigning on Facebook
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome! We also welcome any new people who are interested in politics and technology and evidence based campaign innovation on the left.
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Register ↗This event is for participants in the The Food Data Collaboration, which aims to create an infrastructure that empowers local producers to list & sell their produce across multiple platforms seamlessly, nurturing diversity at scale and supporting farmer-focussed, community-led food systems to thrive.
Building on the work of The Data Food Consortium the project brings together technical platforms (Open Food Network, Ooooby, Big Barn, BoxMaster) engaged with short supply chain food sales to implement an data interoperability framework with organisations and individuals from across the sustainable, regenerative agriculture space (Sustain, Better Food Traders, the Landworkers’ Alliance) and local food producers and distributors to begin the journey of creating a commons governance process to manage the data space created by the Technical workstream.
Register ↗It’s been one year since the launch of The Centre for Democracy, founded to develop the ecosystem of organisations working towards a better democracy in the UK. In that time we’ve hosted more than thirty meetups, and as many UK Democracy Bulletins have landed in your inboxes.
We wanted to celebrate our one year anniversary the best way we know how: to create a space for democracy people to meet and work together. So if you’re working on a democracy project or organisation, or just keen to meet people that do, come along and join us for a co-working day at Newspeak House.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to drop us an email at [email protected]. Centre for Democracy runs a fortnightly online meetup, publishes a newsletter read by more than 280+ democracy organisations, and maintains a database of sector jobs, events and funding opportunities. For more info, please see centrefordemocracy.org.uk.
Register ↗The first of a weekly discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
This week we’re discussing FTX Foundation’s Future Fund
“The FTX Foundation’s Future Fund is a philanthropic fund making grants and investments to ambitious projects in order to improve humanity’s long-term prospects. We have a longlist of project ideas that we’d be excited to help launch.“
There is limited numbers so if you’re interested please RSVP to [email protected].
Covid: If you can, take a lateral flow test before coming.
Register ↗A panel exploring the potential of NFTs for identity and authentication.
- Caron-Jane Lyon @PCMCreative, holder of Arts Council grant for NFTs for creative industry
- Stefan Lutschinger @lutschinger (Lecturer in Digital Media and Web3 at Middlesex University)
- Richard Boase @boaserichard (blockchain game developer Satoshi Block Dojo)
- Luka, Artur and Michal (online music streaming platform Soundoshi)
- Chair: Eva Pascoe (cybersalon.org)
The first of a weekly discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
This week we’re discussing Mushtaq Khan on ‘using institutional economics to predict effective government reforms’:
“Anti-corruption in contexts where corruption is widespread only works if you can separate people who are violating rules for reasonable reasons from other people who are violating rules for unreasonable reasons. And if you can identify the people who are violating the rules for reasonable reasons and solve their problems so they can comply with rules, they become your allies“
There is limited numbers so if you’re interested please RSVP to [email protected].
Covid: If you can, take a lateral flow test before coming.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Instead of a reading list, this month we’ll have a meta-meetup. The idea is to be a space to discuss what works for you about London Rationalish, what doesn’t work, what you’d like to change.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗Join us for the launch of “Democracy in a Pandemic”, a collection of essays drawing together a diverse range of voices of activists, practitioners, policy makers, researchers and writers, highlighting the critical role played by participation and deliberation during the pandemic, and making the case for enhanced engagement during and beyond emergency contexts.
Short talks will by given by contributors to the book, including the editor Graham Smith, Professor of Politics at the University of Westminster and Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy. Talks will be followed by a light buffet dinner.
This event is hosted by Involve’s new Democracy Network, and is open to anyone working in or curious about the field of democracy or civic engagement.
Register ↗This is the first of a series of events at Newspeak House in support of Ukraine and Ukrainians during these hard times.
After the talks, we will give participants the opportunity to share relevant initiatives they are working on. We are particularly interested in the fight against disinformation and the distribution of verified and useful information.
We also welcome any specialists who may want to organize further events connected with the war in Ukraine - please contact [email protected]
The Economics of The War in Ukraine, by a Russian Economist
“I was born in Kyiv, raised in Moscow, and studied economics at Lomonosov Moscow State University. I am Russian with many friends whose families live in Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is a tragedy on many levels and it is personal for me”
Viktor Veterinarov ([email protected]) is a researcher in economics at the UCL, focusing on the political economy and labor economics of migration. The talk will provide historical context to the current war in Ukraine and an economic perspective on the consequences of war.
Historical Context: What is the history of relations between Russia and Ukraine? What challenges have they faced during the last three decades, and why has it escalated now? Viktor will explain how the Russian and Ukrainian economies and cultures are connected, the institutional differences between the two countries, and the role of propaganda and authoritarian tendencies in this divergence.
War Economics: What are the consequences of modern wars from an economic perspective? How do wars affect trade and production chains through network channels (the Donbas War study)? We will also cover the effect of refugees on host countries’ labor market based on evidence from Turkey and the Syrian War.
For curious participants, there are some references to related academic papers
Emergency Response Mechanisms and the Architecture of the Humanitarian System
Manon Jones ([email protected]) works for the CCCM Cluster in geospatial analysis and information management at the Department of Emergency at the United Nations International Organization for Migration. Manon has a background in International Development and Urban Design Research and has carried out several research projects at the Bartlett School of Architecture (UCL) analyzing refugee settlements.
Further talks TBC
If you have a talk you would like to give, at this event or future events in this series, please contact [email protected]
Opinions expressed are solely personal and do not express the views or opinions of any employers or political organizations.
Register ↗The first of a weekly discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
This week we’re discussing ‘It’s okay to leave EA’ by Julia Wise:
“Several times in the last few weeks I’ve seen someone saying EA has become really bad for them. I don’t have anything really profound to say here, but I think people who are especially miserable in EA should seriously consider leaving.
There are lots of ways to engage with EA, and sometimes if you’re burnt out on some aspects there are other aspects that still feel viable and invigorating. But maybe there aren’t. Maybe the whole thing makes you want to hide in bed. And if so, I think you should trust your gut. Not to hide in bed, I mean, but to get some space from EA.
I realize “take some space” might be easier said than done, especially if you work in the EA space or a lot of your social life is there. Maybe try out a small experiment first: a vacation from EA-related work, reading, or actions.“
There is limited numbers so if you’re interested please RSVP to [email protected].
Covid: If you can, take a lateral flow test before coming.
Register ↗A meetup for Odin members. Odin is a community-driven investment platform on a mission to reimagine how value is created and distributed. joinodin.com
Register ↗Join your fellow HackThePress members at Newspeak House to hang out and continue hacking on media-tech 👩💻
We’ll provide power, WiFi, and somewhere warm, you bring the code! (and beer)
Don’t worry if you don’t know what you want to work on. There are a few projects for you to join, or you can come with your own idea to work on.
We’ll be offering technical, design, product, and news industry support to you and your project.
Register ↗The first of a weekly discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
This week we’re discussing ‘We need more nuance regarding funding gaps’ by Joey Savoie:
“Funding gaps are a well-discussed topic in the EA movement and between funders of all sizes. The concept overall is highly relevant and useful when making decisions. However, I think the bulk of communication about funding gaps is quite unspecific and unrefined, and even carefully communicated content can lead to confusion in overall discourse. A claim like “EA has a funding gap” or “EA does not have a funding gap” is too unspecific a heuristic and can lead to a lot of confusion about the state of funding, as some strong charities receive no funding despite a consensus that the given area is considered “funding flooded.” Working with a number of early-stage charities going through the Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program has really given me a more nuanced sense of where specific gaps are and how important this information can be.”
There is limited numbers so if you’re interested please RSVP to [email protected].
Covid: If you can, take a lateral flow test before coming.
Register ↗The first of a weekly discussion group for Effective Altruism topics. EA is about using evidence and careful analysis to figure out how we can use our resources to help others the most.
This week we’re discussing ‘The Most Important Century’, focusing on the first two sections, the intro and ‘All Possible Views About Humanity’s Future Are Wild’.
“I think we have good reason to believe that the 21st century could be the most important century ever for humanity. I think the most likely way this would happen would be via the development of advanced AI systems that lead to explosive growth and scientific advancement, getting us more quickly than most people imagine to a deeply unfamiliar future.“
There is limited numbers so if you’re interested please RSVP to [email protected].
Covid: If you can, take a lateral flow test before coming.
Register ↗A screening of the multi-award-winning documentary Bringing Down a Dictator (56m), which explores the nonviolent defeat of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, focusing on the contributions of the student-led Otpor! movement, followed by a Q&A with Srdja Popovik, leader of Otpor 1998-2002 and now a member of Serbia’s parliament.
Register ↗This is a workshop on creating—all attendees together—a hypothetical software product that would help us make collective decisions.
There is a lot of prior art in this domain of collective/democratic decision making, yet we want to completely ignore it. If you have no idea about the prior art, please come tabula rasa and don’t make any research.
Motivation
Living in the same area implies some kind of coordination. This can start from agreeing that we will not build houses where roads are but also escalates to handling a situation of a neighbour having Covid and not being able to afford food.
In the West, we abstract this coordination away to the Council / Mayor / Government, yet lots of people not part of these institutions want (and do) help. Can software help them? This workshop is an investigation into how.
Details
- The goal is to design (not visually/graphically) a small software product that can facilitate decision making.
- We’ll focus on designing a solution for a local London neighbourhood with a population between 100 and 1000.
- We assume there will not be uniformity across our population. Eg, if we’d designed this for a company we could assume a certain common culture. This is not true in our case of a highly diverse neighbourhood of houses and shops.
- Non goals:
- We are not interesting in approaching this in a deeply technical manner. This means that we are not interested in algorithmic consensus or blockchain distributedness. We are interested in the UX of the software.
- We don’t expect people who do this as part of their day job to attend and deliver a sophisticated proposal. This is an experiment for people interested in the ideas of solving local problems autonomously, whatever their expertise (if you do this as part of your job though, please do attend, we’d love your input!)
- We are not necessarily interested in actually building the solution we’ll come up with. If it’s great, we (or someone else) might though!
Schedule
- Introductory presentation on what we want to achieve (5 min)
- Questions and discussion on end result — opening the scope of what’s possible (10 min)
- Feature ideation and brainstorming — what could our functionality be (10 min)
- Defining an MVP — limiting the scope of our end result to a manageable size (20 min)
- Devising a strategy for extending our MVP (10 min)
- Epilogue — feedback — reflections
Note 1: In case more than 10 people show up, we might split up into two parallel teams doing the same thing.
Note 2: Please come even if you think you are or work in a field atypical for such an event!
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗Local News is broken.
We’ve partnered with two Local News organisations to help find ways technology can enhance a local community:
- Social Spider - Runs 5 Local Newspapers in London
- Clear Sky - A startup Local News company looking to deliver news differently
The core theme we’ll be exploring is enhancing local community, specifically:
- How can we build connections between members of a local community?
- How can we amplify voices within a local community?
- How can we surface information about a local community?
We will have a judging panel of 4 people from the tech and news industries who will select a winner in each of the three themes above.
For more information, see https://hackthepress.eventbrite.com
Slack workspace: https://bit.ly/HTPSlack
Doors will be open from 0900 for a 0930 start on Saturday.
If you’re new to Hackathons, take a look at this: https://hackathon.guide. Everyone is welcome, as long as they follow our code-of-conduct and have signed up on Eventbrite. Beginners are especially welcome! Attendees have a huge range of skill-sets, so you’ll have no problem finding someone to learn from. We have experts from three different fields (developers, journalists, researchers) to help you improve and build your ideas. The last two HackThePress Hackathons (2019 and 2020) were huge successes, you can read more about them here: https://hackthepress.org
Register ↗Public discourse receives the blame for many of society’s problems, but also holds many of our hopes for human progress. Newspeak House presents an evening of lectures on how to think about what people are talking about.
Areeq Chowdhury: The Effect of Digital Technologies on Scientific Misinformation
How are digital technologies changing the way people interact with information? What technologies are there that can fabricate and detect misinformation? And what role does technology have to play in creating a better information environment?
Areeq will talk about The Royal Society’s recent report The Online Information Environment that addresses these questions, providing an overview of how the internet has changed, and continues to change, the way society engages with scientific information, and how it may be affecting people’s decision-making behaviour from taking up vaccines to responding to evidence on climate change, highlight key challenges for creating a healthy online information environment, and make recommendations for policymakers, academics, and online platforms.
Areeq Chowdhury (@AreeqChowdhury) is a Senior Policy Adviser at The Royal Society (the UK’s national academy for science) focusing on data and digital technologies, and founded the influential technology policy think tank, WebRoots Democracy.
Luke Thorburn: Metaphors for Public Discourse
Consider the totality of all human communication, opinion, knowledge, and the mechanisms by which these things change over time. Some people call it the “information environment” or the “marketplace of ideas”, but to use such terms is to assume that environmental or economic metaphors are appropriate. Over the past few years, Luke Thorburn has been accumulating an inventory of such metaphors.
In this talk, he will provide an overview of the different metaphors commonly (and less commonly) used, where they fall short, and the different interventions and regulatory responses they imply—aiming to promote critical thinking about such metaphors when they are encountered ‘in the wild’.
Luke Thorburn (@LukeThorburn) is a PhD candidate at King’s College London within The Centre for Doctoral Training in Safe and Trusted AI. His primary research interest is in ensuring that the algorithms used to mediate our shared epistemic systems are aligned with human values, as well as better understanding the extent to which this is important. Previously, he was a member of The Hunt Lab for Intelligence Research at the University of Melbourne.
Register ↗An informal in-person meetup for members of ClimateAction.tech:
ClimateAction.tech (CAT) is a global community of tech professionals using our skills, expertise and platforms to support solutions to the climate crisis.
The ClimateAction.tech mission is to empower technology professionals to play our part — to meet, discuss, learn and take climate action.
Our vision is that everyone is working on the climate crisis at all levels, and together we are driving industry and society toward a sustainable future.
Our approach is to advocate internally within tech, and to collaborate externally to support the broader climate movement from tech.
Since forming, our membership has ballooned globally, and now involves vibrant input from students and graduates, through managers, designers, developers and creatives who work in tech across a wide array of industries, all the way through to senior figures at the world’s largest tech companies.
We operate an intentionally safe and inclusive environment at all times (code of conduct), for people of any gender, identity, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic status and/or other possible historically exploited differentiators. Protecting this is, and will always be, core to our community value system.
Membership is open to anyone who identifies as a tech worker. People of any geographic region, sector, skill-set, day job, seniority, knowledge or experience level are welcome.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗An informal in-person meetup for members of ClimateAction.tech:
ClimateAction.tech (CAT) is a global community of tech professionals using our skills, expertise and platforms to support solutions to the climate crisis.
The ClimateAction.tech mission is to empower technology professionals to play our part — to meet, discuss, learn and take climate action.
Our vision is that everyone is working on the climate crisis at all levels, and together we are driving industry and society toward a sustainable future.
Our approach is to advocate internally within tech, and to collaborate externally to support the broader climate movement from tech.
Since forming, our membership has ballooned globally, and now involves vibrant input from students and graduates, through managers, designers, developers and creatives who work in tech across a wide array of industries, all the way through to senior figures at the world’s largest tech companies.
We operate an intentionally safe and inclusive environment at all times (code of conduct), for people of any gender, identity, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic status and/or other possible historically exploited differentiators. Protecting this is, and will always be, core to our community value system.
Membership is open to anyone who identifies as a tech worker. People of any geographic region, sector, skill-set, day job, seniority, knowledge or experience level are welcome.
Register ↗A meetup to discuss founding, building and scaling crypto native companies: DAOs, chains & tokens.
- 7pm greets
- 7:10pm update on w3meetupDAO
- 7:20: Talk 1 - Daniel Tenner @swombat on the intersection of NFTs and DAOs
- 7:30: Talk 2 - Amenti Kenea @Amenti4K
- 8pm: Drinks & chat on terrace
Likely around 25 attendees including, Kevin McDonagh and Ed
This group is developing a DAO to pay for sponsored meetups. You can join the journey on yet another Discord.
Register ↗Bethnal Green Ventures (BGV) is Europe’s leading early stage investor in tech for good supporting ambitious tech for good ventures. We provide investment, support and intensive mentoring to great teams with new ideas for using technology to tackle big social and environmental problems.
Applications for our Spring 2022 programme are open until 9th January 2022.
This Q&A event is a great opportunity for startups considering applying to join our next cohort, to find out more about what BGV offers.
You’ll get the chance to meet some of the startups we’ve supported on previous programmes, and learn what it’s like to be part of the growing BGV community. There will also be the opportunity to talk to the BGV team about your idea and get answers to any questions you might have.
Agenda
- 5.00pm Registration and welcome drinks
- 5.15pm What happens at BGV? Who do we support? What does the 12 week programme entail? How much do we invest? Who are our mentors? What other support do we offer? What does it mean to be part of the BGV community?
- 5.45pm Stories from our startups: Hear from other tech for good founders who have been through the BGV programme. Learn from their experiences first hand and hear their tips for getting the most out of BGV.
- 6.00pm Q&A: Ask the BGV team and startup founders any questions you might have about our investment and support programme.
- 6.30pm Networking - Meet fellow founders and chat with some of the BGV startups. You can also use this time to talk with the BGV team about your startup and get feedback on your idea.
- 7.00pm Event close - Before coming to the event it may be helpful to re-read through the information on our programme here. If you’re in a team then we’d encourage you to bring your co-founders/colleagues with you.
Please note that we want to keep everyone attending safe and adhere to government guidelines for health and safety during a pandemic. If you feel more comfortable joining a virtual event, you can sign up to one of our virtual Q&A events.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us at [email protected]
We look forward to meeting you!
The BGV team
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist. People start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This time the articles are:
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have a reading you’d like to suggest for future meetups, please do so at reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, or email Phil.
At 5pm, Joshua Becker will lead a discussion on Priya Parker “The Art of Gathering”.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗In our previous meetup we discussed—amongst other things—scientific magazine publishing houses. However, only few of us had an idea of how they work and most of us didn’t really know much.
There is merit in learning about them; especially if we want to propose an alternative model.
At this meetup we will hear from someone who has worked on this domain from both the side of publishing companies as well as the side of academia, who will hopefully shed some light into how all these things work, what are their objectives, how they profit, etc.
Join us to learn about all these things and talk about Open Access and scientific knowledge dissemination! (Please feel free to join even if you think you are not the usual person who’s interested in things like that).
Here is our Code of Conduct.
PS. We do not support, endorse, or contribute in any way to illegal activities. Our interest to Sci-Hub is only from a societal and research point of view.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗We are delighted to announce that Raul Espejo, the pioneer of Cybernetics and Cybersyn system will give our annual Cybersalon Xmas Lecture in person. We will discuss what Cybersyn pioneers would say about our chances of ‘bouncing back better’. To optimise or to re-boot, this is the question (or one of many).
From Stafford Beer, Janos Kornai to more modern Viable Systems Model, cybernetics can all point at solutions for our current predicament. How do you balance rapid adaptation to new circumstances with making sure you don’t fall over is the question for 2020.
Raul Espejo worked on the original Cybersyn in Chile in 1971-1973 during presidency of Salvador Allende. He has escaped safely and has since been lecturing world-wide on the future of systems. Raul is currently based in Lincoln University.
After the talk we will host a discussion on future of systemic adaptation to Climate Change with Raul Espejo, Dr Richard Barbrook (Westminster University), Eva Pascoe (Cybersalon.org), and Edward Saperia (Newspeak House).
CyberSanta with mince pies to follow.
Sponsors:
- Cybersalon.org – Think Tank on Digital Futures
- Patchworks.com – No 1 UK Ecom Systems Integrator
- Hydro66.com – Green Energy Data Centres
Celebrate winter with DataKind UK, a non-profit helping charitable organisations explore and unlock the possibilities within their data.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗A meetup of DeveloperDAO, a community of builders who believe in collective ownership of the internet.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗A meetup to discuss founding, building and scaling crypto native companies: DAOs, chains & tokens.
Short talks (tbc) then drinks & mingling.
Register ↗Svelte is a radical new approach to building user interfaces. Whereas traditional frameworks like React and Vue do the bulk of their work in the browser, Svelte shifts that work into a compile step that happens when you build your app. Instead of using techniques like virtual DOM diffing, Svelte writes code that surgically updates the DOM when the state of your app changes. Read the introductory blogpost to learn more.
Join fellow Svelte enthusiasts for an evening of lightning talks and chatter.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This time the articles are:
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have a reading you’d like to suggest for future meetups, please do so at reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, or email Phil.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELLED DUE TO A POSSIBLE COVID OUTBREAK
Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗Due to high demand, this event has been moved to The Dickens Inn in Tower Hill, please re-register.
This is a social aimed at people already familiar with effective altruism, including people who haven’t been to an event before. No themes - just come along and chat about whatever you want!
If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗Many people do not know what economics is about, what economists do, and why they receive a Nobel Prize every year for something incomprehensible. This small workshop with a live discussion will help you to see that economics may be clear and straightforward. It will be especially useful for people with experience in social sciences and/or data analysis.
This year Nobel laureates’ research mostly covers causal effects of policies: specifically, how we can measure the role of migration, health, and education in our society. We will discuss why we cannot answer many policy questions based on just averages, correlations, anecdotal evidence, and case studies.
Using examples of policies in migration, health and education we will get acquainted with two basic methods: Regression discontinuity design and Propensity score matching. We will discuss their basic versions and some applications.
There are three main topics:
- One more cigarette or not today? Why the impact of smoking on our health it is not straightforward
- They are taking our jobs! Or not? What migration means for natives and who should worry
- “Mom, I decided to drop out of college and start doing real things!” At what point this may be a very good decision, not only youthful frivolity
For curious participants, there are some references to laureates’ academic papers.
Viktor Veterinarov, Economist, Data Scientist, Researcher at UCL Department of Economics, Resident Fellow at Newspeak House. [email protected], @VVeterinarov
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗We are very excited to host an extra special in-person Hattusia community meet up, as a chance to chat in person with others working in technology who also care about ethics. We’re looking forward to a really relaxed meet up, as an opportunity to meet and chat to other people who are doing the same job as you, exchange ideas on how to manage tricky problems and situations - and above all have fun. Please register if you are attending.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, run by volunteers from the community and open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗An in-person social for social impact driven youth. Invited youth groups include members of Global Shapers Cambridge, London, London Shapers, Shaping Horizons, and VOICES. We will be an overall of 20-25 people at max, and we will be outside, on the venue’s terrace (some areas have a roof so in case if it’s raining we can still be there). As we don’t have funding for this social please bring drinks/food that you wish to have or share during the event. If you would like to attend, please contact Zsofia.
Register ↗Since February Sci-Hub has stopped adding new articles, due an ongoing legal hearing.
We’re a group of people (not affiliated with Sci-Hub) who want to talk about and exchange ideas and stories about the unique library, the first website in the world to provide mass & public access to research papers.
Sci-Hub can be approached through many lenses:
- Practical. Making it easier to download articles, even when one has access through the official channels.
- Essential. Without Sci-Hub lots of people (and especially those from poor countries/universities) would not be able to access a wide array papers.
- Ethical. Neither does one want to be treated unfairly nor wrong someone else. Is it fair for Sci-Hub to exist?
- Political. In addition to everything else, it was our societies’ laws that motivated Sci-Hub to come to existence.
- Technical. How on earth does all this bandwidth demand from all over the world get covered?
- Legal. What do copyright laws say and how are they defined?
- Research. Does more people having access to research papers lead to science speeding up?
- …and many more we haven’t thought yet.
If you have any thoughts or comments on the above, join us—we’d love to hear them.
PS. We do not support, endorse, or contribute in any way to illegal activities. Our interest to Sci-Hub is only from a societal and research point of view.
Register ↗Paolo Gerbaudo, Italian sociologist and political theorist based at King’s College London, launches his new book exploring the transformation of politics in the aftermath of the pandemic and the return of the interventionist state.
In these times of health emergency, economic collapse, populist anger and ecological threat, societies are forced to turn inward in search of protection. Neoliberalism, the ideology that presided over decades of market globalisation, is on trial, while state intervention is making a spectacular comeback amid lockdowns, mass vaccination programmes, deficit spending and climate planning.
This is the Great Recoil, the era when the neo-statist endopolitics of national sovereignty, economic protection and democratic control overrides the neoliberal exopolitics of free markets, labour flexibility and business opportunity.
The book launch event will host the book author alongside other authors and academics working on related issues. It will be followed by a Q&A session.
Copies of the book will be available for sale at the event, and can be bought online now.
Register ↗You say wot?
This September Poles Apart by Wine and Wotsit’s founder Ali Goldsworthy is published. Poles Apart looks at why we are divided and what we can do about it when it gets to excessive levels. A key part of that is asking yourself about a time you changed your mind on an issue and why.
So we’ve got a Wine and Wotsits special. With leaders trying to answer that question in 20 slides which each take 20 seconds. The final presentation of the night will come from Ali along with co-authors Laura Osborne and Alex Chesterfield. They’ll dig into why it is so hard, and so important to understand.
So not only do we give you lighting talks from world class speakers. We give you wotsits. And a book Penguin Random House think is a timeless classic. (you can let us know if you agree)
The format will remain the one you know and love - pecha kucha. This means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, The Sunday Times, pollsters, leading academics, journalists and many more.
Wot Wot Where?
We’re going hybrid. There will be a limited number of tickets for Newspeak House, 133 Bethnal Green Road, London to keep us Corona compliant and space for others to dial in online.
Wot Wot Who?
We’ll be unveiling the full list of speakers over the next week…. but we’re ready to unveil the first three…
- Anjali Ramachandran (Director Storythings, Co Founder Ada’s list)
- Nick Barron (Deputy CEO, MHP)
plus
- Laura Osborne, Alex Chesterfield and Ali Goldsworthy, Co-Authors, Poles Apart.
How many tickets are there?
We are strictly limited to 60 in person - but many more can join online.
You are charging this time - what do I get?
The ticket covers a copy of the book. If you provide your address when you order we will post you a copy. If not there will be a signed one to pick up on the night. We can get 25% off the price and thats the cost of the ticket.
For those of you in person we will be providing wotsits. Those of you at home will need to get your own. Monster Munch and Onion Rings are also firm audience favourites. Yes you can bring them.
Tell me more about the book…
Poles Apart, brings together expertise on polarisation, behavioural science and communications to explain why we are so prone to be drawn into rival, often deeply antagonistic factions. It examines the shaping force of our genetic make-up on our fundamental views and the nature of the influences that family, friends and peers exert. They pinpoint the economic and political triggers that tip people from healthy disagreement to dangerous hostility, and the part played by social media in spreading entrenched opinions. And the authors help us to understand why outlooks that can seem so bizarre and extreme to us, seem so eminently sensible to those who hold them.
Above all, by meticulously showing how and why polarisation affects every part of our lives - influencing everything from our friendship circles to our approach to health issues - they show what practical and effective steps we can all take to narrow divisions, build respect for others, and create a greater degree of common understanding.
“A fascinating read which will help anyone who wants to step out of the polarisation cycle and become part of the solution.” - Jon Haidt, NYU Professor and author of The Righteous Mind
“An extraordinary achievement: fresh deeply authoritative and entertaining on every page… you’ll finish the book wiser, kinder and more hopeful than when you started” - Jamie Susskind, author Future Politics
“Asks the best questions I have ever heard. And, critically offers solutions. A Must read.” - Rory Sutherland, Vice Chair Ogilvy UK, Spectator columnist, author of Alchemy
“A fascinating and thought provoking analysis of the divisions between us, how we bridge them, how we reshape the world and ourselves too. Essential Reading” - Cathy Newman, presenter of Channel 4 News and author
I’ve already bought the book…
Congratulations on your foresight. You can buy a second or send us a copy of the receipt and say you want to come in person or dial in remotely and we will send you details.
For those attending in person, what COVID precautions are you taking?
Important question. Firstly if you have any signs of COVID and have bought a ticket, please stay home and join virtually. We’ll miss you but it is important to keep everybody safe. For people coming we are taking the following precautions
limiting attendance to 60 (50% capacity) and distancing tables more than normal you’ll need to sign an e-declaration when you arrive that you are symptom free and have a temperature check. Windows will be kept open with someone keeping an eye on ventilation circulation via new sensors. Sanitising work surfaces Wot even is a wotsit?
Oh you poor soul. a wotsit is an airy crisp that honks of cheese. American’s call them Cheetos (though they are slightly less moorish).
Who is behind this?
Ali Goldsworthy, Kate Norgrove, Usman Mohammed, Jon Date and Jess Day run Wine and Wotsits. We are very grateful to More Onion for lending us their zoom account and Newspeak House for hosting this cross between a child’s 3rd birthday party and work conference for the last six years. It’s become the most amazing beast thanks to them and a lot of others on the way.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora, including but not limited to LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement. All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Assuming the weather holds, we’ll be having our first in-person meetup in over a year! If the weather doesn’t hold, we’ll sadly retreat to being online again. Due to COVID, places for meeting at Newspeak House are limited to twelve. If we go over, there are plenty of green spaces nearby; I expect we’d head to Weaver’s Fields instead.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This time the articles are:
- Lena (fiction; https://qntm.org/mmacevedo)
- Don’t sell your soul (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/YtisDHHhpxEh4e7zr/don-t-sell-your-soul)
We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have a reading you’d like to suggest for future meetups, please do so at reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, or email Phil.
Please consider taking a Covid test before coming, and consider your personal thresholds for acceptable risk.
Register ↗Unofficial meetup for fans of the Knowledge Fight podcast. Not associated with Dan or JorDAN.
WonkFest may have been cancelled, but Policy Wonks can still meet up in a COVID safe way. BYO-everything, and come chat about Alex Jones with people who also listen to frankly absurd levels of content about the man. (Maybe try and avoid chocolate, we don’t want a Raptor-Princess attack)
If you’ve never listened to Knowledge Fight, and you’re confused about this ‘Alex Jones’ guy, the boys recommend starting with this episode. Please enjoy the wild ride.
Boring/Important COVID Info:
- Tickets are limited because we can only accommodate 16 people safely. Please don’t show up with an unexpected +1.
- You will be asked to sanitise your hands on arrival and to wear a mask when not eating or drinking.
- If you have any additional safety questions or requests please contact Fiona.
The Coronavirus Tech Handbook provides a space where technologists, specialists, civic organisations and public & private institutions can collaborate on a rapid and sophisticated response to the outbreak. It is a dynamic resource with many hundreds of contributors that is evolving very quickly. Its design is easy to read, intuitive to use, and allows for easy long term engagement. With your help, we can produce a comprehensive library of all known resources for mitigating every impact of the pandemic.
https://coronavirustechhandbook.com
Register ↗On Thursday 9 April, local councils will release details of who is standing for the May elections. At this event, we’ll be collecting all that data together into one open database.
Stay for the whole session or just drop in whenever you can — every little helps!
We’ll provide drinks and snacks!
You’ll need a laptop, but no technical knowledge.
You might like to sign up for an account at candidates.democracyclub.org.uk before the event.
Register ↗Every month we meet up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on at www.radicalengineers.com
Register ↗The Echo Chamber Club brings together various experts and specialists who want to improve information environments. You could be an academic, a journalist, a think-tanker, a technologist or a policy-maker who works on anything related to this field. This could be - disinformation, misinformation, information warfare, truth-making, conspiracy theories, data privacy, data politics, political advertising, microtargeting, transparency, mediatisation, normalisation, echo chambers, filter bubbles, herd thinking and more.
The purpose of this meet up is to meet people who are working in adjacent fields to enable collaboration. However, we will also have some exciting provocations lined up to help stimulate conversation.
The meet up will be hosted by Alice Thwaite, founder of the Echo Chamber Club. We will provide snacks and drinks. Please do give us a donation to help us fund the event and buy refreshements.
- Arrivals from 6.30 pm
- Provocations from 7pm (speakers tbc)
- The event ends when the last person exits
The Metropolitan Police have begun deploying controversial facial recognition cameras across London. Future Advocacy, a think tank focused on artificial intelligence and emerging technologies, is currently exploring the potential implications this may have for people of colour and religious minorities. Studies have found that facial recognition technology can often result in discriminatory outcomes for individuals with darker skin.
As part of our research, we are looking to bring together young people of colour at a workshop in East London to discuss their views on the technology. It will be an informal event and refreshments will be provided (including pizza).
For any questions, please feel free to get in touch with Areeq Chowdhury at [email protected].
This project is being supported by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust.
Register ↗A recently released FOIA request made to the National Security Agency brought their internal Python training course to light…
If you’d like to learn Python direct from NSA materials, join us on March 28th in London for our first NSA Python study group session!
Register ↗An event to celebrate the launch of Good Services, a new book about how to design services that work for users.
Good service is a book about what makes a good service, and how to design services that work for users. It took a lot of work to make, so we’re having a party to celebrate!
Talks by Lou Downe and Sarah Richards about all things services - good, bad and ugly - followed by a conversation between both speakers on writing books about emergent disciplines.
And if that wasn’t enough, music, a special gin from The Electric Spirit Co and an opportunity to buy posters, stickers and (more!) books.
There will be live music after the talks and a promise of a party atmosphere.
Talk by Sarah Richards
Founder of the content design movement, Sarah pioneered the standards during her 10-year career with the UK government. As head of content design for the Government Digital Service (GDS), Sarah created and implemented the content strategy for the GOV.UK website.
Talk by Lou Downe
Director of Housing and Land transformation for the UK Government, based at Homes England and author of Good Services - a book about how to design services that work. They were previously Director of Design for the UK Government, where they established the cross-government standards for good services and founded the discipline of service design, building a community of over 3,000 designers, user researchers and content designers across government.
Gin by Electric Spirit Co.
Founded by James Porteous (ex EY Seren and Engine, now distiller extraordinaire). James has been a long term service design friend through the years, and gave it up to distill amazing gin that just so happens, matches the colour of the book!
Music from a live band, followed by Sarah Drummond (aka. DJ Drummondbass).
Party and Talks Schedule
- 18:00 - Arrivals
- 18.30 - Welcomes
- 18:40 - Talk by Sarah Richards
- 19:10 - Talk by Lou Downe
- 19:30 - In conversation with Sarah and Lou, with questions from the audience
- 20:00 - Shake a leg and celebrate!
Gen:Impact was set up to connect young professionals in London working to have social impact. Our goal is to provide a casual setting to exchange ideas, build relationships, and collaborate towards social change. Whether you’re a teacher, a civil servant, an impact investor or you work in the charitable sector, our work is aligned by the fact that we work to make the world a better place. Meet similar people and hear inspiring talks from peers!
- 7:00 - 7:30 PM - Arrivals - Arrive and meet.
- 7:30 - 8:30 PM - Speakers - Learn about exciting projects in the impact space from your peers
- Beatrix Pitel, Fawcett Society - Fawcett Society is a charity campaigning for gender equality and women’s rights at work. They publish research and bring together politicians, academics and activists to tackle issues such as closing the gender pay gap and secure equal political representations.
- Anna Fraser, Social Finance - After studying Human Computer Interaction Design, Anna worked in the Home Office in user research across immigration and law enforcement. She worked to understand and champion the needs of people using the services, researching with a wide range of users including vulnerable people, and people with access needs. Since then, she has moved to Social Finance, working to embed user research in projects across a range of complex social issues.
- More tbc!
- 8:30 - 10 PM - Networking - Chat and share a drink with your peers in the impact community
Org/speaker bios:
Register ↗Join us to hear about research into the use of highly intrusive monitoring technologies in children’s lives at school, after school, and beyond the school gates. Hear what you can do to help the campaign to make all school data safe, fair and transparent.
The creeping capability of commercial school safeguarding software now includes imposed surveillance at home. Companies that once offered only filtering and blocking now monitor individuals on screen content and searches. Typing words that match keywords libraries of thousands of terms can trigger a risk flag.
Advancing technology enables ever more one-sided opaque access to information about children, building profiles, even taking their photos via the webcam.
But there is no discussion of its growing risks or transparency to schools or families about how it works.
defenddigitalme has obtained statistics using Freedom of Information requests that suggest 70% of schools in England use web monitoring software, and a growing trend to monitor personal devices beyond the school playground.
Parents want to know how these flags and watchwords are being used about their children. Under a third of parents polled believe their school use these tools. None of the 400 school policies reviewed by defenddigitalme explain it.
Will the Online Harms agenda normalise or even seek to legalise this gross invasion of private and family life?
Speaker: Jen Persson @TheABB from defenddigitalme
Further reading: https://defenddigitalme.com/2018/12/response-to-school-pupils-being-spied-on-through-webcams-and-school-web-monitoring-software
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We’ll be unveiling the full list of speakers over the next few weeks.
How many tickets are there?
About 125. We always sell out, so please grab a ticket early to avoid disappointment, and if you can’t make it let us know so someone else can grab your spot.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. Rebels sometimes bring onion rings or monster munch.
You have a great evening, make friends with strangers and learn a bunch.
Register ↗This is an event for anyone with an interest in the labour movement.
Too often in our movement, technology has been touted as the answer to all our problems. Clearly, it’s not. But clearly, in 2020, we’ve got to wield it effectively to build power and coalitions across the movement. 120 years after labour unions founded the Labour Party on the basis of collective action, are we making the most of the tools of the 21st century?
We’ll hear from Brian Young, Executive Director of Action Network in the US, where trade unions and activists got together and decided to stop buying technology owned by hedgefunds. Instead they built a coalition first and then the movement decided what technology it wanted and then they created and owned it themselves. This technology has powered the Womens March, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Sunrise Movement, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) and Stop School Cuts here in the UK.
Brian will share experiences of building that coalition culture in the states, how they’ve started to change the way they think about tech so that it serves organisers and activists rather than the other way round.
It’s not about one set of tools over another, we want to think about how we build and use technology more effectively to build the power of the labour movement.
Tea & pastries from 2.30pm with a talk and Q&A to start at 3pm.
Register ↗At a time when successful startups are under growing scrutiny, when too many people are being left out of the value startups create, it’s clear: we need better options. One critical leverage point is the “exit”—the holy grail for most ambitious startups—the moment when the company is sold to another company or a new set of investors. These kinds of outcomes guide startups’ mission and purpose from the very beginning. What if there were another kind of goal to aspire toward?
Already, mission-oriented startups and funds are working on making “Exit to Community” or E2C possible, one experiment at a time. Meanwhile, the likes of Uber and Airbnb are seeking ways to share equity more broadly with their worker-users. Community ownership could be a new way forward for the future of work, data, and innovation. At this workshop, we’ll pool our knowledge and experience to identify pathways for making community ownership more available in the startup economy and its surrounding mythology.
Register ↗Do you want to improve your digital security? Do you keep putting it off? We’re a collective of feminist cybersecurity researchers and activists, and we want to help you access free tools and resources to protect your data. Join us for a free, practical, hands-on workshop exploring how digital security affects your life.
Please consider bringing a laptop, smartphone, or any data-collecting device you own, as the workshop includes a hands-on tech support session. Snacks and drinks will be provided!
This project is a form of “action research”—a type of research which combines research with activism to understand a problem and find solutions. In other words, we want cybersecurity to be more open, fair, and inclusive, and we’re “learning by doing.” Results from the workshop will inform ongoing research, however participation in the research aspect of the workshop is entirely optional.
No prior experience or knowledge of cybersecurity required! As a feminist organisation, we want to reconfigure the assumption that digital security is for technical experts only. While the workshop is open to all, we particularly welcome women and other groups which are underrepresented in cybersecurity discussions.
This workshop is run in partnership with TIME’S UP UK. TIME’S UP came into being following the revelations about Harvey Weinstein and the widespread disclosures of abuse by powerful men via #MeToo across the entertainment industry. The global movement brought together filmmakers, actors, directors, producers and writers in Hollywood and the UK to campaign for systemic change and the ending of harassment and abuse across the sector. TIME’S UP looks forward to achieving zero tolerance of harassment, 50/50 pay parity and equal representation across the leadership of film, television and theatre sectors bringing about sustainable cultural change. https://www.timesupuk.org/
This workshop is organised by researchers at the Oxford Internet Institute, in collaboration with Darktrace, a cyber defence company. It is funded by a UK Research and Innovation “Citizen Science” research grant (BBSRC Grant reference number BB/T018593/1).
Register ↗There’s a Climate Crisis raging around us and all that anyone seems to want to do is talk, now it’s time for action.
We’ve formed this group for everyone who is passionate about human and environmental problems and wants to collaborate to create impactful solutions.
We’ve adopted some simple techniques from the startup world and combined them with some theories on collaborative working to create a simple process for producing impactful solutions we can actually enact.
We hope from this group we’ll invent new products, start exciting projects, come up with interesting campaigns, launch innovative charities and have fun doing it.
Don’t worry! Taking part requires no specific knowledge of anything. Everything is tailored for simplicity to ensure a diverse group can come to the meeting with basically no training and leave with a Climate Crisis solution to collaborate on.
These monthly events will occur in various locations around London, please share this event with anyone else you think would like to attend. You should also sign up on our website for more information: https://cvcollective.mailchimpsites.com
Register ↗Livingmaps Network was established in 2013 to develop a network of researchers, community activists, artists and others with a common interest in the use of mapping for social change, public engagement, critical debate, and creative forms of community campaigning. It now has nearly 2000 names on its subscription list, people who have attended one or more of our events over the past few years, and/or who follow our online journal. We are keen to involve more people in our activities, and to facilitate new projects and events proposed by members of our network.
Join Julie Futcher and other members of the Blue-Sky team to hear about their crowdsourcing project – generating a map of London’s Sky to document and share city-wide feelings of improved wellbeing, to better understand how a view of sky influences our lives and happiness.
Find out more about a planned exhibition and participatory mapping event at Tate Exchange (4th -5th April) where there will be opportunities to discuss your experiences with like-minded souls, put your happiness on the map and do some sky bathing. Together we will be exploring how a view of sky can generate momentary value, towards happiness, health and wellbeing. Take a photo of the sky on your phone, bring it along, and put it on the Tate Map!
The #BlueSkyHappiness project is a collaboration between London Citizens, Flourishing Lives, Inner London Ramblers, Living Maps, London National Park City, Urban Generation and Tranquil Cities.
Tickets are £5.00 to cover the cost of refreshments: Register
Register ↗A gender-inclusive chat about women’s past & future in cultural & tech industries, for International Women’s Day.
We will all sit around an art table, to amuse ourselves and attending children.
Register ↗The Technoprogressive New Deal (TND) builds on various ideas known as “Green New Deals” by additionally emphasising the possibility and desirability of greater liberation from the constraints of what is known as “human nature”. In this way, the TND draws on insights from the worldwide transhumanist and technoprogressive communities about the radical potential of emerging technologies.
The TND is a work in progress. This event, which is jointly organised by London Futurists and the Transhumanist Party (UK), is a chance to shape and improve this initiative, at a time when most political discussion is being blindsided by the accelerating pace of technological innovation.
In this event, David Wood, Chair of London Futurists, will review and raise questions about eight overlapping angles of the TND:
- A technoprogressive social contract: How should society be structured for a world in which many fewer people earn money by working? What preparations are needed as we move towards a “post work society”?
- A technoprogressive scorecard: What metrics should be put in place as a replacement for the GDP index as the guiding light for evaluating the success of the economy?
- The technoprogressive dividend: How will investments in measures to address inherited flaws in human nature (body, mind, spirit, and social relations) have strong and equitable economic benefits as well as strong and equitable humanitarian benefits?
- A technoprogressive regulatory framework: How should Big Tech be constrained and regulated? And what regulations should govern individual freedom of choice regarding new drugs, therapies, and treatments?
- Technoprogressive approaches to environmental crises: Green technologies offer considerable promise to address environmental risks. However, major questions remain.
- Technoprogressive approaches to international conflict: As technology raises worrying new possibilities for warfare and terrorism, how can technology be used in parallel to help establish greater peace and safety?
- Technoprogressive fundamentals: How should decisions be made, regarding which parts of human nature should be cherished and protected at all costs, which should be enhanced, and which should be overcome (transcended)?
- Building a technoprogressive alliance: Changing the world involves alliances as well as ideals. It involves compromises as well as principles. Which alliances and partnerships should the technoprogressive movement cultivate?
For each area, there will be opportunity for audience Q&A and group discussion.
David Wood is the author or lead editor of nine books, including, most recently, “RAFT 2035: Roadmap to Abundance, Flourishing, and Transcendence, by 2035”, from which many of the ideas in this talk have been developed. For more details, see https://deltawisdom.com/books
For information about London Futurists, see https://londonfuturists.com
For information about the Transhumanist Party (UK) see https://www.transhumanistparty.org.uk
Please arrive in time to be seated for the start of the presentation at 6.30pm.
The meeting is free to attend, but numbers will be restricted, so please register.
No refreshments will be provided, but attendees are welcome to bring their own.
Register ↗Effective altruism is about answering one simple question: how can we use our resources to help others the most?
Rather than just doing what feels right, we use evidence and careful analysis to find the very best causes to work on.
Come along and discuss whatever you feel like. If you’re new to effective altruism, you are very welcome too.
Please bring some vegan food to share.
Register ↗Svelte is a radical new approach to building user interfaces. Whereas traditional frameworks like React and Vue do the bulk of their work in the browser, Svelte shifts that work into a compile step that happens when you build your app. Instead of using techniques like virtual DOM diffing, Svelte writes code that surgically updates the DOM when the state of your app changes. Read the introductory blogpost to learn more.
Join fellow Svelte enthusiasts for an evening of lightning talks and chatter.
- Svelte at Bloomberg - Julian Burgess (@aubergene)
- The Svelte Context API - Antony (@antony)
- Using Svelte in React 🤷 - Kevin Wenner (@kevinwenner)
- Svelte-Utils, a quick intro - Joe Reeve (isnit0)
- Your project…
There are currently spots available for lightning talks: if you have a project, or have seen a tool/library/project you want to tell the community about, message or comment to give a <5min talk (need not be your own thing).
Looking forward to seeing you there!
Register ↗Every month we meet up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on at www.radicalengineers.com
Register ↗This will be the first of a series of activist meetups/chats around the country. They’ll be opportunities for a relaxed, open and activist-led discussion (as opposed to a panel event) on where LPV and Labour pro-Europeanism more generally could go next.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
It has only been two months since the election defeat and the upcoming local elections are more important than ever if we want to prevent the consolidation of that Conservative victory across the country.
We made astonishing headway in the 2019 General Election, building and thoroughly testing the GOTV Dashboard, our Twitter tool and the powerful insight viewer.
With only 9 weeks to go from the hack day to the election we need to work fast, build on our existing toolsets and tackle the problems presented to us by the campaigners at our Campaigner Confession event on February 12.
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
Including new people who are interested in evidence based campaign innovation and want to work out what happened and why.
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome!
Register ↗The London meetup for civic and political technology.
Speakers this month are along the theme of political parties and coalitions, and the tools that parties organise on.
- James Clarke, Deputy Leader of Renew UK a new political party
- Tabitha Morton, CEO of MoreUnited a coalition of MPs across the spectrum brought together by shared aims
- Flore Blondel-Goupil, Business Development Director EMEA at Nationbuilder, these are a suite of tools that have helped revolutionise campaigning.
- James Smith, Leader of Something New, a new startup political party.
Schedule
- 7.00pm – Doors Open
- 7.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 7.40pm – Speakers
- 9.00pm – Drinks
Join us in celebrating the launch of Means TV, the world’s first worker-owned, post-capitalist streaming service in London on 2.27.2020!
We’re kicking off the world premiere of Means TV with an evening of entertainment for the 99% with comrades, drinks, and a screening of one of our flagship films, Gaza Fights For Freedom.
Tickets are £15. All proceeds go back into making worker-owned entertainment.
Together, we can build media that empowers and reflects the working class!
About Gaza Fights For Freedom
A riveting documentary on Gaza’s Great March of Return by Abby Martin and a heroic team of Palestinian videographers.
This collaboration shows you Gaza’s protest movement like you’ve never seen before. Filmed during the height of the Great March Of Return protests, it features exclusive footage of demonstrations where 200 unarmed civilians have been killed by Israeli snipers since March 30, 2018.
Watch the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fru3tsO6dzE
About Means TV
Launching on 2.26.2020, Means TV will have a library of documentaries, movies, and shows with new programming added all the time. We’ll also have live weekly shows covering news, culture, gaming and sports.
All of this will be available to subscribers for $10/month across desktop, mobile and smart TV devices like Roku, Fire TV and Apple TV.
No advertisements or product placements. No corporate backers or VC cash ever.
We’re entirely funded by people like you.
Together, let’s build a long-standing, worker-owned media infrastructure that reflects and empowers the 99%.
Means TV is for all of us: https://means.tv
Register ↗Our next data science ethics bookclub is on recommender systems. You are welcome to pick from this reading list, depending on your interest and the time you have:
Articles
- “How Recommendation Algorithms Run the World” is a Wired article giving an overview of recommender systems and associated risks by Zeynep Tufekci.
- “YouTube’s algorithms might radicalise people – but the real problem is we’ve no idea how they work” is an article from The Conversation, by Chico Q. Camargo
- Business Insider article: Former Google data scientist: Don’t blame the internet for dividing the country
Academic journal articles
- “Recommender Systems and their Ethical Challenges” is an academic review paper by Milano, Taddeo & Floridi
- “Regulating Recommending: Motivations, Considerations, and Principles” is an academic paper by Cobbe and Singh
Quick reads
- Five risks of news personalization - particularly good for the non-technical reader
Tutorial
- “Experimentation with fairness-aware recommendation using librec-auto” is material for a hands-on tutorial from FAT* Conference 2020, by Burke and Mansoury
FAQs
Why are we doing this?
There’s a lot of good writing out there and one of the most important principles (even in our own ethical principles) is to discuss and debate the ethical questions.
We hope this will help people gain the tools they need to think about this in their jobs or in DataKind projects, or in encountering algorithmic tools in their everyday life. But if all you get out of it is some friendly discussion over a coffee or beer, that works too :-)
Do I need to be a data scientist to participate?
Nope. We’ll have a mix of technical and non-technical reading material. The aim is to think about data science in a context of ethical impacts and consequences - and that affects everybody!
Is there an online option?
We will be hosting an online group alongisde the in-person event - if you’d like to join remotely, please select the ‘remote bookclub’ option from the ticket options. We’ll also be live tweeting using the hashtag #DKbookclub and taking comments/questions.
I have a brilliant idea for reading material/a theme! Who do I tell?
We love suggestions! Tell us at [email protected]
Register ↗We welcome you to the very first community dinner at Newspeak House specifically for female-identifying and non-binary people.
A casual dinner to meet new friends and bring people together in the politics and technology sectors. No matter your job title or your experience in these industries, we welcome all diversities of thought.
Vegan food will be provided. Donations are welcome. For specific dietary requirements, email [email protected]
What if I identify as male but I want to come and support?
You can support by sharing this event link with your female-identifying and non-binary friends, encouraging them to come along. But you are not welcome to attend this event.
What if I don’t identify with any gender identity labels?
If you feel you need a safe space to connect with others and express yourself, and currently feel you can’t do that in other social spaces, then this event is a good place to start. You are welcome to join us.
Register ↗Data privacy is an important and often an overlooked subject in technology. With the rise of devices such as Amazon Ring, the Cambridge Analytica scandal and facial recognition software being rolled out by the Metropolitan police, it is more relevant than ever.
There will be lightning talks (speakers TBC) and then plenty of time to discuss the topics raised and meet fellow attendees. If you would like to give a lightning talk, please get in touch.
Optional Reading:
- Olu’s thread for Data Privacy Day
- CW: domestic abuse Engadget “For victims of smart home abuse, there’s no easy out”
- The Recompiler “But It Doesn’t Have Gifs! Moving privacy, anonymity, and anti-surveillance tools into the mainstream”
Brought to you by Subversion.
Register ↗PaperJam Game Jam is like a book club, but instead of a book we play a videogame, and as well as discussing it, we make paper prototypes inspired by it!
This time, we’re looking at Factorio, an extraordinary game about escaping an alien planet by building a rocket from scratch.
All are welcome, but some basic familiarity with boardgames or game design will be helpful. It generally goes like this:
- Arrive at the event having played Factorio. There’s a free demo available, but I encourage you to buy it! If you don’t find time to play, don’t let that stop you from coming.
- We discuss the game: Why is it fun? What are the systems in it and how do they work? etc
- We eat dinner together: there are a dozen places on the street that do takeaway of various cuisines.
- We try and make paper prototypes inspired by the game. A selection of materials are provided, but feel free to bring your own.
- We play and discuss each others’ prototypes.
The Conservative party has won a huge majority. ToryTechs want to use technology to help make the most of this.
How can we…
- help new MPs get their offices setup?
- engage people in what the government is doing?
- help the party and MPs be more effective?
Join other Tory Technologists and designers at the first ever ToryTechs Hackathon!
We’ll be spending Saturday and Sunday the 15 & 16th building, testing, and launching tech to improve democracy, and the effectiveness of government.
A hackathon is a weekend event for technologists, designers, and domain experts to come together and solve problems in an intensive and collaborative way. Read more here: https://hackathon.guide
Anyone can come (even if you’re not a member of the Conservative Party), we welcome your interest and would appreciate different perspectives. Everyone is welcome, as long as they follow our code-of-conduct.
Beginners are welcome too! Attendees have a huge range of skill-sets, so you’ll have no problem finding someone to learn from.
Register ↗Join Campaign Lab to see how we can help out in the upcoming local elections! The fightback begins now!
Local elections and mayoral elections will be happening this May across the UK. Some of these elections will be taking place in areas where Labour has lost MPs so the fightback locally begins now!
Join Campaign Lab for our event where we’ll be inviting campaign organisers and activists from across the country to share their local campaign challenges and what technical help they may need. We’re just confirming on our three fantastic speakers for our event - more details to follow!
During the panel and breakout session we’ll explore how the speakers are currently running their campaigns, their current practices in an effort to identify where there is space for innovation and improvement - asking our candidates and activists: how can the Campaign Lab community help their campaigns on the ground?
Campaign Lab is a community of activists, researchers and technologists working towards a more evidence-based approach to campaigning - outside of this event series we run monthly hackdays and meetups, come join us.
Register ↗From facial recognition to social media monitoring, from remote hacking to the use of mobile surveillance equipment called ‘IMSI catchers’, UK police forces are using an ever-expanding array of surveillance tools to spy on us as we go about our everyday lives. Too often, these new and intrusive spying technologies are rolled out without the say, or even the knowledge, of the public or their locally elected representatives.
The use of police surveillance technologies can threaten our privacy and may cause us to change who we associate with and what we feel we can do and say. These technologies can also be used to target, profile and discriminate against certain communities - including minority, low-income and politically active communities.
Join us in London to hear about Privacy International & Liberty’s campaign for the public to have a greater say as to whether their local police force should be allowed to use such highly intrusive technologies.
Speaker: Privacy International Legal Officer Camilla Graham Wood @milliegw
Further reading: https://privacyinternational.org/campaigns/neighbourhood-watched
Register ↗We are organizing an event for Wikimedians and researchers to exchange! Come along and learn more about research happening around Wikimedia and what Wikimedians can teach you about the different Wikimedia projects!
A large part of the computer science research community is exploring Wikipedia, Wikidata and their sister projects. In the fields of natural language processing (NLP) as well as semantic web, Wikipedia and Wikidata are often used as a fundamental part of the research world. At the same time, the community of Wikidata and Wikipedia could make use of a variety of tools developed by researchers. However, currently, the gap between things explored in research and actual applications in Wikidata and Wikipedia needs bridging. Therefore, we want to build a community of Wikidata community members and research to exchange needs, existing tools, open challenges and research question to foster an environment, where both communities can benefit from the exchange.
The ideal is to have all the different approaches and commonalities under one umbrella to foster exchange and support of different research communities and their approaches.
OpenSym and the WikiWorkshop are already doing that for the people submitting to and attending computer science research conferences. But without the exchange with the community, there is a lack of communication, creating silos of missing exchange.
The Goal is to connect the researcher and the Wikimedia community to enable an exchange that could ultimately lead to the research projects being implemented as tools for Wikipedia. And vice-versa: More research projects build on community needs.
We invite researchers, Wikimedians, anyone who does or is planning to do research on or around Wikimedia projects, such as Wikipedia, Wikidata and others, anyone in the community, who is interested in improving the research happening around Wikimedia - you don’t need any experience in research. Wikipedia editor, Wikidata data magician, whatever you do in Wikimedia projects, your feedback will be highly valuable.
We would ask all researchers to bring an A2/A3 poster about what they are doing in Wikimedia that we can put up so that we can create an easy way to exchange on different projects. If you don’t have a project yet, don’t worry- just bring a poster with topics you find interesting, and you might be able to meet other researchers already working in your field of interest. (If you struggle with printing the poster beforehand, please reach out to us a few days in advance.)
We will spend a day exchanging on recent challenges around Wikimedia. Besides the posters, we aim to form working groups for the afternoon to work on topics of shared interest and possibly propose a project of common interest.
Register ↗In our commitment to identifying the gaps in how we think about and work with data in the department, we have agreed to focus on four main problem spaces;
- Silos exist between data analysts, policy teams and digital product teams
- We lack a set of organisation-wide data standards
- Our data is often hard to find and difficult to share
- We give little or no thought to the potential uses of data outside each service
I am holding a cross-functional, (directed) unconference [I realise this is an oxymoron but stick with me] to explore these problem spaces and come up with desirable, feasible and viable actions we can take away and present to our Deputy Directors (Helen, Martyn, Jon and Danielle) particularly around the emergent themes of stakeholders mapping, central knowledge management and education, and access to data.
This session will be very much about actually doing stuff; agreeing positive, tangible actions we can take to improve the use of data, to demystify it for our colleagues and to work across the Policy, Data, Product and Tech Arc communities to drive a collaborative, user centred approach to how we work. We would welcome attendance and input from anyone in the MoJ who has an interest in contributing to this, and who wants to share and learn.
More information about the DCWG here. Please read our draft Terms of Reference and draft Justice Services Data Principles as they will inform the discussion. I’d also welcome people’s opinions on the Digital Ethics Charter.
Register ↗Every month we meet up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on at www.radicalengineers.com
Register ↗Intelligence Rising is a role playing game about the future of AI and its consequences for society. You will be playing as heads of states and leaders of big tech companies, and your decisions will determine the future of the world.
The goal of this game is to:
- Train AI developers and AI policy professionals to reflect on and prepare for future social and ethical challenges related to AI.
- Explore possible futures involving AI technology development, deployment, social impacts, and governance.
More info: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1912.08964.pdf
Intelligence Rising is still under development. This event is one of several play test events we expect to perform this year.
As a play tester, you are expected to:
- Select your character ahead of the game and read up a bit on the person you are playing
- Participate in a game and debriefing
- Fill out a feedback form
The game is also lots of fun and you will be given lunch.
If you want to participate in this game, please contact me directly via email: [email protected].
If you want to participate in future games, fill in this interest form https://sites.google.com/view/intelligence-rising/ and/or join our player google group https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/intelligence-rising-players, to stay informed.
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting. Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
This month we are reading Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction by Philip E. Tetlock and Dan Gardner.
Register ↗Last decade will be condemned as a total failure of humanity to work together. Next decade and climate change crisis brings challenges that can only be solved by working together.
Join us on a journey of discovery of games that can skill up our ability to collaborate, from passing weapons, providing covering fire in a firefight, healing or boosting a teammate over obstacles.
Speakers
- Eva Pascoe (Cybersalon.org) – a peak into history of collaborative video gaming
- Ben Greenway – emotional exploration on how to cooperate with total strangers and without language in Journey and Sky: Children of the Light (by ThatGameCompany).
- Karo Janicka – how to leverage community to improve village life in Stardew Valley (by Concerned Ape)
- Simon Sarginson – surviving galactic wars by teaming up with aliens in Startopia (by Mucky Foot)
- Douglas Rushkoff – author of Cyberia book (1994) and lead of Team Human podcast on collaboration for survival of the species
The Echo Chamber Club brings together various experts and specialists who want to improve information environments. You could be an academic, a journalist, a think-tanker, a technologist or a policy-maker who works on anything related to this field. This could be - disinformation, misinformation, information warfare, truth-making, conspiracy theories, data privacy, data politics, political advertising, microtargeting, transparency, mediatisation, normalisation, echo chambers, filter bubbles, herd thinking and more.
The purpose of this meet up is to meet people who are working in adjacent fields to enable collaboration. However, we also have some exciting provocations lined up to help stimulate conversation.
Every meet up has provocations designed to get the attendees to think about the problems they are facing in different ways. This meet up with have three provocateurs:
Alain de Botton is a writer of essayistic books that have been described as a ‘philosophy of everyday life.’ He’s written on love, travel, architecture and literature. His books have been bestsellers in 30 countries. Alain also started and helps to run a school in London called The School of Life, dedicated to a new vision of education. His latest book, published in September 2019, is a collection of essays written for The School of Life, titled The School of Life: An Emotional Education.
Frederike Kaltheuner is a writer and technology critic and a 2019-2020 Mozilla Tech Policy Fellow. Before joining Mozilla, Frederike was a director at Privacy International in London, where she led the organisation’s strategic work on corporate surveillance and emerging technology. Frederike has given expert evidence in the European Parliament, the Belgium Parliament, and the UK House of Lords. She holds an MSc in Internet Science the University of Oxford and a BA in Philosophy and Politics from Maastricht University.
Areeq Chowdhury is the founder of the think tank WebRoots Democracy which explores the intersection of technology and democratic participation. He’s also Head of Think Tank at Future Advocacy focusing on the social, economic, and political impact of artificial intelligence and emerging technologies.
The meet up will be hosted by Alice Thwaite, founder of the Echo Chamber Club. We will provide snacks and drinks. Please do give us a donation to help us buy the goods.
- Arrivals from 6.30 pm
- Provocations from 7pm
- The event ends when the last person exits
Join us to talk all things political and civic technology - anything from promise trackers, to new ways of campaigning or government. We’re here for it.
We’re starting off the year with 3 brilliant speakers:
- Dan Barrett, Head of Data Science, Citizens Advice
- Alex Parsons, Research Associate, mySociety
- Tabitha Morton, CEO, MoreUnited [TBC]
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We’ll also be joined by some of the Newspeak House fellows who will share some of the new tools they’re developing for future civic tech endeavours.
- 7.00pm – Doors Open
- 7.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 7.40pm – Speakers
- 8.30pm – Drinks
A all-day event bringing public servants together with experts to teach, connect and inspire action on the climate emergency
OneGreenGov is the next global event in One Team Gov’s calendar, focused on the environment, sustainability and climate change.
The global environmental problems we are facing are becoming ever more apparent, and are higher in the public consciousness than ever before. As public servants, our work will be touched by climate change and environmental sustainability whether it is part of our day jobs or not.
The OneTeamGov community wants to bring people together to talk, learn and be inspired to take action - to live and work in more sustainable ways, to share their knowledge, and to develop policies, systems and practices which contribute to tackling the climate crisis, resource sustainability and environmental degradation.
To help contribute to this agenda, we are organising events in the UK and convening events worldwide to do this on 22nd January 2020. The events will have different flavours depending on where in the world they’re organised.
The event in London will be held at Newspeak House, hosted by the London College of Political Technologists. Our ambition is for this event is for participants to:
- Learn something new to help you contribute to the fight against climate change;
- Meet people interested in taking action for the environment, sustainability, and climate change;
- Be inspired to take action.
The event will be part-unconference, and part-scheduled speakers and pre-arranged sessions. If you would like to run a session, please submit this form.
Register ↗Our lives are dominated by an economic system that fuels inequality, makes our jobs and homes more insecure, and hastens environmental breakdown. Support for this system is crumbling, which places us at a moment of both great danger and opportunity. Disaffection with political and economic institutions has unleashed the forces of the populist right, but also created a once-in-a-generation chance to define and build a new economy.
Some people are building this new economy right now in the places they live and work. From workers’ cooperatives to community-owned energy they are shifting wealth and power to people and their communities. But while our zombie economic system stumbles on, all that energy will continue to be blocked by an outdated set of economic rules and institutions.
For more than three decades, the New Economics Foundation’s mission has been to transform the economy so it works for people and the planet. We celebrate – and help to enable – the new economy springing up from below, but we also know that it needs support from above, including a state that prioritises people’s wellbeing and a healthy planet over a misplaced faith in free markets and competition. Therefore we work with people igniting change from below and we combine this with rigorous research to fight for change at the top.
Join us to hear from an exciting panel of speakers to discuss what next for the new economy movement:
- Gary Younge - Journalist and professor of sociology, Manchester University
- Maya Goodfellow - Author and journalist
- Miatta Fahnbulleh - CEO New Economics Foundation
- Dave Ward - General Secretary, CWU
- More speakers TBC
December saw the election of a government without a plan to tackle climate breakdown or fix an economy that has failed so many. Exciting and transformative ideas were put forward during this election but failed to cut through. This agenda remains our best chance to tackle the seismic issues we face, yet people have lost the will to believe change is possible. How can we learn from mistakes, and build on the strength of our ideas to continue making the case for a better future?
After discussion there will be drinks and a social.
Register ↗It may not make the headlines, but Brexit’s impact on UK life online will be a gamechanger. Join us for a night with Open Rights Group to discuss how leaving the European Union will affect how UK residents experience the Internet.
- Open Rights Group Policy Director Javier Ruiz: Javier will explain how post-Brexit international trade deals with the United States and other countries could impact UK rights online. Trade agreements increasingly include clauses to promote digital trade, which unfortunately tend to translate into weakening the protection of the personal data of ordinary people and increasing the protections on the algorithms and trade secrets of businesses. Entering these agreements will put the UK in a difficult position as it strives to maintain the current arrangements for data flows with the EU.
- Open Rights Group Campaigns Manager Mike Morel: Mike will provide an overview of EU laws and institutions that currently influence UK rights to free speech online and digital privacy. Find out which protections will disappear, which will remain, and what could happen in a no-deal scenario.
News is broken.
The current system of monetisation (advertising) dis-incentivises good quality journalism in favour of clickbait and sensationalism.
News organisations have historically existed to solve distribution (printing presses) and monetisation/marketing (town criers) problems, these are problems the internet has solved in a much more scalable way.
It’s time Journalism, and by extension society, got a new model - one that uses technology to make high quality journalism sustainable again.
The first HackThePress Hackathon in September 2019 was a huge success, you can read more about it here: https://hackthepress.org/write-up-hackthepress-hackathon/
For the second HTP Hackathon we’ll be back at Newspeak House on Jan 18-19th. The core themes we’ll be exploring are:
- Monetisation - How can news organisations monetise differently?
- Public Advice - How can news orgs help people make better decisions?
- Follow-through - How can news pieces inspire real change?
We will have a judging panel of 4 people from the tech and news industry who will select a winner in each of the three themes above.
For more information, see https://hackthepress.org/2020-hackathon-jan/
Slack workspace: https://bit.ly/HTPSlack
Register ↗This event is for charity campaigners to discuss best practice and challenges in campaigning for change. We meet quarterly for discussions and to hear from expert speakers. New members are always welcome.
Speakers:
- Steve Pound, Labour MP for Ealing North from 1997-2019, will be answering a Q&A on what it is really like being an MP and how charities can be better at working with them.
- Mary Milne, Head of Comms and Campaigns from Traidcraft Exchange will be speaking about their Injustice Advent Calendar which brought together actions from a number of organisations throughout December.
This event is designed for everyone in and around London who is interested in building and growing great businesses through platform strategy and platform design.
70% of value created by tech companies in the past 30 years has come through businesses with network effects, based on market cap data. Network effects are the ultimate growth hack! On the other hand, launching or managing a platform business is extremely difficult and it can have dangerous side effects.
- How do we improve our success ratio for launching new platforms in the London tech ecosystem?
- How do we build, manage and create platforms that truly deliver value to all players involved?
- What role do platforms play in today strategy making? How does it differ in start-ups vs enterprises?
- How do pipeline products gain Network Effects?
- How do platform businesses evolve?
These and more are the theme we can discuss together. To start our first session there will be two short (15 min) presentations:
- Manfredi Sassoli introducing the group and providing context for the relevance of the field.
- Simone Cicero, ideator of the PDT (Platform Design Toolkit) and worldwide renowned thought leader on platform design and strategy.
Food will be provided.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
We really hoped we’d be holding this under happier circumstances but right now a genuinely neutral evidence-based analysis of the election results is urgently needed. In many ways this speaks to the heart of why Campaign Lab was set up.
So join us for our election campaign retrospective to look at what innovations worked, what maybe didn’t and try to understand some of the factors that contributed to the result.
This event will also be an chance for us to take stock, evaluate what we’ve achieved and think about where we should be heading next.
Finally it will also be a chance to thank our community for all their hard work over the past few months and year.
All technologists, activists, organisers and campaigners, are welcome!
Including new people who are interested in evidence based campaign innovation and want to work out what happened and why.
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome!
Register ↗Wikimedia UK is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia movement which supports Wikipedia and its sister projects. In January 2020, we are hosting a training workshop for Turkish speakers in basic Wikipedia editing. Currently, all language versions of Wikipedia are blocked in Turkey, and although it is still possible to access the website, it is much harder to edit Wikipedia from Turkey. That is why we are encouraging Turkish speakers in the UK to learn to edit Wikipedia so that we can help to improve content on Wikipedia in Turkish.
The workshop will give a general introduction to the basic skills needed to edit Wikipedia, and we will help you to start creating and updating content on the Turkish Wikipedia in the areas of culture, history and the arts. Whatever your interests, Wikipedia has articles about them and we need your help in improving those articles.
Please bring a laptop to the event which you can use to edit Wikipedia. A laptop with a keyboard is much easier to work on than a tablet. If you do not have one of your own, please let us know and we will provide one for you. Snacks and refreshments will also be provided.
For any other questions, please contact Communications Coordinator John at [email protected] or ask us on Twitter @wikimediauk
Görüşürüz!
Register ↗Julio Alejandro asks “If politicians, diplomats and bureaucrats are perennially stupid and illiterate in technology, economics, and globalisation, why should they concentrate the monopoly on creation of human-civilization services?”
He will explain his map of the systems, technologies, and startups fighting to provide competition, markets, and choice in centralised, monopolised government industries to build better, cheaper, more affordable, transparent, inclusive, and market regulated services in social welfare; immigration; money creation; legality, criminality, enforcement; nation building; environmentalism; gender-racial-religious equality; and private property protection; Bitnation, Social Evolution, Seasteading, (3D Printed) Distributed Defense, Alcor Cryonics, Aragon DAO, Special Governance Zones, AI Pandora Boxchain, privacy Monero, Ulex OS Legal System, Free Private Cities, Kleros (crowdsourced jury), the Paralelni Polis ecosystem, and more.
Julio Alejandro is a VC investor, former CEO of three Blockchain and Disruptive Technologies consultancies, and has lectured in +70 universities and think tanks worldwide, including Oxford, Cambridge, United Nations, Google, EU Parliament, MIT, LSE, WeWork Headquarters, Amnesty International, and the Bahrain EDB.
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
We’ll be unveiling the full list of speakers over the next few weeks.
How many tickets are there?
About 125. We always sell out, so please grab a ticket early to avoid disappointment, and if you can’t make it let us know so someone else can grab your spot.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. Rebels sometimes bring onion rings or monster munch.
You have a great evening, make friends with strangers and learn a bunch.
Register ↗Livingmaps Network was established in 2013 to develop a network of researchers, community activists, artists and others with a common interest in the use of mapping for social change, public engagement, critical debate, and creative forms of community campaigning. It now has nearly 2000 names on its subscription list, people who have attended one or more of our events over the past few years, and/or who follow our online journal. We are keen to involve more people in our activities, and to facilitate new projects and events proposed by members of our network.
For this purpose we are organising an event in the New Year which will give you an opportunity to meet the directors and advisory group, and to find out more about our plans for the future. Readers of the journal will be able to meet the editors and some of the contributors, and discuss the possibility of writing something for us. It will also be an opportunity to share your own plans with us, to exchange experiences and ideas with other people in the network, all over pizza and drinks.
Programme
- Welcome and Introduction
- Screening of The Citizens Atlas of London
- Living Maps Review Panel Discussion
- Putting ourselves on the Map: social networking
Tickets are £5.00 to cover the cost of refreshments and room hire: Register
Register ↗Yes it’s cold and dark and January. But remember when it was cold and dark and there was a general election?
Let’s not forget everything we learned: good or bad. What worked? What absolutely bombed?
Let’s celebrate efforts to register voters, get out the vote and all the other good stuff.
If you liked the ElectionTechHandbook, you’ll love the Election Tech Debrief!
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting. Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
This month we are reading Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction by Philip E. Tetlock and Dan Gardner.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Just like in 2017, we will be at Newspeak House to experience the election excitement of adding new MPs to Wikipedia and updating pages related to UK politics subjects.
This is not a training event, so we would expect those who come to be reasonably proficient Wikipedia editors already. There will be lots of updates to do, so come and join us and help improve Wikipedia’s coverage of UK politics.
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Building technology for the Liberal Democrats. You’ll need a laptop to participate.
Register ↗Join your fellow HackThePress members at Newspeak House to hang out and continue hacking on news-tech 👩💻.
We’ll provide power, WiFi, and somewhere warm, you bring the code! (and beer)
There are a few projects for you to join, or you can come with your own idea to work on.
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Building technology for the Liberal Democrats. You’ll need a laptop to participate.
Register ↗On the 14th of November, local councils will release details of who is standing for the upcoming election. At this event, we’ll be collecting all that data together into one database.
Stay for the whole session or just drop in whenever you can — every little helps! We’ll provide drinks and snacks! You’ll need a laptop, but no technical knowledge.
You might like to sign up for an account at candidates.democracyclub.org.uk before the event.
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting. Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
No text this month - volunteers will give lightning talks, and then we will have a discussion.
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Building technology for the Liberal Democrats. You’ll need a laptop to participate.
Register ↗Join your fellow HackThePress members at Newspeak House to hang out and continue hacking on news-tech 👩💻.
We’ll provide power, WiFi, and somewhere warm, you bring the code! (and beer)
There are a few projects for you to join, or you can come with your own idea to work on.
Register ↗Dinner, wifi, sofas, desks, drinks & chats: if you’re a fan of electiontechhandbook.uk then this is the place for you!
Every Wednesday night from now until the election, 7:30 till late, show up any time and ring the bell!
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Digital technology has transformed the way that humans are able to relate to each other. In spite of being able to connect over vast differences, we are more atomised, alienated and culturally estranged than ever. What does this mean for building working-class power? How can we create the cultural infrastructure that we need to be able to organise together and change the World for the better.
Douglas Lain of Zero Books hosts a conversation with some of the most important voices on the British left.
- Sasha Josette, The World Transformed festival and Momentum organiser.
- Chris Nineham, Counterfire and Stop the War founder, Zero Books author
- Tom O’ Brien, Alpha to Omega podcast host
- Angie Speaks, Youtuber and Left wing commentator
- Cian Prendiville, Socialist organiser, Bottom Dog podcast host
- David Swift, Historian and Zero Books Author
It’s Wikidata’s 7th birthday at the end of October. Come and celebrate with drinks at this informal meetup organised by Wikimedia UK.
Meet other Wikidata users and talk about your projects, get help with questions and hang out with other people who share your love of data science!
Register ↗Come and get the conversation started ahead of the main event. Hosted by Mozilla Fellow Anouk Ruhaak.
Register ↗Join your fellow HackThePress members at Newspeak House to hang out and continue hacking on news-tech 👩💻.
We’ll provide power, WiFi, and somewhere warm, you bring the code! (and beer)
There are a few projects for you to join, or you can come with your own idea to work on.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
This month we are reading two papers:
Useful Theory of Change Models: Although frequently discussed in the evaluation literature and general agreement on what a theory of change is conceptually, there is actually little agreement beyond the big picture of just what a theory of change comprises, what does it show, how it can be represented and how it can be used. This article outlines models for theories of change and their development that have proven quite useful for both straightforward and more complex interventions. The models are intuitive, flexible, well-defined in terms of their components and link directly to rigorous models of causality. The models provide a structured framework for developing a theory of change and analysing the intervention it represents.
The COM-B Theory of Change Model (V3): Discussion of the COM-B (‘capability’, ‘opportunity’, ‘motivation’ and ‘behaviour’) model for making interventions to cause behaviour change.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting. Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
Register ↗Join your fellow HackThePress members at Newspeak House to hang out and continue hacking on news-tech 👩💻.
We’ll provide power, WiFi, and somewhere warm, you bring the code! (and beer)
There are a few projects for you to join, or you can come with your own idea to work on.
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
Top notch speakers. Wot else?
- Tamsin Omond on Extinction Rebellion and how they are shaking up campaigning
- Pete Moorey on what campaigners can learn from the Marvel Comic Universe
- Joe Mitchell on Democracy Club’s fantastic election tools
.. more to come
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
Wot you waiting for? (as Gwen Stefani would say) #wineandwotsits
Register ↗The Echo Chamber Club invites you to a meet up and discussion on: “what makes a healthy information environment?”
There are many subjects being examined by academics, journalists, think-tanks, technologists and policy makers when it comes to digital’s impact on democracy. Disinformation, misinformation, information warfare, truth-making, conspiracy theories, data privacy, data politics, political advertising, microtargeting, transparency, mediatisation, normalisation, echo chambers, filter bubbles, herd thinking and more.
Democracy is a contested term. We agree that it means: “rule by the people”. But we also acknowledge that in a modern nation state the people need to elect representatives to govern them. Information then must circulate between citizens and the government in order to ensure that ‘the people have the power’. But what are the best mechanisms for this? What are the institutions that we absolutely need? Are there any red lines?
We often talk about various digital structures ‘undermining democracy’. But if we cannot agree what democracy is, then how do we agree that it is being undermined? How can we then look to how to use digital to promote democratic ideals?
The purpose of this meetup is to meet people who are working in adjacent fields to enable collaboration. However, we also have some exciting provocations lined up to help stimulate conversation:
- Matthew d’Ancona - partner at Tortoise Media and columnist for GQ, the Evening Standard and the Guardian. Matt has decades of experience commentating on politics and has written many books including: “Post-Truth: The New War on Truth and How to Fight Back”.
- Nafisa Bakkar - founder and CEO of Amaliah and CEO of Halal Gems. Amaliah is dedicated to representing Muslim women. It has a reach of 3.2 million across all editorial channels and publishes on topics from lifestyle to relationships to fashion and politics.
- Gemma Milne - tech and science journalist and co-founder of Science: Disrupt. Gemma has written for many publications including Forbes, the Guardian and the BBC. Her latest book focusses on hype and is called: “Smoke and Mirrors”. It is out next year and helps form a realistic understanding of what is going on in tech and science today.
Please register to ensure your place.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗For those who can’t choose sides between Greta Thunberg and the Suffragettes… or between ecology and feminism…
We are a bit lost… somewhere between the #metoo movement and the rise of Extinction Rebellion. Feeling stretched between fighting for women’s rights and the earth… so we want to create a space to connect with, explore the tensions between and raise questions about ecology and feminism. Are they compatible? How can feminist action be mindful of climate change activism and the other way around? How can we join forces to make a difference?
Using dialogue, drama and dance, we will explore your own lived experiences and questions around the climate crisis and the feminist cause. Through this creative process, we will together define the themes that are most alive in us as Londoners, and be the key points in coming meetings.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
It’s General Election Time! Join Campaign Lab for a Hack Day working on political data science challenges and designing, developing and testing election tech and campaigning innovations.
From data analysis to improve targeting and working out the factors that could swing an election to developing new election tools for activists on the ground, we’ll be working out how together we can make the biggest impact on this election.
What is Campaign Lab?
Campaign Lab is a community of politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to build new election tools and change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome!
Register ↗We are a group of philosophy researchers and students from the University of Bristol. We acknowledge that in our increasingly busy lives, the time people spend to inform themselves is extremely narrow. On top of that, behind all media – newspapers, advertising, even entertainment – lies incentives that are no longer driven by truth but by financial or political interests. This means that information is designed to exploit our ignorance and our vulnerability to sentimental persuasion. Information is no longer primarily truth-guiding.
In this talk, we will describe how our Validity Code, a 13-step system that incorporates both logical analysis and fact-checking, will help people to check the validity of the information that every media delivers.
Our mission is to create a citizen who is not only better informed but has a broader outlook on the world, and, ultimately, is better placed to reconcile.
Register ↗For the third round in our Trajectory Talks series of free debates we consider this: how important is the presentation of a human body to our experience of virtual realities?
Direct evidence suggests that embodiment is a key factor in immersion and presence within XR. It is important to recognise however that existing design principles around this embodiment betray implicit ableist and heteronormative bias. In cases where creators attempt to move past this, their efforts are often made in the questionable pursuit of empathy and the inhabiting of another’s experience. So whether extended, cross or augmented the virtual space is as problematic as the traditional performance space when it comes to perspective and representation.
Starting with the lived expertise of makers with different or changing experiences of their own bodies or identities, this Trajectory Talk will examine and debate current and future uses of embodiment in XR. We will ask what insights can be inferred when decontextualizing narrative and design elements from LGBTQ+ makers and makers with disabilities, and to what extent these forms of embodiment effect meaningful representation.
SPEAKERS
- Rob Eagle (Chair), PhD researcher at UWE Bristol, uses methods from audio documentary storytelling, immersive theatre and interactive digital art to present nonbinary and genderqueer narratives in mixed reality.
- Jane Gauntlett, whose work explores the impact of storytelling, shared experience and human connection. She works as a writer, director, producer and lecturer (interactive audio, interactive theatre, game, 360 film, VR, MR). In 2009 she founded the In My Shoes project, each piece combines multi-sensory theatre, technology and first-person documentary to recreate extraordinary real-life events.
- Michelle Baharier, whose artistic practice is influenced by her heritage and life experience, brings new context to a space and gives a voice to people whose stories are hidden and unheard. Since 2006 she has worked collaboratively developing The Largactyl Shuffle. This project is named after Chlorpromazine, one of the first anti-psychotic drugs, whose side effects included a deterioration of motor functions that often manifest in a slow shuffling walk. In 2011, she was commissioned by Southwark Council’s Public Realm Department to create a sculpture on Camberwell Green – representing CoolTan Arts. Using a two part process, we created a live sculpture - a Ginkgo tree to mark the Largactyl Shuffle and to symbolise positive mental health, resilience and memory. She then worked with artist Rossen Daskalov to produce a bench that celebrated all that Largactyl Shuffle represents for the local community – a place of safety, contemplation, friendship and destigmatisation.
RUNNING ORDER
- 6.30-7pm: Arrivals, drinks, nibbles and networking.
- 7-8pm: Debate and ‘fishbowl’ discussion.
- 8-9pm: Drinks and networking.
Steering session for London Tech Workers Coalition, a coalition of workers in and around the tech industry. London chapter of @TechWorkersCo
Open to all tech workers, students and those seeking work in the industry. Bring a friend.
if you’ve any questions or requirements email us at techworkersldn {at} protonmail {dot} com
Register ↗Join us at our first ever HackThePress social!
We’ll spend some time talking about what we all want to get out of the group - learning, networking, or something else entirely. Then there will be plenty of time to get to know your fellow tech and news nerds over booze and food.
We’re looking forward to meeting you there!
Register ↗Help us to beta test two workshops in applied mathematics:
Workshop 1: Intro to Bayesian Statistics (50 mins)
The first half of this session will focus on the base rate fallacy, building intuitions of how it affects probabilities. In the second half we’ll compare Bayesian and frequentist methods of inference and consider the advantages/disadvantages of each.
Workshop 2: Can Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) stop the AIDs epidemic? (50 mins)
We’ll read a paper that makes some exciting claims about the possibility of ending the global AIDs epidemic. With a small amount of contextual knowledge, we’ll look at the paper with a critical reviewer’s eye to see what we make of its methods and claims.
Register ↗Hear a digital marketing expert blow the whistle on deceitful tactics used by digital advertisers and show us how we can “opt out” of the corporate surveillance economy.
We’ll also receive an update about Open Rights Group’s AdTech complaint against Google and the Interactive Advertising Bureau.
This event is a great way to learn easy and practical ways to protect yourself online from companies that aggressively target and track you across the Internet.
Bring your laptops and mobile phones so you can use what you learn immediately.
Register ↗Our planet is in ecological crisis and everyday we are seeing the effects of increasing climate breakdown. Yet from Heathrow expansion to debates over land use, time and again the environmental movement comes up against barriers to achieving the significant systemic change that is needed.
To secure democratic consent for the significant actions we will need to take, we need to understand how to bring more people into the conversation and reach out beyond the activist base. This means exploring how we can create a positive vision of a greener future for everyone in society.
How can we get people to understand the scale and urgency of the challenge without them feeling hopeless? How can we understand and more effectively counter right wing populism and conspiracy theories which deny climate change? At this meet up we’ll be looking at how we can start working together more concretely to solve some of these pressing challenges.
If you know someone who you think needs to be in the room, please do invite them too! We’re really keen to hear from a range of perspectives across the movement and working at different levels.
Drinks and refreshments will be provided.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗The solar power industry is growing remarkably fast worldwide, with over 100GW installed for the first time in 2018 and over 120GW expected in 2019. This is largely driven by rapidly dropping costs and increasing competitiveness of solar electricity with gas and coal in many countries, almost regardless of action on climate change. Over the past decade, the price of solar modules has fallen over 90% and the big challenges for solar power have moved beyond the cost of electricity, to much bigger questions about the future of electricity.
A new book, Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon, introduces key concepts in finance and renewable energy and provides a readable introduction to the world of business as it applies to solving the energy portion of climate change. It covers startup culture from a personal angle, some less successful examples of solar companies with candid interviews of the founders, and explanations of concepts like levelised cost of energy, the power markets and the experience curve.
Author Jenny Chase, head of solar analysis at financial information provider BloombergNEF, has been tracking solar price, demand, technology and investment since 2006 and aims to write the book she should have read as a student wanting to work in clean energy. This evening will be a chance to meet the author and talk about renewable energy with like-minded people.
The book is available from publisher World Scientific Publishing here and on Amazon here.
Register ↗New social media communities have bred a renewed interest in radical politics, particularly among the youth generation. Will this culture persist only online, or can we bring our digital communities into the real world to bolster left-wing struggle here?
Join Left Culture Club’s panel event, where we talk about the benefits and pitfalls of using social media to organise online in the digital age.
- Angie Speaks is an anarchist video essayist and Youtuber.
- BadmanMassive is a video producer for Zero Books and Means TV UK, and host of the YouTube-based Spicy Takes series.
- Xexizy (aka. Muke) is a Marxist vlogger and streamer, and founder of the Marxist society at the University of Sussex.
Doors are at 7:00 for a 7:10 start. All are welcome!
Register ↗The current system of monetisation disincentivises investigative journalism in favour of clickbait and sensationalism. We must find a new model - perhaps technology can help make high quality journalism sustainable again?
A two day hackathon. See the schedule and register your place at hackthepress.org/2019-hackathon/.
Register ↗Wandsworth Young Labour + London Young Labour trial a new format for a workshop, focused on developing policy solutions to Youth Violence.
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
The book for this month is Seeing like a State by James Scott.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting. Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
Register ↗With the prospect of a general election becoming ever more likely, now more than ever we need to build bridges between technologists and activists on the ground.
Join Campaign Lab for our event Campaign Confessions where we invite candidates, organisers and activists from across the country to share their campaign challenges and where they think Campaign Lab volunteers can help.
For our event, we’ll be joined by Patrick Alcantara & Joe Morrison who are leading the local campaign to unseat Boris in Uxbridge, and Jessie Joe Jacobs one of the Labour Candidates for Tees Valley Mayor, where Labour lost a lot of ground to the Tories in the last election. Our third speaker is to be confirmed.
During the panel and breakout session we’ll explore how the speakers are currently running their campaigns, their current practices in an effort to identify where there is space for innovation and improvement - asking our candidates and activists: how can the Campaign Lab community help their campaigns to innovate?
Campaign Lab is a community of activists, researchers and technologists working towards a more evidence-based approach to campaigning - outside of this event series we run monthly hackdays and meetups, come join us.
Register ↗A networking event for those applying technology to the upcoming UK election to talk about ideas, resources, strategy and collaborations.
If you have something you want to share with everyone attending, please add it to electiontechhandbook.uk
Register ↗A meetup for effective altruists who work in/are interested in software, data or tech.
- 6:30pm: Doors open
- 7:00pm: Coworking time and/or networking
This month there will be time for co-working if you wish, bring a laptop and feel free to work on EA-related projects with likeminded folks! Otherwise, you’re welcome to use the time for networking as normal.
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism/
Register ↗The first meeting of the Equality Discussion Group, where there shall be a discussion on Angela Y. Davis’ book “Women, Race, and Class”.
Future books, podcasts, things to watch will be discussed and chosen by the group each time for the next event.
NB. Don’t worry if you won’t have read the whole book - it doesn’t matter.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗An informal meetup for people interested in effective altruism and want to work on their own projects or self study.
This may be as individuals or in groups, but we plan to work for 50+ minutes then break at least once and maybe up to three times depending on how much you want to do, with the rest of the evening set aside for socialising and discussing what you’re working on with others.
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism
Register ↗A day of coding to help the Liberal Democrats HQ, The Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors, and local parties around the country get more done and win more votes.
This event is hosted by The Liberal Democrat Software Group - join to hear about future events.
There will be free pizza for lunch.
Register ↗Meet people working with Wikidata, learn to use SPARQL to query the database and visualise data in interesting ways! Please bring a laptop to work on.
This is the fourth Wikidata meetup organised by Wikimedia UK at Newspeak House. We hope to support the community of people working with Wikidata and encourage new people to get involved in the project.
This event will be aimed at training people to query Wikidata using SPARQL, a coding language similar to SQL which is commonly used to query databases. SPARQL is not a complicated coding language, and the basics of it can be learned easily, especially if you have previous experience of working with data. This event is aimed at people who want to learn the basics of data science, or people already working in that field.
Wikidata is becoming increasingly important, and data science skills are increasingly sought after by employers in the tech sector. This training will help you get acquainted with some basic concepts in data science, or improve your skills at working with and visualising data.We think this could especially appeal to people studying data science, data journalism or any other data-related field, as well as established data scientists and journalists who want to improve their skills.
Non-alcoholic refreshments will be provided.
If you have a Wikidata project you’re working on and would like to do a 5-10 minute presentation on, please contact me about it - [email protected]
Register ↗Raise money for the next round of outsourced worker strikes at the University of London
Register ↗This special TechforGood side-event follows on from our last meetup, which we had to cut short because of the heat: https://www.meetup.com/techforgood/events/263194160/
You don’t have to have attended the first event to come along to this one, and you can see the outputs of that event here: http://bit.ly/TFGJulAllAssets
For this August meetup, the Cyberdelic Society (whose co-founder Carl M Smith spoke at last month’s event) will host a Collective Intelligence summit in order to explore how immersive technologies can be radically recontextualised to help tackle some of the grand challenges humanity is currently facing.
The Cyberdelic Society will set the scene by sharing the outputs from our recent XR for XR event which explored how immersive technologies can be utilised to help combat the climate and extinction crisis. The full video of the XR for XR event is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzwfzwaI81Q
Help us build the collective intelligence around Tech for Good solutions by sharing your opinions, ideas and skills. What are the most relevant areas of concern for you? We look forward to this process of collectively co-creating.
KEY QUESTIONS:
- How do we ensure technologies are part of the solution rather than the source of the problem?
- How are we going to use the power of technology to radically change lives and the environment for the better?
- How can we use technology to help us imagine and realise the level of transformation needed to meet the challenges we face?
KEY CONCERNS:
- How can we avoid replacing imagination with computer animation?
- What do our current imaging and sensing technologies already do to our perception of reality?
- If our senses are enhanced or augmented will we become distracted – or more mindful and connected?
- What are the biological and psychological risks of altering your perception with technology?
- Is transformative technology just a shortcut for people who lack the willpower for consistent work with their bodies, breath, meditation and sitting in silence?
- Do AR/VR/MR/AI (XR) experiences endanger people from getting lost further inside the simulation?
- Do Cyberdelics promise a ‘shortcut’ to a false experience of ‘awakening’/‘enlightenment’?
- Why rely on something external when we have all the answers, power and ability to be conscious co-creators of this ‘world’/’reality’ within ourselves?
POTENTIAL APPLICATION AREAS:
- How can we use immersive tech to both measure the impact we are having on our environment and also explore some appropriate systems change solutions?
- How can we use immersive tech to expand our experience of ourselves and the reality we live in?
- How can we create truly transformative experiences within these immersive technologies?
- How can these technologies help us to reprogram our associations and see ourselves from other perspectives (including the non-human)?
- How can we design and use these technologies to contribute to individual and collective awakening?
- What is the healing potential of these technologies?
- How can hybrid technological devices, of often-prosthetic alienation, help us to reconnect to ourselves and to the surrounding environment?
- To what extent can we influence our internal processes and bodily sensations using external sources? How adaptable is our perception?
- How much can we understand the rules that govern our minds and bodies through these technologies?
- How can artificial senses be used to access a greater dynamic range of reality?
If there is appetite, this may form the first in a series of follow-ups along this theme, led by the Cyberdelic Society.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗How did Facebook allow an obscure data company named Cambridge Analytica hack the 2016 US presidential election? Why did they do it? What have been the consequences for democracy?
In this enlightening documentary join film makers Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim as we explore the motivations of some of the key players in the story and the journey of those that tried to hold them to account.
Featuring some familiar Newspeak House community faces, this is a must see for anyone interested in increasingly murky intersection between politics, data and ethics in elections.
Popcorn will be provided.
“You leave with a very clear sense of how one company aided and abetted the selling of democracy down the river, not to mention having your fingernails chewed down to the quick.” - David Fear, Rolling Stone
“An intelligent but infuriating piece of liberal hand-wringing.” - Owen Gleiberman, Variety
Register ↗Climate disaster and far-right politics continue to pose an increasing threat in Britain, the rest of our continent and the world. It is time to act. Time to get organised.
DiEM members and supporters from London and the surrounding area will gather on the 8th of August for a third time - this time in the Newspeak House in Bethnal Green, where we will continue to discuss DiEM policy, how to get organised and the future of Europe.
The overarching goal will be to set up AT LEAST ONE new London local group!
There will be a loose agenda for the evening, including a “creative space” at the end of our meet-up.
Considering the great interested in the “Green New Deal for Europe”, our plan to tackle the threat of climate disaster and the burning injustices in Europe and beyond, you can find out more about it here: https://www.gndforeurope.com/
Register ↗A reading group focusing on systems management, where an organisation or group is considered as one or more living systems and this perspective is used to assess how such a system could be structured to function at the highest level possible. This could consider multiple facets of the system, including the individuals working in the system, physical environment, virtual spaces used, tools available, media used for communication, how teams are structured and how information travels, is processed and stored (and more)!
The general intention is that by developing our ability to understand systems we’ll be better equipped to improve (or at least assess) the organisations or groups we work in or with, whether not-for-profit, corporate, or government.
The book for this month is The Field Guide to Understanding Human Error, by Sidney Dekker.
We meet roughly monthly on a weekday evening to eat and discuss that month’s book, including its ideas and any practical applications (the day of the week varies). There is no set reading list - the next book is generally chosen at the meeting.
Past books include Thinking in Systems (Meadows) and Doing the Impossible (Slotkin).
Register ↗Prototype games to explore complex systems. Today we explore the game loop in Baba Is You.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗A meetup for effective altruists who work in/are interested in software, data or tech.
- 6.30 pm: Doors open
- 7 pm: Talks
- Vicky Clayton (Senior Researcher, Nesta): the desirability of automating impact measurement
- Ozzie Gooen (Research Scholar, FHI Oxford): Forecasting infrastructure and Foretold, a new forecasting app
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism/
Register ↗Are you digitally able? A videographer? A copy writer? A social media mastermind? London Green Party has put together a Green Party Hackathon on the 3rd August to help put together a digital campaign from scratch.
Work with Sian Berry to put together a housing campaign designed to push the Mayor and local Councils to take radical Green backed action!
Spaces are limited so please fill out this form to let us know how you want to contribute. We’ll be in touch to confirm places.
Register ↗Join us for a day of making, playing, failing, and doing as we take a Hackathon and a Scratch Night and smash them together.
About this event
We invite those from the arts and technology worlds, as well as anyone interested in different ideas and new approaches, to come along to this open and relaxed forum for the creation and testing of work that combines digital and immersive technology with artistic practice.
The Hack strand will be a chance for tech people and art people to get together to test an idea, iterate on a concept or demonstrates a method none of which existed at the beginning of the day. They’ll be working away all day and will show off what they’ve created at the open sharing session.
We will give you the chance to try out work in development from those participating in the Scratch strand. Similar to traditional theatre scratch nights we invite direct and collaborative feedback from audiences, but with the pieces growing and changing throughout the day. The Scratch space will be open to the public for free from 12 – 5pm, no sign up required.
The day will culminate in an open sharing session at 5:30pm before we head to Newspeak’s terrace to reflect on the work of the day over a BBQ and drinks.
Further details and participant details to follow. Sign up so you don’t miss out.
Though our open call has now closed there may still be possibilities to participate - get in touch via [email protected].
About your hosts
Trajectory Theatre are interactive digital performance makers. We produce work for both site-specific physical and virtual spaces. Our interests centre around interpersonal connection, the future of the digital era, and challenging notions of reality through perception. To get in touch please reach out on Twitter, or email us at [email protected].
Register ↗Why fight for a just digital future if there might be no future at all?
Technology crisis and climate crisis have many aspects in common: they are both often invisible, yet pervasive in their impact. Whether it is privacy, bias in AI or open data, the digital human rights community often fights for more equal and just futures while vastly ignoring the environmental crisis we are currently facing.
In this meet up series we want to initiate, map and advance the intersection between digital human rights and climate crisis. That means that we want to figure out how to create a sustainable social, environmental and technological future. By that we aim to go beyond current debates in the community that include arguments such as 1) we need to fly less 2) we need to repair devices 3) bitcoin consumes too much energy. We want to figure out how topics such as bias in AI or open source can be combined with the very idea of sustainability. We want to deepen the intersection between technology and nature.
At this first Sustainable Tech Meetup in London Katrin will give a short introduction with some initial thoughts on the topic. Then we will discuss how the intersection of digital human rights and climate crisis can advance. We will collect national and international initiatives that already work at the tech for good/sustainability intersection to make a first overview. Also, we are going to create a roadmap for more research and activism to advocate for a sustainable social, environmental and technological future.
The Sustainable Tech Meet Up and Newspeak are very happy to receive donations. Please bring pen and paper. If you want to contribute with an input or if you have any questions contact Katrin on Twitter at @KatrinFritsch, private messages are open.
Register ↗“We have developed an immensely powerful technology. We have stronger means of changing the physical universe than has ever existed before. How are we going to use it? This whole attitude of using technology as a method of fighting the world will succeed only in destroying the world. Technology and its powers must be handled by… people who cherish… above all, the Earth, and treat it with the reverence that is due to one’s own body.” - Alan Watts
How are we going to use the power of technology to radically change lives for the better? That’s a question we will explore in this meetup to really find out if we’re thinking and acting radical enough in applying technology to solve the world’s most pressing social and environmental challenges. Tech for Good is certainly gaining mainstream recognition and popularity, but so is our collective appreciation and recognition of the scale of existential threats facing humanity.
How can we use technology to help us imagine and realise the level of transformation needed to meet the challenges we face? Who is involved? Who needs to be? This event will look at some more ambitious and consciousness-shifting applications and explorations within tech.
The event will start with speakers, then open out into a facilitated ‘citizens assembly’ style discussion where we invite you to bring your ears and ideas.
As always, we’ll have our community announcements at the end, which is a chance for attendees to share an update, funding opportunities, jobs and more with the community. If you’d like to share yours in advance with the organisers, email us at [email protected].
We charge £3 (+VAT) to help manage the number of people who show up on the night, which goes towards the cost of running the event. We don’t want this to become a barrier to attendance, so please get in touch via Meetup messages or directly via [email protected] if this causes a problem for you. Furthermore, if you need a VAT receipt please email [email protected].
Our speakers are:
Cassie Robinson, National Lottery Community Fund / The Point People / Tech for Good Global / CAST / Nesta New Radicals Awards: Cassie wears multiple hats in the tech for good space, which gives her a rare perspective on the field and the changes within it. She’ll discuss some of the key burning questions she feels we should all be asking, and who’s working to answer them currently. She’ll set the scene for the citizens assembly discussion around different possible futures, and the challenges we must overcome to get there.
Carl H Smith, Ravensbourne University London / The Cyberdelics Society / The London Experimental Psychonautics Club / Contextology: Carl is a regular writer and speaker on Humanism, Transhumanism and Hyper-Humanism, and how a new mental model can help us better shape our relationship with technology and the world around us. He will share examples of where mixed reality and other XR technologies are enabling positive context engineering, as well as new modes of thinking and embodiment. He will also share the outputs from a recent XR for XR event, hosted by the Cyberdelics Society which explored how immersive technologies can be utilised to help combat the climate and extinction crisis.
We hope to see you there!
Dama & Ellie (Bethnal Green Ventures + CAST)
Register ↗
When we talk about technology we always talk about the future—which makes it hard to figure out how to get there. In her new book Future Histories, Lizzie O’Shea argue that we need to stop looking forward and start looking backwards. Weaving together histories of computing and social movements with modern theories of the mind, society, and self, the book constructs a “usable past” that help us determine our digital future.
What, she asks, can the Paris Commune tell us about earlier experiments in sharing resources, that might hold relevance for similar concepts today, like the Internet? Can debates over digital access be guided by Tom Paine’s theories of democratic economic redistribution? And how is Elon Musk not a visionary but a throwback to Victorian-era utopians?
Future Histories has been described by Claire L. Evans as “a potent, timely, and unrepentantly radical reminder of history’s creative potential.” O’Shea will be talking about some of the questions raised by her book and how we can use history to fight for a democratic digital tomorrow.
https://www.versobooks.com/books/2960-future-histories
Register ↗Often referred to as one of the fathers of systems thinking, Dr John Gall was the first to articulate the counterintuitive nature of systems, in particular how they succeed and how they fail. He is best known for his seminal work The Systems Bible. A Renaissance man, as well as writing on systems, John worked as a paediatrician writing books on parenting, child development, historical novels and memoirs.
Join Newspeak House in warmly welcoming his wife Carol Gall for a special guest lecture celebrating John’s work and their life together.
Carol Gall married Dr Gall in 1994 and for many years worked in his medical office. Together they taught parenting classes and jointly authoring Hit by a Low-Flying Goose a book about their experiences. She has worked as a piano teacher, a special education teacher and tutor, a family counsellor, specialising in young offenders and as a lecturer in child development and music.
In this lecture Carol will explore some of John’s later thinking laid out in his unpublished work and share stories that illustrate some of the many concepts raised in The Systems Bible. Alongside this she will share some of the many personal biographical anecdotes and memories of her life with John that inspired his thinking around systems. The listener does not need a background in systems theory to enjoy and learn from this lecture about John’s life and work.
Register ↗Labour for a Public Vote is setting up an independent, activist-led grassroots organisation to fight Brexit and promote a left wing remain and reform agenda, called Remain and Reform: Grassroots. They’re proposing a predominantly non-hierarchical structure which they hope will encourage autonomy and engagement - in short, you’re encourage you to get involved, and take a lead on the issues that you’re passionate about.
They are eliciting ideas from across the UK, and from across Europe, in order to develop a transformative agenda that can win widespread public support for our EU membership, and which can win support for the changes needed to make our economy fairer, our societies safer and more secure, and to help us stop climate chaos.
They’re looking for activists who want to be there at the start of this journey, and want to help shape this project from the outset. If this sounds like you, come to their first organising meeting when they’ll discuss all this and more in an open and friendly setting.
Register ↗Presenting the community powered tourism platform Fairbnb.coop, and kicking off the search for someone to develop the London node!
Fairbnb.coop platform cooperative is a community-centred alternative to current vacation rental platforms that prioritises people over profit and offers the potential for authentic, sustainable, and intimate travel experiences.
As a community of engaged citizens, researchers, and people coming from a variety of professional backgrounds and different cities we have been working together for several years to create the platform, and the beta version is finally nearly ready to be released.
We are now looking for like minded people to foster the creation of Local Nodes in towns and cities in the UK.
If you’re interested in finding more about what this involves you can find more info here.
While in London for LONDON UNBOUND 2019 we are organising a meet up and our co-founders will be delighted to meet whoever is interested to participate in this co-creation process.
This will be the first of a series of events part of a European roadshow that will span over the next 15 months with the goal to involve as many communities as possible in our project.
Programme of the meet up::
- 6:00 pm: Doors open
- 6:30 pm: Presentation of Fairbnb.coop project
- 7:00 pm: Co-creation Workshop in small groups
- 7:45 pm: Food and drink, chill
Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Brave Conversations was created to bring thinking around Web Science and the Social Machine to mainstream conversations that occur in everyday life. Its objective is to demystify the world of emerging technologies and enable an exploration of the impact that these technologies will have on our selves, our communities, our societies and our planet.
We deliberately create a space where everyone can be brave, can say the things that they know need to be said, and be prepared to apply intellectual rigour to challenging ideas that might take us to uncomfortable places.
Background
In 2008 a group of people from industry, government, academia, and the community sectors came together to create the first Brave Conversations (then called the Meta conference) to create a forum for people to discuss and debate the emerging issues related to humans and their use of digital technologies.
At about the same time a group of luminaries from the Web world were creating Web Science in order to focus interdisciplinary research on precisely the same thing.
Since that time the world has changed.
The Web has evolved from being read-only to read-write and now dominates how the majority of society interacts with digital platforms, giving rise to the largest companies of the modern era. These companies are now pushing the boundaries for how data and information are used and are becoming a key driver for the next step in human evolution.
We can all feel that the world ahead is very different from the world behind, but:
- How often do we find the time to step back, to engage in robust and challenging dialogue and debate with others from diverse backgrounds about what sort of future we want to create?
- How often do we feel that our opinions are respected, that we have the space to imagine real possibilities, and that we can take some proactive control of the world that is emerging?
Objectives
The goal of Brave Conversations is to challenge everyone who participates - regardless of what background they come from, or what their skillset and expertise are - to more fully explore and understand the interplay between humans, the societies we live in, and the technologies we have created.
We want to empower people to proactively make decisions about how we live our everyday lives, how we participate as commercial actors within the economy, and how we operate as digital citizens and exercise our political rights. That empowerment comes from demystifying data and information and understanding how it informs the everyday decisions which gradually create the future.
Each of those decisions begin on an individual human level - our bodies and our minds - and then emanates out to our families, communities, societies and from there to nation states. We are all responsible for the world we are creating and never has there been a time when we have more potential to influence the changes around us. But we need to be given the space for robust debate and respectful curiosity, learning from each other, playing with ideas, and asking the questions that are both confronting and potentially will take us to uncomfortable places.
How it works
The best way to learn is through experience and the act of playing with ideas.
We have deliberately chosen to partner with Newspeak House to co-host Brave Conversations London 2019 to build on the work we have been doing around the world over the past two years. Our aim is to enable that teams of diverse participants to critically examine our current societies through the lens of systems, communications, governance and technology.
This is important as the Geopolitics of Political Governance is now playing itself out as the Internet and the Web become more enmeshed in how regimes govern.
Brave Conversations complements the work being done at Newspeak House to address the challenges and opportunities which face contemporary society.
Register ↗A new public service - and how we plan to make it
How do we better create a culture of mutual aid, reciprocity, co-operation, and collaboration in our cities?
How can more public social eating spaces be made and how can they be more inclusively designed?
At a time when public services are increasingly under threat, can we create an entirely new one?
The National Food Service is a new idea. A public system emerging from a network of social eating spaces across the UK. The goal is to enable social eating spaces to better interrelate, tackle common issues as a unified body, and provide a collaborative, inclusive welfare system for all.
Join members of the NFS Campaign as they explain their vision for the organisation, detail the progress so far, and invite the audience to contribute their ideas to the project.
This event is free to attend. Donations for the evening meal are optional, and not expected. Please email ‘‘[email protected]’’ about dietary requirements.
Running order:
- 18.00: Doors open
- 18.30: Campaign update - What is the NFS, and what have we been doing?
- 19.00: Group discussions
- 20.00: Dinner is served
Follow the campaign on:
- Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/National-Food-Service-472002436672526/
- Twitter - https://twitter.com/national_food
- Podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/31CVoO6KLoXq1wyjmM7zhR
more onion is an award winning digital agency behind the Campaignion platform, which delivers high-impact digital campaigns and fundraising for progressive non-profits. Come and meet the more more onion team as well as fundraisers and campaigners from across the UK charity sector.
ON THE AGENDA
- New Campaignion features - thank you page overlays, custom redirects and more
- Campaign showcase - how Compassion in World Farming have gathered over a million signatures for their #EndTheCageAge European Citizen’s Initiative
- Consultation report launch - be the first to see tips, best practice and case studies from Young Minds, Stonewall, Open Rights Group and more on helping your supporters take part in public consultations
Please Register: https://www.more-onion.com/en/campaignion-london-july19
For those who are new to Campaignion (or fancy a refresh!), please feel free to join us a little earlier at 2.00pm for a demo.
Register ↗A year since launching, the London Renters Union is establishing itself as a powerful union where renters can get organised and win the big changes to the housing system we all need.
We’re now looking to grow and expand the union so we can organise in new places, get more people involved and build the power of renters.
To do that, we need YOU!
Join us for an evening of training and planning.
We’ll be talking about how we can communicate in ways that encourage people to get involved in organising, and how we can do street stalls and other outreach effectively.
We’ll also be planning some exciting stalls and outreach for over the summer. Bring your diaries so you can leave with some dates for exciting outreach in it!
No experience of activism or the LRU is required to join this session!
Childcare is available if needed, please let us know in advance by emailing [email protected]
Register ↗A meetup for effective altruists who work in/are interested in software, data or tech.
Come to chat with other EAs about doing the most good with tech. After our first successful run of having talks last time, we’ll return with another exciting talk this time.
- 6.30 pm: Doors open
- 7 pm: Talks
- Michal Trziesimich (Rethink Charity, Local Effective Altruism Network): How LEAN rebooted the EAHub, a social platform for effective altruists
- Mark Somerset (Freelance software engineer): How to find freelance work as a software engineer
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism/
Register ↗Millions and millions of people across the UK say they are sometimes, or always, lonely. Many older people say they go more than a month at a time without speaking to friends or family.
It’s thought to be as bad for you as being obese and even smoking.
At The Reader we have spent more than 20 years getting people of all ages reading great literature aloud together because it gives us the opportunity to read more and read differently.
Storytelling is an ancient human practice and, done in this way, it allows us to imagine a future beyond screens.
The Reader has launched a unique collaboration with Hackney Libraries to get people of all ages reading great literature aloud together.
If you’ve been wanting ‘something more’ in your life, you can train to use this powerful practice to change your local community.
Come to Newspeak House on Monday 8 July from 7pm to 8.30pm for a conversation about why getting together in real life matters more than ever, followed by a Shared Reading taster.
Stop scrolling.
Email: [email protected] to book.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June 2018 we’ve been a busy bunch, the Campaign Lab community has sourced hundreds of demographic and austerity impact datasets, developed scrapers and written parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets. We’ve built a comprehensive UK ward-level election results dataset and begun comparing factors impacting elections across the country.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next hackathon as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there have been very few contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK. Similarly, there have been precious few attempts to determine the effect of local economic factors such as house prices and austerity on election results and vote share.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re building a repository of publicly available data and models to better understand the 2018 Local Elections, identifying which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning.
But we need your help.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for a day of politically motivated data science.
Over the course of our new hackdays we’ll be tackling the questions plaguing activists up and down the country, making a real impact on elections and political campaigning right across the country.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks, a big homemade soupy lunch and pizza dinner will be provided!
Not been to a Campaign Lab meet up before? No problem! Come along to meet politically-minded progressive data scientists, reasearchers and activists who are working together to change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
All attendees to Campaign Lab HackDays may join future discount data science courses put on specifically for Campaign Lab volunteers - contact us for more information.
Register ↗We think that discussing the ethics and impacts of data science is important, but also, kind of fun? There’s a lot of good writing out there and one of the most important principles is to discuss and debate the ethical questions. We hope this will help people gain the tools they need to think about this in their jobs or in DataKind projects, or in encountering algorithmic tools in their everyday life. But if all you get out of it is some friendly discussion over a coffee or beer, that’s also good.
Reading List:
- How do we define fairness? 21 Fairness definitions and their politics - Arvind Narayanan, 2018 [video; 1hr]
- Machine Bias - the Propublica COMPAS story that is the key reference point in talks about algorithmic bias and unfair outcomes [article]
- Where fairness fails: data, algorithms, and the limits of antidiscrimination discourse - Anna Lauren Hoffman, 2019 [academic article]
- IBM AI Fairness 360 tool [blog + links to interactive tutorials]
Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Wikipedia is one of the first places that people go to find out information about any subject. Google’s search results privilege Wikipedia links highly, and many Wikipedia pages receive millions of views a year. It’s hugely important for fans and music companies to ensure that their artists are well-represented on the site.
Join the Association of Independent Music (AIM) and Wikimedia UK for the latest AIM Academy workshop, with expert guidance on how music companies and artists can fully optimise and understand Wikipedia.
Why Wikipedia is important for you and your artists
- Having a Wikipedia page is a sign that an artist is established and successful. Because the text is Open Licensed, it can be reused elsewhere - Spotify and the BBC use biographies from Wikipedia for artists listed on their sites.
- Images used on Wikipedia also end up appearing elsewhere, so uploading a good image of your artist is a way to influence how other sites present your them.
- Wikipedia pages will be added to and curated by fans, so it’s also a way that fans can engage with the artists they care about.
- Wikipedia pageviews are open – find out about how to access your data (page views, edits, editors etc) and how to analyse it. Did you know these pageviews count towards some charts.
Who should attend?
- Anyone with an interest in understanding Wikipedia and open licences.
- Anyone working in artist marketing, press, promo or label management.
- Self-releasing artists, or anyone who manages their own online presence.
Thanks to breakthroughs in science and technology, the future could be profoundly better than the present – provided we recognise this opportunity, and take appropriate actions.
In this vision, there will be an abundance of all-round human flourishing. Everyone will have the means to live better than well - healthier and fitter than ever before; nourished emotionally and spiritually as well as physically; and living at peace with ourselves, the environment, and our neighbours both near and far.
That’s the vision of the Transhumanist Party UK. The Party is developing a set of bold top level targets for the UK to seek to achieve by 2035. These goals are intended to be memorable, clear, and inspiring.
A number of these goals have already been publicised (text/video) and are generating a rich set of feedback (feedback survey!)
This meeting is a chance to join members, supporters, friends, and critics of the Transhumanist Party UK to take this discussion further forward:
- What are the strengths and weaknesses of the Party’s current set of goals for 2035?
- What are the most important steps to take to significantly enhance all-round human flourishing by 2035?
- And bearing in mind both the potential and constraints of both technology and politics, what transformations would need to be well advanced by 2025?
The event will involve a short presentation followed by an extended discussion of roadmap options and priorities. It’s free to attend, but numbers will be restricted, so please RSVP in advance.
Register ↗Join Wikimedia UK and Open Street Map UK for a joint event, following on from Open Street Map’s AGM earlier in the day. The plan is to get people interested in Wikidata to meet people from the OSM community and talk about possible areas of collaboration.
If you would like to present a short talk of 5-10 minutes about a Wikidata or OSM project you are working on, please email [email protected] to let us know that you would like to speak.
There will be room for people to meet and discuss their projects, and hopefully the weather might be nice and we can also use the outside terrace. So whether you want to come and talk about a specific project or just to meet other Wikidata and OSM users to find out more about the projects, come and join us for a casual discussion of all things OpenData and OpenMaps!
Register ↗This year the OSMUK AGM will be held in London at Newspeak House, Bethnal Green, 1-5pm. There will be an official AGM bit followed by short talks and possibly some planning activities.
Schedule talks or discussions at https://www.loomio.org/d/rnWSF7uZ/osmuk-agm-schedule
At 3pm we have invited Wikimedia UK to join us for a “Wikidata Meets OSM” crossover. There should be attendees from the South East and further afield.
Register ↗The future of governance is distributed. Exchange ideas and get a glimpse into our governance track at Web3 Summit. Also: Open afterparty!
Are you involved or interested in distributed governance, future of governance, DAOs, blockchain governance? Join us on Friday, June 28 at Newspeak House and discuss related topics in an open conference format.
This will be the official after-party drinks to the OPEN 2019 Event (www.open.coop). So, prepare to welcome the participants from the conference too, discussing P2P, co-ops and distributed governance.
We will run a similar format to the DGOV Council, with open discussion format and some lightning talks. If you’re working on an interesting project related to Decentralized Governance, DAOs or Blockchain and want to share it: please drop an email to [email protected]
Phoebe Tickell will share ideas and thoughts from the dgov retreat in May with us. Also, there might be a glimpse into our preparation for the dedicated track on governance during Web3 Summit on August 19-21 in Berlin.
We look forward to seeing you!
Timing:
- Welcome / Intro / Topic Selection – 10 mins
- Lightning talks, 3x 10 mins
- Phoebe - dgov foundation retreat recap
- [propose yours]
- Facilitated Discussion (Lean Coffee Format) – 60 mins
Join charity campaigners from across the sector to learn how to communicate effectively with stakeholders in government.
Hattie FitzGerald, former campaigner and now a civil servant at the Home Office, will talk about how charity campaigns and communications are viewed from within a Government department, and how to land your messages most effectively.
Simon Morrison is Deputy Chief Executive at Nesta, the innovation foundation working to bring bold ideas to life to change the world for good. He has extensive experience of communications, and whilst at the Home Office led one of the most comprehensive media engagement and public affairs programmes in the UK. We’ll be talking to Simon about what he learned and how it shaped the way he now approaches influencing stakeholders in Government.
This event is for charity campaigners to discuss best practice and challenges in campaigning for change. We meet quarterly to hear from expert speakers, share ideas and build relationships across the sector. New members are always welcome.
Registration will open at 13:30 with the event starting promptly at 14:00. The session will finish at 16:00.
Please Register
Register ↗Trajectory Theatre brings together the brightest minds in the XR community for an evening of debate and discussion.
Like most technologies XR has seen a lot of its research and early exploration performed under the banner of the armed services. Without long term investment from governments attempting to use it as a tool of military strength, we would not have consumer VR and AR today. Does this then have moral implications for the artists and makers using XR? And what should be our stance on further funding from the military?
SPEAKERS
- Bill Thompson is a technology writer, best known for his weekly column in the Technology section of BBC News Online and his appearances on Click on the BBC World Service. He is also an Honorary Senior Visiting Fellow at City University London’s Journalism Department and writes for BBC Webwise.
- Roderick D. Morgan, Director and Producer at Trajectory Theatre.
- Chair: Jo Kerr, digital consultant, Fellow of the Intersticia Foundation and a Resident Fellow of Newspeak House.
Read the re-cap of our last event: Content vs Technology in XR.
RUNNING ORDER
- 6.30-7pm: Arrivals, drinks, nibbles and networking.
- 7-8pm: Debate and discussion.
- 8-9pm: Drinks and networking.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Trajectory Theatre are interactive digital performance makers. We produce work for both site-specific physical and virtual spaces. Our interests centre around interpersonal connection, the future of the digital era, and challenging notions of reality through perception. To get in touch please reach out on Twitter, Instagram or email us at [email protected].
Register ↗Welcome to our Co-BBQ, made up of three communities centred around Coworking, Coop and Coliving.
Hosted by Open Coop, The European Coworking Assembly, and co-liv.
Register ↗Founders and Coders CIC is a UK-based nonprofit that develops and runs tuition-free, peer-led training programmes in web development, guided by our core values of cooperation, inclusion and social impact. We operate in London and work with Mercy Corps and the UK government to deliver programmes in the Middle East and Africa.
Today we’ll discuss upcoming changes to the programme and Tech For Better, as well as have demonstrations of the summer cohort’s prototypes.
Register ↗Virtual Futures presents Aaron Bastani in conversation on his new book, ‘Fully Automated Luxury Communism: A Manifesto’ (Verso, 2019).
Fully Automated Luxury Communism promises a radically new left future for everyone.
The first decades of the twenty-first century marked the demise of the current world order. Despite widespread acknowledgement of a series of disruptive crises, the proposed response from the mainstream has been to stick with the status quo. Against the confines of this increasingly limited politics a new paradigm has emerged. Fully Automated Luxury Communism claims that new technologies will liberate us from work, providing the opportunity to build a society beyond both capitalism and scarcity. Automation, rather than undermining an economy built on full employment, is instead the path to a world of liberty, luxury and happiness. For everyone.
In his first book, leading political commentator Aaron Bastani conjures a new politics: a vision of a world of unimaginable hope, highlighting how we might move to energy abundance, feed a world of 9 billion, overcome work, transcend the limits of biology and build meaningful freedom for everyone. Rather than a final destination, such a society heralds the beginning of history.
In conversation with Richard Barbrook, Senior Lecturer at University of Westminster. Moderated by Luke Robert Mason, Director of Virtual Futures.
Aaron Bastani is co-founder and senior editor at Novara Media. He holds a PhD from the New Political Communication Unit, University of London, examining social movements in the digital environment which fail to correspond to the traditional logic of collective action. His research interests include new media, social movements, asymmetric strategies and post-scarcity political economy. He has written for Vice, London Review of Books, Guardian and Open Democracy.
Richard Barbrook is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Westminster, London, England. He is a trustee of Cybersalon and a founder member of Class Wargames. He has written about the politics of the Net and gaming in his books Media Freedom: The Contradictions of Communications in the Age of Modernity; The Class of the New; Imaginary Futures: From Thinking Machines to the Global Village; and Class Wargames: Ludic Subversion Against Spectacular Capitalism.
- 18:30 – 19:00: Registration & Drinks
- 19:00 – 20:00: In Conversation with Aaron Bastani
- 20:00 – 20:30: Audience Q&A
- 20:30 – Late: Book Signing & Networking
Please register. Discounts are available for students and early career researchers. Contact [email protected] for Promo Codes. Tickets are FREE for journalists and members of the press. Virtual Futures (Est.1994) is a Community Interest Company (CIC). Ticket sales help to cover the cost of filming and documentation.
‘Fully Automated Luxury Communism: A Manifesto’ is published by Verso: https://www.versobooks.com/books/2757-fully-automated-luxury-communism
Follow the debate on Twitter #VFSalon / @VirtualFutures
Register ↗This 2 day workshops will cover elements of the ‘Transition Training’ used by the Transition Towns movement to resources its members. This will include covering the following elements:
- Exploring the context issues; such as climate change and peak oil, and wider ecological questions, and social justice and equality.
- Introduction to the Transition model and the principles behind it. We will examine the issue of the right scale to create a Transition Initiative. Small groups will experiment with a world cafe style discussion around what experience we bring.
- We will explore different types of visioning, including an exploration of the ‘Deep Adaptation’ agenda.
- We will look at awareness raising, why we need to do it and how. We will explain how people engage with change and play the awareness raising game. We will also take a look at practical projects.
- We will look at groups and group process, in particular the role of the initiating group. We will look more generally at how and why functioning in groups can either be heaven or hell.
- We will examine the role of networking and partnerships. A strategic model for building good relationships in your community will be explained.
- We will introduce the role and practices of inner transition. What is inner transition, and why is it important. We will offer some psychological models which make it easier for us to incorporate this often neglected and tricky side of Transition.
- We will look at what makes a healthy human culture and how to avoid burnout.
- We will see us look at the global spread of transition, how to connect with and make best use of the world wide learning network.
Workshop host background:
Naresh Giangrande
Co-founder of Transition Town Totnes, the first Transition Town, and of Transition Training, Naresh has been involved in designing, running and evolving many of the events, groups, and trainings that have been at the heart of the enormously successful Transition project. He has delivered the hundreds of Transition Trainings to thousands of participants in twenty countries worldwide.
As one of the Transition Town founders he has given dozens of lectures and interviews, and spoken at many conferences and other public events. He set up and coordinated the Energy Group of Transition Town Totnes and was a director of Transition Town Totnes Ltd. Before the Transition movement took over his life he lived and worked in an eco community, was Managing Director of a landscape company, and a gaffer in the film industry, as well as teaching meditation.
His work for Transition Network has lead to a passion for working with self-organising systems, and how participatory learning can be fostered and strengthened across the movement. This has lead to coordinating Transition Network’s work with academic researchers. He is fascinated by data analysis and the block chain, while being painfully aware of the preciousness of life, his capacity for love, and acceptance of his own mortality.
He is father to two lovely daughters.
Sophy Banks
Sophy jointly set up the first “Heart and Soul”, or Inner Transition group in Totnes in 2006. She co-founded Transition Training and, during her time at Transition Network, delivered Launch and other workshops to transition projects around the world.
A trainer for over 20 years she has worked as an engineer, information systems consultant and psychotherapist and has considerable experience of voluntary sector and community projects.
In 2016 Sophy stepped back from the Transition movement to give time to her own work and teaching.
Register ↗Join Medact, Medact Refugee Solidarity Group, MSF Take Action Group, and Docs Not Cops for an evening of short films, and discussion to celebrate #WorldRefugeeDay.
We will be showing a selection of shorts exploring the themes of identity, inclusion and how we can contribute.
SCREENING
- HAMSA - Caroline Spearpoint (trailer)
- Only My Voice - Myriam Rey (trailer)
- Flight - Laura Wadha (trailer)
- Entitled - Adeyemi Michael (trailer)
We are delighted to be joined by Caroline, Laura and Adeyemi who will introduce their films and join us in a discussion exploring people’s experience of migration and the impact of the Hostile Environment on migrant communities. There will also be an opportunity to hear about what Migrant Solidarity Group, Medact, Docs not cops, and the local MSF group are doing in refugee and migrant health and meet other folk from the group. The event is free to all, no one will be turned away.
Register ↗From Heathrow expansion to debates over land use, time and again the environmental movement comes up against barriers to achieving the significant systemic change that is needed to tackle climate chaos.
With Extinction Rebellion and the School Climate Strikes bringing unprecedented attention to the threat of inaction and Labour voting to declare a climate emergency, how can we make sure this focus is best utilised? What are the competing priorities within the left that stop more from being achieved? How can we find a way through them? What compromises can we reach? Could a Green New Deal offer the solution?
Join us for a workshop in which we explore how we can build bridges across the left to unlock new and lasting support for a greener future.
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
Top notch speakers. Wot else?
- Faty Kane - Girls Not Brides
- Ella Goldner - Zinc VC
- Alex Chesterfield - behavioural scientist
- Deborah Coughlin - Studio X
- Ros Urwin - The Sunday Times
.. more to come
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
Wot you waiting for? (as Gwen Stefani would say) #wineandwotsits
Register ↗With deepening funding cuts and an increasing need for support, the services that charities and non-profits provide are more crucial than ever. In short, we need to help more people, but with less funding.
In addition, consumer behaviour and expectations are rapidly changing – as are those of our beneficiaries. People do not change how they want to access and experience services when they switch between sectors – charities and non-profits need to meet these expectations. Frankly, social care needs to catch up.
This event will showcase the journey that Action for Children and the charity sector is embarking on. Exhibitions and speakers will talk about:
- developing user-led services that start small
- real life examples and (often hard) lessons learned
- our vision for the future of digital services – which is scalable and data rich
- how to work collaboratively with agencies and funders to achieve real impact for beneficiaries
Speakers include:
- Kate Stulberg – UX Lead, Action for Children
- Rachael Gilthorpe – Digital Services Manager, Action for Children
- Lynn Roberts – Head of Digital and Innovation, Action for Children
- Darshan Sanghrajka – Founder, SuperBeingLabs
This event is free to attend, however registration is mandatory to secure your space.
Register ↗Every other Tuesday we will be meeting up to collaborate on projects, to discuss progress and to learn together. This is a meetup for engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to radical projects, or work on their own projects. The evening will kickoff with a short introduction round, after which you can proceed to work on your own project, join someone else’s or join one of ours.
What is a radical project? Here at Radical Engineers, we have been seeking and contacting organisations which aim to fundamentally change our economic, political and social systems to enhance human autonomy and social equality. We discuss their projects and clarify any technical challenges or needs they may have so that when they are presented to you, our community, you know that they are properly considered and genuinely useful. Our vetting process means that you will only be working on projects which will help not just to fix the symptoms of our economic systems, but aim to contribute to systemic change itself.
Not an engineer? That’s ok too! You would be surprised at the variety of skills needed for projects. Spreadsheet sprites, word wizards and pixel pirates are valued guests and we could always use a hand scoping out new projects!
See some projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗It’s been a busy few months! We’ve won section 21 but with Theresa May resigning as Prime Minister we are going to have to work hard to push this new legislation over the line.
On Monday 17th June we are coming together to plan out our next steps on Section 21 and more. We’ll work out which campaigns to work on, who we need to join us and what each of us can do to win for renters.
Expect a big conversation about section 21, next steps and building a big network of campaigners.Feel free to bring a friend and some food or drink (if we each bring something , we’ll share a big picnic together).
Register ↗The civic tech meetup for curious passionate people.
Tonight we’ll be hearing from:
- Helen Milner, CEO of Good Things Foundation
- Laurie Parma, Neuropsychologist - The fastest way to culture change
- Irina Bolychevsky, Redecentralize - We can’t just break up Big Tech, we must break them open
- Alex Blandford, Person of Interest - ‘I’ve got the power’ and 3 other inaccurate songs about politics and the internet
Join us for a screening of Knock Down The House - the story of four women taking on American politics. Hosted by BBC journalist Catrin Nye at Newspeak House in Shoreditch, this event has been put together by WebRoots Democracy and Unicef’s Next Gen London.
Entry is free of charge and we are planning to hold a Q&A session with one of makers of the film (details tbc). Spaces, however, are limited and you will need to be on the guestlist in order to attend.
When tragedy struck her family in the midst of the financial crisis, Bronx-born Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had to work double shifts in a restaurant to save her home from foreclosure. After losing a loved one to a preventable medical condition, Amy Vilela didn’t know what to do with the anger she felt about America’s broken health care system. Cori Bush was drawn into the streets when the police shooting of an unarmed black man brought protests and tanks into her neighborhood. Paula Jean Swearengin was fed up with watching her friends and family suffer and die from the environmental effects of the coal industry.
At a moment of historic volatility in American politics, these four women decide to fight back, setting themselves on a journey that will change their lives and their country forever. Without political experience or corporate money, they build a movement of insurgent candidates challenging powerful incumbents in Congress. Their efforts result in a legendary upset.
Register ↗The Echo Chamber Club invites you to a meet up and discussion on: “what makes a healthy information environment?”
There are many subjects being examined by academics, journalists, think-tanks, technologists and policy makers when it comes to digital’s impact on democracy. Disinformation, misinformation, information warfare, truth-making, conspiracy theories, data privacy, data politics, political advertising, microtargeting, transparency, mediatisation, normalisation, echo chambers, filter bubbles, herd thinking and more.
Democracy is a contested term. We agree that it means: “rule by the people”. But we also acknowledge that in a modern nation state the people need to elect representatives to govern them. Information then must circulate between citizens and the government in order to ensure that ‘the people have the power’. But what are the best mechanisms for this? What are the institutions that we absolutely need? Are there any red lines?
We often talk about various digital structures ‘undermining democracy’. But if we cannot agree what democracy is, then how do we agree that it is being undermined? How can we then look to how to use digital to promote democratic ideals?
The purpose of this meeting is to bring experts in this field together to discuss these difficult issues. There will be provocations, conversation, drinks & snacks.
SCHEDULE TBC
Please register to ensure your place.
Register ↗A meetup for effective altruists who work in/are interested in software, data or tech.
Come to chat with other EAs about doing the most good with tech. After our first successful run of having talks last time, we’ll return with another exciting talk this time.
- 6 pm: Doors open
- 6.30pm: Talk by Alex Zari (Senior Software Engineer, Imperial College London): “Why research science needs software engineers”
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism/
Register ↗Psephology is a division of political science that deals with the examination as well as the statistical analysis of elections and political polling. Psephologists and the polls they create and interpret are a powerful force in contemporary politics. They shape our political narratives around elections, govern the news cycle and act as powerful social proof of a campaign’s success or failure.
As trust in polling declines and as technology begins to unlock new sources of political information, we ask what is the future of this discipline and how will it affect campaigning?
So how do psephologists calculate results and turnout? What kind of models, approaches and data do psephologists currently use? Can new approaches be developed using data science techniques which are emerging from different sectors?
For our event, we’ll be joined by Marcus Roberts, Director of International Projects for YouGov and John Sandall, Founder of SixFifty, a community of voluntary data scientists, and software engineers who worked on a model to predict the 2017 election results. (Further speakers to be announced).
Campaign Lab is a community of activists, researchers and technologists working towards a more evidence-based approach to campaigning - outside of this event series we run monthly hackdays and meetups, come join us.
Snacks and refreshments will be provided.
Register ↗This event will feature two top data protection experts working “hands on” to devise mechanisms of accountability for personal data processing, with particular focus on artificial intelligence applications. Reuben Binns will present some of the work that he is leading at the Information Commissioner’s Office on AI auditing, while Sophie Stalla Bourdillon will discuss promises and challenges that she has encountered at Immuta in promoting the adoption of responsible data management practices. We’ll thus have the opportunity to hear about cutting-edge issues in this domain from the perspective of both the regulator and the private sector.
Schedule:
- 6:30 - 7:00 pm Networking time
- 7:00 - 8:30 pm 2 talks (30 mins + 15 mins Q&A for each speaker)
- 8:30 - 9:30 pm Networking time and refreshment
Speakers:
Reuben Binns recently joined the ICO on a two-year Research Fellowship. He will research and investigate a framework for auditing algorithms and conduct further in-depth research activities in AI and machine learning. Dr Binns is also a researcher in Computer Science at the University of Oxford. His research interests include technical, legal and ethical aspects of privacy, machine learning, and decentralised systems. He has a BA and MSc in Philosophy from University of Cambridge, and a PhD in Computer Science and Law from the University of Southampton.
Sophie Stalla-Bourdillon is Senior Privacy Counsel and Legal Engineer at Immuta, the leading data management platform for data science. She is responsible for examining current data protection and model risk frameworks, helping customers to embed aspects of these frameworks within the Immuta platform, and framing these practices into digestible, easy-to-scale methods so they can better control risk across their data science programs. Sophie is also a professor at the University of Southampton Law School of law, where she co-directs the Web Science Institute. She is the author and co-author of several legal articles, chapters and books on data protection and privacy, including Privacy vs. Security (Springer, 2014). Sophie is Editor-in-chief of the Computer Law and Security Review, a leading international journal of technology law, and has also served as a legal and data privacy expert for the European Commission, the Council of Europe, the Organisation for the Cooperation and Security in Europe, and for the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation.
The talks and QA will be filmed for people who can’t make the event. For past presentations check out London Mydata on Youtube.
Register ↗Most people agree that the quality of information and discourse during election and referendum campaigns is too low – both in the UK and in other democracies around the world. But what can be done about it?
Drawing on their recent report for the UCL Constitution Unit, Alan Renwick and Michela Palese will lead a discussion of what our vision for a better democracy should be and what practical steps can be taken to get there. They will explore the lessons that can be learnt from a range of democracies in Europe, North America, and the Asia-Pacific and propose an ambitious new model for transforming how we conceive of democratic campaigning.
Dr Alan Renwick is Deputy Director of the Constitution Unit. He is an expert on elections, referendums, and deliberative democracy, and recently served as Research Director for the Independent Commission on Referendums.
Michela Palese was Research Assistant and McDougall Fellow at the Constitution Unit. She is now Research and Policy Officer at the Electoral Reform Society.
Their report, Doing Democracy Better: How Can Information in Election and Referendum Campaigns Be Improved?, can be read here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/constitution-unit/news/2019/mar/new-report-doing-democracy-better
Register ↗Join Lyrical Science for Minds on Tap, our event series where public audiences listen to scientists discuss their research in the format of 10 minute-long inspiring talks.
Six scientists from King’s College London and University College London will speak about their cutting edge research on Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and Motor Neuron Disease. We’ll also share our vision to bring public support and philanthropy to early career researchers in the medical sciences.
You’ll be able to learn more about the state of critical research in this field, network with the scientists over drinks, and discover a new way to get involved in scientific discovery.
For an example of what these talks look like, check out Dr Lizzie Glennon’s talk from our inaugural Minds on Tap event last November: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5SrS6JOUH0
The event is open to all members of the public – carers, friends or family members of those who have suffered from neurodegenerative diseases; scientists, science lovers, philanthropists, members of foundations or corporations and anyone interested in helping the scientific community gain the support it needs to conduct critical research on neurodegenerative diseases. Whatever your background, simply come on by, hear the scientists and enjoy the informative and inspiring evening.
At Lyrical Science, we help scientists share their inspiring stories with the public in an effort to connect them with private funders and philanthropists. Scientists are often prevented from doing life saving research by funding shortages outside of their control. This event is about helping brilliant young scientists communicate their research to the public in an inspiring and compelling format. It’s also a call for philanthropists to fund their labs. We’re a team of early career researchers and public speaking creatives across the US and UK and can’t wait to share our vision with you in person.
Visit lyricalscience.com and find out how we got started
Register ↗UnFound is for tech founders and start-ups looking for a different way to set-up and run platform businesses. It brings together platforms that would like to go about their business in a more collaborative and inclusive way.
- Hear about the potential for platform co‑ops
- Hear how your platform or product could benefit from the co‑op model
- Learn about next steps and support available
- Meet others exploring this space for their next platform idea
The events are being delivered by Cat Ainsworth and Annie Legge of Dot Project in collaboration with Co-operatives UK and Stir to Action. Find out more: http://unfound.coop
UnFound is funded by The Hive - a support programme for co-ops delivered by Co-operatives UK in partnership with The Co-operative Bank: http://thehive.coop
Register ↗Come and share your most prescient analyses, cutting insights, and hottest takes on the European Elections, a day after the dust has settled.
Register ↗The European Parliament Election 2019 is a pivotal moment in the history of the Democracy in Europe Movement 2025, and even more so for the European Union as a whole. How well will DiEM25, the European Green New Deal and the European Spring perform in the 6 countries they are running in? What will the future of the continent look like? How much will the far-right gain?
The fate of Europe is on the line! This is why we teamed up with Another Europe Is Possible and DiEM25 United Kingdom in watching the announcement of the Exit Polls.
Register ↗The Race Beat is a network for people of colour, open to anyone working in, or interested in, journalism.
We are independent of any media organisation and open to all people of colour – experienced news reporters, citizen journalists, students, writers, freelancers, staff writers, broadcasters, media academics, aspiring columnists and critics. You don’t need to be a professional journalist to join us. Come down and get involved!
The May meet up will be a great a chance to get to know people of colour who are interested in the media. We will also be discussing further our big events coming up later in the year, including a panel at Byline Festival on the coverage of climate change the environment. Where are the people of colour?
We are also planning a one day conference in Glasgow on Friday 27 September with Gary Younge as keynote speaker and another day long event in London in November. Both will include workshops, panel discussions, networking.
Bring ideas for who you would you like to see speak at our events this year, or maybe you are a journalist who could offer some training?
This is a space for people of colour only. We welcome queer and trans people of colour and all other identities.
The venue is wheelchair accessible.
About us
We want to create space for writers of colour to come together and begin to:
- collaborate on race related stories and reporting projects on a wide range of subjects,
- provide accessible spaces for regular discussion; on craft, on racism, on class, skills sharing, solutions,
- build partnerships with small organisations fighting for better representation and supporting writers of colour,
- strategise on ways to properly fund more quality journalism (comment, criticism, investigations) and race reporting by writers of colour.
Join us for a special EU Election week event focused on technology’s worrying impacts on UK democracy.
Nearly a year after the General Data Protection Regulation was implemented, questionable data practices on social media advertising are threatening UK elections. We’ll hear from Who Targets Me about their innovative browser extension that improves transparency in online advertising by showing users who is targeting political ads at them and why.
We’ll also hear from our new Data & Democracy Project Officer Pascal Crowe about why we should be concerned about electronic voting trials in the UK. We’ll also hear about ORG’s upcoming event ORGCon.
No technical expertise are necessary, all are welcome to this free event. Attendees will be offered discounted access to our July event ORGCon 2019!
Register ↗Extinction Rebellion Democratic Socialists is an independent collective of activists within the XR movement who are interested in progressive socialist ideas for concrete political, economic and social change. We view the climate crisis primarily in terms of climate justice: this means that in order to fight climate change, we also need to fight the social systems which drive its destructive march. We sponsor events and workshops dedicated to sparking conversations around movement-building practice, outreach and consciousness-raising, and the practical policy questions that come with any serious committment to de-carbonising the economy within our lifetimes.
This is our launch event! XRDS is a freshly-minted collective, so this will be a relatively informal occasion for people to meet, greet, and share their ideas about what kind of good a group like XRDS could do for Extinction Rebellion and the broader movement to de-carbonise the economy.
Asad Rehman, Executive Director of War on Want, will join us to talk about the need for an intersectional approach to the climate crisis and the need to place the people most affected by climate change at the heart of the movement to defeat it. Asad was Head of International Climate at Friends of the Earth from 2009 to 2017, and has over 25 years’ experience in the non-governmental and charity sector. Asad has served on the boards of Amnesty International UK, Friends of the Earth International, Global Justice Now and Newham Monitoring Project. Find out more at www.waronwant.org
Doors open from 7:00 PM for a start around 7:30. Asad’s presentation will be followed by a period for questions and discussion, which will be followed by time for general networking. Snacks and drinks will be provided.
To stay up to date, follow XRDS on Facebook and Twitter!
- www.facebook.com/Extinction-Rebellion-Democratic-Socialists-2296611777242659
- www.twitter.com/XRDemSocs
In this training we will take people through the methodology and practice of an NVDA (non-violent direct action) training. We will discuss what makes an effective training and trainer, as well as the necessary facilitation skills to hold a training session.
Those attending will practice leading the exercises used in our training, and better understand why they are used.
Those attending will NEED to have attended one of our NVDA trainings previously and be prepared to lead the group through various exercises.
As the movement grows, we need to build our base of organisers. This is a great opportunity to develop the tools needed to effectively carry out NVDA training, prepare people for actions, and understand why Civil Disobedience works.
By the end of the session you will be ready to carry out XR NVDA Trainings.
Register ↗900 million people are currently participating in a massive festival of electoral democracy in India. Over 6 weeks, Indian citizens are going to the ballot to elect 545 MP’s to govern them for five years. 2014 saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi ride a massive wave of anti-incumbency to enter the highest office with a thumping majority. Five years hence, the man and his mania may have waned a little but he remains the favourite to win the elections.
The five years of Modi rule has raised profound questions on the idea of India. His government has witnessed the rise of whatsapp lynchings, Hindutva terror, environmental destruction, devastating fiscal and monetary policies and a near absolute control of popular media.
So how does Modi continue to remain popular? How do we, here in the UK, view these elections? What do the outcomes mean for democratic space and dissent? How social media is shaping the Indian elections?
To discuss these complex questions and engage in a lively debate, we have Salil Tripathi joining us. Salil Tripathi is a senior adviser at the Institute for Human Rights and Business. Based in London, he is a contributing editor at Mint and Caravan in India, two respected media outlets. He is currently Chair, PEN International’s Writers in Prison Committee and an outspoken individual on twitter @saliltripathi
Event format:
- A quick primer on Indian elections for 7-10 minutes
- Salil Tripathi offering his views for 25 minutes
- QnA from the chair for 10 minutes
- QnA from the audience for 45 minutes
Come join us for this free event. Please arrive from 6 PM for a 6:30 start. We will wrap up by 8:30 pm.
This event is not being put together by any organisation. We are just individuals interested in Indian politics, culture and society.
Register ↗Gen:impact aims to connect young (22-35 y/o) professionals in London who work in the social impact space. Our goal is to provide a casual setting to exchange ideas, build relationships, and collaborate towards social change. Whether you work in social entrepreneurship, education, the charity sector, impact investment, or something different, we look forward to meeting you.
- 7:00 - 7:30 PM - Arrivals - Arrive and meet.
- 7:30 - 8:30 PM - Fireside Chats - Learn about exciting projects in the impact space from your peers.
- Angus Innes, Jangala
- Tanveer Sian, Social Finance
- Ellie Ereira & Aly Blenkin, Pivotal Act
- 8:30 - 10 PM - Networking - Mingle with your peers in the impact community
Org/speaker bios:
Jangala is a London-based charitable organisation that design and make Wi-Fi systems to provide connectivity to those displaced by natural and man-made disasters. In 2015, Jangala made the first and only wifi network in the Jungle, the refugee camp in Calais, providing internet to over 5000 people a week. In 2018, they equipped 16 grassroots groups across 3 continents with their first product Big Box. In 2019, their aim is to distribute 100 more systems. Angus joined Jangala back in November to lead strategy and business development. His talk will discuss what brought Jangala together back in Calais, how he came to join and what they have planned for the future.
Social Finance is a London-based social enterprise that aims to deliver social change through innovative mechanisms such as its social investment model, the Social Impact Bond, now scaled across 24 countries, and its Impact Incubator which has incubated unique responses to difficult issues such as domestic violence and refugee integration. Tanveer is an analyst at Social Finance who will speak about the Impact Incubator’s Black Thrive initiative which aims to reduce inequalities in mental health outcomes in the black community in London.
Pivotal Act is a program that partners with humanitarian organizations and nonprofits to identify, design, and develop practical technology solutions to pressing challenges around the world, born out of San Francisco-based software and design org Pivotal. Aly and Ellie are associate directors at Pivotal Act and will talk about the projects they’ve run. These include finding ways for NGOs to share data during emergency responses for distributing cash aid, improving the design of toilets in refugee camps, creating a tool to support young people in foster care, and designing for climate change resilience in coastal cities. With a background in Industrial Design, Systems Thinking and Service Design, Aly is passionate about designing products and services that addresses social and environmental issues. Ellie comes from a product management background and has has worked on developing technology to make social impact from an international development angle at the World Bank and with private sector startups.
Note: This will be the first event held by Gen:impact. There will be some light snacks and drinks available, but please BYOB!
Register ↗The third meetup for government digital folk to share their work and ideas around designing case-working systems in government.
For this event, the theme is around around developing standards and patterns. We’re going to experiment with more collaborative sessions.
The agenda will be:
- 10:00 - 10:30: Arrival
- 10:30 - 12:30: Morning session: A series of workshops to look at defining standards for caseworking systems
- 12:30 - 13:30: Lunch break (sorry, no lunch provided)
- 13:30 - 16:00: Afternoon session: Unconference style sessions open to anyone to suggest topics
If you have any questions at all, please email: [email protected].
You can read write-ups of the previous events here:
Pease note this event is limited to people working in government only.
Please sign up with a government email address.
Register ↗The financially driven, capitalist economy works as it does by design. Money is created by banks as interest bearing debt and serves the interests of the few over the many. Money, as it has been designed, is the core driver of environmental destruction, global warming, inequality and poverty.
If we are going to escape the multitude of systemic issues which plague our planet the monetary system has to change.
Since revolution is unsafe, and reform has been proved ineffective, we need to implement new systems of exchange which out-evolve capitalism. A money system that serves our needs better is not only possible, but is already in operation - it’s known as mutual credit.
The challenge is to refine, scale and integrate the various mutual credit systems so they can support a saner global economic system for people and planet.
The event is for anyone with an interest in the evolution of money and will focus on how mutual credit networks are beginning to build a new, alternative financial system known as the Global Credit Commons.
In an exclusive round table discussion we will hear from:
- Thomas Greco, author of The End of Money and the Future of Civilization, who, for more than 35 years, has been working at the leading edge of moneyless exchange systems, community currencies, financial innovation, and community economic development - and is on a rare visit to the UK from Arizona.
- Representatives of the Open Credit Network, a new UK co-operative mutual credit network made up of businesses who have come together, under a simple shared agreement, in order to trade with each other without the need for hard cash.
- Matthew Slater, complementary currency engineer and author of The Credit commons - A money system for the solidarity economy, a proposed accounting system to allow mutual credit schemes anywhere to trade with each other in a new, global, moneyless system.
Please register. This is a free event but as places are limited we ask for five (conventional) pounds as a deposit to encourage attendance. Attendees deposits will be refunded on request.
Register ↗Paul (Rally) & Jo Kerr Consults are excited to present a screening of Knock Down The House.
The film will take us behind the scenes as four determined women, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, challenge big money politics in the 2018 race for Congress.
We’re expecting a great crowd of general troublemakers from all sorts of amazing organisations. We will provide popcorn and time for chat. You should bring something to drink.
Register ↗Newspeak House starts a partnership with GREENHAUS, the co-retail concept store for sustainable products.
Come try some cocktails all PERMACULTURE focused using SUSTAINABLE liquors and SEASONAL fruit!
Register ↗Join the Center for Innovative Governance Research for a discussion about charter cities, effective altruism, and their plan to lift ten million people out of poverty.
Charter cities are cities with special jurisdictions which give them a blank slate, or close to it, in commercial law. The new jurisdiction allows them to adopt the best practices in business registration procedure, labor law, tax administration, commercial dispute resolution, and more. By adopting governance systems which encourage trade, investment, and entrepreneurship charter cities create the conditions for decades of economic growth. Examples proto-charter cities include Shenzhen, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Dubai, whose successes demonstrate that it is possible for cities to achieve prosperity in 2-3 generations.
Executive Director Mark Lutter and Communications Lead Tamara Winter will be on hand throughout the night to say hi and answer your questions. Whether you’re interested in discovering just what exactly charter cities are or are a skeptic, they’d love to meet you.
Light appetisers will be provided.
Register ↗A meetup for effective altruists who work in/are interested in software, data or tech.
Note: This event is targeted at people who already know about Effective Altruism. If you’re new to EA, start with one of the newcomer socials advertised here: https://www.facebook.com/LondonAltruism/
Register ↗Are you an experienced coder, tester or designer that wants to contribute your skills to a socially and ecologically transformative project? Are you new to software and want to join a project that will help you develop your skills? Do you hate a series of vague questions attempting to lure you into something before you know enough to be excited?
Then read on!
The Open Food Network are thrilled to announce our first ever UK Hackathon. Over the weekend of the 4th and 5th of May we’ll be nestling into Newspeak House to spend two days working on real issues for the global open source project. Together we hope to expand our exciting community, bring in new people that believe in what we do and share our experience in building a successful remote open source community. And of course we will share great food, laughs and fun!
What is the Open Food Network?
The Open Food Network (OFN) is a global, open source collaboration building software for short and local supply chains. We want to make it easy for people to build vibrant and viable communities around the production and distribution of healthy, sustainable food. Our open source platform is used in a dozen countries by hundreds of food enterprises, selling millions of pounds of good food every year. Our global team is built of about 25 people around the world, working on product, dev, testing, UX and support. OFN is growing fast and are hoping to expand our community of passionate food tech enthusiasts.
What to Expect
Over the weekend you will:
- Work in teams to tackle issues that are affecting sustainable farmers and community food projects all over the world
- Build and share your skills. Our stack is built on Ruby, Rails, Postgres, AngularJS deployed with Ansible (Unicorn, NGINX).
- Learn from OFN developers, contributors and professionals
- Contribute to issues in different stages of our pipe process – from development to testing to release
- Work on problems that suit your skills and interests – design, UX, coding, APIs, testing
- Learn about our processes and systems, including how to become a paid contributor in the longer term.
- Meet an amazing group of like minded people working to use tech to make the world we want to live in
- Stickers and other (much more) exciting rewards for being involved and making contributions!
We’ll provide lunch, snacks and drinks throughout the two days.
If you would like to attend but travel or accommodation costs are prohibitive please get in touch as we might be able to help.
Register ↗Wikimedia UK is organising the second London Wikidata meetup. If you’re working on Wikidata projects, or interested in Wikidata and want to find out how to get involved, come along and talk to us about it.
As this will take place in the downstairs part of Newspeak, there will be an opportunity for brief presentations. If you have a Wikidata project you’re working on and would like to do a 5-10 minute presentation on, please contact me about it - [email protected]
This event will not be catered, but you are welcome to bring your own food or drink into the venue.
Register ↗Come along to this free introduction with Autopia creator Stephen Reid to learn how to use the platform, and how you can contribute to its development.
Autopia (https://autopia.co/) is a platform that makes organising co-created gatherings and sticking to good habits easy and fun.
Most of the gatherings organised via Autopia are smaller than 150 people and last less than a week. We’ve found this to be a sweet spot offering great depth of connection for reasonable time and cost.
People use Autopia to organise gatherings across the globe: both standalone gatherings, and camps at larger events like Nowhere and the Borderland.
The process of co-creating a gathering on Autopia can act as a kind of initiation into collective intelligence and emergent order.
Come along to this free event to learn more.
Register ↗The Race Beat is a network for people of colour, open to anyone working in, or interested in, journalism.
At the April meet up we will talk about our plans for 2019, including day long training events in London and Glasgow, as well as panels at summer festivals. Bring ideas for who you would you like to see speak at our events this year - writers, editors, broadcasters. Are you a journalist who could offer some training? Do you want to get involved with organising or have access to event space?
It will also be a chance to chat and get to know people of colour who are interested in the media. Some of us might also have a drink afterwards.
This is a space for people of colour only. We welcome queer and trans people of colour and all other identities. You don’t need to be a professional journalist.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June 2018 we’ve been a busy bunch, the Campaign Lab community has sourced hundreds of demographic and austerity impact datasets, developed scrapers and written parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets. We’ve built a comprehensive UK ward-level election results dataset and begun comparing factors impacting elections across the country.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next hackathon as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there have been very few contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK. Similarly, there have been precious few attempts to determine the effect of local economic factors such as house prices and austerity on election results and vote share.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re building a repository of publicly available structured data and models to better understand the 2018 Local Elections, identifying which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning.
But we need your help.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and helping with a new approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for a day of politically motivated data science and innovation.
Over the course of our hackdays we’ll be tackling the questions plaguing activists up and down the country, making a real impact on elections and political campaigning right across the country.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
You do not need to be a data scientist or developer to take part in this event!
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks, breakfast pastries, a big homemade lunch and dinner will be provided!
Not been to a Campaign Lab meet up before? No problem! Come along to meet politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
All attendees to Campaign Lab HackDays may join future discount data science courses put on specifically for Campaign Lab volunteers - contact us for more information.
Register ↗Collectives are everything, from the cells of our bodies and brains to the groups, nations, and ecosystems we are part of. Are there principles that characterise collective intelligence across scales? Have the factors that lead to human group performance been accurately measured? How do flocks of birds or swarms of bees make collective decisions, and are there lessons in them for human groups? When are crowds wise and when are they stupid? Can technology improve collective decisions? If so how, and by how much?
Drawing on research from academia, corporate performance optimisation, and group decision technology, we’ll dive into the knowns and unknowns of collective intelligence and see where they lead.
We’ll start with an interactive presentation on some of the key findings on collective intelligence from psychology, biology, ecology, and elsewhere.
Then, we’ll take the research out of the journals and experiment with it, using conversational games, human swarming, voting by convergence, and other experiments to test our real-world sensitivity to collective intelligence principles and how they appear (or don’t!) in the groups we’re part of.
Throughout, we’ll tap the collective’s intelligence about collective intelligence with reverse Q&A, discussion, and experimental group decisions about the flow of the event.
Register ↗A meetup discussing the state of data privacy and data ethics. If you’re working in privacy, grab a free ticket.
Speakers:
“Fuck your banners, fuck your pop-ups and fuck your feature walls!” - Shad Jahangir @systemantix, fellow of Newspeak House, design director of Metomic. He’ll talk about designing data transparency and trust into the fabric of the web.
“Data everywhere, how we got to this point.” - Ben van Enckevort @benvan87, CTO of Metomic, will be talking briefly about the state of data on the web and how we got here. He promises he will only mention Facebook three times.
Register ↗Since becoming Lord Mayor of Sheffield in 2018, Magid ‘Magic’ Magid has taken the political scene by storm, making headlines in the UK and across the world. A former child refugee, Magid is Sheffield City Council’s first Green Party mayor and its youngest at 29. His monthly campaigns have reached millions of people online and have touched upon a wide range of issues including knife crime, climate change, Brexit, and the NHS.
Areeq Chowdhury (Chief Executive, WebRoots Democracy) will be in conversation with Magid and will be delving into his journey from Somali refugee to one of the most engaging young politicians the UK has ever seen. In particular, we will be exploring his methods for “doing politics differently”.
Register ↗How urgent is the need to take serious action over the threat of what some are calling “climate catastrophe”? What are the factors that prevent sufficient attention being given to this topic? And what are the best methods to overcome this state of learned ignorance, and to advance practical solutions?
Andrew Medhurst, former investment banker, now climate change activist with Extinction Rebellion, a global movement focussed on creating mass nonviolent civil disobedience.
Paul Powlesland, founder of Lawyers for Nature and Newspeak House Fellow.
Gavin Starks, founder of Open Environmental Risk Standard, aiming to radically increase the accessibility of data required to address a wide range environmental risks.
Register ↗In this half-day training, we will focus on the foundation of every collaborative team: how to communicate effectively and deal with conflict in a productive way.
We’ll look at the appropriate use of digital communication tools, understanding how different tools suit different jobs. We’ll examine typical reactions to conflict, and how to choose the right response when conflict arises. We’ll explore how to give good feedback and improve your listening skills.
You’ll leave with processes your team can use to address conflict, and practice the skills that will make you a more effective communicator.
This workshop is ideal for groups working with less hierarchy and more collaboration: cooperatives, self-managing teams, startups, Teal organisations, Agile squads, innovation units, flat NGOs… if you’re growing a participatory culture of shared leadership and mutual accountability, this training is for you. Our knowledge is rooted in our lived experience in our own organisations at the forefront of collaborative work practice. We bring examples from different groups around the world, as well as research from academic studies. We host participatory learning exercises for participants to reflect on how these lessons apply in their group context.
The Hum is Nati Lombardo and Richard Bartlett. We have been immersed in decentralised organisations since 2011, playing co-leadership roles in the Loomio tech co-op and the Enspiral network of social enterprises. For the past 3 years, we’ve been travelling the world sharing our experiences, and learning with others about non-hierarchical management. We’ve worked in 17 countries, with a huge diversity of organisations across all sectors.
We’re offering a 20% discount for “early bird” tickets, purchased before March 20th. This training is even more effective when multiple people from the same team can join. If you have 3 or more people coming together, contact us for a group discount.
Register ↗On the 5th of April, each council will release a document called a Statements of Persons Nominated, which details the candidates for the upcoming local elections. We need to manually enter this information into a database so that more useful things can be done with it. Come and help!
Register ↗Trajectory Theatre brings together the brightest minds in the XR community for an evening of debate and discussion.
The first in the ‘Trajectory Talks’ series will explore the nuances of a topic that has long fallen into platitudes and empty conjecture.
Does the answer to broadening audiences for XR lie with content, or technology? It’s a challenging binary choice, but it’s also potentially limiting.
We’ll unpack the arguments through lively discussion to reach a collective understanding of what a successful content-driven ecosystem looks like.
Four people from across the arts and tech space will frame the discourse, before we open up to a ‘fishbowl’ discussion where everyone has the opportunity to share their views and experiences. You are all experts, so we’ll hear from as many of you as we can.
SPEAKERS
- Roderick D. Morgan, Director and Producer at Trajectory Theatre.
- Chair: Jo Kerr, digital consultant, Fellow of the Intersticia Foundation and Resident Fellow of Newspeak House.
Further speakers to be announced soon.
RUNNING ORDER
- 6.30-7pm: Arrivals, drinks, nibbles and networking.
- 7-8pm: Debate and ‘fishbowl’ discussion.
- 8-9pm: Drinks and networking.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Trajectory Theatre are interactive digital performance makers. We produce work for both site-specific physical and virtual spaces. Our interests centre around interpersonal connection, the future of the digital era, and challenging notions of reality through perception. To get in touch please reach out on Twitter, Instagram or email us at [email protected].
Register ↗This training explores how we make group decisions when there’s no top-down command-and-control structure.
You’ll learn different decision-making protocols, like consensus, consent, and the advice process. We’ll unpack the neuroscience of cognitive biases, and how to de-bias your decisions. And we’ll investigate how digital tools can help you make collective decision more efficiently.
This workshop is ideal for groups working with less hierarchy and more collaboration: cooperatives, self-managing teams, startups, Teal organisations, Agile squads, innovation units, flat NGOs… if you’re growing a participatory culture of shared leadership and mutual accountability, this training is for you. Our knowledge is rooted in our lived experience in our own organisations at the forefront of collaborative work practice. We bring examples from different groups around the world, as well as research from academic studies. We host participatory learning exercises for participants to reflect on how these lessons apply in their group context.
The Hum is Nati Lombardo and Richard Bartlett. We have been immersed in decentralised organisations since 2011, playing co-leadership roles in the Loomio tech co-op and the Enspiral network of social enterprises. For the past 3 years, we’ve been travelling the world sharing our experiences, and learning with others about non-hierarchical management. We’ve worked in 17 countries, with a huge diversity of organisations across all sectors.
We’re offering a 20% discount for “early bird” tickets, purchased before March 20th. This training is even more effective when multiple people from the same team can join. If you have 3 or more people coming together, contact us for a group discount.
Register ↗A meetup for software/web developers, tech and data science people in London who are also interested in effective altruism.
Register ↗Innovation is a term we hear a lot in government and the private sector. Innovation is a lot of things. Innovation is emerging technology, new ideas, experimentation, and partnering across sectors. It’s self-driving cars and conversational interfaces and it’s also applying for your first passport online.
We’ll have talks from the GovTech Catalyst team, the head of front-end development at GDS on Progressive Web Apps and more. We’ll hear about what innovation means for designers in government.
Register ↗We Hack London is a hackathon where you will have the opportunity to work together with people, NGO leaders and entrepreneurs to develop solutions to challenges in London.
Confirmed mentors include:
- Alex Stephany: Founder & CEO, Beam
- Marilise de Villiers: Director of Security Skills And Culture, Centrica
- Sherry Peck: Chief Executive, Safer London
- Ben Hudson: Project Director, London Sustainability Exchange
Schedule:
- 09:30am Registration
- 10:00am Welcome and speaker
- 10:20am Split into Challenge groups
- 10:30am People pitch project ideas
- 11:20am Project teams form
- 11:30am Break
- 12:00pm Hacking begins with Mentors
- 02:00pm Lunch
- 02:45pm Hacking continues
- 05:30pm Break
- 05:40pm Keynote speaker
- 06:00pm Presentations to judges
- 07:30pm Judging and awards
- 08:00pm Close
All attendees must register.
Find out more at the We Hack London website.
Register ↗The UK government’s Prevent policy places a legal obligation on professionals working with children and families to identify and report children and vulnerable adults at risk of radicalisation. This process can have serious implications for families’ freedom of movement and right to privacy, including restrictions on children travelling abroad under guidance issued by former President of the Family Division Sir James Munby, or removal of children in the family courts according to documentation collated by CAGE in 2018. This is contentious and raises many questions. As practitioners what do we perceive as ‘radicalisation’? Are terms like ‘radicalisation’ and ‘extremism’ adequately defined in law? At what point does ideology place children at risk of serious harm? And in cases related to radicalisation, does secrecy in the interests of national security interfere with the human rights of children and families?
This event is open to social work and mental health practitioners, academics and students. Beginning with a panel discussion, we will explore the impact of the Prevent policy on children and families in social work and mental health practise from multiple perspectives. We will invite practitioners to together for a workshop led by the charity Medact, and share experiences of working within the Prevent policy, the ethical challenges it raises for practitioners, and ways of practising or advocating to uphold the human rights of the people we work with.
- 19:00 - Welcome/Refreshments
- 19:30 - Panel Discussion
- 20.15 - Break/Refreshments
- 20.30 - Workshop
- 21.30 - End
Note: The perspectives offered by panellists are their own. They do not represent BASW London, Psychologists for Social Change or MedAct.q
Speakers
Chair: Sumayyah Hart is a BASW London committee member and has held a number of senior roles in children’s services across London, including Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) in Lambeth and Independent Reviewing Officer in Hammersmith and Fulham. Her current positions are Child Protection Advisor and Child Protection Conference Chair for Brent.
Dr. Asim Qureshi is Research Director for CAGE, a London-based advocacy organisation working to empower communities impacted by the ‘War on Terror’. Asim collected evidence from families and published the report ‘Separating Families - How PREVENT Seeks the Removal of Children’ in 2018. The full report can be found here.
Dr. Tony Stanley was Chief Social Worker for Birmingham Children’s Trust and Principal Social Worker for Tower Hamlets. He has published three papers on social work practise and the Prevent duty with colleagues Dr. Surinder Guru, Dr. Anna Gupta and Vicki Coppock, and recently led the BASW Webinar ‘A Risky Time for Muslim Families: Professionalised Counter-radicalisation Networks’.
Dr. Charlotte Heath-Kelly is Associate Professor in Politics and International Studies at Warwick University. Her research focuses on Counterterrorism in the UK and USA and Counter-Radicalisation Policies The Guardian’s coverage of her research into Prevent Duty Safeguarding in the NHS is here and here (also see Ted-X Warwick talk on ‘The Motivations for Terrorism’).
Dr. Tarek Younis is Newton International Fellow at UCL (University College London). His current project is a a community ethnography study of the impact of anti-radicalisation discourse within healthcare institutions on the recipients and providers of PREVENT policy.
Anna Sekular is a caseworker with PreventWatch, which supports people impact by the Prevent policy to access legal advice and representation.
Workshop Coordinator: Reem Abu-Hayyeh works for the charity Medact, and is set to launch a consultation into healthcare professionals experiences of working within the Prevent policy in 2019. Reem has worked in advocacy and campaigns particularly on social justice issues relating to the marginalisation of BAME and migrant communities in the UK and Europe. In her last role at Maslaha, Reem managed projects focusing on Islamophobia, gender and stereotypes, working primarily with young people.
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event of the quarter is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Who?
ou’re getting a sneak peak at this and we will be unveiling the full line up in the next week or so. We’re thrilled to announce our first speakers though..
- Sarah Corbett - Craftivist Collective
- Polly Billington - UK100
- Bayo Adelaja - Do it Now Now
- Kat Sladden - We Huddle
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
Register ↗Hate has gone viral and is destroying our communities. Our world has has become tribal, ‘betrayal’ and ‘treason’ appear daily in social media about even the smallest differences of opinions.
How can we fight this footballisation of politics ?
How can we change Them and Us into our shared community again?
“Learning another language is like having a chance to live another life” this quote is true but learning another language takes a lot of time and are all busy people. Lucky for us, playing a game can be like peeking into someone else’s life. In the space of a few hours we can explore in-depth how native Alaskans live (Never Alone), with a glimpse into how incredibly collaborative culture manages to survive in the harshest of climates, how lack of privacy is turned into strength.
In Where the Water taste like Wine we are faced with unemployment and survival dilemmas from the Great Depression times in US. It has amazing soundtrack and shows live in rural US during the tough period in American history. It also explores the Other, non-urban values.
On The Surface – How to be friends with people who are different? Exploring empathy and feelings for others. A game by Digital Liberties for The Challenge and ISD.
Flash Demo VR from Casto – showing a VR game recreating old environments, alternative worlds that can be explored as a story background- Huddersfield Uni) will be show in the break.
The Problem: Our online filter bubbles (Twitter, Facebook) have a propensity to create rapid polarisation (Paolo Gerbaudo and Jamie J Bartlett), where quickly some Them and some Us emerge, praying on people’s innermost fears, emphasising tribalism and exploiting their insecurities. From polarisation to extremism is only a short hop and as a society we need to search for ways to ‘vaccine’ ourselves against the siren call of hate.
The Challenge: How do game designers create worlds where experience of other world, other lives and unfamiliar cultural context can be experienced by thousands of people in a space of few hours and without the need to learn their language? Can games become our hate-vaccines? How can intense emotional gaming experience convey the subtle and often nuance differences in opinion love, sense of community, sense of belonging and shared history or lack of it. Can we create as powerful games as 12 Angry Men movie was for Human Rights movement in 1960 ?
Join us on 18th March to find how hit games step up are the Force for Good in the world obsessed with hate.
Speakers
- Ben Greenaway – Cybersalon’s Game Reviewer-in-Chief
- Simon Sarginson – ex game developer (RockSteady Studios and SplashDamage)
- Casto Vocal – VR /3D developer (Huddersfield University /Teeside University)
- Chaired by Eva Pascoe – Cybersalon
What is holding us back from creating a powerful and inspiring vision for our future? Why do we seem stuck in making minor upgrades to managerial capitalism?
One of the youngest law professors in Harvard’s history at 29, Professor Roberto Unger played a significant role in bringing democracy back to Brazil, served in Lula’s government as a minister and has been called “a prophet” by the famed philosopher Richard Rorty. A key influence and inspiration to Obama he was also one of Obama’s toughest critics, memorably arguing against Obama’s second term.
Unger is the author of several important and groundbreaking works, most recently “The Future of American Progressivism” and “The Knowledge Economy”. For decades, he has been a pragmatic utopian, working to envision a practical path to a radically better future at a time when such political dreams were unfashionable. An outspoken critic of neoliberalism and a prophet before his time, he early identified the ideological bankruptcy of managerial capitalism. Now, at a time when history seems to be proving him right, we should learn all what we can from this pioneering voice.
The conference will be facilitated by Dr Rufus Pollock, economists, technologist and author of the Open Revolution and Dr Liam Kavanagh cognitive scientist and Director of the Art / Earth / Tech institute.
Register ↗Common Knowledge is a newly founded non profit tech workers cooperative with a mission to support and build infrastructure for grassroots political and community organising.
Join us for an evening debrief and workshop. We’ll be presenting the work done in the last two weeks, the third sprint of work. Then we’ll be putting this in the context of the last six months of the project and deciding next steps.
Since October, we’ve been designing and testing our first product, a political organising and community capacity building platform. This work is aimed squarely at boosting the levels of autonomous organising in the progressive space and grassroots movements, activating a largely passive activist population and decentralising and devolving key community resources currently held by large institutional actors.
March 15th will mark the end of our third sprint. We’d like to invite you down, have a few drinks with us and share in our work and learnings. We’ve interviewed over 70 activists and organisers across London as part of this project so far and are currently testing a range of assumptions we’ve developed from those conversations - that’s a lot of juicy learnings.
Alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, and snacks will be provided.
The event will be split between a presentation and discussion of our work and a short breakout and group feedback session.
Register ↗Every year, hundreds of thousands of party activists across the world pound the streets and knock on doors in an effort to mobilise large numbers of citizens to vote for their party of choice.
Get Out The Vote (GOTV) voter mobilisation has become a staple of electoral campaigning, but as new technologies develop and new political forces take root, is there room for improvement?
Join Campaign Lab for the first event in our new series exploring the potential for innovation in electoral campaigning in the UK and beyond.
For our debut event, we’ll be joined by Rudi Shenk, former National Outreach Director of Obama for America, and Matt Goddin, Labour Party organiser for Ilford North, one of the few Labour wins in 2015. Our third speaker is to be confirmed.
During the panel and breakout session we’ll explore current methods and GOTV strategies used by political parties and campaigns in an effort to identify where there is space for innovation and improvement - asking our speakers: in an ideal world, how would you improve the GOTV operation?
Campaign Lab is a community of activists, researchers and technologists working towards a more evidence-based approach to campaigning - outside of this event series we run monthly hackdays and meetups, come join us.
Register ↗Purpose is central to resilience in organisations, but it’s more than a mission statement. Drawing on academic theory and practical examples, this talk will show how to figure out what an organisation is really working towards and build resilience. It will touch on the relationship between people and technology in organisations, how to understand different people’s perspectives and how to design for changeability.
Dr Eloise Elliott-Taysom is a Product Manager specialising in emerging technology, data and AI. She did her PhD in Engineering at Cambridge University looking at resilience in complex socio-technical systems. Her most recent publication, ‘On the Resilience of Sociotechnical Systems’, can be found in a new book on Systemic Design.
Register ↗Burglary affects 2 in every 100 households, and it sucks! In 2018 there were 664,000 burglaries. It’s a miserable and frightening experience for the victim, and a huge drain on police resources.
We’re building a bot to help the victims of burglary. If you’re interested in being a part of the project, join us on Tuesday 12th!
You can find out more at our site: https://www.policecoders.org/home/2019-01-projects/002-burglary-victims-support-bot
If you meet any of these criteria, then you’re perfect for this project:
- Creative problem solvers who’d like to give a little back.
- Former victims of burglary who’d like to reach out and help others.
- C# developers with a passion for doing some civic good.
- Professional testers who can push our bot to its limits.
- Security professionals with knowledge around GDPR compliance and secure design.
- HTML/CSS/Javascript coders and designers who’d like to help make our work open and accessible to the public.
- Copywriters who can help us with conversational text and blog posts.
- Technical writers to help us preserve the legacy of our framework.
Police officers, we’ll be reaching out once we’ve completed a working prototype that we can structure around the work you do.
Register ↗The market for personal data is broken. All of our information is traded behind our backs every day by 3rd parties with whome we have no direct relationship. Misaligned incentive structures ensure our privacy is violated again and again.
How did this happen and what we can do about it? The GDPR gives you powerful new rights, but real world constraints continue to prohibit large numbers of people from exercising those rights.
While the problem may seem unprecedented, it is actually something we have solved many times before. Personal data is just an information good, best thought of as a newspaper we publish about ourselves to be read by AIs. What this means is that, in effect, every person is now an author whose copyright is being infringed. As such, we draw draw important insights into this problem by studying information economics and information law.
In this lecture, we identify the key failures afflicting the market for personal data by examining the history of other types of information goods, including books and music. We examine how societies in the past helped fix these broken markets, how new technologies require regular updates to the rules and regulations governing these markets, and outline our solution to the problem modelled on the Worshipful Company of Stationers.
What does a 15th century publishing guild have to do with this 21st century problem? Join the discussion to find out!
Register ↗Open to those interested in conflict intervention and reconstruction, the mapathon will try to bring people together through a collective activity of mapping one of the Syrian cities (Daraya) affected by the conflict.
Bring along your laptop and mouse to the mapathon where you will be guided through the process of mapping, and given a summary about our project as a whole. Also, the role of open maps platforms in humanitarian intervention and human rights protection in conflict areas.
Other than being a tool for intervention and protecting property rights for Syrians, this mapathon will be a safe and friendly space where we can get to know each other and explore together what can maps reveal about different areas in Syria and how can they be put on the map for all Syrians.
Part of a multi-stage project that seeks to draw maps for urban cities and areas across Syria based on satellite images available through open mapping platforms. The priority is given to areas which fall under laws and decrees that legalise the confiscation of properties owned by Syrian citizens who fail to claim it, giving the priority to the destroyed properties a result of the conflict. The project will be carried out through multiple mapathons adopting a bottom-up approach which depends on the the participation of volunteers (Syrians and non-Syrians) in the mapping process.
Register ↗One of a series of bi-monthly socials for those interested in community-led housing.
This month we’re joined by Zarinah Agnew (zarinahagnew.com), a US based neuroscientist and social scientist, and a member of the Embassy Network (www.embassynetwork.com) of ten intentional communities spread over six countries.
Zarinah will give a short talk about their exploring and iterating living methods, and in particular their eight month experiment with forms of governance (embassygovernance.space).
Also present will be members of existing cohousing and coliving communities in London, who will be happy to share their experiences and knowledge. You can meet others who are forming projects, looking for members for existing projects and you can find out about other events, advisers, consultants, funders and other organisations.
The event is free to attend and children are welcome.
Feeling daunted about coming alone? We feel that too sometimes. Send us a message with the words ‘buddy me up’ and we’ll make sure you are welcomed in by one of the group and helped to feel at ease.
Cohousing London is a community-led organisation working to create a network of diverse, inclusive, sustainable and affordable cohousing developments across London: facebook.com/groups/cohousinglondon
KIN helps to deliver world-class sustainable and community-led housing projects, providing site finding, facilitation, design and funding: cohousing.co / kinarchitects.co
Register ↗An afternoon diving into an open dataset of repair data on electronics to discover what is impeding repairs.
Take part in person at Newspeak House, or participate remotely.
The Restart Project collects data on every repair attempted at their community repair events. That data is used to present insights into the devices and problems found to those who design, manufacture and regulate products in the first place. The aim is to identify the barriers to repair that people come up against, whether it’s lack of spare parts, poor documentation, or simply bad design.
This Open Data Day focuses on computers, the product most frequently brought to Restart Parties. New regulations on the repairability of computers will soon be discussed at EU level. The data may reveal common problems, common (and less common!) solutions, and what are the barriers to repair that should be highlighted to policymakers.
There is data on over 10,000 devices from repair events around the world, and a group of volunteers has fixed over 50% of them, offsetting tonnes of e-waste and hundreds of tonnes of CO2 emissions in the process.
There will be a range of data and research tasks suitable for newcomers and experienced analysts, and tools will be provided for the analysis if required. All you’ll need to do is bring a laptop.
Register ↗The planet is in ecological crisis: we are in the midst of the sixth mass extinction event this planet has experienced. Scientists believe we may have entered a period of abrupt climate breakdown. This is an emergency.
In this public talk, climate speakers from Extinction Rebellion will share the latest climate science on where our planet is heading, discuss some of the current psychology around climate change, and offer solutions through the study of social movements.
Everyone is welcome and there will be time to ask questions and discuss afterwards. Entry is free.
Register ↗Paolo Gerbaudo (author), Anastasia Kavada (University of Westminster), Adam Klug (Momentum co-founder), Matteo Canestrari (digital politics expert).
From the Five Star Movement to Podemos, from the Pirate Parties to La France Insoumise, from the movements behind Bernie Sanders to those backing Jeremy Corbyn, the last decade has witnessed the rise of a new blueprint for political organisation: the digital party.
Paolo Gerbaudo will discuss the transformation of political parties in the digital era, drawing on the argument of his new book The Digital Party: Political Organisation and Online Democracy, with scholars and practitioners of digital politics.
In the book Gerbaudo addresses the organisational revolution that is transforming political parties in the time of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Cambridge Analytica. Drawing on interviews with political leaders and organisers, he demonstrates that besides rapidly growing in votes, these formations have also revitalised party democracy, involving hundreds of thousands in discussions carried out on online decision-making platforms.
Participatory, yet plebiscitarian, open and democratic, yet dominated by charismatic ‘hyperleaders’, digital parties display both great potentials and risks for the development of new forms of mass participation in an era of growing inequality. All political parties will have to reckon with the lessons of the digital party.
Paolo Gerbaudo is a political sociologist and the Director of the Centre for Digital Culture at King’s College London. He is the author of The Digital Party: Political Organisation and Online Democracy (2018), The Mask and the Flag: Populism and Global Protest (2017) and Tweets and the Streets: Social Media and Contemporary Activism (2012).
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June 2018 we’ve been a busy bunch, the Campaign Lab community has sourced hundreds of demographic and austerity impact datasets, developed scrapers and written parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets. We’ve built a comprehensive UK ward-level election results dataset and begun comparing factors impacting elections across the country.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next hackathon as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there have been very few contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK. Similarly, there have been precious few attempts to determine the effect of local economic factors such as house prices and austerity on election results and vote share.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re building a repository of publicly available data and models to better understand the 2018 Local Elections, identifying which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning.
But we need your help.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for a day of politically motivated data science.
Over the course of our new hackdays we’ll be tackling the questions plaguing activists up and down the country, making a real impact on elections and political campaigning right across the country.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks, a big homemade soupy lunch and pizza dinner will be provided!
Not been to a Campaign Lab meet up before? No problem! Come along to meet politically-minded progressive data scientists, researchers and activists who are working together to change the way we analyse and understand political election campaigning.
All attendees to Campaign Lab HackDays may join future discount data science courses put on specifically for Campaign Lab volunteers - contact us for more information.
Register ↗Aaron Swartz was a young hacktivist, and co-founder of Reddit, early developer of RSS, Markdown and Creative Commons. He led the campaigns against SOPA and was both an excellent technologist and activist.
He was convicted for mass downloading academic journals from JSTOR from MIT. His final charges included a cumulative maximum penalty of $1 million in fines, 35 years in prison. He hanged himself two days after prosecution.
Let’s come together and remember what happened by watching the documentary about him, The Internet’s Own Boy (available here), and be inspired together by his courage. Afterwards we will have time for chatting.
- 19:00 Arrivals
- 19:30 Screening starts
- 21:30 Discussion/networking
This month’s theme is health. Whether you lead a healthy life still largely depends on where you are born, your socio-economic class, race, gender and sexual orientation. Given this reality, how do we ensure we all have access to health services? How do we ensure issues that affect the health of marginalised populations (e.g. drug addictions, or tropical diseases) get researched and treated? And, how do we promote healthy habits when our digital lives, increased social isolation and sedentary lifestyles are putting our (mental) well-being at risk? Many radical initiatives are working to tackle these problems. They need our help!
We are inviting organisations working in this area to meet engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to these projects. During the meetup we will run a speed dating session, for organisations to introduce themselves to our engineers.
Please confirm your presence.
See other projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗This meetup is the final one in our three-part series, ‘Interdisciplinary alchemy’, exploring what data scientists can learn from delving into other disciplines.
This time, we’re turning the spotlight on civil liberties activists. As technology continues to permeate more and more aspects of our lives, data is increasingly becoming a civil rights issue.
We’re asking how data scientists and activists can work together to design innovative tech solutions that don’t compromise our civil liberties.
Bringing years of experience along with some fresh ideas to help us consider this question, we have a panel of speakers from the world of civil liberties activism, including:
- Hannah Couchman - Policy and Campaigns Officer at Liberty
- Frederike Kaltheuner - Data Programme Lead at Privacy International
More speakers to be announced soon!
- 6.30pm: Doors open and sign-in
- 7.00pm: Welcome from host
- 7.10pm: ‘What can the worlds of data science and civil liberties activism learn from working together? - panel discussion
- 7.45pm: Questions to the panel
- 8.30pm: Drinks and a chance to chat
- 9.00pm: Finish
Wikimedia UK is organising the first Wikidata meetup in London.
If you’re working on Wikidata projects, or interested in Wikidata and want to find out how to get involved, come along and talk to us about it.
Register ↗Those of you familiar with the world of finance know it is a complex world built on trust. Banks and financial institutions are hard at work with how they can win our trust again, and offering options for ethical investment is high on the list. It is a positive development, but also something we need to remain critical about: to what extent can we see ethical investing as a way to make the world a little bit better?
The discussion will be hosted by Eline Hesse, who has spent three years creating Petrol Dollars for a Different Engine, a documentary of her experience researching how to reinvest her portfolio in a sustainable manner. She has spoken to many sustainable investment experts and various bankers raising the question if it is possible to match your ideals with your capital. She would like to start a discussion about the value of ethical investing presently and in the future.
Register ↗Join us at Newspeak House for a rebellious song sharing workshop. Bring your favourite protest, peace and medicine songs and let’s learn them together in a co-created space.
Whether you want to learn songs to take with you to Extinction Rebellion actions, or you just want to come together with a group of people to create beautiful music you are very welcome. We will start by sharing some XR favourites before opening up the space for new sharings. If you have an instrument that you wish to bring, please do. Otherwise just come with yourself and your voice and you’re ready to go!
Following from this event there will be an open discussion on ethical investment, asking to what extent we can see ethical investing as a way to make the world a bit better.
Register ↗Campaign Lab is a community of political analysts, researchers, developers and data scientists organised around a simple idea, to develop an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
After 5 fun meetups and a fantastic hackday we’re pausing for breath to do some strategy thinking!
We’ll be discussing:
- Our methodology: What have we achieved so far, next steps & getting to grips with statistics
- Our “austerity mapping” platform: How can we get funding for it and who can help us build it?
- Our testing & innovation: How can our community help candidates who approach us for help in future elections?
- Our governance & structures: How can we organise ourselves and make better decisions together?
- Our skills & training: How can we upskill our community? How can we share and exchange our technical and political knowledge?
It’d be great to see campaign labbers old and new come along and help us work out our strategy for the next 6 months… We can promise homemade veggie burgers & wedges!
Want to recap where we’ve got to? Check out our GitHub and join our slack!
Register ↗Our second meetup is themed around the idea of waste. From fast fashion to endless packaging, we are surrounded by the unnecessary. This meetup is about ways to get rid of it.
This could be dematerialisation, sharing, reuse and transformation.
We are inviting organisations working in this area to meet engineers of all stripes (hackers, makers, designers and other technologists) who wish to contribute their spare time and talents to these projects.
Please confirm your presence.
See other projects Radical Engineers are working on.
Register ↗Following up from the Human Networks Convergence held in Barcelona in October 2018, a gathering which brought together people from 16 different networks to see how we might experiment and learn together, we are hosting a small gathering in London to continue the conversations on ecosystemic collaboration, systemic change and networks, working on shared challenges.
This will be an open space with a small number of people (10-12) who are working in the areas of ecosystemic collaboration and addressing complex issues that involve a variety of players. The purpose is to exchange insights and learn from each other.
This gathering is organised by Corina Angheloiu (Forum for the Future), Phoebe Tickell (Enspiral) and Manel Heredero (Ouishare). If you can’t attend or think of someone who would be interested in this topic, please feel free to make it your own and invite them.
For more context:
- Weaving networks — when we all need to be spiders by Corina at Medium
- Write Up after the Convergence in Barcelona
- Festival by Emergence by Manel at Medium
- “If we want to address the complex problem situations that the world is facing, being a smart systems thinker and innovator is not enough. We need to engage in new ways of collaborating that promote continuous, productive and collective learning and innovation. These collaborations require us to learn social skills, build social structures, and adopt attitudes of openness to learning, trust and responsibility, however hard it is to let go of the behaviours and structures that hold us back.” Why being smart is not enough — the social skills and structures of tackling complexity by Mieke van der Bijl
Take part in a live round of Work Cycles, a productivity technique:
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Register for the event. (It’s free, but there’s limited capacity — so we ask you only register if you can actually attend.)
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Bring work you want to accomplish. This isn’t a lecture or networking event — you’ll actually be getting your work done at the event.
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There will be 20-30 minutes of setup and overview where you’ll learn how to break your work into a more efficient format.
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You’ll work in cycles: 30 minutes of focused work followed by 10 minute breaks to analyze, plan the next cycle block, get feedback if desired, and do some brief socializing.
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At the end of the whole day, you’ll debrief lessons learned for 10-20 minutes, share lessons with other cool people attending, and call it a day.
Ultraworking has run Work Cycles both virtually via videoconferencing, and live and in-person with thousands of people around the world, including at coworking spaces, top universities like the University of Chicago, at the offices of top companies including YCombinator-backed startups, and at government-sponsored innovation spaces like the Seoul Global Startup Center.
For more info on the technique, see ultraworking.com.
Register ↗Prototype games to explore complex systems. Today we explore the game loop in Return of the Obra Dinn.
Register ↗On 16th January 1969, young Czech philosophy student Jan Palach burned himself to death. He did so in protest against the growing indifference of citizens towards the gross injustices of the communist regime. The impact of his act was unprecedented. It changed the course of Czechoslovak history and became a symbol that inspired protesters around the world.
There are many different kinds of sacrifice. What is the meaning of sacrifice today? Is it the right way to protest? What can we learn from the legacy of Jan Palach’s most radical act?
The purpose of this event will be to address these questions. We will discuss the philosophical origins of the idea of self-sacrifice, from Christianity to Buddhism to the New Left. We will hear people sharing their own personal experiences with protest by sacrifice. We will engage in a collective ritual to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Jan Palach’s death.
Register ↗Help us vectorise Mandate-era maps of Palestine, and learn about open mapping tools
We found archival maps of mandate-era Palestine (from 1923 to 1948), including details of 500+ ethnically cleansed villages and towns. We have made them available through PalOpenMaps.org. Now we are working on extracting the data out of the maps, in order to make them useful and accessible to artists and researchers. All the data that we produce will be freely licensed for anyone to use.
In this event, we will introduce the project, show you how to vectorise historic maps using open mapping tools (OpenStreetMap/osm-seed), and we will spend the rest of the session exploring the maps and vectorising sections of it.
No previous mapping experience is necessary. All you need is a computer, curiosity and a desire to help. Please bring a laptop & mouse if you have one. If not, then you can still help by pairing up with another attendee. The more eyes the better!
This will be a relaxed Sunday afternoon, we will provide light snacks and drinks.
Palestine Open Maps is a project supported by Visualizing Palestine and the Bassel Khartabil Free Culture Fund.
Register ↗Insights from the South is a new event format by IDEAS Globally, to create the space for knowledge exchange between London and the Global South. Our theme for this event is ‘Designing for Development’: how can external efforts for development be improved through perspectives from the ground?
Come listen to IDEAS Globally authors present their Insights on key issues in Development today, and have your perspectives challenged by our international speakers - community leaders, business people and artists who connect us with the local reality of each topic. Witness conversations that will change your perspective of development and North-South relations.
IDEAS Insights are short academic briefs written by members of the IDEAS Globally international network, providing thought leadership on development and social enterprise. All IDEAS Globally Insights can be read freely at: www.ideasglobally.org/Insights. They have been viewed over 6,000 times (and counting!). This event will use selected insights as the starting point for deeper discussion of issues in the Global South.
Our Selected Insights authors:
- Tamas Katona: “Narratives of Development (Hungary’s Social Enterprise Landscape in Historical Context)”.
- Kristina Funk & Alyette de Royere: “Women in Nepalese Healthcare as a Potential for Development”.
- Joe Forsdick: “Grids & Batteries: Strengthening Energy Reliability against Natural Disasters”.
Our Outsights leaders:
- Dr Estella Carpi, Postdoctoral Research Associate: “Analysing South-South Humanitarian Responses to Displacement from Syria: Views from Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey”.
- Shamim Azad, writer and poet: “The Significance of British-Bangladeshi Bilingualism and History in my Writing and Social Activism”.
We live, socialize and work in communities, with some of our closest friends, families and colleagues. We also live in a world that socializes and reinforces violence. We live in a rape culture where media portrays violence and violation as romance.
Data indicates that most consent violations take place, not in abandoned alley ways by strangers, but by people we know, in places where we are supposed to feel safe. One in four women in north america will be assaulted in their lifetimes, many men also. This affects us all, not just those directly harmed. Families are destroyed, communities are fragmented, workplaces become alienating.
How we do best prepare ourselves for these issues? How do we create a culture that clearly sets the bar for the future society that we wish to live in? How do we create restorative and alternative processes and practices that protect those that are harmed in our communities, and also work to guide, teach and serve those who have done the harm? What do you each want to see, how would you like to be treated should you find yourself on either side of the coin in one of these situations?
Come and join us for a discussion around how we’d like society to deal with these issues and to see if we can take some of these lessons on into our day to day life.
Format // Doors 7pm // Talk 7.30pm // Moderated discussion 8pm - 10pm
Register ↗Food, drink, pretty lights, live music, and more political technologists in one place than is probably wise.
Please register so we can plan for attendance: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/christmas-at-newspeak-house-tickets-52482297966
Register ↗Recent predictions about the future of work point in the direction of an incredibly fluid labour market. We face an increasingly precarious employment-market, where the individualisation of labour — seen as a push towards self-employment, short-term contracts, unpaid internships, and disingenuous forms of non-standard employment — becomes the unhappy norm.
At Newspeak House on 13 December 2018, three leading experts will debate the future of work, unions, and the digital economy.
- Dr. Christina Colclough, Director of the Future World of Work, UNI Global Union
- Dr. Barry Cofler, Deacon Fellow, Oxford University; Researcher, Policy Network
- Final Speaker TBA
Audience participation is encouraged. We will assess the technological and political barriers that limit union’s use of data as well as the skills and systems needed to overcome them.
Our goal is to understand how trade unions – the natural and historic advisor and guardians of collective rights – must adapt to this new digital economy to meet the needs and aspirations of workers.
In the question period, we will explore how digital technologies could be used by unions and workers to improve job quality and collective empowerment.
Register ↗New, expanded and updated edition of How to dismantle the NHS in 10 easy steps: The blueprint that the government does not want you to see, by Dr Youssef El-Gingihy published by Zero books
The much anticipated new, expanded and updated edition of How to Dismantle the NHS in 10 Easy Steps comes with high praise from Noam Chomsky, Jeremy Corbyn, John Pilger and Ken Loach.
Dr Youssef El-Gingihy is a Tower Hamlets GP at the Bromley by Bow Centre. This book tells the story of how the NHS is being sold off and why you might have to buy private health insurance soon. It contains new chapters on the junior doctors’ strike and the introduction of US style healthcare models of accountable/integrated care. It also has a coda on how we can save the NHS.
Events have spiralled since the first edition of How to Dismantle the NHS in 10 Easy Steps. The junior doctors’ strike, the Conservative victory in the 2015 general election, the Corbyn phenomenon, the unexpected Brexit vote and the arguably even more unexpected loss of the Conservative majority in 2017.
Further, since writing the first edition, Dr. Youssef El-Gingihy found himself stricken with a life-threatening illness and the NHS doctor became the NHS patient. The fight to save the NHS transformed into a fight for his own life.
Now, fully recovered, Dr El-Gingihy returns to his 10 Easy Steps in order to strengthen his original argument on the 70th anniversary of the NHS. Dr El-Gingihy’s insights have never been more vital as our National Health Service continues to be hit by the privatisation of public services.
Register ↗more onion is an award winning digital agency behind the Campaignion platform, which delivers high-impact digital campaigns and fundraising for progressive non-profits. Come and meet the more more onion as well as fundraisers and campaigners from across the UK charity sector.
ON THE AGENDA
- New Campaignion features - upgraded ‘email protest’ actions and more
- Campaign showcase - insights into campaign actions and strategies including Mencap’s Treat Me Well campaign, and Friends of the Earth’s lead generation quiz
- Campaign clinic’ - chance to get input from other campaigners and fundraisers into your campaign plans and challenges
- Christmas drinks, networking and discussion with peers from across the sector
Please Register: https://www.more-onion.com/en/campaignion-dec2018
For those who are new to Campaignion (or fancy a refresh!), please feel free to join us a little earlier at 2.30pm for a demo.
Register ↗From The Hunger Games to Ready Player One, visions of dystopia dominate contemporary ideas of the future. But is there room for a more hopeful alternative?
At the Utopia Café we explore alternative ideas of the future through the lenses of literature, film, and other media. We also consider how these ideas can be realised.
Drinks and snacks will be provided. Everyone is welcome. :)
Register ↗Decentralisation is charging ahead, but where to? How do we ensure a decentralised web brings about greater autonomy, privacy, choice? What’s the priority? Which apps work now? What’s in the way for mainstream adoption?
Join us for an evening of decentralized conversation! This month, we’ll host a redecentralized speed dating session: a chance to embark on deep (but short) conversations with those building decentralized apps, or developing decentralized governance models and designs.
In addition we’ll have drinks, pizza and tons of fun!
We encourage you to bring anyone with an interest in decentralization. No prior knowledge required! This movement belongs to all of us!
You can reach us at [email protected], or find us on Twitter: @anoukruhaak, @shevksi
For anyone wanting more context, here’s a blog post on the motivations and values behind redecentralize.org, with suggested characteristics of decentralisation that we should care about (TL;DR distribution of power and how this applies to tech)
Register ↗A huge amount of edible food is wasted and many efforts are being made by governments, companies, charities and community organisations with mixed results. Nick Sellen is hopeful that de-centralized co-operative community organising using open source software can provide a way forward.
Please note that space is limited in the Drawing Room so seats will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.
Register ↗This event is open only to Kairos Fellows and specially invited Friends of Kairos.
Kairos UK has partnered with Enspiral to bring you a unique evening, exploring the future of entrepreneurship. Registration is required.
Kairos is a global network of young entrepreneurs seeking to fix broken industries. We are from different continents, verticals and backgrounds but share a desire to leave the world in a better way than how we found it, by sharing our experience, networks and expertise.
Enspiral is a global ecosystem of entrepreneurs and freelancers who develop software and practices for global collaboration, and who collaborate together to launch businesses with a social and/or environmental mission. The Enspiral network has been experimenting with new forms of governance, making decisions and collaboratively budgeting together for 8 years.
Life as an entrepreneur can be tough. As Elon Musk says, “Being an entrepreneur is like eating glass and staring into the abyss of death.” Long days, constant challenges, learning from failures - and unfortunately a lot of this is often done alone.
But could it be different? Imagine a new kind of entrepreneurship, an Entrepreneurship 2.0, where instead of the focus being on the lone wolf entrepreneur, the focus is on the community, and the ecosystem that supports a start-up into flourishing? This kind of collaborative entrepreneurship throws up some big questions:
- How can we come together as entrepreneurs and be stronger?
- How could we pool our resources, time and know-how to be larger than the sum of our parts?
- What kind of impact could we unlock if we learned to collaborate on a large scale?
Cost: We are asking for a £15 contribution to cover food and drink (beers, wine and soft drinks) for the evening and nothing else. If there is any money leftover after organising, this will be donated to charity.
Dresscode: Casual. The evening will be casual but we may decide to go out in Shoreditch after the event.
Format: There will be drinks, we’ll order in some food, and some light exercises to get to know each other better. There will also be slots for some Lightning Talks - 5 minute talks from the community to share what they are working on, and any problems they need help solving.
If you have any questions, please reach out to Phoebe ([email protected]) or Seth ([email protected]).
Register ↗The internet has democratised speech — it has given everyone a publishing platform. So how can we make sense of this explosion of material?
In this Citizen Beta we talk to Turi Munthe and Jamie Bartlett about the new projects they’re working on that try to do just that.
We’ll be covering whether argument mining can actually map an atlas of ideas or arguments, how knowledge and information is currently stored and how that needs to change, and who will actually benefit from these kinds of tools?
Doors open at 7.00pm, talks start at 7.30pm
Speakers
- Turi Munthe. Turi is a VC for Northbase Media. He is most recently the founder of Parli. He is also the founder of Demotix and served as its CEO. Turi has worked as Head for CNN, and at the BBC, NBC, al-Jazeera, Asahi, Reuters, Sky, you name it. He is a Publisher, Editor, Policy Analyst, Lecturer, Journalist. He has written for The Economist, Slate.com, the FT, the Telegraph, the Nation and many others. He has given lectures on Iran to the Central Communist Party of China, and on erotica to the ICA. His one book is the Saddam Hussein Reader. He studied at Oxford University, the Hebrew University and NYU.
- Jamie Bartlett. Jamie is the Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at the think-tank Demos, where he has become one of the UK’s leading thinkers on politics and technology. He is also author of The People Vs Tech (2018) about the relationship between technology and democracy, Radicals (2017) about political outsiders and best-selling The Dark Net (2014) about internet subcultures, which has been translated into 13 languages. His Ted Talk about how dark net technology is changing the nature of cybercrime has been viewed almost 3 million times.
Schedule
- 7.00pm – Drinks
- 7.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 7.40pm – Turi Munthe
- 7.50pm – Jamie Bartlett
- 8.00pm – Q&A
- 8.10pm – More drinks and mince pies!
Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June, together we’ve sourced hundreds of demographic and austerity impact datasets, and made a start on setting up scrapers and writing parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our first full HackDay as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there have been very few contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK. Similarly, there have been precious few attempts to determine the effect of local economic factors such as house prices and austerity on election results and vote share.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re building a repository of publicly available data and models to better understand the 2018 Local Elections, identifying which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning.
But we need your help.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for a day of politically motivated data science.
Over the course of our new hackdays we’ll be tackling the questions plaguing activists up and down the country, making a real impact on elections and political campaigning right across the country.
Check out the Campaign Lab volunteer teams and project guide
You will need to bring a laptop to this event
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks, lunch and dinner will be provided!
Register ↗Connecting developers, designers and other technologists to radical organizations in need of technological support. Radical organizations aim to solve society’s gravest problems by addressing the underlying systems, rather than merely fighting symptoms.
During this meetup we’ll host a speed dating session, to connect the two groups and get you working on the world’s most urgent problems. In addition we’ll also have drinks and chats and lots of fun!
Are you a technologist? Great, join our meetup and we’ll connect you to organizations that need your help. ‘Help’ can range from getting e-mail setup to building full-fledged apps.
Are you a radical organization? Send us an email: [email protected]. We’ll reach out to you and explain a bit about the evening and how you can get the most out of it!
Find more: http://radicalengineers.com and find us at [email protected], or @anoukruhaak on Twitter.
Register ↗Four scientists from across the UK will speak about the battle against Alzheimer’s, cancer and the future of regenerative medicine. We’ll also share the story of Lyrical Science, and our vision for the future of science funding.
You’ll be able to learn more about the state of critical life science research, network with the scientists, celebrate our public launch over drinks, and discover a new way to get involved in scientific discovery.
At Lyrical Science, we help scientists share their inspiring stories and earn research incomes from their public backers. Scientists are often prevented from doing life saving research by funding cuts outside of their control. This event is about how we change that.
We’re a team of early career researchers across the UK and can’t wait to share our vision with you in person. We look forward to welcoming guests from all backgrounds– scientists, science lovers, philanthropists, impact investors, and anyone interested in helping the scientific community gain the support it needs to conduct critical life science research.
Let’s come together for a beautiful and inspiring evening!
Visit lyricalscience.com and find out how we got started
Register ↗Got an idea to make the world a better place but need advice or volunteers? Utopia Forum wants you!
We’re looking to follow the reading groups of Utopia Cafe with a venue for people to plan and work on their projects together. Unlike many planning groups, we’re not focused on one type of politics, or on one sector for transformation. Instead we’re hoping to bring together lots of different projects together to transform society as a whole.
In this first meeting, we’ll be discussing Utopia Cafe and Forum as a project, and then opening up the floor for discussion of various projects. Bring your ideas!
Register ↗Design Hops are the first step for charities exploring the role of digital in their services. By demystifying technology and design approaches, this free half-day creative workshop builds confidence and motivation to take the next step, as well as focus on what that immediate next step should be for each organisation.
For more details and to apply for a place, https://wearecast.org.uk/for-nonprofits/design-hops
Register ↗At its heart, data science is a set of tools for turning impenetrable datasets into clear insights & decisions that can help you to achieve your goals. This workshop series will introduce you to several of these tools with the aim of giving you practical skills to take away and immediately apply in your own work.
Part I (Mon 5th): A Crash Course in Coding
The first workshop will focus on learning the Python programming language and related libraries for importing, manipulating and visualising datasets.
Part II (Wed 7th): Dabbling with Data
The first workshop leads straight into Part II, which will cover more advanced data visualisation techniques, creating your own datasets by scraping web pages, and a brief introduction to building your own regression models.
The workshops will be hands-on throughout with code examples and exercises provided to apply what you’ve just learned. We strongly encourage you to attend both workshops if possible as they are designed to run together. There are no pre-requisites other than a laptop and your own curiosity.
Registration and further details
Register ↗Over the last decade, the police, tasked with ensuring our safety, have been so severely defunded that they are unable to help every person, or respond to every crime report. The numbers don’t lie. Over the last 8 years, police funding dropped by 19%, resulting in 20,000 fewer police officers and significantly reduced resources to tackle, investigate and prevent crime.
We can’t magically restore the policing budget, but we can help the remaining officers leverage their police skills by providing the tools and technologies they need to be effective.
While innovation within the police has historically been slow, technology could help overcome a number of obstacles. That’s where you come in.
On 6th November we’re holding our first meet-up at Newspeak House to start building tools for police officers! We welcome software developers, designers and anyone with ideas, critical thinking and problem-solving skills to come along and help out. If you’re not available on the 6th, but you’d like to get involved, join our community to find out more about the projects.
Register ↗At its heart, data science is a set of tools for turning impenetrable datasets into clear insights & decisions that can help you to achieve your goals. This workshop series will introduce you to several of these tools with the aim of giving you practical skills to take away and immediately apply in your own work.
Part I (Mon 5th): A Crash Course in Coding
The first workshop will focus on learning the Python programming language and related libraries for importing, manipulating and visualising datasets.
Part II (Wed 7th): Dabbling with Data
The first workshop leads straight into Part II, which will cover more advanced data visualisation techniques, creating your own datasets by scraping web pages, and a brief introduction to building your own regression models.
The workshops will be hands-on throughout with code examples and exercises provided to apply what you’ve just learned. We strongly encourage you to attend both workshops if possible as they are designed to run together. There are no pre-requisites other than a laptop and your own curiosity.
Registration and further details
Register ↗Want to learn how to be a Wikipedia editor and improve the quantity and quality of information about underrepresented subjects on the world’s biggest encyclopaedia?
Wikimedia UK is hosting a Wikipedia training workshop at Newspeak House on November 4 on the subject of Middle Eastern Human Rights.
The content and contributors on Wikipedia still do not represent the diversity of our world. If we are going to truly create ‘the sum of all knowledge’, we need to improve the coverage of underrepresented subjects.
Recent global events have highlighted the lack of free and factual media both in the Middle East and about Middle Eastern human rights subjects.
Wars continue to rage in Syria and Yemen, creating untold humanitarian disasters. Authoritarian states silence their critics at home and abroad. Wikipedia allows anybody with an understanding of its rules and guidelines to contribute to a shared understanding of any subject area, and there has never been a better time to increase understanding of the human rights situation throughout the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) area.
Wikimedia UK is the charity responsible for promoting Wikipedia in the UK. We aim to increase the diversity of the content and contributors to Wikipedia, and organise training workshops for anybody who wants to take part in our projects.
Come to Newspeak House on Sunday 4th November from 12pm for training from Wikipedia experts and help to improve articles on human rights defenders, violations, laws, events and other related areas.
Register ↗Redecentralize get-together to meet, catchup, share news
Decentralisation is charging ahead, but where to? How do we ensure a decentralised web brings about greater autonomy, privacy, choice? What’s the priority? Which apps work now? What’s in the way for mainstream adoption?
So many interesting topics and a key time for the decentralisation movement. Come to Newspeak House to hear about what’s been happening, plan next steps and meet the community!
We’ll be doing lighting talks - contact hello[@]redecentralize.org or @shevski on twitter to sign up!
Register ↗Speakers:
Dr Youssef El-Gingihy tells the story of how the NHS has been gradually converted into a market-based healthcare system over the past 25 years. This process is accelerating and the very existence of a National Health Service is in danger. He fears that there will not be an NHS as our generation grows old and certainly not for our children - yet the British public remains largely unaware of this and the media, with few exceptions, have failed in their duty to inform them. Youssef’s book, How to Dismantle the NHS in 10 Easy Steps, has been described by Jeremy Corbyn as wonderful and sobering, and has received rave reviews from the likes of Noam Chomsky and John Pilger.
Dr Sonia Adesara is the co-chair of the Young Medical Womens International Association, Director of the 50:50 Parliament campaign, and Communications Director for Doctors For Choice.
Register ↗Come and join us for the official launch of the Tech for Better programme, run by Founders and Coders.
- Find out what the programme involves.
- Hear from clients that participated in the initial round of the programme and see the MVPs that have been developed.
- Talk to us about how you can participate in Tech for Better!
More info to follow.
Register ↗Western communities are plagued with divisions; Leavers and Remainers, Momentum and moderates, ‘deplorables’ and ‘the resistance’. This has been called polarisation, and we’re in an era where identities are fractured more than ever before. Pundits and academics have stated that this is terrible for democracies. Populism is on the rise and we no longer believe in facts to make decisions.
But is this the right way to understand politics in the 21st century? To what extent can the concept of polarisation help us design online public spaces, offline forums and structure journalism?
This evening seminar looks to understand the difference between polarisation and disagreement and asks are we truly more polarised now than ever before? And does that matter?
Join us on the 23rd October where we will host a keynote by Alice Thwaite of Oxford Internet Institute and the Echo Chamber Club, followed by a panel discussion and Q&A.
Spaces are limited so please register
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora.
The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Slate Star Codex, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This week the articles are:
- Diversify your identity (https://markmanson.net/diversify-your-identity)
- Conscious dreaming and controlled hallucinations (http://www.shaman-australis.com/~claude/dreams.html)
- In defense of flogging (https://harpers.org/blog/2011/07/in-defense-of-flogging-six-questions-for-peter-moskos/)
We’ll start to talk about these around three. People usually start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time.
We also have a subreddit, reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, which right now is mostly used for announcing meetups, but if you think it would be useful for other things too I encourage you to use them for it. You can also suggest discussion articles in the thread for that, reddit.com/r/londonrationalish/comments/8oxedb/reading_group_voting_thread/.
Register ↗Hacktoberfest is a month-long celebration of open source software. Sign up online, contribute to five projects and get a sweet t-shirt.
At this event, we’ll be focusing on civic tech projects - those which enable engagement, participation or enhances the relationship between the people and government.
If you want to highlight your open source civic tech projects to attendees - you can do so here: https://goo.gl/XaMJK8
We’ll provide some snacks and refreshments.
See you at the event!
Register ↗What would happen if we locked 100 people in a complex with access to barely enough food for everyone? What if we made it so only one person had the power to say who could eat what and when? Would such a society always fall into totalitarianism? What simple changes to such a society would make a difference?
We know that power can be structured by simple rules in some societies. Bee colonies have a queen with access to the best food and lays all the eggs. Are there simple rules for human societies? How do people organise themselves politically?
We’ll be investigating questions like these in the workshop using a systems modelling approach. It’s possible to create simulation models on computers where individual ‘agents’ behave and interact according to simple rules. We can then observe and study the artificial societies and political systems that we create.
You can see some examples of simulation models from the excellent explorable explanations.
The workshop will be hosted by Dr John Bryden, a research fellow at Royal Holloway, University of London and a fellow of Newspeak House. It will start with a background talk about the topic. Examples of simulation models will be provided to get you started.
You’ll need to bring a laptop and an aptitude for programming. We’re going to be using python, so it would be good if you have python 3, matplotlib and scipy installed.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June, together we’ve sourced over 130 demographic and austerity impact datasets, and made a start on setting up scrapers and writing parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next event as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning in the UK.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there has never been any contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK. Similarly, there have been precious few attempts to determine the effect of local economic factors such as house prices and austerity on election results and vote share.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re building a repository of publicly available data and models to better understand the 2018 Local Elections, identifying which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to electoral campaigning.
But we need your help.
To create these insights we need to identify as much publicly available demographic and political data sources as possible.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for an evening of data gathering.
You do not need to know how to code to attend and help.
You will need to bring a laptop to this event.
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks and food will be provided!
Register ↗The rapid rise of the gig economy in recent years reflects a huge shift in the way people work. While greater flexibility has created more jobs and low unemployment, in many cases the low-pay and insecurity of some of these jobs means that workers are worse off.
Over three million people in the UK are now estimated to be in insecure work such as temporary work, low-paid self-employment or working on a zero-hours contract, according to the IPPR Prosperity and Justice report. This is not just a problem of the gig economy. The report argues that this trend has reversed the income gains and employee protections secured over much of the last century.
While policy reform is back in the news (BBC), this event will explore how technology could be used to create better work for flexible and independent workers.
We’re interested in how technology can be used to push back against these trends. We’ll discuss products or services that make flexible work benefit workers, as well as employers. For example by helping independent workers increase their income, access benefits, or have more control over when and how they work.
Speakers include:
- Emma Blackmore, Head of Partnerships and Marketing at Gigstr
- Kayleigh Walsh, Co-op member at Outlandish, CoTech and member of the Worker Co-op Council
- Anna Maybank, Co-founder of Poplar (aka Better Work Lab)
- Alysia Wanczyk, Head of Marketing at Trezeo
If you’d like to put forward a speaker then please message us through the WorkerTech meetup page.
The WorkerTech event series is brought to you by Bethnal Green Ventures and sponsored by Resolution Trust and Accenture. This event is delivered in partnership with Newspeak House, The London College of Political Technologists.
Register ↗This discussion is aimed at people who have a relatively good understanding of the core concepts of effective altruism and know the basic principles behind global priorities research.
We’ll be discussing what the current gaps may be in global priorities research and if and how we as individuals and a community can do anything to help out, whether that is self directed research or working out which organisations we can support more or even whether individual and volunteer research may be negative.
Register ↗A casual meetup for those who make games!
Please contact @Jupiter_Hadley if you would like to bring your game to show off, we’d love to see what you’re working on!
Register ↗The Foreign & Commonwealth Office is publishing a list of all British diplomats from 1782-2015. They’re looking for bold and innovative ideas for navigating, using, and presenting the data.
- Where have we had the most female Ambassadors?
- Did diplomats follow similar career paths, or were they posted at random?
- How old are diplomats when they die?
Everyone is welcome, experienced developers and total beginners alike.
The Prize:
- the chance to see your idea become a live product, with the help of FCO experts
- a private tour with our expert historians of the FCO King Charles Street building in Whitehall
- a chance to win Palmerston memorabilia and potentially meet the infamous feline himself
The Event:
- Hacking and building: Friday 28th September 18:00-23:00 & Saturday 29th September 09:00-16:00
- Pitches and Judging: Saturday 29th September 16:30
- Prizes awarded: Saturday 29th September 18:00
Spaces are limited so please register
Register ↗Some of our most important laws- public safety codes such as building, fire, or electrical codes - are considered the private property of standards development organizations and may only be read at great cost and under conditions set by them. In this talk, Carl Malamud will discuss his 10-year fight to change that situation in the U.S., Europe, and India, including court fights that are ongoing on all 3 continents.
Carl will then discuss the efforts Public Resource, the nongovernmental organization he heads, has undertaken to make other forms of knowledge more broadly available, including works of government and the ongoing fight to free up scientific knowledge for use by students.
Carl Malamud has spent 30 years making government information more broadly available on the Internet. He helped put U.S. court cases, the patent database, non-profit tax returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service, and the Securities and Exchange Commission on the net. In 1993, Carl created the first radio station on the Internet. He has been a visiting professor at the MIT Media Lab and is the recipient of the Pioneer Award from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Carl’s current work is focused for the most part on India, where he is leading efforts to make several important repositories available. He is the author of 9 books, most recently (co-authored with Sam Pitroda), Code Swaraj: Field Notes from the Standards Satyagraha.
Register ↗The numbers that govern our lives: The Office of National Statistics, new APIs and the stories we tell
There are some numbers which mean more than others. GDP rising, prices falling, the average cost of a house. Numbers tell us stories about the lives people are leading, whether they have jobs, how much they are earning and how that’s changed year on year.
Access to these numbers governs how we understand and tell those stories, and who we hold accountable for the choices that have lead us there.
The Office for National Statistics has done a spectacular job in recent years of moving us to a position where we can do more.
Come to this Citizen Beta to hear about that journey, and how it’s changing the lives of people everywhere.
Speakers
- Andrew Dudfield, Office for National Statistics
- Mevan Babakar, Full Fact
- More speakers announced soon
Schedule
- 7.00pm – Drinks
- 7.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 7.40pm – Talks
- 8.30pm – More drinks and chat
From The Hunger Games to Ready Player One, visions of dystopia dominate contemporary ideas of the future. But is there room for a more hopeful alternative?
At the Utopia Café we explore alternative ideas of the future through the lenses of literature, film, and other media. We also consider how these ideas can be realised.
In our third meeting, we’ll be discussing Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed and exploring what the strengths and weaknesses of different types of utopian societies might be. Don’t worry if this is your first meeting as we’ll be focusing on the broad themes of the book more than specifics!
Drinks and snacks will be provided. Everyone is welcome.
Register ↗This event is brought together and led by Adam Greenfield in collaboration with Theatrum Mundi
Contemporary society is traversed at every level by the software-encoded rules generically known as “algorithms.” Algorithms determine whether or not we’ll be offered a job, or a loan, or a place at school. They guide the route and mode of transit we take on our way to and from work. They drive the disposition and posture of police on our streets, and if we should happen to run afoul of those police, strongly shape just what it is we’ll experience as we make our way through the criminal justice system. They shape what we wear, what we watch, what we listen to, what kind of answers we’re offered when we ask questions, possibly even who we woke up next to this morning. Together, their field of operation is little short of total.
And yet, for all their tremendous power to condition our life choices and chances, very few of us understand algorithms — neither where they come from, nor how they do their work in the world, nor even necessarily what they are. The aim of this one-day workshop is to trace the material effects of these seemingly immaterial actors from a variety of different disciplinary perspectives, and to share what it is we know about their origin, purpose, function and impact on our lives.
For the purposes of this conversation, we have chosen to emphasize three different aspects of our encounter with algorithms: their poetics, kinaesthetics and politics.
By “poetics,” we mean a consideration for an emergent algorithmic aesthetic in art, design, literature and craft, and especially the ways in which algorithmic systems begin to suggest the metaphors through which we explain and contextualize everyday experiences. By “kinaesthetics,” we mean the ways in which algorithms and machine-learning systems capture, understand, represent or condition the human body’s movement through urban space. And by “politics,” we mean the ways in which algorithmic systems condition, constrain or determine collective choice, especially with regard to the allocation of power.
During this day-long working group we will discuss these facets of algorithmic experience. We’re especially interested in the perspective of artists that consciously use the expressive dimension of emergent technologies to communicate experience, as we believe their work plays a critical role in helping a broader public understand the capabilities, implications and limits of the technologies that already do so much to condition our lives.
Agenda
11.15 Session 1 | The Poetics of Algorithmic Culture
Topics to be discussed might include James Bridle’s putative “New Aesthetic”; the legibility (for humans) of spaces and objects designed procedurally/parametrically; the drift into other expressive media of terminology originating in the study of algorithmic systems; and dimensions of the algorithmic sublime and uncanny. Three 10-15-minute presentations and discussion.
12.30 Session 2 | The Kineaesthetics of Algorithmic Culture
Here we’ll treat aspects of the algorithmic capture and regulation of bodily experience: techniques of face recognition, gait recognition, etc.; the abandonment of traditional choreographic notation in characterizing the movement of the human body through space, and possible new approaches to doing same; pattern recognition and the characterization of stereotyped human gestures; and crowd detection, crowd-size and footfall analysis, and their use in the design of urban space. Three 10-15-minute presentations and discussion.
14.30 Session 3 | The Politics of Algorithmic Culture
By “politics,” we mean the ways in which the systems described and discussed condition, constrain or determine collective choice, especially with regard to the allocation of power. Topics might include decision-support systems; credit-scoring systems and their use as tools of discipline; new modes of association or collective. action based on blockchain technologies; and China’s “social credit” system and its implications for networked authoritarianism elsewhere. Three 10-15-minute presentations and discussion.
15.45 Session 4 | General discussion: Algorithms, activism and the arts
16.45 Wrap-up and next steps
Register ↗Registration: email [email protected] to express interest in attending.
In this public talk, Roger Hallam will explain why we are entering a climate apocalypse and show how denial mechanisms stop us from seeing what is now obvious. Based upon his award winning PhD research on effective campaign mobilisation, he will outline the political response necessary to maximise the chances that we will avoid the extinction we are presently racing towards. It doesn’t involve NGOs and governments.
A year ago, Roger organised a rapid 8-week direct action campaign at Kings College which resulted in a commitment to fully divest from fossil fuels. It involved the painting of the central hall of the university for which he was suspended. He then went on a 14-day hunger strike which led to the College agreeing to all the campaign’s demands.
This talk in being held by the Rising Up Network in towns and cities all around the country in preparation for large scale civil disobedience activities in London this November which will call for emergency action on the climate crisis.
Register ↗Prototype games to explore complex systems. Today we examine at the game loop in Dead Cells.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
Since June, together we’ve sourced over 130 demographic and austerity impact datasets, and made a start on setting up scrapers and writing parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next event as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning.
This coming event we’ll be:
- Doubling down on Police cuts in an effort to correlate local crime data, police cuts and local election results.
- Inputting Local Election results into Democracy Club’s beta results platform.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there has never been any contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re planning to build a repository of publicly available data and develop a model to better understand the 2018 Local Elections and identify which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to campaigning.
But we need your help.
To create these insights we need to identify as much publicly available demographic and political data sources as possible.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for an evening of data gathering where we’ll be asking:
- What existing data sources are already structured at a ward level?
- How can we transform data that is not at a ward level into data that is?
- What data is missing and how can we use Parliamentary Questions and FOIs to access it?
You do not need to know how to code to attend and help.
You will need to bring a laptop to this event.
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks and food will be provided!
Register ↗Article 13 of the EU Copyright Directive makes platforms liable for copyright violations of the content they host. It’s facing yet another major vote on 12 September, with dramatically conflicting narratives coming from rights-holders, industry bodies, artists, musicians, and free speech organisations.
Is Article 13 good for musicians or just music labels? Will it usher in a new era of automated Internet censorship or instead help direct royalties to under-appreciated artists? Where do UK political parties stand and why aren’t MEPs voting on strict partisan lines?
Join us for a lively night as we review the current status of the Directive and consider all sides of this important debate.
Speakers include:
- Jake Beaumont-Nesbitt, Copyright Committee, International Music Managers Forum
- Anna Mazgal, EU Policy Advisor, Wikimedia Foundation
- Mike Morel, Campaigns Manager (& musician), Open Rights Group
A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora.
The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Slate Star Codex, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Usually we have a short list of articles for discussion. No need to read them, but you may well want to. This week the articles are:
- When Your Left Arm Becomes A Chicken
- The New Politics of Meaning
- Can Economists and Humanists Ever be Friends?
- Yuppie Fishtanks: YIMBYism explained without “supply and demand”
- The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics
We’ll start to talk about these around three. People usually start showing up around two, and there are almost always people around until after six, but feel free to come and go at whatever time.
We also have a subreddit, reddit.com/r/londonrationalish, which right now is mostly used for announcing meetups, but if you think it would be useful for other things too I encourage you to use them for it. You can also suggest discussion articles in the thread for that, reddit.com/r/londonrationalish/comments/8oxedb/reading_group_voting_thread/.
Register ↗“Everything you ever wanted is on the other side of fear”
HACK Fear is an interdisciplinary hackathon bringing together technologists, neuroscientists, psychologists, academics, hardware tinkerers, UX, gamers, activists with parkour and mindfulness practitioners to team up and experiment on designing and building out ideas and solutions to hack our own fear and develop our self awareness through technology.
There will be:
- Interactive workshops, both physical and non
- Intensive hacking sessions where teams work on the design and implementation of a prototype that makes progress in hacking fear
- Input and feedback from subject matter experts
- Deeper work uncovering and moving past your own fears and shared ones
We welcome coming both solo and as a team. Cross disciplinary teams will be created with the intent to maximise the potential towards successful fear hacking.
Please note: Bring a laptop. The event will be livestreamed and remote listeners will have opportunities to input comments/requests. Inform the organisers if you do not want to be recorded.
The ideas that come out of Fear Hack could contribute towards R&D for the award winning work of Karen Palmer, who is currently in development for RIOT*, an emotionally responsive film which uses facial recognition and A.I. technology to navigate through a dangerous riot.
*RIOT: You are confronted by a riot cop. Respond with fear and the film goes in one direction respond with anger and it goes in another. RIOT makes the player aware of their subconscious behaviour and enables them to consciously build new neurological pathways in their brain, to override automatic behaviour responses and create new ones.
Register ↗Fashion consumers can make better buying decisions if they can find out whether an item is ethically produced or not. Likewise, transparency along the fashion supply chain allows investors to better understand where their money is going. Ultimately, clear investor information can help manufacturing workers in the global garment industry know who they are working for and how to leverage for better working conditions.
Yet, supply chain and investor information are scarce, scattered and hard to access.
On August 23, 2018, Clean Clothes Campaign, in collaboration with OpenCorporates and WikiRate, invite you to an Open Data Sprint to find out what kind of investor data is publicly available and how we can all start connecting the dots in supply chains.
We will bring together researchers, data analysts, and activists to map investor to company relations in the fashion industry. The focus of the sprint will be on some of the largest companies within the apparel industry, such as HANES, ASOS, GAP, and H&M.
After the research and review session, we invite you to stay with us for a get together.
Follow updates about the event on twitter with the hashtag #InvestorDataSprint
Program:
- 13:30 - 13:40 Welcoming remarks and introduction
- 13:40 - 13:50 Learn how to research (Goals, Methods, Process)
- 13:50 - 14:00 Group settings
- 14:00 - 15:50 Researching in groups
- 15:50 - 16:20 Share findings and wrap-up
- 16:20 - 17:00 Networking and refreshments
Refreshments will be served. Please let us know if you have any dietary requirements.
As this is an interactive event please bring a laptop so you can participate in the research. The event is open to the public but the venue has limited space, so please confirm your attendance by registering.
Register ↗A new network for people of colour in the UK - open to anyone working in, or interested in, journalism.
Catch up with exciting plans to develop the Race Beat network, meet other journalists of colour, and feed in your own ideas on what the collective should look like and focus on in the future.
We will dedicate around 30 minutes to workshopping a piece of work/pitch/project proposal by one of our members.
Register ↗For decades people wishing to organize in more cooperative ways have been encouraged to make decisions by consensus, and for good reason: when it works well, it’s awesome. However—when it doesn’t work—it can lead to personal guilt, frustration; organizational paralysis or disintegration.
What should we do when consensus can’t be reached? What if cooperative decision-making is better achieved in such cases with practices other than “reaching consensus”? In this talk I will explore how score voting with tweaks can provide a simple, scalable and systematically cooperative alternative to the often utopian ideal of consensus.
Please note, due to space this event is limited to only 15 people. If you aren’t able to come, please cancel your ticket so someone else is able to attend.
Register ↗Launch of the debut book by Carl Miller, Newspeak Fellow & Research Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos: “The Death of Gods – the new global power grab”, a ground-breaking journey to reveal the new centres of power and control in the twenty-first century.
The old gods are dying. Giant corporations collapse overnight. Newspapers are being swallowed. Stock prices plummet with a tweet. Governments are losing control. The old familiarities are tumbling down and a strange new social order is rising in their place. More crime now happens online than offline. Facebook has grown bigger than any state, bots battle elections, technologists have re-invented democracy and information wars are breaking out around us. New mines produce crypto-currencies, coders write policy, and algorithms shape our lives in more ways than we can imagine. What is going on?
For centuries, writers and thinkers have used power as a prism through which to view and understand the world at moments of seismic change. This talk will be about Carl’s journey to find the reality of power today. From a cyber-crime raid in suburbia to the engine rooms of Silicon Valley, and from the digital soldiers of Berkshire to the hackers of Las Vegas, he will explain how power – the most important currency of all – is being transformed, fought over, won and lost. As power escapes from its old bonds, he shows us where it has gone, the shape it now takes and how it touches each of our lives.
Register ↗Meet and mix with Londoners working in or passionate about social impact and enterprise.
No agenda - This is purely social and with the goal to make connections, learn and collaborate within the industry.
Pop in at anytime between 6-8:30pm for drinks, nibbles and mingling.
BYOB and BYOGrub! Please contribute whatever you would like to share with the group.
Register ↗Get ready to mix and mingle with people working or interested in the tech for good space over a drink or two. You’ll have the opportunity to hear from some tech for good funders and field-builders, and find out who is actively involved in this space.
We’ll kick off at 6.30pm with a short round of introductions of tech for good funders and field-builders, dive straight into community announcements and use the rest of the time to socialise with some quality people in this community.
Registration: We charge £3 (+VAT) to help manage the number of people who show up on the night, which goes towards the cost of running the event. We don’t want this to become a barrier to attendance, so get in touch via Meetup messages or directly with [email protected] if this causes a problem for you.
Register ↗The #metoo movement spread virally in October 2017 prompting a global dialogue about countering sexual violence and assault. A stream of more localised movements brought more contextual alternatives around the world. Almost a year on, it’s time to reflect. What has been achieved in challenging norms? How do we build on the momentum? What is the role of digital technology in reporting, solidarity and opening dialogue?
Introducing Hollaback! a global, people-powered movement to end harassment. We work together to understand the problem, ignite public conversations, and develop innovative strategies that ensure equal access to public spaces on and offline. Hollaback! are delighted to invite you to an event to unravel strategies and methodologies which are open for civil society to challenge harassment.
Please join us to hear from these incredible speakers in a panel discussion:
- Laura Somoggi - Women’s Empowerment Expert at Womanity - Womanity fights for girls’ and women’s empowerment and Laura manages The Womanity Award for the Prevention of Violence Against Women, an international award that supports collaborations to combat gender-based violence.
- Molly - Hollaback! London Site Leader
- Miranda Dobson - Hollaback! Oxford Site Leader Miranda is also Communication Manager at the Orchid Project who have a vision of a world free from female genital cutting
- Courtney Young - Board Member, Hollaback and Founder of Think Young Media - a professional storytelling and digital media firm that practices strategic storytelling.
Moderated by Amy O’Donnell - Board Member, Hollaback! and Digital in Programme Lead at Oxfam
Register ↗Celebrate summer with DataKind UK, a non-profit helping charitable organisations explore and unlock the possibilities within their data.
Register ↗Impact Founders is a community-run support system for impact-driven entrepreneurs and their companies, which are trying to contribute to solving the world biggest problems.
We love the London summer & are celebrating it with our first Impact Founders Summer BBQ, and we’d love to have you join us!
While attending is free, we ask for a contribution on the day of the event to cover costs of the food.
Find out more about Impact Founders here: www.impactfounders.io
Impact Founders is powered by www.realchangers.com, the recruitment matching platform for impact-driven companies.
Register ↗Ben Falk will be leading a session getting volunteers to log as many subject access requests as possible, from as many organisations as possible, as a first step towards building a ‘data democracy.’
You will be given instructions on how to request your data from organisations that include the Home Office, the NHS and Facebook, hopefully highlighting how much of your data is available to you, and prompting you to ask the question ‘what do I do with all this?’
Please bring a laptop or tablet if you wish to take part.
Register ↗We’ve recently seen a flurry of new startup programmes aimed at supporting innovation in public services - from accelerators and incubators to catalysts and challenge prizes.
In this joint CitizenBeta + Tech for Good Meetup we’re bringing together some of these programmes to discuss how they’re supporting startups and public service innovation.
- What are the opportunities and challenges for startups in govtech and civic tech?
- How do these programmes help startups tackle the challenges of developing and selling tech for public services?
- What do they look for when they select startups?
Talks and Speakers
We’ll be joined by speakers from:
- GovTech Catalyst
- Mayor of London’s Civic Innovation Challenge
- Bethnal Green Ventures
- more to be announced
Schedule
- 6.00pm – Drinks
- 6.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 6.40pm – Talks
- 9.00pm – More drinks and chat
See you there!
PS: Don’t miss out! Applications for the GovTech Catalyst and the Mayor of London Civic Innovation Challenge are already open and will close soon.
Apply by July 8th for the Mayor of London’s Civic Innovation Challenge. Offering £15,000 plus partnerships for solutions in 7 challenge areas: dementia, housing and data, active travel, physical activity, isolation and loneliness, electric vehicles and financial inclusion.
Apply by July 18th for the 1st GovTech Catalyst. Offering up to £80,000 to develop a new digital solution to help track waste from source through treatment to end destination.
Register ↗Commonspoly is a hacked version and critique of the game Monopoly, where the goals are to first re-municipalize private goods and then turn them into Commons. Rather than compete against each other, players must overcome ingrained training and ‘rational’, self-interest maximizing behaviours and instead learn how to cooperate to create a commons-oriented locality. It’s also great fun to play and a good challenge.
We’ll be playing with several boards simultaneously, which will make for a lively game. Apart from enjoying a fun and thought-provoking board game, we’ll also be chatting about commoning, radical politics, collaboration and much more in the context of the game.
An action-oriented workshop hosted by Stacco Troncoso, Richard Bartlett and Natalia Lombardo.
The workshop is free but places are limited! Please sign up by emailing contact AT p2pfoundation.net
Register ↗From The Hunger Games to Ready Player One, visions of dystopia dominate contemporary ideas of the future. But is there room for a more hopeful alternative?
At the Utopia Café we explore alternative ideas of the future through the lenses of literature, film, and other media. We also consider how these ideas can be realised.
Join us for our second meeting as we discuss Rutger Bregman’s Utopia for Realists and sketch out what we think Utopia could look like. Don’t worry if you haven’t attended before: we try to just use the book as a starting point for much broader debates!
Drinks and snacks will be provided. Everyone is welcome :)
Register ↗If you are trying to organise in a decentralised, collaborative, less-hierarchical team, you are probably asking yourself: How do we include people in decisions without spending so much time in meetings? How do we develop an open, collaborative culture? How do we encourage participation, engagement, and shared responsibility? And if nobody is in charge, where does accountability come from?
You are not the only one. For the last decade, we have been immersed in these challenges, as we co-founded and built Loomio and Enspiral, two pioneering decentralised organisations. (Read more about us here.)
Everyone seems to face the same challenges when we try to work without a traditional command-and-control structure. The good news is: you don’t have to reinvent the wheel! Many of us have found solutions, and we are here to guide you along the way.
In this Masterclass we will share with you 14 Patterns for Decentralised Organising. These patterns are like lenses for understanding the challenges of working with less hierarchy, and the practical responses that have proven to solve them.
Through this full day of participatory learning, you’ll not only gain new understandings, connections and fresh perspectives. You’ll leave the workshop with practical actions that you can start applying right away, to grow a purpose-driven team environment that feels nourishing, engaging, hugely productive and resilient.
Register ↗This is a workshop for people already exposed to the general idea of Ethics in Mathematics, have some intuition for the need for it, and who are keen to figure out how progress can be made in this area.
The workshop will be small, 10 - 15 people, and is by invitation only. It is mostly for people who have done or are doing mathematics or something adjacent, whether in industry or not. Maurice Chiodo, behind CUEiMS will be joining us.
The workshop will focus on imagining and defining what good looks like, after which we will come up with instrumental goals to get there. We will be identifying who in the room can help with what: from just offering ideas, to taking actions.
Agenda
- 6.30 - 7.00pm - Arrivals, food and drinks
- 7.00 - 7.30pm - Introductions and expectations circle
- 7.30 - 8.00pm - Visioning and goal storming
- 8.00 - 8.30pm - Prioritisation: Evaluating goals by tractability, importance and neglect (prioritisation)
- 8.30 - 8.40pm - Break
- 8.40 - 9.00pm - Action item generation and failure mode spotting
- 9.00 - 9.30pm - Voting, action claiming/owning and collaboration going forwards
- 9.30 onwards - Informal discussion
If there is someone you know who you think should be here, please contact the organiser with a brief description of them and an invite can be sent.
Drinks and snacks will be provided, donations in cash on the day appreciated. If you have any dietary requirements, please contact the organiser.
Register ↗Hear examples of charities using AI, machine learning, web forms and chat bots to great effect.
Register ↗Measuring good: Defining product metrics to maximise social impact
Whether you’re working in a for-profit or not-for-profit, as a socially motivated product person you care about making the world a better place.
This meetup is about the challenge of defining product metrics that allow you to optimise the social impact of your product. We will be discussing questions like:
- What in-product metrics do product managers use as a proxy for longer term social impact measures (that might be measured outside the product)?
- How do you make sure that social impact measures can stand up to revenue and growth metrics in prioritisation discussions?
- What do funders look for to give them confidence that an early stage product is generating positive outcomes?
Speakers
- Matt Kepple, Founder at Makerble
- Rachel Kettlewell, Digital Manager at Esmee Fairbairn Foundation
Suggested Reading
- 10 Reasons not to measure impact and what to do instead
- CAST “Mist” Growth (Measuring Integrated Social Tech)
P.S. thanks to everyone in the community who did the quick feedback poll last week - We’re doing this event because it was your top voted topic! If you’ve not done the poll yet, have your say here: Survey
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event of the quarter is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Wot Wot Where?
We are lucky to be back at our regular venue, Newspeak House (big thanks to them for hosting)
Wot Wot Who?
- Esther Foreman, Social Change Agency
- Mike Harris, 89up
- Beth Knight-Yamamoto, Citizens Advice
- Helen Gravestock, Clic Sargent
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
Register ↗We’re celebrating the launch of Land Explorer!
Land Explorer is our interactive online mapping platform that provides access to information on land; such as use, ownership and planning. We’ve been improving and updating our initial prototype and are ready to launch our latest BETA version!
Come and join us: test drive new mapping and drawing tools, enrol in future BETA launches, give us feedback.
We’d love the pleasure of your company, so come and celebrate with land professionals, policy folk, public servants, data geeks, and common good land users.
Our aim is to provide community groups, charities and not for profit businesses who manage land for public benefit, with access to the information they need, so everyone has easy access to information about the land around them.
Even in an age of increasingly open data, finding information about land can be time consuming, complicated and costly.
Developers and corporate landowners who purchase and develop land for private profit have the resources to do this but communities, and those seeking to own and manage land for the common good, often can’t access the same information.
Land Explorer has been created in response to this, utilising recently opened up MasterMap data from Ordnance Survey, and a range of other open data, to empower communities and enable more land to be managed for the common good.
Land Explorer helps to level the playing field for community-led development: housing, workspaces, green spaces, energy generation and rural or farming enterprises.
Land Explorer: spaces to live, work, play, generate & grow.
Register ↗Please note - you will need to bring a laptop to this event
On June 13th we ran our first Campaign Lab, together we sourced over 90 demographic and austerity impact datasets, and made a start on setting up scrapers and writing parliamentary questions and FOIs to source the more hard to get datasets.
But we’re not finished yet. Come and join us for our next event as we continue to build the case for an evidenced-based approach to electoral campaigning.
What is Campaign Lab?
Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there has never been any contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re planning to build a repository of publicly available data and develop a model to better understand the 2018 Local Elections and identify which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to campaigning.
But we need your help.
To create these insights we need to identify as much publicly available demographic and political data sources as possible.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for an evening of data gathering where we’ll be asking:
- What existing data sources are already structured at a ward level?
- How can we transform data that is not at a ward level into data that is?
- What data is missing and how can we use Parliamentary Questions and FOIs to access it?
You do not need to know how to code to attend and help.
You will need to bring a laptop to this event.
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks and food will be provided!
Register ↗In 2008 mySociety’s Freedom of Information platform WhatDoTheyKnow.com was born.
10 years on, the site is the biggest online archive of Freedom of Information requests in the UK, and has over 6 million visits a year.
With 130,144 users making over 480,000 requests, the site has helped millions of people to get the information they need to understand the workings of public authorities, and to hold them to account.
WhatDoTheyKnowPro, a new powerful toolkit which provides extra functionality for journalists and other people who use FOI in their jobs, has also just been launched.
Now all of that is a reason to celebrate!
mySociety will host an evening of drinks, nibbles and presentations to reflect on the last 10 years, and to look forward to what the future holds for WhatDoTheyKnow.
As spaces are limited, this event is by invitation only and you must present your invitation on arrival. To request an invitation, please email [email protected] and she’ll let you know if spaces are available.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Turkey goes to the polls for a snap election, both presidential and parliamentary, on 24 June. In a rare move, Turkish opposition have largely united against President Erdoğan who could be at risk of losing parliamentary majority. And if no presidential candidate wins 50%+ of votes on June 24, the election will go to a second round in July.
Head over to Newspeak to watch the Turkish election results come in (English broadcast) as we eat, potluck style. Bring a Turkish dish to share if you can, and of course, BYOB.
Register ↗Cook the Books Club is a facilitated reading group to explore what we can learn about companies using public data sources, drawing inspiration from the latest ideas in social science.
In the fourth session we will discuss platform companies. The data that platform companies collect gives them unique advantages but can also make their operations traceable. What opportunities for intervention does this open, and what does “scraping” reveal about platform capitalism? For inspiration for the discussion, we suggest a number of readings and data sources, focused on creative ways people have studied AirBnb.
Please send an email to [email protected] for more information if you’d like to take part.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗- 7:00pm: Doors open and welcome
- 7:30pm: Talks
- 8:15pm: Discussion & drinks
Newspeak House invites you to thoughtful talks and discussions on what Blockchain is and is not, and on real impactful applications of the technology that are already deployed today.
We are very happy to have Ben Laurie, Head of Security and Transparency, at DeepMind, and Sarah Meiklejohn, Reader in Cryptography and Security at UCL, with us to talk about:
- real world non-financial applications of blockchain technology, and
- the trade-offs of blockchain architectures.
Afterwards, there will be group discussions and plenty of opportunity to network.
Some drinks and snacks will be provided by Newspeak House.
If you’d be interested in speaking at or sponsoring this or future meetups, get in touch with @nwspk.
This event is hosted by Andreas Kirsch (@blackhc) at Newspeak House, a community space focusing on the intersection of politics and technology.
About the speakers Sarah Meiklejohn (smeiklej.com)
Sarah Meiklejohn is a Reader in Cryptography and Security at University College London. She has broad research interests in computer security and cryptography, and has worked on topics such as anonymity and criminal abuses in cryptocurrencies, privacy-enhancing technologies, and bringing transparency to shared systems.
Ben Laurie (@BenLaurie)
Ben Laurie is the head of security and transparency at DeepMind in London. He was a founding director of The Apache Software Foundation, a founder of OpenSSL, a member of the Shmoo Group, a director of the Open Rights Group, Director of Security at The Bunker Secure Hosting and spent 10 years in Google’s security team. He is a software engineer, protocol designer and cryptographer.
Ben has worked on Certificate Transparency at Google, and on Verifiable Data Audits at DeepMind Health using blockchain technology.
Register ↗A Roundtable on Political Psychology at Newspeak House with Lee de-Wit (University College London).
Registration by invitation only.
Agenda
- 18:30 - 19:00 Networking and arrivals
- 19:00 - 19:15 Dr de-Wit opening with a short talk
- 19:15 - 20:30 Roundtable facilitated discussion
- 20:30 - 21:00 Open discussion
Lee’s talk
This discussion will review key findings in the psychology of politics from the last 10 years. This research has discovered a range of individual differences between voters with different political leanings (including different moral values, different personality profiles, and different patterns of neural activity), and more recently individual differences in cognitive flexibility between Leave and Remain voters in the UK’s Brexit referendum.
These differences will be explored in relation to claims that this ‘psychological profiling’ can be used to effectively target different voters (in the context of the Cambridge Analytica scandal). Following that Lee will explore some recent findings from my own research that seeks to test for underlying differences in psychological beliefs and cognitive styles that might help to explain divergent opinions on political polarised topics like immigration and inequality.
Lee is a Teaching Fellow at UCL in the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences. He has recently published a book on the psychology of voting with Elliot and Thompson exploring the biases we bring to the political process.
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora.
The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Slate Star Codex, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Reading for this discussion:
- Young Men Are Playing Video Games Instead of Getting Jobs. That’s OK. (For Now.)
- Basic Income, Not Basic Jobs: Against Hijacking Utopia
- Institutional Memory and Reverse Smuggling
- Understand - Ted Chiang
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Thousands of activists across the UK volunteer their time and energy for electoral campaigns every year. Year in, year out, we use the same campaigning methods and tools we always have, because we think they work.
But there has never been any contemporary analysis or studies undertaken to assess the impact or value of electoral campaigning methods in the UK.
So, if no one else has done this, then maybe it’s about time we started?
We’re planning to build a repository of publicly available data and develop a model to better understand the 2018 Local Elections and identify which results bucked the national political and demographic trends. These are areas in which local campaigning may have actually made a difference and where we can start learning and testing.
This is about developing an evidence-based approach to campaigning.
But we need your help.
To create these insights we need to identify as much publicly available demographic and political data sources as possible.
So if you’re interested in chipping in and developing a new data-driven approach to understand what actually goes on in elections and campaigning, bring your laptop and join us for an evening of data gathering where we’ll be asking:
- What existing data sources are already structured at a ward level?
- How can we transform data that is not at a ward level into data that is?
- What data is missing and how can we use Parliamentary Questions and FOIs to access it?
You do not need to know how to code to attend and help.
Everyone welcome – beer, soft drinks and pizza will be provided!
Register ↗
Join us for the launch of Rufus Pollock’s new book Open Revolution – New Rules for a New Age
Forget everything you think you know about the digital age. The simple truth is that it’s not about privacy, AI or blockchain—it’s about the rules. And hope lies in the fact that we can change them in a radically better way.
Will the digital revolution give us information democracies or information empires? The answer lies not in technology but in a political choice: a choice between making information Open, freely accessible to all, or, making it Closed, exclusively owned and controlled.
In his provocative book Dr Rufus Pollock, founder and president of Open Knowledge, challenges our preconceptions about how the digital age work and its impact on our world.
Open Revolution shows us the source of the increasing inequality and stunted innovation that comes with building our digital age on outdated rules. It offers a solution for how to reboot those rules on a more equal and innovative basis.
Register ↗North Korea has been directly involved in a wide array of global cyber attacks, including an attempt to steal $1bn from the New York Federal Reserve, the WannaCry ransomware attack, and the Sony hack. Trump is now under pressure to confront North Korea about its aggressive hacking strategy alongside nuclear security issues.
On the night before the historic Trump-Kim summit*, Newspeak House hosts a drinks & discussion evening with Evans J.R. Revere, retired from the U.S. Foreign Service in 2007 as the principal deputy assistant secretary and acting assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Currently Non-Resident Senior Fellow with the The Brookings Institution and a senior advisor at the Albright Stonebridge Group, Revere has also served as the president of the Korea Society and has extensive experience in negotiations with North Korea
The event is hosted by Ekin Can Genç, a Resident Fellow at Newspeak House and an incoming postgrad student at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford. Ekin is a policy consultant and has a background in international politics through work in Brussels, London, Istanbul and Washington, D.C.
Agenda (11 June)
- 19:00 Door open
- 19:30 Talk by Evans J.R. Revere
- 20:00 Q&A
- 20:30 Drinks & Networking
- 21:00 End
No ticket required.
*The Trump-Kim summit has now been called off – see the letter [but our event will still take place!]: whitehouse letter to kim jong un
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗In a live podcast Novara tackles some of the big concepts in left-wing politics – from imperialism to revolution, from political ecology to political economy, from electoralism to insurrection.
After the recording, unwind with a few drinks, lively conversation and, doubtless, a disagreement or two.
Register ↗Technology is completely changing the way we live, work, and play.
What does it mean to be a citizen in the digital age? What common things do we care about and want to tackle as a group? Those are the questions we’re asking people all over the world through our global inquiry into citizens in the digital age.
We kick things off in London where The Fourth Group will host a public conversation. It’s really simple: Join us, engage in debate, meet new people, be part of a movement.
This year The Fourth Group (in partnership with UCL and the Global Social Entrepreneurship Network) is running an inquiry to learn what people want, problems they want to sort out and what actions they want to take in regards to the fourth industrial revolution. To this, we are hosting conversations in every region of the world, and giving everyone the opportunity to engage through our online survey. After listening, we will develop an agenda of issues and solutions which will be launched at Politics Summit 2018 in London. This agenda will form the basis of The Fourth Group’s actions in 2019 and beyond.
Register ↗Join us at our 2nd WorkerTech meetup - an event for anyone interested in the future of work, and using technology to improve the prospects and power of workers.
“The opportunity for tech-led, pro-worker innovation are many, but there are just too few people pursuing this agenda. That’s what we want to change.” - Gavin Kelly, CEO Resolution Trust
We want to bring together a community of people who can help spread, use, develop, fund and support new WorkerTech solutions. For example, these could be tools that help workers organise and increase bargaining power, boost skills and pay and curb insecurity.
Join us for drinks, talks and networking from 6.30pm at Newspeak House.
If you’d like to speak about an initiative or demo a product on the night then get in touch: [email protected]
Register ↗Co-working on radical post-capitalist projects.
We look for a wide range of initiatives: from thought-provoking artworks, to alternative financial models and from cooperatively run factories, to tools for collective decision-making. We welcome projects that aim to instigate change and last until they achieve their goal, as well as those designed to survive the long haul. Our program is especially suitable for projects that hope to grow out of the idea phase.
Register ↗Come on down to the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain’s #DeliverJustice party - raising money for our campaign to end Deliveroo exploitation.
Imagine putting your health at risk to deliver something as banal as a pizza. As absurd as it sounds, this is the reality faced by many Deliveroo couriers, who force themselves to make deliveries in snow, sleet and rain, just to earn enough to get by. By taking advantage of legal loopholes the company is able to deny these workers basic rights such as the right to a guaranteed minimum wage, holiday pay and trade union rights.
Abandoned by their employer and abandoned by the government, a courageous group of Deliveroo couriers decided to come together and fight back. First unionising with the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) and then launching a ground-breaking legal challenge against this food delviery behemoth, these young couriers proved that nobody is too small to take on the powerful.
But now, they need your help. While their legal challenge established the overwhelming desire of the couriers to collectively bargain for their rights, Deliveroo was able to win by inserting an eleventh-hour legal loophole into its contracts. Now, these couriers, backed by the IWGB and armed with a crack legal team including legendary trade union barrister John Hendy QC, are taking Deliveroo on in the High Court.
On 12 June our lawyers will be going to the High Court to overturn a decision preventing the couriers from appealing the case. This case could have massive consequences not only for Deliveroo couriers, but for all workers in the so-called “gig economy”. Winning will create a major precedent that could stop future companies from exploiting workers the same way Deliveroo does, but defeat, could push back a number of earlier victories and put us back years in terms of employment rights.
The potential cost liability is in the tens of thousands and the IWGB, a grassroots union for low-paid and precarious workers, has already been saddled with a £10,000 legal bill by Deliveroo’s lawyers.
Despite the company’s attempts to scare us out of taking action by landing us with legal costs, we are determined to fight back. That’s why we are asking for £50,000 to cover these and any future costs. Any money that isn’t spent will go into the IWGB’s fighting fund, to take on other exploitative companies. With your help we will make sure the courts #deliverjustice.
There’s no reason why we have to allow this multi-billion pound company to bring Victorian work practices into the 21st century. We need your help to push back against the financial might of this company that can spend millions fighting our legal challenge, so please share and donate.
Register ↗If you are interested in scholarship or activism on the topic of digital labour and the future of work, then consider joining our regular meet-up series that will be held in London.
We aim to meet from 7pm have a few drinks and talk about topics related to digital labour, the platform economy, digital gig work, and online freelancing.
Hosted by
- Mark Graham (@geoplace), Professor of Internet Geography at @oiioxford, researching digital labour, gig economy, economic geography, critical data studies, development, and digital divides.
- Jamie Woodcock (@jamie_woodcock), Fellow at LSE researching digital labour, sociology of work, resistance, videogames, and streaming. Publications: https://t.co/udwCHIzjhh + https://t.co/F66wMq9SSy
Digital and design principles are a well established concept across the tech and startup worlds, and there are already some great sets being used by some of the most digitally mature charities. The Centre for the Acceleration of Social Technology (CAST) has conducted research over the last four months into how charities use principles to design and deliver better digital services.
Together with dozens of nonprofits and grant-makers, they’ve developed a new set of principles specifically designed to align with the needs, language and practice of the UK social sector. These provide clarity on what ‘good’ looks like when developing digital services, to help nonprofits and funders ‘build the right thing in the right way’, whatever stage they’re at.
You can read more about the process, rationale and learnings in this blog: Digital Design Principles for and by The UK Charity Sector
This event will see the launch of the first version of the principles. Over breakfast, we’ll hear from charities about how they’ve used these principles and the impact they’ve had within their organisations, as well as from funders on why the principles are important to them. We’ll also discuss the future of these principles and how we can engage the sector in their evolution.
For more info and to register, visit the Eventbrite Page
Please note - these digital design principles are designed specifically for nonprofits and their funders, so while they will also be relevant to other types of organisation, this event is primarily intended for those two groups and individuals/organisations that support them.
If you’re unable to attend in person, we’ll be livestreaming it on the Tech for Good Facebook page - simply tune in here at the start of the event: https://www.facebook.com/techforgood/
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The digital land data team are a new team at the ministry for housing communities and local government. We’ve been set up to help make it easier for people to access the data they need about land and housing. We’re holding an open meeting at Newspeak House so that anyone can drop in and ask us questions about data, tell us the data they need and the problems they have.
We will:
- show what we’ve done so far
- discuss what data people need
- support people to navigate the existing datasets
One way we think the digital land data team can help is to make it easy for different people to find the information they need when they make the decision to move house, build houses or plan local policies. We know that information about land and housing is hard to find, hard to use and hard to reuse. We’d like to make this better.
We’ve found roughly 300 existing datasets, published by around 400 different public sector organisations and done some work to tidy them up. Now we’re leaving the office and asking you to help us work out:
- what data is most needed
- what data is missing
- what are the problems with the data
Github: https://github.com/communitiesuk/digital-land-data
Register ↗When you hear words like civic tech and open data, we tend to think about shiny websites and csv downloads. But there is nothing necessarily modern or digital about civic tech.
Citizen Beta, History & Policy and mySociety have worked together to bring you historians with perspectives from different points over the last few millenia where technology has changed the relationship between the citizen and the state.
Talks and Speakers
- Short introduction on forgotten histories of civic tech – Alex Parsons (mySociety) & Alix Mortimer (History & Policy)
- Pebbles, potsherds and the polis: legal and political decision-making ‘technology’ in classical Athens’ – Dr Christine Plastow (OU)
- Power to the People? How printing changed politics in early modern Europe. – Dr Sara Barker (University of Leeds)
- The 264-year plan to improve a nation, in every way imaginable: lessons from the history of the Royal Society of Arts. – Dr Anton Howes (King’s College London)
Schedule
- 7.00pm – Drinks
- 7.30pm – Welcome and intro
- 7.40pm – Talks
- 9.00pm – More drinks and chat
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗- Doors open: 7:00pm
- Talks: 7:30pm
- Drinks & discussions: 8:15-10:00pm
OpenAI’s Jack Clark (@jackclarkSF) is visiting from San Francisco and will give a talk on “Policy puzzles: Openness, Measurement, and Malicious Actors”.
Jack will talk about how the open, rapid development norms of the AI community mean that the technology poses unique opportunities and threats to policymakers.
Some of the opportunities include figuring out ways for governments and other organizations to measure and forecast progress of AI-related technologies to better prepare society for its changes, and learning how to use the open development nature of the AI ecosystem to maximize the number of people that can participate in its development.
Some of the threats include the rapid proliferation of powerful AI capabilities via the open ecosystem leading to the arrival of new threats and the enhancement of existing ones, as discussed in the recent multi-stakeholder Malicious Use of Artificial Intelligence report (PDF).
He will also discuss ways that the AI community in London can become more involved in these and other policy debates and would love to do a Q&A and discuss ways to develop grassroots policy movements in London for AI issues of interest to the attendees.
About Jack Clark
Jack is the strategy and communications director for OpenAI, a non-profit artificial intelligence research company whose goal is to ensure that powerful artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity - both through direct technical work and through analysis of its impacts.
Jack recently testified in congress on the subject of Artificial Intelligence and Public Policy. You can watch the testimony and read the comments here.
He writes a weekly newsletter about cutting-edge AI research and applications called Import AI, which is read by more than ten thousand experts around the world. He has given numerous talks about artificial intelligence and its impact on policy, ethics, and security.
He also helps run the AI Index, an initiative from the Stanford One Hundred Year Study on AI to track and analyze AI progress.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Transition Towns are about people in communities coming together to reimagine and rebuild our world. There are 30+ Transition Towns inside the M25 and 250+ across the UK, not to mention the thousands around the world.
Over the last 2 years, the London Hub has been connecting Transition Towns to share, support and celebrate actions on environmental, social and economic sustainability by local folks for their communities. We also look across and out to build a larger narrative and connect with other organisations as well as develop the infrastructure and communications to make the hub super useful to Transitioners and others.
You’re welcome to come along to the meeting in which we will:
- share what’s going on in our respective groups in an opening go-round
- respond to the needs and interest of those attending, leaving space for that which emerges
- work on a project to connect with other Hubs around the world, share learning and best practice
- open a discussion about a London wide event to build a movement for sustainability suggested for Autumn ‘18/Winter ‘19
- share an invitation to connect with a Community of Practice about work with refugees and asylum seekers from Transition Town Tooting
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a monumental piece of legislation, the ramifications of which we are only beginning to understand.
Join us to learn about your new and strengthened rights as a consumer over the data that organisations store about you including:
- Your Right of Subject Access - get a digital copy of all your data from any organisation in the EU, including retailers, websites, hardware and device makers, government agencies, educational institutions, and many more!
- Your Right to Withdraw Consent to Processing - tell organisatins you no longer consent to them analysing or selling your personal data
- Your Right to Erasure - also known as the “right to be forgotten” exercise your right to delete sensitive personal information from 3rd party servers
- Your Right to be Informed - ask for an explicit elucidation for what your data is being used and to whom it is being sold
- Your Right to Rectification - correct any inaccurate or misleading data no matter where it sits
Following the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal, these rights are more important than ever because in a world where AI is ubiquitous, data is power. Understand your data rights, protect your privacy, and take back full legal control of all your personal data.
Register ↗We are organising a Wikipedia training workshop in London to mark the 1 year anniversary of the block of Wikipedia in Turkey. We are disappointed that no progress has been made to find a solution to resolve the issue, and would like to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of Turkish culture and history to show that the Wikimedia community is trying to improve both the Turkish Wikipedia as well as the coverage of Turkish culture in English.
All welcome – English and Turkish speakers, including those with no prior experience editing Wikipedia!
Bring a laptop, if you can.
Register ↗A casual meetup for those who make games!
Please contact @Jupiter_Hadley if you would like to bring your game to show off, we’d love to see what you’re working on!
Register ↗Cook the Books Club is a facilitated reading group to explore what we can learn about companies using public data sources, drawing inspiration from the latest ideas in social science.
In this session, we’ll discuss the ideas and practice behind corporate governance. We’ll follow that up with a discussion of a critical theoretical perspective, asking whether the corporate form allows for moral action on the part of the corporation or the people within it, and considering what changes are necessary to allow this.
Please send an email to [email protected] if you are interested in participating.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A discussion group for London-based members of the rationalist diaspora.
The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Slate Star Codex, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.
All are welcome, whether or not you identify as rationalist.
Reading for this discussion:
- Inadequacy and Modesty (https://equilibriabook.com/inadequacy-and-modesty/)
- For Signaling Part I (https://meteuphoric.wordpress.com/2017/09/27/for-signaling-part-i/)
- What’s College Good For (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/01/whats-college-good-for/546590/?utm_source=atltw)
- College Isn’t a Waste of Time (https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-12-11/college-isn-t-a-waste-of-time)
- Archipelago and Atomic Communitarianism (http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/07/archipelago-and-atomic-communitarianism/)
Ntropy and DCC Global invite you for Decentralised A.I. Brunch on Saturday, 5th May at 10am. On the menu - round table open discussion where we will be joined by our special guest Ben Livshits, Chief Scientist at Brave Software.
Software is eating the world and internet has become the most important connecting tissue between crowds, organisations and platforms. Lacking a web native model of value exchange, the internet resulted in copying business models of conglomerates of the past creating extremely centralised and powerful entities capable of establishing complete control over choice, opinion and access.
Artificial Intelligence is giving superpowers to the software that is already consuming the world, thus this control tightens. Responsibility frameworks are poorly established and not web native either.
Agenda:
- 10:00 Meet & Greet with tea/coffee
- 10:30 Inspiration video & discussion “Showcase how centralised computer and algorithms are inefficient and biased”, recommended by Guillaume Chaslot
- 10:45 Introduction to Ntropy and DCC Global
- 11:05 Special Guest’s Talk about “Machine learning on the edge”. We are accustomed to the big data approach to machine learning, where user data is aggregated, leading to privacy challenges. I’ll talk about the challenges of machine learning on the edge, i.e. client devices, and the trade-offs between the accuracy and privacy.
- 11:30 Closing, more tea & coffee networking
Guests:
- Ben Livshits - Chief Scientist for Brave Software, reader at Imperial College London and an affiliate professor at the University of Washington
- Guillaume Chaslot - Founder at Algotransparency (virtual intro)
- Nare Vardanyan - Co-founder at Ntropy Network
- Alina Bezuglova - Leader at Decentralised Computer Consortium
About special guest:
Ben Livshits is Chief Scientist for Brave Software (https://brave.com/), the company behind the Brave browser, a fast, open source, privacy-focused browser that blocks intrusive ads and trackers. He is also a Reader at Imperial College London and an affiliate professor at the University of Washington. Previously, he was a research scientist at Microsoft Research. He received a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in 1999, and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University in 2006. Ben’s research interests include application of sophisticated static and dynamic analysis techniques to finding errors in programs. Ben has published papers at PLDI, POPL, Oakland Security, Usenix Security, CCS, SOSP, ICSE, FSE, and many other venues. He is the author of over 100 academic papers, dozens of patents, and multiple tech transfer awards for bringing research into practice.
About organisers:
- DCC Global - research & innovation playground for decentralised computing community
- Ntropy - a family of client-side data, algorithms and applications
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗House of Lords committee for Regulating The Internet is seeking submissions before 11th May.
Cybersalon will hold Open Workshop to formulate a combined submission.
The Lords have posted a set of specific questions/format and during the workshop we will address each of them in depth. Space limited so please book early.
Workshop Leaders: Helen Keegan (Mobile Marketing), Eva Pascoe and Ben Greenaway (Cybersalon)
Register ↗Join us for an evening of discussion on Ethics in Mathematics, a relatively neglected field with high potential to make tractable improvements to society. This bold statement rests on the premise that mathematicians are extremely valued by society and often end up in powerful places.
Our speaker is Maurice Chiodo, a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics at the University of Cambridge, bye-fellow in mathematics at King’s College Cambridge, co-ordinator at the Cambridge University Ethics in Mathematics Society and lead investigator of the Cambridge University Ethics in Mathematics Project.
- 18:00 - 18:30 Networking and arrivals
- 18:30 - 19:00 Maurice Chiodo introducing the field and current challenges
- 19:00 - 19:30 Q&A
- 19:30 - 21:00 Themed focus groups that revolve
- 21:00 - 22:00 Unfacilitated conversation
Drinks and snacks will be provided.
Register ↗It’s great that Government Digital Service has done so much for services and products that affect citizens lives, but…
- What is government not building?
- What are the services that are outsourced to third parties?
- What does that mean for accountability?
In this session we’ll hear from some cancelled projects and third party services that are core to democracy in the UK.
Further reading: https://github.com/paulmaltby3/digitalpolicyreadinglist/blob/master/Digitalpolicyreadinglist.md
Register ↗Prototype games to explore complex systems.
Register ↗Newspeak House invites you to a roundtable focused on political data and modelling, hosted by:
Dr John Bryden, Research Fellow at Royal Holloway. John’s research focuses on modelling the behaviour of political groups and developing methods to study political activity on social media, especially on Twitter.
John Sandall, Fellow at Newspeak House. John is an independent data science consultant. In April 2017, he created SixFifty in order to predict the UK General Election using open data and advanced modelling techniques.
The event will be very informal, and we particularly welcome activists and practitioners with no academic background. The event will be held in the Newspeak House Drawing Room. Space is very limited, so please register as soon as possible. We reserve the right to refund tickets depending on capacity changes up to three days before the event.
Snacks and drinks will be provided.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗With the growing interest in so-called ‘dark’ political advertising, fake news, and unfettered online abuse, Governments around the world have been attempting to regulate and clamp down on social media platforms. Is it all in vain? Can it be done? Should it? What can practically be enforced?
Join us to listen, learn, and question on the 3rd of April.
Speakers to be announced.
Register ↗Spaces are limited so please register
Screening of short documentary “When Citizens Assemble”, panel discussion and Q+A
Panel - additional members to be announced:
Patrick Chalmers – director and producer of When Citizens Assemble, pilot episode for the All Hands On documentary series on democracy. Journalist and author of Fraudcast News.
Ireland’s efforts to break a decades-old political deadlock over its de facto abortion ban inspired a bold political response. Its politicians agreed to create a Citizens’ Assembly to tackle the issue.
A random pick of Irish people deliberated on the highly contentious question. One hundred people took part, balanced for age, gender, social class and region. They heard from experts, campaigners and women directly affected by the ban. Their conclusion, reached in April 2017, recommended radical liberalisation.
The assembly’s work helped bring on a national referendum on abortion in 2018, when Irish voters will have a chance to change abortion laws.
Ireland’s approach was similar to the one it used on same-sex marriage, which voters approved in 2015. Both mark breakthrough moments for all those wondering how politics could be done differently. Rather than leaving decisions to elected politicians, The Irish showed how public wisdom can help cut through controversy.
At a time of deep dysfunction in our electorally driven politics - what issue wouldn’t lend itself to a citizens’ assembly approach? Where might things be on Brexit, on Scottish independence, poverty and other social justice questions given access to public panels addressing such questions?
When Citizens Assemble is the first in the global, nine-film series All Hands On. The series focus will be the state of world democracy and real-life efforts to radically improve it using the ages-old device of public juries. Follow the films, or get involved directly to help fund and publicise it, by signing up for project updates via this link.
When Citizens Assemble was made possible thanks to help from founding partners the newDemocracy Foundation and Common Weal, who gave support in cash and kind.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Glyn Wintle, experienced penetration tester and security industry professional intersperses infosec horror stories with insights, tools and tips for keeping your users and their data safe.
This talk is scheduled to last 1 hour, with time for questions and an opportunity to meet others from the Police Rewired community afterwards.
Refreshments will be provided.
Register ↗Are you a software developer interested in the media or economics? Or a journalist interested in technology’s capacity to inform and empower?
Join us for this informal brainstorming evening hosted by Economy, a non-profit organisation that aims to make economics more accessible and relevant to the public. Economy wants to experiment with innovative technologies that can change people’s consumption of news and make economics less confusing. They also believe that bringing people together from different fields is the best way to spark creativity. You don’t need a deep knowledge of economics, just an interest in helping the public make better life choices.
Swap ideas. Meet interesting people. Share a beer.
PROGRAMME:
6:30pm: Registration and networking
6:45pm: Introduction from Economy
6:50pm: Group Brainstorm 1: How could we use technology to facilitate immediate interactivity and action around economic topics?
7:10pm: Group Brainstorm 2: What type of products could we design to embed a little bit of economic learning and literacy into people’s daily routine?
7:30pm: Debrief and networking, followed by the pub
Economy is a public education charity promoting accessible, engaging and pluralist economics. We produce accessible, relatable, engaging content on the subject for our digital platform, www.ecnmy.org, and run economics crash courses in marginalised communities across the UK. We also campaign for economics to be statutory in schools, and work with economic institutions to create spaces for people to engage with their policies and ideas in an accessible way.
Register ↗Evening and workshop with Stuart Prior (Wikimedia UK) and Denise Norris (Accenture Operations).
Targeting marginalisation in academia, RCA Students of Unbias is teaming up to run a workshop on equality with Wikimedia and Denise Norris focusing on Women (Cis & Trans) / LGBTQIA+ experiences in IT and in information access online.
Unbias.cc is a creative commons project that continues to seek collaborative and like-minded supporters keen for systemic change and an egalitarian, inclusive culture to challenge western and androcentric hegemonies. As gender and race bias is a well-known problem within higher education, our ambition is to join forces with academics, activists, and web developers to improve ease of access to web-based information featuring women, people of colour, non-western origin and LGBTQIA+.
Our work is revolving around finding a multitude of functions to increase equality in representation and access to marginalised perspectives. A first proof-of-concept response to the issue at hand pioneered the Unbias plugin supported by Wikimedia.
Event schedule
- 4:00 - 4:10 Short introduction and welcome by Unbias, hosting the event, and a safe space policy brief.
- 4:10 - 5:00 Speakers Stuart Prior and Denise Norris presentations and a joint Q&A.
- 5:00 - 7:30 Workshops in groups according to skills and interest, with different focuses.
- Elena Falomo leading a speculative session on ‘rethinking equality in information access - what else must be done/how can it be addressed differently?’
- Stuart Prior leading a workshop ‘Editing Wikipedia: A guide to improving content on the online encyclopedia’ by using the Unbias format, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Meetup/Unbias_Format
- 7:30 - 8:00 All reconvene and present their process and outcomes.
- 8:00 - 8.30 Thanks to all - stay for a chat!
How can charities consume and publish open data?
A meetup featuring presentations and discussion from Mor Rubinstein (360Giving), Nick Jewell (DataKind) and Simon Johnson (British Red Cross).
Register ↗Throughout history, citizens have come together to respond to major societal problems and work towards common goals.
Today, technology is rapidly changing the way we live, work, and play, and new pressing problems are arising. Social media echo chambers, fake news, net neutrality, misuse of personal data, ethics of artificial intelligence. These are but to name a few.
Most recently, the Facebook Cambridge Analytica exposé has shown millions of people are being impacted worldwide.
The Fourth Group ran a petition calling to hold Facebook to account. It garnered the support of over 175,000 people in a matter of days and helped put pressure on Mark Zuckerberg to commit to appear in front of US Congress and investigate other cases of misuse of data by third party providers.
Now, to build on this momentum, The Fourth Group is exploring the potential of creating a new union of citizens to hold technology to account.
This union of citizens would be an organised group of people, non-partisan and independently funded, whose aims would be to ensure advancements in technology serve the interests of all citizens, leaving nobody behind.
This union of citizens would aim to:
- Understand what citizens around the world believe are the major issues we need to collectively respond to in the digital age;
- Develop citizens’ knowledge and skills to empower them to take impactful action for real world change;
- Work with governments, businesses, and civil society to bring about the change we want to see in the world, and;
- Build a world where technology leads to progress for us all, leaving nobody behind.
This month, we are hosting a meeting to explore this idea further and to see if there is a desire to make this happen.
We are charging a small nominal ticket fee of £5 for general admission, with free entry to founding patrons. To become a patron, go to www.patreon.com/UnitedCitizens. All proceeds will go to the early development of this project. Registration
Join us.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Mark Zuckerberg will appear before the US Senate to answer questions about the misuse of Facebook users’ personal data. This is in response to pressure from the public, media, politicians, and organised civil society.
The Fourth Group will co-host a live viewing of his testimony with Newspeak House in London. To attend, please register here and we will send updates accordingly.
In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica data scandal, The Fourth Group started a petition signed by over 175,000 people calling for Mark Zuckerberg to testify in front of US authorities and to investigate other misuses of data by third party providers. Mark has agreed to both of these actions. We also called for him to appear in UK Parliament which he has refused to do.
Details of the petition can be found here: www.change.org/TalkToUsMark
Register ↗An afternoon + evening of election-related coworking, hosted by Democracy Club, Tech For Good and Citizen Beta at Newspeak House. Open to all, from experienced political technologists to those who are just interested. Bring a computer.
1/ Councils announce candidates today, but not as structured data - we all need this data so let’s aggregate it together! We’ll be here to help if you don’t know how to get started.
2/ Let’s share assets and expertise: 2018 Local Elections Tech Handbook
Kicking off with lunch at 1pm through dinner at 7pm and carrying on until everyone goes home!
Register ↗Hear the story so far on our mission to end the housing crisis, meet other YIMBY activists, get involved with our plans for the council elections, and more!
Register ↗What: Jam for Change is a big arts Jam Session. We want people to come along and make art, music, video games and any content you can think of. At the end of the following week we will bundle it all together and sell it to raise funds for women’s aid.
The aim: raising money for Women’s Aid, to stop violence against women! You can join in person at Newspeak House, or take part online from the comfort of your own home.
Ability required: Absolutely none! we will be providing lots of support and materials, feel free to bring along children. They will find it easy to get involved and make content during the Jam.
The theme: party games!
Date: 10am - 6pm, Saturday 7th & Sunday 8th April 2018
Come make stuff together in a friendly space full of first-time jammers, experienced devs, and people who’ve never done any game development whatsoever.
We will offer support for everyone and even some of our own tools and entire games you can use to simply mod and theme yourself. Even if you have no experience whatsoever you WILL be able to make a game or two.
We will spend 8 hours each day together having fun and making things! It should be inspired by the theme, but can be as weird and wonderful as you like: a digital version of Pass the Parcel, or a twister inspired boardgame! Don’t worry if it all goes wrong! At the end of it, we shall have something fun.
At the end of the next week the creations will all be bundled together and sold to raise funds for women’s aid.
Register ↗Lightning talks:
- Victoria Krakovna: Victoria is a research scientist at DeepMind, where she works on AI safety. Her PhD in statistics and machine learning at Harvard focused on building interpretable models. Before joining DeepMind, she co-founded the Future of Life Institute, a non-profit organization working to mitigate technological risks to humanity and increase the chances of a positive future.
- Robert Miles: Robert is a computer scientist and online educator with an interest in AI, particularly the risks and safety issues around advanced AI systems. For the last year or so he’s run a YouTube channel, making videos explaining our best understanding of the nature of the risks posed by emerging AI technologies, and the technical research currently underway to understand and mitigate those risks.
Schedule:
- Doors open: 7:00pm
- Lightning talks: 7:30pm
- Drinks & moderated discussions: 8:00-10:00pm
Register ↗
If you are interested in scholarship or activism on the topic of digital labour and the future of work, then consider joining our regular meet-up series that will be held in London.
We aim to meet from 7pm have a few drinks and talk about topics related to digital labour, the platform economy, digital gig work, and online freelancing.
Hosted by
- Mark Graham (@geoplace), Professor of Internet Geography at @oiioxford, researching digital labour, gig economy, economic geography, critical data studies, development, and digital divides.
- Jamie Woodcock (@jamie_woodcock), Fellow at LSE researching digital labour, sociology of work, resistance, videogames, and streaming. Publications: https://t.co/udwCHIzjhh + https://t.co/F66wMq9SSy
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A design thinking inspired open conversation around innovating health in the UK
- What innovation programs and efforts are currently happening?
- How can entrepreneurs and innovators respond?
- What data, tech developments, and patient tools need development and better utilisation?
- How could blockchain be used in the health sector?
- What responsibility do pharmaceutical companies help innovate healthcare?
The event opens with a panel of experts discussing current innovation initiatives, the NHS outcomes framework, and their experiences ath the forefront of the NHS.
We will then open it out to a fishbowl format to continue developing ideas and discussion points, using design thinking as a guiding framework for exploring possibilities.
“Design thinking is a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.” — Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO
Drinks & nibbles will be available.
Doors open at 6.30pm, debate begins promptly at 6.45pm
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Paolo Gerbaudo, Rodrigo Nunes and Nick Srnicek discuss the consequences of digital technology for political organising.
Register ↗CAST will be running a workshop on the 28th of March with charities and funders, to explore how a set of digital principles might help the sector to create and fund better digital services.
There will be tea, coffee, lots of biscuits and plenty of time to network with other attendees.
Just sign up here and we’ll send you a calendar invite and the full agenda nearer the time.
More background here
Any questions, email [email protected]
Register ↗City Hall have launched a “listening exercise” to help the Chief Digital Officer Theo Blackwell and his Board fulfil the Mayor’s aim of making London the world’s leading Smart City.
We believe that a Smart City should also be a Networked City, where community-led mapping, technology and network-building combine to address social isolation and ensure an inclusive, fair society in a rapidly-changing world.
On March 27 2018 we are holding two events:
In the afternoon we are running a workshop for anyone involved in mapping assets and networks in London communities, or interested in learning how to do that.
We’ll share the results of our exercise in mapping the London mappers, to show who is doing what. We’ll do some hands-on work with Nicolas Fonty and Barbara Brayshay of Justmap, and also Drew Mackie of Connecting Londoners, who is using network mapping software Kumu and Sumapp. And we’ll discuss how we may form a Community of Practice to continue learning together.
- 14:00 - 17:30 workshop and mapping exercises
- 17:30 - 18:30 networking and refreshments
In the evening we’ll share insights from our workshop, hear different perspectives from our panel, and open up for discussion.
- 18:30 - 21:00 panel dicussion (speakers from Smart City, Connecting Londoners and #waywayahead) and group work
“A better politics awaits us, beckoning us forward. It’s up to us – all of us – whether we recognise that call and take the required actions. Key to these actions will be to harness technology more wisely and more profoundly than before.”
These are the opening words of the new book by chair of London Futurists, David Wood: “Transcending Politics - A Technoprogressive Roadmap to a Comprehensively Better Future”.
In this event at London’s Newspeak House, David Wood will be sharing some of the key analysis from his book, and inviting the audience to advance the creation of the better politics which technology can enable. Topics that will be covered include:
- A integrative vision of sustainable abundance for everyone - and the technologies needed to achieve that outcome
- Why technological change is presently making politics worse rather than better
- Ten legitimate causes of the fear and unrest that are destabilising society - and suggested technoprogressive responses to these issues
- The key role of the philosophy of transhumanism in accelerating the transformations needed for humanity to navigate through the existential landmines lurking in the near-future
- The fundamental importance of “super democracy” alongside the three traditional “supers” of transhumanist thought: super longevity, super intelligence, and super wellbeing
- The technological changes that can enable better humans and better politics to co-evolve over the next 10-20 years
- The opportunity to transcend the present-day divisiveness of right-wing vs. left-wing politics
- A roadmap of practical next steps.
People who attend this event will have the opportunity to purchase a physical copy of “Transcending Politics” for £10 (cash) - reduced from the standard cost on Amazon of £12.
People who would like to start reading the book ahead of the event can obtain it here: paperback or Kindle ebook.
More about the book: https://transpolitica.org/projects/transcending-politics/.
More about the author: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dw2cco/
Register ↗The Social Change Agency warmly invite you to the launch of our report: Lost Voices: Digital campaigning and its impact on the lived experience, funded by JRCT. Over the past year, we have been researching the role of digital campaigning in increasing democratic engagement - particularly by those who are most affected by the issues at hand.
We have collated our insights after over 70 interviews with charities, tech providers, MPs and those working with marginalised communities, to compile this report. The report will include key findings and recommendations, along with a tool to help organisations better interrogate their digital campaigning practices.
This event is free and open to all. We rarely get the chance to think critically about our digital campaigning practices. This event is intended to provoke, challenge and provide fertile ground for innovation. We can’t wait to see you there!
Register ↗A casual meetup for those who make games!
Please contact @Jupiter_Hadley if you would like to bring your game to show off, we’d love to see what you’re working on!
Register ↗Cook the Books Club is a facilitated reading group to explore what we can learn about companies using public data sources, drawing inspiration from the latest ideas in social science.
Please send an email to [email protected] if you are interested in participating.
Our second session is about corporate networks. We are reading a highly cited yet controversial paper that describes the structure of transnational networks of corporate control. For the adventurous, we also suggest trying out the possibilities of network analysis using a dataset from the Paradise Papers.
We’re seeking to link two ideas: the potential of “big data,” which is most commonly used to describe people, to tell us more about companies and their role in the world; and the power of social science to give us new angles to explore from.
In our sessions, we’ll explore existing datasets about companies including government-administered registers, scraped platforms and social networks as well as Panama Papers-style megaleaks. A corresponding reading will inform both how we use the data as well as the questions we are asking – “cooking the books” by looking for new meaning in raw data about companies.
Register ↗Join us to celebrate one year of Research for Action.
How can research support grassroots movements? Can research be a tool for action? How can we avoid replicating oppressive structures such as class in our research work?
The co-operative Research for Action was set up a year ago to support campaigning for social, environmental and economic justice. This far, we have been focusing mainly on local authority finance and democracy. For this event, we want to bring together researchers, journalists and activists to discuss the relationship between research and action - and to celebrate our first anniversary!
The event will start with a panel discussion (speakers TBC soon), followed by interventions from the audience. After the discussion, there will be music and refreshments. Please join us!
Newspeak House is wheelchair accessible. If you have other access needs, please get in touch at [email protected].
Entry is free, but please register so we know how many people to expect: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/research-for-action-tickets-43164664674
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗This event is for anyone interested in new approaches to improve the prospects and power of workers.
“The opportunity for tech-led, pro-worker innovation are many, but there are just too few people pursuing this agenda. That’s what we want to change.” - Gavin Kelly, CEO Resolution Trust
We want to bring together a community of people who can help develop, fund, support and use new WorkerTech solutions. For example, these could be tools that help workers organise and increase bargaining power, boost skills and pay, and curb insecurity.
Register ↗“Machine learning” and “AI” are everywhere, but what is machine learning exactly about, and how is it different to e.g. blockchain?
We will provide a gentle introduction and overview for people who are not exposed to computer science and maths, but still want to know what it is all about.
There will be a presentation with some exercises and time to mingle at the end. You will come away with a basic understanding of what machine learning is, what it tries to solve and how, and what it is not.
Doors open: 7:00pm
Presentation starts: 7:15pm
Register ↗After many successful hacknights, this is the first side project hackday. It started as a bunch of friends who wanted to work on side projects in the evening after work and not do so by themselves. Come join us and participate!
Everyone can come and bring their side project along. There will be space to sit down and work. Whether it is a mobile app, a novel or a painting, every project is welcome. Show it to people, get motivated and make unreasonable progress on it.
Light refreshments will be provided.
Register ↗As a socially motivated product person you want to build products that make the world a better place. Maybe you work for a charity, a not for profit, government or a foundation-funded startup.
So you prioritise your product roadmap to maximise positive social impact, right? Hopefully!
But here are a few things that can disrupt this plan:
- Need to focus on revenue generation
- Funders who are too interested in growth/scale
- Political imperatives
- Priorities of senior stakeholders (internally and externally)
- Your boss went to a conference and wants to build that shiny new AI / big data / machine learning / virtual reality / flying car feature
This is a meetup to share the things that stop us and discuss strategies for maintaining a product roadmap that’s focussed on social mission.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The second meetup for government digital folk to share their work and ideas around designing case-working systems.
- 10:30 - 11:00: Arrival
- 11:00 - 12:30: Morning session including short talks from the Universal Credit team, Citizens Advice and FutureGov
- 12:30 - 13:30: Lunch break (sorry, there’s no budget for food)
- 13:30 - 16:00: Afternoon session Workshop (to be confirmed)
Please register: https://attending.io/events/designing-caseworking-systems-2
Register ↗Attention is activism’s most crucial resource, and social media has revolutionised the competition for it.
In many ways, social media has empowered activists and fuelled positive change. But could the trade for our attention be hijacking our free will, and even our democracy?
Join Unicef Next Gen London at this charity event to ask whether social media is empowering or enslaving our generation, with panellists:
- Professor David Runciman: Head of Politics and co-director of the Conspiracy and Democracy Project at Cambridge University.
- Dr Shola Mos-Shogbamimu: co-organiser of the Women’s March London, lawyer and founder of Women in Leadership.
- James Williams: winner of the 9-Dots Prize for his groundbreaking research into the ethics of attention and persuasion in the digital age, recipient of Google’s highest honour during his ten years’ employment at the company.
- Nimco Ali: anti-FGM campaigner and founder of Daughters of Eve, named ‘Woman of the Year’ by Red, and ranked as one of Debretts’ 500 most influential people in Britain.
- Richard Wilson: founder of Stop Funding Hate, the viral social media campaign challenging hate advertising in British Tabloids.
- Jamie Bartlett (Chair): Author of The Dark Net and Radicals and Unicef Next Gen London Committee Member.
The panel discussion will start at 7.30pm until 9pm, arrivals from 7pm with time for chat and drinks after.
All proceeds will go to Unicef’s emergency appeal for the children of Syria.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Dr Alan Watkins, Nick Loader and Simon Jones present their plans to create a digital platform to understand the opinions of citizens and extract wisdom from the crowd.
Dr Alan Watkins is recognised as internationally through his work on leadership and human performance. He has a broad mix of commercial, academic, scientific and technological abilities and over the past 18 years he has been a coach to many of Europe’s top business leaders. He is the author of “Crowdocracy, The End of Politics”.
Nick Loader is Head of Production for CSM group, and has 20 years as a media specialist. He works across digital content creation, brand development and strategy.
Simon Jones specialises in strategic communications and reputation management for governments, corporations, organisations and individuals globally. Over the course of the last 20 years he has advised chief executives and chairs of global organisations, in addition to managing complex and global communications campaigns for some of the world’s leading brands (including Barclays, BBC, BSkyB, Coca Cola, Facebook, Vodafone.
If you cannot attend, subscribe for updates: https://www.everyoneintheworld.org/take-action/
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗In February 2008 mySociety’s Freedom of Information platform WhatDoTheyKnow.com was born.
10 years on, the site is the biggest online archive of Freedom of Information requests in the UK, and has over 6 million visits a year.
With 119,218 users making over 447,000 requests, the site has helped millions of people to get the information they need to understand the workings of public authorities, and to hold them to account.
WhatDoTheyKnowPro, a new powerful toolkit which provides extra functionality for journalists and other people who use FOI in their jobs, has also just been launched.
Now all of that is a reason to celebrate!
mySociety will host an evening of drinks, nibbles and presentations to reflect on the last 10 years, and to look forward to what the future holds for WhatDoTheyKnow.
As spaces are limited, this event is by invitation only and you must present your invitation on arrival. To request an invitation, please fill in this Google Form and mySociety will get back to you.
Register ↗We have to talk about YouTube. Over 4bln videos are hosted but is it a force for good or evil?
YouTube and Google know your deepest desires and darkest fantasies, but also your home location and which is your local pub. How do they get your data? What is the secret sauce in their algorithm that makes you come back for more and more YouTube videos? Meet with YouTube researchers revealing what can be unearthed via scraping and reverse engineering of recommendation engine. What makes YouTube tick? Can we reclaim it?
CHAIR: Alessandro Gandini (King’s College) – Lecturer in Sociologies of Digital Media and co-editor of Journal of Convergence YouTube Special Issue
PANEL
Sophia Drakopoulou (Middlesex University) – Researcher of Networked Tech and co-editor of YouTube Special Issue in Journal of Convergence (January 2018)
James Woodcock (London School of Economics) - research on what makes You Tube tick.
Panel will be joined by YouTube Vloggers, e-sports commentators and edu Vloggers
Join the discussion on the cryptic nature of YouTube algorithms. The emergence of intermediaries, Multichannel Networks (MCNs) and affiliate marketing agreements like MCNs claim to help YouTubers making money faster. Although YouTube is a platform seemingly characterised by the amateur video – the truth is that it is dominated by a myriad of commercial channels. What is really going on with the battle for your eyeballs, attention and emotions? Are we losing the opportunities for new video start-ups?
Data scrapping provides one method to attempt to understand how algorithms work. The way follow-up videos are determined can make or break a YouTube channel, but it remains undisclosed to users and your kid may end up watching “Peppa Pig Drinks Bleach For the First Time” or worse.
The recent changes in the terms of joining the partner programme have caused quite a big upheaval amongst small time You Tubers. Small channels now need to have longer viewing hours, longer length of membership and subscribers before they qualify for monetisation. Check out the winners and the losers and have YOUR say on video algos.
Register ↗With the launch of the Open Banking Standard, it’s a timely moment to look at the new ways banks and other utility companies are using data and making it available.
Stevie Graham, founder of Teller, will talk about emerging patterns that help people access and share utilities data. We’ll be announcing more speakers in the coming weeks.
trustanddesign.projectsbyif.com
Register ↗Exploring the minefield of class, racism and neoliberalism which informed the EU referendum result, Brexitannia - the first film about Brexit - portrays the people of a once powerful empire as they negotiate their identities in a world that is changing faster than ever, and in which power appears to lie further and further from people’s own hands.
In this first of a series of occasional screenings presented by Unite Community, we will be joined by director and Tower Hamlets resident Timothy George Kelly, and special guests, for a post-film discussion.
Free entry.
Register ↗Informal chats around web analytics, tracking and user privacy.
Register ↗Cook the Books Club is a facilitated reading group to explore what we can learn about companies using public data sources, drawing inspiration from the latest ideas in social science.
Please send an email to [email protected] if you are interested in participating.
Our first session will begin with a short article about the history of the corporation and a discussion about the nature of companies.
We’re seeking to link two ideas: the potential of “big data,” which is most commonly used to describe people, to tell us more about companies and their role in the world; and the power of social science to give us new angles to explore from.
In our sessions, we’ll explore existing datasets about companies including government-administered registers, scraped platforms and social networks as well as Panama Papers-style megaleaks. A corresponding reading will inform both how we use the data as well as the questions we are asking – “cooking the books” by looking for new meaning in raw data about companies.
Register ↗The Commons Platform Co-Creation Group are building a secure, open source, decentralised commons-owned social network for community organising, activism, resource-sharing, crowd-sourcing, open access research, education and data, independent media, ethical commerce and a new economy.
Creating a more equal world where everyone can create solutions for themselves
Come along and meet other members of the group, get out some post-its and map out a plan for the Commons Platform. This workshop will be part visionary, part practical, methodical and thorough in places, and all hopefully fun and nice with great people. And lots and lots of post-it notes!
What is our collective dream/mission for 2025? What do we want to achieve in the next 5 years? Where could we realistically be in 2 years? What is our plan for the next 3 months, what are all the things we need to do and how are we going to do them?
If you are not able to be there the whole time please let me know what times work for you between 12 and 5 so I can work out how to fit your particular skill/interest area into the time you are available. If I don’t know what your interests are yet let me know!
If you are not already a member of the Commons Platform Co-Creation Group please contact Sophie Varlow [email protected] to find out about how we work and our values/aims.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Join us for our first informal meetup and find out more about the community for coders and makers that want to make a difference in policing.
Register ↗Could new plans to make Britain “the safest place in the world to be online” have unintended consequences?
Hear from ORG campaigns manager Mike Morel about how the Government is working with social media companies to decide acceptable standards for online content.
Learn how heavy fines could encourage the use of automated censors that can hurt free speech, and how murky definitions of ‘harmful content’ give social media companies unprecedented control over free speech online.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Lightning talks:
- Federated Learning: the data privacy holy grail
- Deepfakes: porn today, propaganda tomorrow
- UK Gov announces Office of AI: what should we expect?
Hosted by Newspeak House Fellows:
- Ekin Can Genç, Director at Politik Consulting, former Research Associate at Global Politics of AI Research Group
- Andreas Kirsch, former Research Engineer at DeepMind, former Software Engineer at Google Zurich
Schedule:
- Doors open: 7:00pm
- Lightning talks: 7:30pm
- Drinks & moderated discussions: 8:00-10:00pm
Register ↗
If you are interested in scholarship or activism on the topic of digital labour and the future of work, then consider joining our regular meet-up series that will be held in London.
We aim to meet from 7pm have a few drinks and talk about topics related to digital labour, the platform economy, digital gig work, and online freelancing.
Hosted by
- Mark Graham (@geoplace), Professor of Internet Geography at @oiioxford, researching digital labour, gig economy, economic geography, critical data studies, development, and digital divides.
- Jamie Woodcock (@jamie_woodcock), Fellow at LSE researching digital labour, sociology of work, resistance, videogames, and streaming. Publications: https://t.co/udwCHIzjhh + https://t.co/F66wMq9SSy
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We are facing an age of massive political change. Racist nationalisms, pervasive gendered violence, the environmental breakdown, corporate power and precarious jobs — the system we live in doesn’t work for the majority of us and it is crumbling. But how can we fight inequalities in the long-term if we don’t know what we’re fighting for? DEGROWTH — SYSTEMIC ALTERNATIVES #1 is the first in a series of workshops where we imagine how the economic, political and social order could be different in the future.
Degrowth theory takes a political ecology perspective to challenge the idea that unlimited economic growth is the best way to organize our economies and lives. The movement demands that we scale-down our obsession with consumerism and shrink the economic system, leaving more space for human cooperation and ecosystems.
Together with our speakers, we’ll be exploring how degrowth can contribute to a future we want to live in. Is it possible to degrow our economy within a global capitalist order? What would a degrowth economy look like? What is the future of work and energy production? Can we live locally in a globalised world? And is degrowth really possible in a world of rapid automation and technological change?
Speakers:
DOROTHY GRACE GUERRERO is head of policy at Global Justice Now. Before, she worked for Focus on the Global South and other organisations in the Philippines, Thailand, Germany, the Netherlands and South Africa. She works on and writes about degrowth, climate change and energy issues, the impacts of globalised trade and investments on people’s livelihoods in Asia, China‘s new role in the global political economy and other economic justice concerns.
AARON VANSINTJAN is a writer and researcher whose work focuses on economics, politics, cities, and food. He is a member of Research and Degrowth and the Barcelona Laboratory for Urban Environmental Justice and Sustainability. He recently edited the book In defense of degrowth and is a co-editor at Uneven Earth.
Register for a free ticket by clicking on the eventbrite link above.
For more information on degrowth, visit https://degrowth.org/.
Our Future Now is a group of young activists based in London; we are part of the Global Justice Now youth network. LIKE OUR FACEBOOK PAGE (https://www.facebook.com/OurFutureNow/) to stay informed about what we’re getting up to and our next Systemic Alternatives workshop.
Register ↗What a difference a year makes! Social change often feels like a long game but more and more we are seeing incredible women harness the power of digital to create impact quickly.
Just days into 2018 the energy, conversation and activism of the #MetToo movement has translated into action with #TimesUp raising $15M for women to challenge sexual assault, harrassment and abuse in the workplace. And the year is only just beginning!
For WeHuddle’s first event of 2018 we are bringing together amazing women who show that it is possible to turn ambitions into action quickly. We’ll discuss our own activism goals for 2018 and hear tips and tricks to inspire us to make this the year we turn our goals into reality.
Come along to get the inspiration and support you need to make 2018 an impactful year for you!
We’ll be joined by:
Paula Akpan, co-founder of the ‘I’m Tired’ Project and social media coordinator for gal-dem magazine, and Nicole Crentsil, founder of Unmasked Women. In 2017 Paula and Nicole crowdfunded and launched The Black GIrl Festival, the UK’s first Black British festival for women and girls that celebrated and explored what it means to be a Black woman in the UK.
More speakers to be announced soon.
Doors open 6.45pm discussion starts at 7.15pm.
WeHuddle supports world changing women (all women!) through community, events and resources. Our events are open to all and proceeds from ticket sales will be donated to the organisations represented by our speakers.
After the sell-out success of our first event, we look forward to starting 2018 as we mean to go on.
Come join us! Tickets are £6.50
Register ↗Local elections on 3rd May: Let’s get ready! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_local_elections,_2018
Share your ideas, strategies and plans so we might collaborate and not duplicate effort. Bring a laptop if you can.
For the general election last year we did this: bit.ly/GE2017TechHandbook
Possible discussion points:
- What do Londoners want from election tech?
- What data is or will be available?
- What are you planning in terms of digital engagement?
- What’s happening re voter registration?
- What’s happening re voter awareness?
- What tech could be mobilised to help raise awareness and encourage participation?
- Who’s running hustings? Can they be digitalified?
- Agenda & pre-event discussion gdoc
Democracy Cafe, a London-based network organisation focused on creating new technological tools for democratic debate, engagement and decision-making, is organising a day-long event at Newspeak House on the 4th of February, in which political activists from across Europe can meet and discuss pressing political issues in an informal “Cafe” setting.
- 09:45-10:00 Room open in Newspeak House
- 10:00-10:30 Introduction, Live streamed on Zoom
- 10:30-11:30 Meet each other and Presentation of topics
- 11:30-13:30 First Democracy Cafe Round - Practising Democracy and Use Cases
- 13:30-14:30 Lunch break at Newspeak House
- 14:30-15:00 Feedback session
- 15:00-18:00 Second Democracy Cafe Round - Events and Use Cases
- 18:00-19:30 Wrap up and feedback
- 19:30 Wrap up and drinks at Newspeak House
Join a conversation with Wikimedia Foundation Executive Director Katherine Maher and Wikimedia UK Chief Executive Lucy Crompton-Reid on the Future of Wikipedia and the Wikimedia movement.
As we reach 50% of the world’s population having access to the internet, what does the digital arrival of the Global South mean for the Wikimedia movement and its goal to give every human being access to the sum of all knowledge?
How will the movement deal with issues like the digital gender gap, and the problem of the representation of women and non-European people on Wikipedia? How is the community dealing with the problem of information verification in the ‘post-truth’ era? How should Wikipedia be used in academia, and how should educational and cultural institutions get involved in the Open Access movement?
Come and find out how the Wikimedia movement is addressing these issues and ask Katherine and Lucy anything you want to know about Wikipedia and its sister projects.
Register ↗Wikidata is the intersection between wikis and big data. You can upload data about almost anything to Wikidata, and then use its search functions to query this data in any language.
Started in Germany in 2012, Wikidata now comprises over 42 million items, and with some basic coding knowledge, you can ask it questions like ‘show me all the children of Genghiz Khan in a cluster tree’, ‘What are all the cities in the world with a female mayor’. and ‘show me all the cats with photographs on Wikipedia’.
Wikidata is an important tool for researchers, journalists, scientists and anyone else who wants to systematically study large quantities of data, and new data is being added to Wikidata all the time.
Come to a hackathon hosted by Wikimedia UK to find out how Wikidata works and how you can use it. Experienced Wikimedians will show you everything you need to know to start asking Wikidata questions which can help you research the subject areas you care about. If you are a more experienced coder or Wikidata user, we will have an advanced stream with developers there to show you more complex things you can do with Wikidata, and tools you can use to make the most of its vast possibilities.
Training will include:
- Introduction to Wikidata - editing Wikidata items
- Using SPARQL to write queries and search the data
- A-Z of useful tools (Visualisation and upload/data management)
- Wikidata games
- Importing data to Wikidata from spreadsheets
Refreshments will be provided, and participants should bring their own laptop to work on.
Following the hackathon there will be a talk with Katherine Maher, the head of the Wikimedia Foundation. You must sign up to guarantee your seat!
Register ↗Radical Philosophy, a UK-based journal of socialist and feminist philosophy, is relaunching as an open access journal with a redesigned website and renewed editorial energy.
Please join us to celebrate with celebratory drinks and copies of the newly-designed journal, issue 2.01, hot off the press.
Register ↗Free tickets but mandatory registration
Build a decentralised microservice platform for the Commons!
Platform.Earth is a vision of a microservices architecture to support human organisation - to digitally enable all sorts of stuff that seems tedious and bureaucratic, but which is necessary for legal constitution, for good democratics, for effective debate - and make these easy, so that the maximum space for the human interactions - the real work of groups - can be as free, as creative, as joyful, as beautiful, as serious, as it wants to be. #darVOZPlatformEarth #darVOZParty
Register ↗We’ll be designing a visual language for argument maps.
We have the opportunity of engaging with some coders who work in the area of argument / decision mapping - of building the data structures and graphical tools that we will need to present the Ethical Framework in effective ways.
The current tools are not quite as rich as we might need them to be. This session gives us a chance to show these projects what we are doing, discuss the potential reach of the Ethical Framework, discuss the use cases and the qualities which will be needed.
This work will carry forward into working with developers on Friday and a session on Sunday, too. #darVOZargmaps
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Trevor Hilder will run his one-day, workshop course on Stafford Beer’s Viable System Model. Trevor learned directly from Beer in the 1990s, and has experience of using the model with great success. Highly interactive sessions, limited numbers. Book soon!
A four hour workshop to teach the fundamental concepts of how organisations work, based on the work of Professor Stafford Beer in the field of management cybernetics, which he founded in the 1960s.
Beer applied these concepts to fields as diverse as managing steel production, publishing, banking and economic policy. I learned them from Beer in the 1990s and since then have applied them with great success to understanding organisations and building better (software) systems to free people to get their work done with the minimum of bureaucracy.
I recently taught these ideas to the COO of an organisation with an annual turnover of £30 million which reduced his working week from 100 hours to about fifteen!
The workshop will be in depth and highly interactive, and I will be helping participants work on their own interests as we go along. It will consist of two sessions of about two hours each, with a break for lunch in between:
- 11:00 - 13:00 Introduction to the Viable System Model (VSM).
- 13:00 - 14:00 Lunch.
- 14:00 - 16:00 Overcoming Social Barriers to Organisational Change - the Moral Modalities Framework (MMF).
How would you design a currency that strengthened democracy? Is debt-based currency inherently oligarchic? Is it possible for money with a monopoly on issuance to play well with effective democracy? Does size matter? How is the scale of operation of money systems related to the scale of operation of democracy? What are the parameters of money systems? What are their implications? How do they interact - with each other? With their social setting? Can we design money systems with any confidence about their large-scale systemic features? To what extent do currency systems exhibit formally complex properties?
Bitcoin has lifted the lid of Pandora’s money-box. It is now incontrovertibly the case that many characteristics of money are simply design decisions that get made. That many types of currency are imaginable, with wildly disparate characteristics and implications. At this point the important question is - what type of money will work best with the kind of society we would like? It’s time to institute the study of money as a design problem - to pull money, squirming and struggling, into the light, and begin to map the possibility space more thoroughly, more seriously, more operationally than ever before.
COME AND ENGAGE We’ll be running a World Cafe / Unconference approach - identifying areas for discussion, grouping up to open them up, re-grouping to share. Th podcast studio will be open for polemics, interviews, debates, summaries. We’ll be looking to identify key areas for exploration/research/documentation.
darVOZ will be soft-launching a creative currency, a mutual credit currency intended to facilitate all sorts of creative and collaborative work in the areas addressed during the week.
Register ↗Wiki 2.0: Ward Cunningham, inventor of wiki, has been working on a full-on re-imagining of the wiki approach in a project called Federated Wiki - where your pages are your own, with lightweight and flexible navigation and multi-format content, but with a beautiful and liberating new dimension, whereby any user can fork, remix and adapt content from any public page, while preserving a full accreditation history.
Come and see what this amazing tool can do. #darVOZWIKI
Register ↗A week long Holochain Sprint-athon; a hackathon, but with definite coding projects (of course, you are welcome to roll your own!).
The principal focus will be on LiquidWiki - a step change in the functionality and collaborative power of wiki. We’ll also we working on mutual credit currencies and argument mapping.
Running alongside this, there will be a series of evening DEMOCRACY CAFE style events, to provide inspiration, content and ideas to feed in to the coding. The week will be rounded off with two DemocracyLab events over the weekend, exploring new modes and tools for democratic design and constitution of organisations and institutions. Full Programme here.
Podcast studio too! #darVOZweek
Register ↗The Global Game Jam is the world’s largest game jam event (game creation) taking place around the world at physical locations. Think of it as a hackathon focused on game development. Get together and make a game in 48 hours.
This Global Game Jam hub is organised by Games for the Many, a collective of game developers and political activists using the power of play to impact politics.
Register ↗Over 2.2 billion people worldwide will be playing games in 2018. A hit game is not only fun, but also an opportunity for a transformative and educational experience. As technology, politics and urbanisation make our lives more complex, games can help us thrive in this new post-truth world by allowing us to learn faster about things we need to know.
Cybersalon.org will host a panel on how game creatives and social innovators can put spotlight on real-world challenges like state and work surveillance, fake news and anti-democratic practices of modern governments while providing inspiring game experiences.
Speakers
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Rich Metson – game designer and OFF GRID co-author. The game reveals the world of surveillance and invites player to explore the avoidance and defense techniques.
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Amanda Walker –”Fake It to Make it” US-based web games author and interactive designer interested in fighting propaganda and confusion in Mainstream Media in US and beyond (joining via Skype from US)
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Osmiotic Studios – Hamburg-based authors of “Orwell” game, sharing the key points from the development and potential of the game for impact
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Ben Greenaway – Cybersalon’s games’ reviewer who will discuss Riot and also impact of AI and AR in Games for Change
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Chair: Rosa Carbo-Mascarell – London-based game designer and Corbyn Run game co-author, Creative Director for Game Jam and Games For The Many
Cybersalon will be hosting a Summer 2018 competition for Game Creators Challenge and will incubate/support projects with production and fundraising support. We are looking for AI applications in Games for Social Change, AR as well as web-based, mobile and board games that aim to bring fun to civic issues.
Register ↗Open Rights Group Legal Director Myles Jackman joins us at Newspeak House to illustrate the critical importance of legal action in the fight to defend our digital rights.
Learn about ORG’s record of achievements at the European Court of Human Rights, the Court of Justice of the European Union, and the Royal Court of Justice in London. We’ll also survey fast approaching legal challenges in 2018 involving age-verification technology, protecting free speech online, and fighting the Government’s mass surveillance programme.
No experience or knowledge is necessary for this FREE event! All you need is an interest in protecting our human rights in the digital era.
We want to hear from you, so there will be plenty of time for questions and group discussion. Join us!
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗In The Box Board Games is hosting a party to celebrate the launch of NewSpeak The Boardgame! And where better than at Newspeak House?
There will be a couple of short presentations from interesting people, and then there will be the chance for you to try out the game for the first time.
Drinks and snacks provided, but you must register
Register ↗The Brexit vote sent a shockwave through the political establishment in the UK and across the world, but there have been allegations that foreign states such as Russia tried to influence the vote. These include accusations of thousands of bots being set up to sow discord in order to destablise the European Union. Some Members of Parliament have even called for a judge-led inquiry into the possibility that Russia meddled with the referendum.
But is it all true? And if it is, did it really have an impact on how people voted on Brexit? What can or should be done to guard against social media warfare in the future? Join us to listen, ask questions, and learn on the 5th of January.
Speakers are to be announced in due course.
Register ↗Spaces are limited so please register
This is a casual GameMaker Meetup where we will discuss development in GameMaker and game development in general. Feel free to come along if you are interested in GameMaker and game development!
Please contact us if you would like to bring your game to show off, we’d love to see what you’re working on! Feel free to bring down a computer and put on your game.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗January’s meeting will be where we determine the next few months of network work. We have a substantial amount of money in the bank, many members and a strong track record of work, but strategy and capacity problems have led to an impasse about how to move forward.
So January’s meeting will be a pot-luck of proposals and ideas for out future.
ALL RHN MEMBERS ARE INVITED TO PUT FORWARD PROPOSALS FOR WHAT WE DO WITH OUR MONEY, TIME AND RESOURCES OVER THE NEXT 12 MONTHS AT JANUARY’S MEETING.
PLEASE BRING A PROPOSAL, OR TEN, THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE THE NETWORK DO FOR US TO DISCUSS.
Register ↗NOTHING TO HIDE is an independent documentary dealing with surveillance and its acceptance by the general public through the “I have nothing to hide” argument.
The documentary was produced and directed by a pair of Berlin-based journalists, Mihaela Gladovic and Marc Meillassoux. It was crowdfunded by over 400 backers.
NOTHING TO HIDE questions the growing, puzzling and passive public acceptance of massive corporate and governmental incursions into individual and group privacy and rights. After the emotion initially triggered by the Snowden revelations, it seems that the general public has finally accepted to live in a monitored digital world.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗An evening of food, drink, music, and political technology, co-hosted by Citizen Beta.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The Games for the Many team would like to invite you to our people powered festive party at Newspeak House with our friends and supporters.
We’re rustling up a hearty feast, traditional treats and a selection of games for the merry.
Doors will open at 7.30pm with a festive feast, before Newspeak’s main space opens up for us at 9pm for music, dancing and games on the big screen.
Register ↗Stories behind interaction design from artists, designers, scientists and makers of all kinds working on Climate Change.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Civil Society Futures is a national conversation about how English civil society can flourish in a fast changing world. Come and share your hopes and fears for the future, the changes you’re seeing in civil society, and together co-develop specific visions for what civil society might look like ten years from now.
“An inquiry into the future of civil society suggests concern about the present. In politics this relates to concerns about a democratic deficit, and a series of public issue crises: an environmental crisis, a refugee crisis, and health and housing crises.
This is set against a backdrop of concerns about fake news which adds to and reflects a lack of trust in public actors. According to the Edelman Trust Barometer (2017), between October 2016 and January 2017 trust in government fell from 36% to 26%; in business from 45% to 33% and in the media from 32% to 24%.
Britain also has a significant ‘trust gap’ of 19% between ‘informed publics’ (‘in the upper income quartile, university educated and with a declared interest in politics and the media’) and those with an income of less than £15,000.” - initial research report
Before the event we will send out a poll to help create a frame for the discussion - make sure you register.
The event will be hosted by Marietta Le who is an Engagement Manager at BetterPoints, and a founder and activist working on civic tech initiatives in Hungary.
Use the hashtag #CivilSocietyFutures or mention us at @civsocfutures on Twitter.
Please note that for the purpose of summarising the takeaways of the discussion the event will be recorded (audio).
Register ↗Fabio Natali will be giving a presentation on the Cryptobar installation, a project aimed at spreading the word about privacy (and privacy-enhacing technologies) in an artistic and accessible way.
Register ↗How does the UK become the world’s most advanced digital society?
In his first keynote speech since becoming Shadow Digital Minister, Rt. Hon. Liam Byrne MP will draw on his history of Britain’s entrepreneurial revolution to set out the roadmap for developing Labour’s digital manifesto over the year to come.
Liam Byrne MP’s speech will be introduced by Rt. Hon. Tom Watson MP, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition.
Afterwards, Jamie Bartlett, Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos, will lead an ‘in conversation’ with Liam Byrne, with time for questions and answers from the audience.
A drinks reception will be served following the formalities.
Please make sure to register
Any questions, please contact Demos’ Events team on: [email protected]
Register ↗In the summer of 2013, front-line police officer’s from the Metropolitan Police’s Commissioner’s 100 volunteered to set up and run the first UK Policing Hackathon - Hack the Police. The entire event was a voluntary effort to develop and trial new technology and new ways of working. Invitees were both serving front-line officers, and independent software developers.
This year, we’re bringing the event back to further explore the themes of:
- Better first hand evidence and reducing suggestion.
- Improving comfort and building rapport in the interview room.
- Tools for better police wellbeing and mental health.
We aim to once again engage with developers, designers, researchers, and officers. We’ll also have representatives from the Forensic Psychology Unit at Goldsmiths, University of London.
Register ↗Two contemporary artists critique media manipulation in this pop-up art show.
Register ↗Gone are the days of conventional 9 to 5. As we strive to redress our work-life balance;
- How can we help each other to ensure our energies are focused where they should be?
- How can we best leverage and sustainably build, our constant connection and ever expanding network?
- Cut through the (white) noise and be connected to gigs where we can both give value and feel valued?
- What are our personal value systems? How ready are we for skills-sharing and non-monetised working?
Please join facilitator Alexandra Wright, ceo/founder of Able app, for a special meetup celebrating and exploring work in the gig-economy. During the session you will have the opportunity to collaborate with other independent workers, and begin to build additional support networks together. Additional presenters/facilitators tba
Register ↗- What is the current state of play with digital tools and social change?
- How have digital tools impacted the work of social change?
- What is the future of digital tools for social change?
- What part do human relationships and connection play in today’s digitally enabled world?
- To what extent has digital technology changed everything?
A discussion hosted by The Sheila McKechnie Foundation & mySociety
Register ↗
Celebrating 20 years of Cybersalon techno-futures
8pm - a debate on Human And Machine with Alessandro Gandini (Kings College) and tech trade union activist David Dahlborn (Sweden Trade Union), chaired by Dr Sophia Drakopoulou (Middlesex Uni)
9pm till late - DJ set by Simon S
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Blockchain (a digital, decentralised, public ledger of transactions) forms a core component of Bitcoin, the worldwide cryptocurrency, and is often talked about for its potential in other aspects of society.
Due to the secure and transparent nature of blockchain, it is touted as a concept that could be used for online voting platforms not just for representative elections, but for direct democracy, liquid democracy, and participatory budgeting.
If you’re interested to find out more about blockchain and how it can be applied, join us to listen, ask questions, and learn on the 6th of December.
Speakers:
- Dr David Galindo - Senior Lecturer in Computer Security, University of Birmingham
- Further speakers to be announced.
Register ↗Spaces are limited so please register
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A fortnightly reading group. For this session, we’ll be talking about academia and research, with a particular focus on how Brexit will affect Britain’s standing as a place of research excellence and innovation.
Join this facebook group for updates.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Over the past two years Fako Berkers and Edward Saperia have created an experimental framework called WikiFeed. It allows you to create open source algorithmic newsfeeds using semantic data and metadata from Wikimedia.
We think this could allow new transparent and collaborative approaches to editorial policy, and also be a powerful way to discover stories in niche areas.
We’re running our first open workshop to experiment creating custom feeds. We’ll teach you everything you need to know and be on hand to support. You’ll need to bring a laptop. Remote participation is also possible - get in touch via [email protected]
The workshop is being run on both Saturday and Sunday. Both days are the same; it’ll be a short intro followed by free time to experiment with the framework. Please register so we can gauge numbers.
- Intro: 1pm - 1:30pm
- Workshop: 1:30 - 4pm
A more detailed introduction to the underlying technology can be found here.
Register ↗On the basis of our working model, we are building our ethical network with each session. Come and learn about the approach, and add your own perspective to the ethical framework!
You can examine the network interactively here - for more detail, click on any circle and open the info panel using the three small dots mid left.
Register ↗Over the past two years Fako Berkers and Edward Saperia have created an experimental framework called WikiFeed. It allows you to create open source algorithmic newsfeeds using semantic data and metadata from Wikimedia.
We think this could allow new transparent and collaborative approaches to editorial policy, and also be a powerful way to discover stories in niche areas.
We’re running our first open workshop to experiment creating custom feeds. We’ll teach you everything you need to know and be on hand to support. You’ll need to bring a laptop. Remote participation is also possible - get in touch via [email protected]
The workshop is being run on both Saturday and Sunday. Both days are the same; it’ll be a short intro followed by free time to experiment with the framework. Please register so we can gauge numbers.
- Intro: 1pm - 1:30pm
- Workshop: 1:30 - 4pm
A more detailed introduction to the underlying technology can be found here.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Tom Steinberg (@steiny) has decided to start a book club/reading group for Newspeak House folk and their most thoughtful friends.
The club will focus on books that relate to politics, activism, techno-social change, the news media, government innovation and failure.
This month we will be reading The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt.
Register ↗Drop tom an email to [email protected] so he knows you’re interested.
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Brexit is happening. And whatever level of hardness it eventually takes, we are all going to have to live with it. It makes sense then to gather and talk about how we plan to weather the storm.
There will be winners and losers from Brexit and I think it makes sense to sit and talk lucidly about the consequences we foresee, and what actions we can take. Hopefully this group will be as pragmatic as it is utopian.
There is a lot of negativity and despair in the news about Brexit, and some of it is certainly warranted. But rather than falling into apathy, we can do something wonderful by coming together reminding ourselves of the potential positives that will emerge over the next few years.
The plan is to host this as a fortnightly discussion group held at Newspeak House. Join this facebook group for updates.
Chaired by Newspeak Fellow Awais Hussain.
Register ↗- What are the broader psychology biases that cause people to vote in different ways?
- How possible is it to change them?
- Can we use psychological insights to improve participation in politics?
- How can we improve public knowledge of how political systems work?
A roundtable discussion chaired by Dr Lee de Wit, author of What’s Your Bias
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Open Rights Group presents a talk by Joyce Hakmeh on the use of cyber crime laws to criminalise criticism of governments in the Gulf states on social media. She is a legal and development expert working on the Middle East and North Africa region since 2006.
Her areas of expertise include cybercrime, rule of law, good governance, international criminal justice, and international aid. She is researching cybercrime legislation in the Gulf countries and has worked for organizations including UNDP, IFRC, and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, as well as for NGOs and media organizations.
Register ↗Rich and Nati have been supporting non-hierarchical organisations for more than five years, co-founding Loomio (a worker co-op building software for collective decision-making) and Enspiral (a network of self-organising companies):
We’re currently touring Korea, USA, Europe, and South America, meeting with all kinds of entrepreneurs, activists, coaches and organizers who are trying to work with less hierarchy and more collaboration: people in democratic workplaces, intentional communities, startups, collectives, and NGOs.
In our journey we’ve discovered that every group faces common challenges when they try to work non-hierarchically. In this workshop we’ll share 8 collaboration patterns that have been proven to help groups overcome these common failure points, from group culture, to technology, decision-making and flattening power imbalances.
Most importantly, we don’t just tell people about participatory organizing, we practice it together, co-creating the workshop and learning by experience. You can bring your real challenges that you are facing in your team, organisation, or collective and we’ll work together to design solutions you can try immediately.
“Through these patterns I could see how my past adventures with non-hierarchical groups had fallen apart. It gave me new ideas to bring back to my own fledgling cooperative. I imagine that everyone in the room was experiencing a similar revelation; the uncovering of something known but also unnamed, the implicit patterns that are present in every group of humans, which so often are never identified, seemed here to be explicit, finally.” - Drew Hornbein, Good Good Work
To maximise accessibility, we have a sliding scale of ticket prices. If you can’t afford a discounted ticket, but you really want to be there, send us an email at [email protected]. We have a few scholarships available.
Spaces are limited, register here.
Find more information about us and our workshops on our website.
Register ↗Mass hallucinations, depression, anxiety, and other mental health conditions have been a challenge for long duration space missions for decades and can only become more prevalent as we embark on Mars missions.
Join us at ‘Survive on Mars: Life in Isolation’ to learn from Dr Vincent Giampietro about the mental health issues astronauts face in space and train your brain like an astronaut. We will be exploring solutions to the mental health problems using design thinking.
Dr Vincent Giampietro is a Neuroscientist and a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Neuroimaging at King’s College London (KCL). His main research interest is in imaging brain functions, in health and in disease, with a current focus on developing MRI-based neurofeedback as a novel neurotherapy.
Vincent combines his research activities with his innate curiosity for space through tailored educational sessions on the role of neuroimaging to study astronauts’ brains and to monitor their mental health and cognitive functions before, during, and after their missions.
Doors open at 7.00pm. There will be plenty of time to meet and collaborate with like-minded people.
See you there!
Register ↗How can civic technology be used to fight corruption in the UK?
Join Transparency International, mySociety, Members Interests, Campaign Against the Arms Trade and more for an evening of show and tells, food and drink, and networking at the interface of anti-corruption and civic tech.
- 18:00 – Open and refreshments
- 18:30 – Welcome: Corruption and Civic Tech
- 18:35 – Presentations (TI-UK, Members Interests, mySociety, CAAT)
- 19:00 – Group breakouts: Q&A’s, problem-solving
- 19:30 – Reporting back
- 19:45 – Networking
- 20:30 – Close
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗With Winner-Take-All Platforms like Amazon, Airbnb, and JustEast, many small, local businesses are facing a huge challenge in delivering more orders online whilst maintaining a strong profit margin. This is a stand against the Extraction Economy. This meetup is for high street and local businesses with a strong connection to their communities - who want to use technology to reach more people and sell more goods, whilst finding a way to strengthen their local area in the process.
Have you had negative experiences selling your food or products through third party platforms online, and you want a place to share your frustrations and struggles? If so and you are eager to learn how and where you can do it better…
This event is for you. Hosted at the Hub of everything that intersects technological, economic and social change…
Evening Format:
6:30pm - 7:00pm: Arrival and Drinks
7:00pm: Introduction and insight by hosts
Josiane Smith, Country Manager, Digital Town and Project Lead, smart.london
You’ll learn about better ways to sell more of your orders online (make more money, get more online traffic, connect with the city and the world) through a visionary, new (and free) smart cities platform. For more info - check out https://smart.london
7:30pm: Pitches by 3 small businesses or restaurateurs who have stories to share about their online selling experiences - the good, the bad and the ugly! (Please contact Josiane if you would be interested in sharing your story.)
8:00pm: Speed Learning - the opportunity for those with tips and tricks about eCommerce to share what they know with other local businesses and restaurateurs who are new to online sales and/or online delivery and are eager to learn more.
Register ↗The aim of this project is to work towards the development of some real projects that build out spaces of non-market value-creation and access as sustainable (and hopefully replicable and/or scalable) bubbles of engaging and useful human interaction that lie outside capitalism.
Such projects need careful imagination, design and consideration; to achieve sustainablility and scalability while deliberately standing outside the commoditising market system is deeply challenging. Wikipedia is our poster-child - something of enormous and continuing value, co-created by hundreds of thousands of people with no thought of market exchange, that would either pop like a bubble or simply re-emerge somewhere else if anyone attempting to buy it and monetise it.
Wikipedia has achieved this for systemisable knowledge (there are side projects like wiktionary and the like which extend the model to other areas than encyclopedia style systemising).
Knowledge was perhaps the low hanging fruit - all humans use and co-create knowledge, and systemised knowledge is eminently digitisable.
What other areas might we consider? Starters for ten: reputation/trust, intermediate currencies designed to resist amassing of capital, co-curation of medical experience, co-curation of social experience, platform co-ops.
Register ↗10,000 deaths in London each year have been attributable to human-made particle air pollution. It’s time to demand change.
This open meeting will discuss why direct action is necessary to tackle the air pollution crisis and how East Londoners organise their own actions.
Stop Killing Londoners - Cut Air Pollution, is an inclusive direct action network organising short sit-downs & dance sessions on London’s most polluted roads. We are working with other groups in the city to create an escalation of protests this autumn to force the politicians to take concrete action.
We offer support and advice to local communities wanting to organise for drastic pollution reduction.
For more on the campaign follow twitter.com/stopkillingldn and like our page fb.com/stopkillingldn
Register ↗
After 40 years of neoliberalization, the promised end of history has led to a decomposition of established hierarchical systems, including politics. This process has culminated in Brexit and Trump. While there are strong reactions against these, the current of political change cannot be rewound back towards neoliberalism. However, alternatives based on the logic of networks and Peer to Peer are emerging and gaining attention.
Join Stacco Troncoso from the P2P Foundation to discuss on how Commons-based peer production — the relational dynamic behind projects such as Wikipedia and Linux — can prefigure new heterarchical systems for dealing with complexity, and how the figure of the “commoner” can be seen as an emancipatory political subject. The discussion will also analyse the municipality coalitions which successfully won local elections in many of Spain’s major cities and how this process contributes to what we call a Commons Transition.
Register ↗This year, the service design fringe festival team put a focus on inclusion and diversity in our work.
We ran an event in collaboration with UKBlackTech and FutureGov back in June to get service design in front of the BME community, and we ran a workshop about D&I with service designers to start to uncover the problem a little more.
This event is for us to collectively figure out what the value of diversity and inclusion is to the service design industry.
Register ↗The service design industry is still finding its feet. We have the problems of a teething industry - there’s still some difficulty in persuading clients of the value of service design, and when we get those contracts, there’s a great deal of explaining to do to enable projects to be successful.
People in organisations that want to hire service designers can have trouble providing evidence of the approach’s effectiveness to their colleagues with decision making power.
People transitioning in to service design have difficulty finding junior roles, regardless of their past experience in other professions.
And those with a little experience in service design find themselves starting teams in organisations where they have to build a service design practice from scratch, with little support, and a great deal of pressure to prove that service design works.
This session is an open discussion forum about the issues in the service design industry as it is today. Come to share your woes - you’ll likely find that you’re not alone - and to together come up with potential actions to make a difference to these issues. The session won’t end without some actions being identified! We’re focused on being constructive :)
We held a similar discussion event in April attended by festival volunteers - it was validating to attend, and we’d like to offer the opportunity for you to attend a repeat session.
The festival is designed to be an intervention to tackle some of the industry’s problems. Your input in this session could help the festival’s future direction. The festival is community-run, and this event may bring to light an opportunity for you to get more involved, and benefit your own career at the same time.
Register ↗The Spider’s Web, Britain’s Second Empire is a documentary film that shows how Britain transformed from a colonial, to a global financial power.
At the demise of empire, City of London financial interests created a web of offshore secrecy jurisdictions that captured wealth from across the globe and hid it behind obscure financial structures in a web of offshore islands.
Today, up to half of global offshore wealth may be hidden in British offshore jurisdictions and Britain and its offshore jurisdictions are the largest global players in the world of international finance.
How did this come about, and what impact does it have on the world today? This is what the Spider’s Web sets out to investigate.
There will be a Q&A after the screening, participants to be announced.
Register ↗An evening of short talks and conversations around Parliament, data and democracy.
If you’re a librarian, statistician, academic, historian, technologist, designer or just interested please come along.
Speakers
- Dan Barrett, Head of Data and Search, Parliament Digital Service
- Anna Scott, Head of Content, Open Data Institute
- Samu Lang, Technical Director, Parliament Digital Service
- Rachel Coldicutt, CEO Doteveryone, Trustee Fawcett Society
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Politics is meant to be ‘the art of the possible’ – yet the defining political developments of recent years have been events widely declared ‘impossible’ until they happened. How do we find our bearings in a time when the boundaries of political possibility are repeatedly breached?
Over five days at Newspeak House, Dougald Hine has been hosting conversations with artists, technologists, thinkers and doers about this. On the last night he is opening it up to anyone who wants to join and hear a bit about where the conversations have led – and maybe try out some of what has been talking about.
He’ll be joined by guests including Billy Bottle and Liz Slade, and probably some of the others who have been involved over the weekend.
Here are some of the starting points for their conversations:
- This suggestion from Will Davies in the LRB: ‘The coincidence of the Corbyn surge with the horror of Grenfell Tower has created the conditions – and the demand – for a kind of truth and reconciliation commission on forty years of neoliberalism.’
- These lines from theatre-maker Chris Goode: ‘my sense is that only seldom is the problem that we ‘don’t know’ – or, at any rate, that we don’t know enough. The real problem is that we don’t have a living-space in which to fully know what we know, in which to confront that knowledge and respond to it emotionally without immediately becoming entrenched in a position of fear, denial and hopelessness.’
- This Compass report from Indra Adnan on the future of political parties.
- A series of occasional posts Dougald wrote, starting the morning after the UK general election of 2015, which people seem to have found helpful in making sense of unexpected political events.
If you are interested in scholarship or activism on the topic of digital labour and the future of work, then consider joining our regular meet-up series that will be held in London.
We aim to meet from 7pm have a few drinks and talk about topics related to digital labour, the platform economy, digital gig work, and online freelancing.
Hosted by
- Mark Graham (@geoplace), Professor of Internet Geography at @oiioxford, researching digital labour, gig economy, economic geography, critical data studies, development, and digital divides.
- Jamie Woodcock (@jamie_woodcock), Fellow at LSE researching digital labour, sociology of work, resistance, videogames, and streaming. Publications: https://t.co/udwCHIzjhh + https://t.co/F66wMq9SSy
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike. A great chance to meet the fellows and get the latest tech & politics gossip.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Discuss the categories of action that are most appropriate , here and now, to further the agenda of a post-market paradigm shift.
Register ↗Pictfor is hosting a Summer Reception to introduce our All-Party Parliamentary Group.
Members, Parliamentarians and potential future members are invited to apply to attend. Please also pass the invitation along to new and young employees - with a particular emphasis on young people and those new to the tech and political sectors who may not have engaged with us before.
Please join the waitlist for this event using your work email address. Once we have approved your request, your registration will be confirmed and you will be sent further details of the event. This event will introduce Pictfor to a wider network, engage young people working in tech and policy, while also exploring the future of tech.
This interactive, interview-style panel event will discuss:
- What is the future of tech?
- What skills do the next generation working in tech need to excel?
- How will Generation Z shape technology?
BCS will be sharing findings from their new report on diversity in the tech sector.
Speakers:
- Darren Jones MP
- Catherine Knivett, Principal Policy Officer for Digital Skills, Greater London Authority
- Maxine Mackintosh, Co-Founder, One HealthTech
- Barry Whyte, COO, Decoded
- Chair: Professor Tom Crick MBE, Trustee, BCS
More speakers to be announced
Register ↗Wikidata is a free and open knowledge base that can be read and edited by both humans and machines. It’s the structured sister to Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia, and it provides a common place to gather and re-distribute data that can be reused by anyone.
In this short event we’ll be examining what it is possible to do with Wikidata - using UK political data as a springboard. Whether you are interested in building an application, doing some analysis, or just experimenting, this is for you.
This workshop will be divided into two parts:
- A brief introduction to Wikidata: cool tools and tricks for using it
- A hackathon to use, visualise and improve the data
Join us if you’re interested in learning some new tricks, or to understand how Wikidata can be useful to your work or your organisation. If you’re interested in political data, or have experience in visualising or building tools to work with data, come along!
Register ↗Julio Alejandro will give an overview of new cryptocurrencies like Ethereum, ZCash, Litecoin, Steem, Dash, Wings, MCAP, IoTa, Voxel, Numerai, Indorse, Decent, Kin, Storj, Siacoin, Maidsafe, Monero, ZCash, Dash Gnosis, Augur…
…and how they allow distributed functionality that give new ways of solving problems in prediction markets, attention economy, smart cities, privacy, machine learning, distributed computing, mixed reality, ownership, digital identity, and more.
Julio Alejandro is director of three Blockchain companies in London, UK Foreign Correspondent for Excelsior, Founder & CEO of Humanitarian Blockchain. He has lectured, lobbied, and participated in transnational projects with the United Nations, the European Union, and the University of Cambridge.
Register ↗
This month we’re looking at the various routes people have taken to become Service Designers and the skills needed to succeed.
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How does a doctor become a service designer?
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How could a background in music help in the design process?
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Do service design courses prepare you for life as a jobbing designer?
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Why do so many UXers make the leap?
Our fascinating speakers will be telling us a little bit about their personal experience and ruminate on the essential skills needed to make a great Service Designer.
If you’re thinking of becoming a Service Designer this event will help you understand the may and varied routes that your peers have taken before you. If you’re a seasoned-hand it will remind you of the diversity of experience and how vital that makes our discipline.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗This session will think about the most engaging and fruitful ways of connecting our membership into the work of the Project, as we develop the Ethical Framework that will underpin a Progressive Ethics (for more detail about this, look here - exciting and effective ideas have been developed).
This membership has built itself - there has been no outreach, no large event, no recruitment drive - the idea of a Progressive Ethics clearly has the potential to engage.
Looking through the list, the signs are that we are an excitingly diverse bunch, with a wide range of interests and skills.
Clearly, not all members will come to Working Session events (although they are engaging and exciting experiences - do give it a try!), but people don’t join a Project without some idea of contributing to its development: at this session we will come up with ways of opening participation and engagement out beyond physical Meetups.
This session is a complete event, with its own topic for discussion and consideration, built around the idea of participatory development - no prior engagement is necessary! No future commitment is required!
Register ↗Assemblies for Democracy will be having another planning group meeting at Newspeak House to prepare the meeting for an alliance for a citizens’ convention on the constitution. Any interested observers are most welcome to attend.
See this post for more info.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗On Wednesday 3rd August our friend and colleague @MalwareTechBlog was arrested by the FBI in Las Vegas after the Defcon/Blackhat security conventions.
Many know him for his integral role in helping analyse, explain and mitigate the WannaCry ransomware worm - particularly for registering the sinkhole domain which slowed the attack and saved upwards of millions of computers from infection and inestimable damages.
In the UK and possibly elsewhere, it is entirely plausible that his heroic contributions prevented loss or injury to human lives.
MalwareTech has been indicted by the US DOJ and faces charges relating to alleged involvement in the Kronos banking malware in 2014-2015. No evidence has been presented at this stage to substantiate the claims and under US and international law he is considered innocent until proven otherwise.
Understandable concern is being felt and important questions are raised regarding how a UK citizen and highly-regarded member of the security researcher community came to be arrested by US authorities. The possibility of decades of imprisonment due to the disproportionately harsh sentencing regime in the USA compared to the UK and the prevalence of coercive plea-bargaining give cause for significant alarm.
Within the community of information security researchers and practitioners the dangers of being criminalised for efforts to address malware and improve computer security are all-to-familiar. With the arrest of MalwareTech, especially after such conspicuous and laudable contributions in responding to cyberattacks, there is a serious risk that the already strained trust between the hacker community and law-enforcement and government authorities will be eroded further and significant “chilling effects” on the willingness of volunteers to assist with computer security will be felt at a time when their help is most needed.
We owe it to our friend and colleague, to his family and loved ones, to ourselves as a community and society at large to ensure that MalwareTech’s rights are upheld, that his brilliant potential to contribute to our collective security is not squandered, and that relations between the hacker community and state authorities are not harmed for the common goal of maintaining internet and private computer security.
Please attend if you are able, or contribute remotely, so that we can respond together in an effective and responsible manner to resolving this situation in the best interests of everybody concerned.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Tech Against Modern Slavery is an event in aid of World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, brought to you by Free_D and the London Tech for Good Meetup to raise the profile of human trafficking and explore tech’s role in addressing it.
Human trafficking is a crime that exploits women, children and men for numerous purposes including forced labour and sex. The International Labour Organization estimates that 21 million people are victims of forced labour globally. This estimate also includes victims of human trafficking for labour and sexual exploitation. While it is not known how many of these victims were trafficked, the estimate implies that currently, there are millions of trafficking in persons victims in the world (http://www.un.org/en/events/humantrafficking/)
This event will explore tech’s role and responsibility in prevention, prosecution, rescue, and reintegration; from the perspectives of charities, startups and big tech companies.
We’ll be hearing talks from:
- Siavash Mahdavi, tech entrepreneur & co-founder of Free_D
- Phil Bennett, Program Architect at Salesforce
And a panel discussion from:
- Katherine Prescott, co-founder of Free_D
- Gail Kent, Global Public Policy Manager, Facebook
- Justine Currell, Executive Director, Unseen
- Sarah Brown, Lead Analyst, Stop the Traffik
- Min Teo, Strategy, Techfugees
Hosts:
- Jessica Stacey, London Tech for Good & Bethnal Green Ventures
- Ellie Hale, London Tech for Good & CAST
Doors open at 6 pm, talks start at 6:30 pm. There will be time for questions and networking after the panel discussion.
Register ↗Join MakeSense with Local Welcome and their communities at Lunchtime on Sunday 30th of July for what is promised to be a very unique Holdup, MakeSense Design Thinking Workshop!
Come to Connect, Cook, Eat and experience first hand what the project is and who the project serves… and then Challenge yourself brainstorming and building a strategy to grow the Local Welcome movement!
Local Welcome project combines digital service design with traditional community organising. At the heart of it, they help refugees and locals cook and eat together. The experience of this shared activity helps atomised communities build solidarity and find common ground. They spent 2016 running test events throughout the UK, in Berlin and the States, connecting small groups of Syrian refugees and local residents to cook and eat together.
Now its time for them to do the next important step!
Everybody is Welcome! Due to the challenge we think that people who loves and practice User Research and Design, Marketing Campaigns and Community Building will LOVE to be part of this challenge. Let’s solve this all together!
Don’t be Late! We recommend to arrive at 11:50am, because at 12:00pm we start our group activities.
MakeSense is an international community that rallies SenseMakers in 128 cities across the world to help social entrepreneurs to solve their challenges. By putting together our skills and ideas, we can help social entrepreneurs create and develop their businesses and solve the most pressing issues faced by society in such areas as: education, health, environment, food, waste, refugees, etc. MakeSense is all of us. It’s an open project that brings together a community of passionate people.
Register ↗A workshop to set a common direction for The UK Transhumanist Party, something to inspire many towards a better future.
Using design thinking methodologies we will aim to align different voices around a single goal and strategy for the future of The UK Transhumanist Party.
Register ↗A discussion about what the experience of Newspeak House looks like for women at the moment, and how we may be able to improve it.
Register ↗A special event featuring Peter Krafft who has just finished his PhD at MIT Media Lab.
In his own words:
In my work, I develop computational models to reveal patterns in human social behavior and computational perspectives to guide that behavioral modeling. In this talk I will present a modeling framework I have developed that organizes my own thinking about the structure and function of social systems. I will then present varied models that can reveal topic-specific communication networks in complex organizations, information silos during rumor spreading, and political preferences in the American electorate. I will conclude with a discussion of potential future areas of interest to me, including participatory mechanism design, computational political theory, models of public engagement with science and technology, and models of “fake news”.
Talk followed by drinks & discussion.
If you’d be interested in speaking at this or future meetups, please contact Sophie.
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aiandpolitics/
Register ↗Due to strong demand, registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ai-politics-episode-v-tickets-36275140923
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A meeting to discuss James Darling’s Membership Relationship Management Prototype:
“The majority of successful digital products in existence today are built on two possible organisational models: atomised individuals interacting with each other, or a centralised organisation (typically a company) interacting with its users (typically customers).
You can see this forced dichotomy playing out in the language of [the campaign] sector; you have ‘traditional organisations’ trying (and mostly failing) to engage with the ‘grassroots’. Both have their advantages and disadvantages, but neither are particularly effective in 2017.
Traditional organisations are pulled into creating bureaucracies that are better suited to a corporate company of the 1990s. ‘Volunteers’ suddenly have to behave more like staff members, while new members who are unable or not yet willing to make such commitments begin to see the organisation as a professionalised company to be a customer of, rather than an active member.
Meanwhile, grassroots organisations struggle to create any useful bureaucracies at all, rapidly collapsing under their own weight if they try to expand or build power. They are too risky for power to engage with seriously. Without simple, public ways for new members to get involved, they often end up cliquey.
I feel there is the possibility to build new bureaucracies, largely written in open source code instead of rulebooks (because it’s 2017), that break down this dichotomy, and allow smaller grassroots teams to help and be helped by the more centralised and professionalised HQ. This prototype was a stab at that.”
- https://medium.com/@abscond/membership-a-prototype-ea822b2683b#.57x1z2avb
- https://github.com/james/membership
The launch of Matthew Blakstad’s second novel, Lucky Ghost.
Please RSVP to [email protected]
Register ↗This summer, The Fourth Group is hosting a hackathon to see how tasks politicians are expected to do can be automated.
These tasks include: Understanding voters’ preferences; writing speeches; making strategic decisions in regards to policy proposals, and; addressing problems faced by constituents.
We’re looking for people with experience in politics, data analytics, machine-learning, and design.
If you’re interested in joining, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Digital Democracy is a question that has been heavily debated in recent years at a time of intense development of practices of online decision-making. New digital democracy softwares, online services and applications are all manifestations of the vitality of this discussion, as are initiatives and experimentations launched by both emerging and established political parties, national parliaments and city councils.
However, often we are overlooking the degree to which the common label “digital democracy” hides the presence of a great diversity of directions and approaches. While some of these practices project the vision of a direct democracy, in which participatory practices can wholly substitute all forms of representation, other lines of development take a more pragmatic view, seeing digital democracy as a way to address some of the inconsistencies of representative democracy, and constructing a continuous feedback loop between represented and representatives.
How do these competing visions of digital democracy, the participatory and representative ones map onto existing practices and projects? What are their underlying criteria, visions, and claims to legitimacy? Which of these models of digital democracy is more effective and which one is destined to prevail in the long run?
The workshop will bring together theorists and practitioners of digital democracy from different European countries to explore the emergence of competing models of digital democracy, their theoretical inspirations and their practical developments.
Register ↗Public meeting - Radical Housing Network members, campaigners, friends, residents and all others are welcomed to this meeting to discuss:
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What housing campaigns have organised in the wake of the Grenfell atrocity.
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What campaigning for better housing looks like after Grenfell - on safety, estate regeneration, tenant rights, privatisation, council housing - and more.
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How, and for what, can we campaign - in our home, our areas and together?
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How housing groups - across all types of tenure and property - can work to ensure Grenfell marks a transformation in how we house people.
All welcome.
Register ↗The film “Waynak”, which means “Where are you” in Arabic, is a six-part web documentary which was filmed in 2016 and produced by MakeSense presents men and women who have developed practical solutions (from arts, to theatre and technology) to problems encountered by refugees, and shows us how to move from screen to reality.
You can watch the trailer here.
The documentary was screened at the Cannes festival last May and was very well received. It was also awarded best international non fiction at the Melbourne WebFest in July 2017 !
Register ↗In the last session, we looked at the components (technical and social) that could be assembled to build a bullshit detection system.
Discussion of each of these components generated questions, alternative approaches, awkward issues.
This session , we will look in more detail at a particular component that is part of the imagined ethical engagement system this Project is aiming for - an ethical chat-bot.
Why a chat-bot? Well, when thinking about building an ethical framework that can engage widely - both to help them traverse the ethical frameworks we might build, and to learn from people about the questions and the ethics that they might bring to bear - some sort of simple ethical chat-bot always seems like something to explore.
What would people want from such a thing? What should it try to do? What should it try not to do? Could it be used as an aid in building ethical frameworks? Can we allow it to give automated ethical suggestions - or should these always come from people?
No doubt we’ll come up with many more questions, and many answers too.
What we’ll aim for is a ‘starter-for-ten’ specification for what an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) ethical chat-bot should do.
Register ↗Come celebrate what we’ve achieved together over the last year!
Includes so many elections, much data! And we want your braaains on what’s next…
(Democracy Club is a community interest company that uses open data, design and technology to give every voter the information and participation opportunities they need, in a way that suits them. We are non-partisan and we work openly. Come say hello!)
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A breakfast event looking at how product and behavioural design principles could be used to improve the policy-making process, with the idea of bringing together a mix of product designers, behavioural scientists along with policy-makers/civil servants to investigate the idea of how we can create a ‘well-designed democracy’.
We’re delighted to say we’ve got some excellent speakers confirmed:
- Dr Michael Hallsworth, Director at the Behavioural Insights Team – on using behavioural economics to design better policies
- Glyn Briton, Chief Strategy Officer at Albion – on designing ‘democratic brands’; some lessons from designing GiffGaff, a pioneering democratic brand
- Temi Ogunye, Citizens Advice Bureau – presenting research on how people practically engage with democracy from a day-to-day perspective
- Chris Quigley, Delib – on ‘playocracy’: the use of gaming mechanics to build engagement in policy
Breakfast will be provided and, of course, there’ll be plenty of tea and coffee available.
This event is part of the Practical Democracy Project, a series of events organised by Delib dedicated to looking at how technology can best be used to make every-day improvements to the democratic process – with a particular focus on policy-making at local and central government levels.
The overall aim of the Practical Democracy Project is to design the ‘ultimate democracy user-journey’. On one side, we’ll be mapping out in practical terms how to create the best democratic user-journey for citizens, using technologies that dominate people’s everyday lives; on the other side, we’ll be mapping out the optimal user-journey for government officials/policy makers/elected officials. The key point being that democratic processes are a two-sided affair, which need to be optimised for both citizens and government if they’re to work.
For more info or to kick in ideas, drop us a line on Twitter: @delibthinks
Register ↗Register: Eventbrite
The sell out corn-based snack event of the quarter is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in Campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds. It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2, Let Toys be Toys, Transform Justice and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Speakers
- Sam Jeffers (The Shop) - Who targets you? The inside scoop and results of the elections most talked about new tools
- Hayley Davidson (Crisis Action) - Creative Coalitions
We’ll be unveiling a further list of kick-ass speakers for this event over the coming weeks. Expect more learnings from the snap General Election campaign to be among them.
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non-alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
If we can we will try and organise some pizza to be delivered after the event to allow people to keep talking.
Wot you waiting for? #wineandwotsits
Register ↗Red Pepper meets to launch the latest print issue of Red Pepper Magazine - Empire Will Eat Itself - and chart out the path it takes from here.
Register ↗Register: Eventbrite
homelesshack17 is for anyone interested in helping solve homelessness in this city and beyond.
According to Crisis, more than 8,000 people slept rough in London last year. That number has doubled since 2010. The problem is much bigger than that, though - more than 100,000 people each year apply to UK local councils for help with homelessness, and that number is increasing by more than 10% a year.
Experts from charities, service providers and government will come together with service designers, policy professionals, data analysts, developers, researchers and people with lived experience to see if we can create some useful things to help.
There will be people who know what’s needed, people who know what data is available and where to find it, and people who can take on the ideas and prototypes from the event and find ways to make them happen.
Friday 23rd June
- 10:00 to 12:30: presentations from experts who work on homelessness in London to help hackers understand what’s needed
- 13:30 to 17:00: open space style event for everyone to talk about their ideas for ways to help
- 17:00 to 23:59: form self-organising teams and get to work
Saturday 24th June
- 09:00 to 16:00: work in self-organising teams to design solutions and build working prototypes
- 16:00 to 17:00: show and tell
- 17:00: finish
Everyone with energy and ideas is welcome. This will be an inclusive, open and collaborative event. #Homelesshack is not only for people with special technical skills - come along if you have ideas, energy and any relevant skills or knowledge to offer. Please don’t worry if it’s your first time at an event like this - everyone is welcome and there will be plenty of help and support on offer.
Register ↗If you are interested in scholarship or activism on the topic of digital labour and the future of work, then consider joining our regular meet-up series that will be held in London.
We aim to meet from 7pm have a few drinks and talk about topics related to digital labour, the platform economy, digital gig work, and online freelancing.
Hosted by
- Mark Graham (@geoplace), Professor of Internet Geography at @oiioxford, researching digital labour, gig economy, economic geography, critical data studies, development, and digital divides.
- Jamie Woodcock (@jamie_woodcock), Fellow at LSE researching digital labour, sociology of work, resistance, videogames, and streaming. Publications: https://t.co/udwCHIzjhh + https://t.co/F66wMq9SSy
A post-election planning meeting to work on the Citizen led Constitutional Convention.
Observers welcome.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Build something for the election? Come and talk about what you did.
Also please add it here: bit.ly/GE2017TechInitiatives
Register ↗38 Degrees is the angle at which snowflakes come together to form an avalanche.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A short introduction, followed by discussion, then for those who want to (everyone, hopefully!), a workshop session.
We’ll develop practical ideas for how a framework of entities, each taking responsibility for some aspect of an issue, can work together to make efficient and effective assessments.
We’ll think about how these entities can operate both as algorithms and as human-powered decision makers.
This is about starting to develop a product - the relationships and mechanisms we’ll develop will underpin the workings of an ethical framework that can interact, can deliberate, can make recommendations.
Register ↗Spend election night at Newspeak House with a load of democracy nerds.
This will mostly look like a bunch of people furiously using laptops, but there’ll as much conviviality as is possible under the circumstances.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗On Sunday 4th June election fever will be in the air: candidates crying clockwork catchphrases, pundits pontificating on polls, every citizen considering the choices before them. In other words, the perfect time for an election hackathon!
Schedule
- 9am: Doors open & breakfast
- 10am: Opening remarks from Newspeak, SixFifty & e.g. Democracy Club
- 5pm: Pizza
- 7pm: Presentations
- 8pm: Wrap up, prizes, pub
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗AI & Politics is back. With #ge2017 around the corner we ask: Can Facebook Win Elections?
Short talks, followed by drinks & discussion.
Speakers to be confirmed.
If you’d be interested in speaking at this or future meetups, please contact Sophie.
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aiandpolitics/
Register ↗Due to strong demand, registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ai-politics-can-facebook-win-elections-tickets-34778022000
EXPLORE OPEN COMPANY DATA & MAP CORPORATE NETWORKS
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism.
It’s been four years since the tragic events at Rana Plaza, where lack of safety and humane working conditions were exposed due to the collapse of a garment factory in Bangladesh. This FlashHacks, we’ll be digging into the corporate network of apparel brands.
“There was barely any publicly available information about the apparel brands that were using the Rana Plaza factories. Activists searched through the rubble for labels and interviewed survivors. For decades, such secrecy has been the norm in the garment industry. While a handful of companies, like Adidas, Nike, Levi’s, Puma, and Patagonia, began publishing details more than a decade ago, others have recently joined. By the end of 2016, at least 29 apparel companies were disclosing some information about their source factories. Yet, company commitments to transparency about supplier information are inconsistent, with widely varying standards for what they choose to disclose. Many brands have held out completely.” - Human Rights Watch
We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach. OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 125 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up as that will be our main port for communication and work: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗
Join us for the launch party of CorbynRun, a game about building a movement to beat the Tories. You’ll get to try the game and chat to the makers.
Games can change the way you think. They’re more than just entertainment, they can help engage, teach, influence, spark conversations and start movements for change… and perhaps have an impact in the election.
What is Games For The Many?
Games For The Many is a new grouping of Labour members, creatives, gamers and tech enthusiasts, passionate about making games. From Melenchon’s Fiscal Kombat, to Molleindustria’s Phone Story, to UsVsTh3m’s 2010 viral election games - games have shown a meaningful capacity to help promote and develop ideas and messages, and they’re fun to boot!
Register ↗This Meetup is going to bring together people and organizations working in (open) data for development.
We will feature speakers whose organizations have launched or are soon to launch a data portal for development purposes, speakers that will discuss responsible data handling for development, and others who are using large tranches of data to inform their work.
While we have some speakers secured already, we encourage anyone working on an exciting (open) data for development project to get in touch for an opportunity to speak!
Register ↗How can decentralised technology change management, incentives and discovery in attention-content markets?
In today’s attention-based economy, institutions who hold power over data access and discovery can dictate what content and collaborations will be successful and what we spend our attention on.
Paweł Wojtkiewicz is a data scientist and phd candidate from Warsaw School of Economics. He will talk about his work implementing a system that manages and incentivises the creation and spread of content that people find beneficial while creating transparent environments where singular content creators and normal viewers can thrive as individual units.
Register ↗Design Jam is a one-day brief to prototype event to work cool disruptive topics. This Jam’s theme will be politics and the upcoming election with the final brief being announced on the day of the Jam.
Why? We want to meet people, make things, learn, have fun doing it, and build a community of awesome people.
I’ve never Jammed before. What should I bring? Bring your laptops, coding environments, iPhones and iPads, Sketchpads, writing / drawing implements, cameras and video cameras, and whatever else you need to make sweet stuff. We’ll be finding ways of creating quick-and-dirty prototypes for testing, and then building convincing mockups by the end of the day.
Here’s the schedule (we try to stick to this, but we can change it up too):
9:00 - Doors open and breakfast begins. Groggy conversations and coffee.
10:00 - Topic presentation! We’ll give you some background and inspiration to get started with.
10:30 - Making teams and brainstorming session 1! Each team member will do rapid sketches of 4-8 different ideas. Then we’ll put them up, discuss and prioritise.
11:00 - Brainstorming session 2! Each team member will sketch a single idea. Then we’ll dot-vote and choose direction.
11:30 - Team discussion & finalizing idea
12:00 - Break for lunch
13:00 - Building your prototype begins here! This can be a sketch, paper prototype, html click dummy, a website, a video about your service or anything else that can be used for quick and dirty testing with real people.
15:30 - Testing with peers and on the streets!
16:00 - Prototyping, round 2! Refine Refine Refine!
17:30 - Finalise your presentations! Make them awesome, have fun!!!
18:00 - Final Presentations We’ll take 5 minutes with each project and see what you’ve built, and what you’ve learned.
19:00 - End of the day We’ll head to a local pub to celebrate and generally have a great time :)
Register ↗Someone familiar with the matter will give an inside view on the NHS systems.
Chatham House Rules.
Register ↗Generation Rent and PricedOut are holding a joint social in London to introduce prospective volunteers to the organisations’ activities.
The organisations are both mobilising private renters to take action to improve the rental market, and to support more housebuilding.
The activities that the volunteers would be signing up for include:
- Developing online tools for people to support housebuilding in their local areas
- Using public data to create an evidence base to support policy change
- Devising systems of holding local councils to account over their housing responsibilities
A subsequent training session in June, run by Generation Rent to equip volunteers with the skills and knowledge to start or get involved with a housing-related campaign.
This social offers an opportunity for people who have not been involved before to find out more and meet like-minded people in an informal environment.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗This is an opportunity for community activists and voluntary organisations in London to get support for their priorities in this election.
We will focus on three sets of questions:
- What are your priorities, who has similar priorities & how can we work together to achieve them?
- What is the London manifesto and how can you use it?
- How can you influence candidates to support your priorities?
Election campaigns are a national conversation about priorities. While most attention is on competing candidates and Brexit, the election is also a chance for you to draw attention to issues in your community, tell politicians what you want and get their support.
Key facilitators / presenters:
- Titus Alexander, Democracy Matters – top tips for influencing
- Matt Scott, LVSC – update on London manifesto
- Women’s Resource Centre / ROTA
- Community Sector Coalition – update on manifesto (tbc)
- David Wilcox, Social Reporter- Networked City / Connecting Londoners
- Newspeak House fellows – Josh; Edward tbc
- Just Space – Richard Lee tbc
We will have refreshments, small groups discussions and a plenary to share ideas and get support for what you want out of the election.
Come along and get support for what you want politicians to do for your community and for London.
Please book so that we get enough refreshments for you!
Register ↗Come and celebrate three years of WebRoots Democracy by attending this year’s anniversary event: take back ctrl: digital democracy, post-brexit
After the ground-breaking referendum last June, we will be looking at the future of digital democracy in the UK, setting out WebRoots Democracy’s next steps, and bringing together those in the democratic participation and civic tech fields.
Register ↗A drinks reception to celebrate the launch of Jamie Bartlett’s new book Radicals.
Based on two years of field work, Radicals follows the people and ideas of outsider political movements, from psychedelic pioneers searching for oneness to futurists promising immortality to anarcho-capitalists founding new nations to communes trying to create a new model for life. As the mainstream of politics seems to hollow out, Radicals poses the question: are these groups the future of politics?
Join for drinks and snacks, perhaps even some very light conversation about politics that is definitely not business as usual.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Technologists + History of Technology = History Hack
History Hack is an experiment to see what happens when you get technologists to read classics from the history of technology. Before each episode we’ll all read a text. Then we will meet up for a hack where we use the ideas from the reading to build amazing new things.
Episode 1 starts with an absolute classic: Langdon Winner’s essay “Do Artifacts Have Politics?” Winner explores a radical idea: technologies aren’t neutral inanimate objects. They have political agendas just like humans do. The essay totally reshaped the field. Let’s explore how it can reshape the way we build things.
Read the essay. Then come to Newspeak ready to brainstorm and be creative.
Register ↗Journalist and filmmaker Billie JD Porter (BBC3, Channel 4, Vice) and ThinkNation invite you to an urgent summit addressing the state of political engagement across the UK.
It is a critical time for people across the UK, and on June 8, a decision will be made by all those who choose to vote. The third major vote in two years, constituents across all generations are said to already be ‘fatigued’ by the prospect of once again returning to the polling booth, but young people’s future remains at stake.
The event will be opened with the screening of “USE YOUR VOICE” - a short film that explores political disenfranchisement of the younger generation.
The film will be followed by a series of short interviews live on stage with Summit host Billie, mixed with talks and audience discussions with thought leaders across media, education, politics. Crucially, young people will be speaking on behalf of themselves.
Our agenda is not to sway people’s vote, but to call a state of emergency in encouraging young people TO vote.
This isn’t about party politics. This is much more important.
CONFIRMED PARTICIPANTS:
- Lord Jim Knight (ex Labour MP)
- Abi Wilkinson (The Guardian)
- Danny Fahey (Thirty Pound Gentleman)
- Hannah Clare (Chair of the Young Green Party)
- Simon Childs (Home Affairs Editor, Vice UK)
- Mhairi Fraser (Director at Conservative Future Women and Parliamentary Assistant)
- Mete Coban (Founder My Life My Say)
- Shelly Asquith (Vice President Welfare National Union of Students)
- Kathryn Corrick (Founder Represents)
- Areeq Chowdhury (Chief Executive, WebRoots Democracy)
- Kenny Imafidon (Young Political Commentator)
- Jim Waterson (Political Editor Buzzfeed UK)
- Gemma Styles (Writer / Digital Influencer)
- Anna Rose Barker (Chair British Youth Council)
- Liv Little (Editor-in-Chief gal-dem)
- Isaiah Hull (writer and perfomer)
Schedule (subject to change)
6:45pm: Doors open for registration
7:00pm: Welcome by “Use Your Voice” event host, Billie JD Porter, who will also be joined onstage by some of the young people from “Use Your Voice” video
7:10pm: Screening of “Use Your Voice”
7:20pm-7:35pm: In Conversation: Billie talks with three of the young people from the video exploring what they learnt from their Brexit experience, and how they are engaging with GE2017
7:35-8:00pm: “Why do young people feel especially disconnected from politics?” Panel discussion followed by audience Q&A
8:00-8:30pm: “Should politics be taught at secondary school?” Panel discussion followed by audience Q&A
8.30-8.55pm: “How can we make sense of politics in the new media age?” Panel discussion followed by audience Q&A
8.55pm-9.20pm “Shouldn’t politics belong to everyone?” Panel discussion followed by audience Q&A9:20pm: Launch of Use Your Voice: The Toolkit. Billie is joined by with three young people who will explain why the Toolkit is important.
9:30pm: Networking/drinks
10:00pm: Finish
Register ↗We’ll start with a short presentation on how the Ethical Framework is currently imagined - how it works, how it gets built, how it can be used.
Then we’ll get some proposals for ethical dilemmas that we can explore - choose two or three, and explore the ethical issues they raise - and work out the Ethical propositions that capture these issues.
We’ll make linkages between these, look for patterns that underly and unify them, perhaps, discuss their characteristics (what specifics of the problem affect how they apply? Do they interact with other issues? What is their relative importance?).
We’ll explore using Kumu to capture and represent all of this, and see how we can link these issues together, beginning to see what a network of ethical propositions looks like.
Register ↗On the 11th of May, each councils will release a document called a Statements of Persons Nominated, which details the candidates for the upcoming election. We need to manually enter this information into a database so that more useful things can be done with it. Come and help!
Register ↗Newspeak House Fellow Alex Parsons went to TicTec 2017, the Impacts of Civic Technology Conference focused on the impact that civic technology and digital democracy are having on citizens, decision makers and governments around the world.
At this event he will talk a bit about what he learned there.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗An evening of short talks and conversations around Parliament, data and democracy.
If you’re a librarian, statistician, academic, historian, technologist, designer or just interested please come along.
Register ↗Rob Blackie talks about elections.
The rough agenda will be:
- Why seats matter more than votes
- The numbers that matter: Electorate, turnout, hard vs. soft voters
- The two PIGs that drive campaigns (Persuasion, identification, getting out the vote)
- Which voters matter most?
- Messaging
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Come and join us this Saturday to collaborate in the creation of online and offline tools to support voters to access the information they need to decide who to vote for in GE2017.
We can think of 4 themes to work around that might provide a useful focus for the day but are happy to hear other proposals at the start of the event when we’ll use an ‘OpenSpace’ approach to chose what topics to work on. This builds on much of the work that’s been happening in the past days and weeks.
We invite people with skills in UI, digital, data, political science, activism, media and communications to join us for a co-design session to build on and contribute to a range of initiatives which aim to build a progressive alliance and enable data-informed tactical voting on 8 June.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗OpenIDEO is a global community working together to design solutions for the world’s biggest challenges. Come along to the launch of the London Outpost if you want to:
- Use design thinking for issues you care about.
- Exchange ideas with people everywhere.
- Help projects get off the ground.
- Connect with others in your community.
As well as introducing you to OpenIDEO London we will use Human-Centred Design to tackle a current challenge: How Can We Provide Higher Education for Refugees?
Draft Agenda:
- 6.30pm Poster Session
- 7.00pm Welcome and Introduction to OpenIDEO London
- 7.30pm Challenge: How Can We Provide Higher Education for Refugees?
- 9.30pm Community Development
- 10.00pm Close
Keep abreast of developments by following @OpenIDEOLondon on Twitter.
Register ↗Ludum Dare is a global event where you create a game from scratch in a weekend based on a theme. The theme is voted on by the community and revealed at the beginning of the jam.
There will be:
- Lightning fast internet speeds
- Showers
- 24 hour access
- Free food and drink
- Optional self-care activites
- Tables and chairs
What to bring to a game jam:
- A laptop and charger
- Pens, paper, whiteboards - whatever you need to get creative
- A sleeping bag and a pillow
- A matt or blow-up mattress
Money from ticket sales will all go towards providing free food and drink. If you are a student or unemployed and cannot afford a ticket get in touch at r.carbomascarell (at) gmail (dot) com.
Learn more about Ludum Dare: http://ludumdare.com/
Register ↗Register: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ludum-dare-game-jam-at-newspeak-house-tickets-32981465451
In the past months, speculation over whether Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg will run for president has intensified. After the Trump victory, nothing of this sort seems impossible. Would such a shift establish a democratic tech utopia - or would it marginalise dissent in a way unseen even in 20th century dictatorships?
LightClock presents: ZUCKERBERG 2020?
Join us for our panel debate and our provocative games over drinks.
Panelists include:
- Anoosh Chakelian (senior writer; New Statesman)
- Brandon Jackson (creative technologist; Kano)
- Tom Paskhalis (statistics of political social media; London School of Economics).
- Game master: Sarah Stein Lubrano (The School of Life)
- Moderator: Anna Gát (founder, LightClock)
There’s going to be a UK General Election on Thurs 8 June.
Last time around, Democracy Club — a non-partisan group of technologists — used digital tech to help voters get better informed about their candidates. We reached millions of voters.
This time, there’s lots more stuff we can do — with your help! And we want more ideas!
This will be an open space session where we get together to talk data infrastructure, how we use that data, how we know what voters want, how we can use it, test it, research it.
Everyone is welcome — from activists to designers to techies — so long as you’re willing to do stuff!
A quick first draft of our plans, questions, resources etc is going in this Google Doc: https://goo.gl/8WtZvc
Not in London? Organise your own meetup and add it here: https://goo.gl/Mbbo2p Tweet it @democlub and we’ll help publicise it!
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Freedom of Information and Openness - why bother? The past, present and future of transparency in the UK
This event looks at why politicians push openness, how they try and back out of it and what happens once the policies are in place. It will look across FOI and Open Data in the UK and offer some thoughts on what may happen to the transparency agenda with Brexit.
Speakers
- Dr Ben Worthy, Birkbeck College, University of London
- Martin Rosenbaum, BBC, FOI expert
The discussion coincides with the publication of Ben’s new book on this topic, ‘The Politics of Freedom of Information: How and Why Governments Pass Laws That Threaten Their Power’. The first chapter is available online here.
Register ↗Tom Steinberg (@steiny) has decided to start a book club/reading group for Newspeak House folk and their most thoughtful friends.
The club will focus on books that relate to politics, activism, techno-social change, the news media, government innovation and failure.
This month we will be reading Red Plenty by Francis Spufford
Expect strong characters, a fascinating fact/fiction hybrid, Leninist dogma, and linear programming.
Register ↗Drop tom an email to [email protected] so he knows you’re interested.
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We’re meeting up to hear about what’s new with decentralised apps, the Redecentralize Radar and have some drinks!
What is redecentralization?
We’re at the start of a new information revolution. The last one was the printing press.
It took centuries for us to work out how to use print fairly. Concepts like copyright, the novel and libraries were formed, which we all take for granted now.
Although it seems like lots has happened… personal computers, the world wide web, smart phones… Really, it’s only just begun.
The original Internet was decentralized. Anyone could set up parts of it. That’s why it won.
For various reasons, control of our information technologies is increasingly falling into a few hands. Some big companies and Governments.
We want it to become decentralized. Again.
Register ↗Join ORG London for a discussion with ORG Legal Director Myles Jackman and feminist pornographer and sexual liberties campaigner Pandora Blake, about the Digital Economy Bill and what it could mean for you.
Myles Jackman who once described online pornography as “the canary in the coalmine of free speech” and is best known for his cutting edge practice in obscenity law and sexual freedom of expression.
Pandora campaigns for sexual freedom, read her Guardian article about the Bill link
Find out more about the Bill link
Register ↗Meeting for volunteers for Generation Rent and lettingfees.co.uk to update and expand the database of letting fees ahead of the consultation on letting fees.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The sell out corn-based snack event of the quarter is back. It’s Wine and Wotsits time.
You say wot?
That’s right, there aren’t enough wotsits in Campaigners lives, so a few times a year we co-ordinate people coming together to share some of their successes. It’s a pecha kucha format, which means approx 5 presentations of 20 slides, each lasting 20 seconds.
It will be an opportunity to hear from cutting edge speakers doing exciting things. Previous speakers include those from Save the Children, Shelter, WWF, Unlock Democracy, Which?, Change.org, National Autistic Society, Care2 and many more. If you have something you’d love to talk about, please let us know!
Who is speaking?
We will be unveiling our full speaker line up over the coming week but it includes
- Penelope Gibbs - Director at Transform Justice on Herding cats- how one campaigner tried to persuade the criminal justice sector to reframe it’s messaging
- Jess Day - Campaigner, Let Toys be Toys
- Laura Osborne - Head of Corporate Affairs, Which?
- Rachel Collinson - Donor Whisper for most of the big charities you have ever come across!
- … and more to come.
How many tickets are there?
A limited number, we generally have a waitlist, so sign up early. We try and fit in as many people as we can.
How does it work?
You show up with whatever you want to drink (wine, fizz, non alcoholic, whatever takes your fancy), we provide the wotsits and some cups. You have a great evening. It’s deliberately timed to allow people to come straight from work.
Wot you waiting for? #wineandwotsits
Register ↗Join us for the launch of the OpenOwnership Register: an open data register of global beneficial ownership, in the public interest.
The revelations of the Panama Papers have shown that anonymous company ownership bears an unacceptably high cost for society and business. On the anniversary of this game-changing leak, we are launching a tool that will bring information about who owns companies out into the open. By linking beneficial ownership data from worldwide corporate registries and other sources, and by providing a clear, consistent mechanism for data collection, the OpenOwnership Register will help reveal the transnational connections between people and companies and build a culture of corporate transparency.
Get a first look at the pilot version of the OpenOwnership Register.
Take a tour of the platform and learn how it will enable governments to crack down on crime, allow companies to verify who they are really doing business with and empower civil society to investigate and campaign against injustice.
The launch will be webcast worldwide. We welcome your questions before or during the launch on the Twitter hashtag #OpenOwnership or via email to [email protected].
Speakers
- Chair: José M. Alonso, Director of Digital Citizenship, the World Wide Web Foundation
- Maggie Murphy, Senior Global Advocacy Manager, Transparency International
- May Miller-Dawkins, Senior Global Advocacy Manager, The B Team
- Zosia Sztykowski, Project Coordinator, OpenOwnership
This live event will be streamed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckC_EIvny9U
Register ↗Timed to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the Panama Papers leaks, this event will convene a range of journalist, data/tech and civil society actors to share research and findings released in the year since the leaks, share plans and brainstorm collective actions to make progress.
Programme:
- 8:30 Registration
- 9:00 Introduction, by Gerard Ryle, Director, ICIJ
- 9:15 – 10:45 MiddleMen, Mansions & Maseratis: new research and tools
-
- Drew Sullivan, OCCRP on brand new leaks
-
- Max Heywood, Transparency International on brand new research on money laundering through luxury goods
-
- Zosia Sztykowski, OpenOwnership on new tools
-
- Rachel Davies, Transparency International UK on property
-
- Oliver Bullough, journalist on getting the money back
- 10:45 – 11:15 Networking break
- 11:15 – 1:15 Pitches and plans
-
- Naomi Hirst, Global Witness on golden visas
-
- Nick Mathiason, Finance Uncovered on tax disclosure
-
- Madeleine McCarroll, B Team on Ownership Transparency
-
- Robert Palmer, Open Data Charter on what next
-
- Emma Prest and Rishi Kumar, Datakind on data science in investigations
-
- Alix Dunn, The Engine Room on support for making the right data/tech choices in projects
- 1:15 – 1:30 Wrap-up
- 1:30 – 2:00 Lunch
• Ever found yourself stuck behind a corporate desk wondering what happened to your dreams of changing the world?
• Ever wondered how to leverage the resources of your company for global justice causes?
• Ever wanted to meet other young professionals with a similar passion for doing good?
EA Workplace Activism is a new project aimed at answering these questions - we use the power of our workplaces to maximise our positive impact, and help others do the same. You can make a real difference within and through your company - come and find out how at this informal, discussion-based event. Tickets are free via Eventbrite. We have a few speakers:
• Jo Macrae (GiveDirectly & former Head of UK Humanitarian Policy). Speaking about GiveDirectly’s pioneering work to administer direct cash transfers to the poorest households in East Africa.
• George Howlett (EA Workplace Activism/CEA). Giving an overview of our workplace activism to date, and discussing how we can leverage corporate resources for high-impact causes.
• Dr. David Reinstein (Exeter University Business School). David’s innovative ‘Give-if-you-Win’ initiative seeks to raise charitable donations from corporate bonus pools, via asking people to commit amounts in advance.
- 12:00-13:20 Intro to Effective Altruism workshop
- 13:20-14:00 Lunch (separately ticketed)
- 14:00-17:00 Workplace Activism Launch
- 14:10 Short talks on workplace activism
- 14:50 Discussion on workplace activism
- 15:20 Break
- 15:40 Activism brainstorming & planning
- 16:40 End + feedback + stay for a drink
This event will be the pre-launch the effective altruism workplace handbook: http://eaworkplaceactivism.org/handbook-overview/
Register ↗How can machine learning affect the political process?
Short talks, followed by drinks & discussion.
Miles Brundage - Research Fellow at the University of Oxford’s Future for Humanity Institute and a PhD candidate at Arizona State University in Human and Social Dimensions of Science and Technology. His research is focused on policy challenges in artificial intelligence. He is also affiliated with the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes (CSPO), the Virtual Institute of Responsible Innovation (VIRI), and the Journal of Responsible Innovation (JRI). Miles will be talking about progress in AI and its long-term policy implications.
If you’d be interested in speaking at this or future meetups, please contact Shad.
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aiandpolitics/
Register ↗Due to strong demand, registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ai-politics-episode-iii-tickets-32469821109
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗What we believe about the world affects the decisions we make every day, whether we are citizens or presidents. Bad information means bad decisions, and it corrodes trust. Join us and our special guests on the 27th of March at Newspeak House in London to discuss fake news and the misinformation ecosystem, and how best to respond.
The Panel
- Richard Allan, Vice President Public Policy EMEA at Facebook
- Peter Barron, Vice President Communications and Public Affairs EMEA at Google
- Rob Owers, Head of News Partnerships EMEA at Twitter
- Jenni Sargent, Managing Director at First Draft News
- Will Moy, Director at Full Fact
The Host
Bill Thompson, BBC
The Event
Full Fact is the UK’s leading factchecking charity, and has been at the forefront of automated factchecking. We’ve been to a lot of events about fake news recently, but none quite provided the opportunity for people to hear directly from the key players. So we organised this. We hope you enjoy the evening. The event will be live streamed. You can follow the Full Fact twitter account on the night for the live feed. Tickets are free. However, Full Fact is a charity, so if you would like to donate we would be very grateful.
Tickets will be released in batches:
First batch released on Weds March 15th at noon
Second batch released on Weds March 22nd at noon
Register ↗Register: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/full-fact-presents-not-the-fake-news-tickets-32541136415
An evening for all freelancers to learn about setting up cooperatives.
Self-employment is booming in the capital. Freelancing can be liberating, but all too often this comes at a price: isolation, precariousness and insecure pay.
Join us for an evening of discussion, meeting like-minded freelancers, and hearing from speakers including Pat Conaty and Alex Bird (Co-operatives UK), and Kayleigh Walsh (Outlandish - a tech cooperative of freelancers).
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Come to the launch of “The Mask and The Flag: Populism, Citizenism and Global Protest” by Dr Paolo Gerbaudo, Lecturer in Digital Culture and Society at King’s College London.
From the Arab Spring to the Spanish Indignados, from Occupy Wall Street in New York to Nuit Debout in Paris, contemporary protest bears the mark of citizenism, a libertarian and participatory brand of populism which appeals to ordinary citizens outraged at the arrogance of political and financial elites in the wake of the Great Recession.
The book draws from 140 interviews with activists and live witnesses of occupations and demonstrations to explore the new politics nurtured by the movement of the squares of 2011-16 and its reflection of an exceptional phase of crisis and social transformation.
- 7:30 Paolo will present his book and discuss the relevance of the progressive populism of the 2011 occupy wave for contemporary politics
- 8:00 Response by journalist and author Dan Hancox
- 8:30 Debate
- 9:00 Drinks & mingling, and the chance to buy signed copies of the book.
Sarah Kavanagh from the National Union of Journalists will be joined by Pam Cowburn, Open Rights Group’s Communications Director, to discuss the implications of the proposed Espionage Act.
Join us for a discussion and Q&A followed by a trip to the Brewdog pub next door.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Tom Steinberg (@steiny) has decided to start a book club/reading group for Newspeak House folk and their most thoughtful friends.
The club will focus on books that relate to politics, activism, techno-social change, the news media, government innovation and failure.
I’ve decided to rocket forward from the 19th century to the 21st, looking at a book that’s mainly about the lessons from the Bernie Sanders campaign: https://goo.gl/Jg0aIW
Register ↗Drop tom an email to [email protected] so he knows you’re interested.
If you’re involved in Another Europe Is Possible, or an allied or interested campaign, feel free to join us for an evening of fun, politics and socialising.
We’ll have a quick presentation about what Another Europe is doing - including our fight against hard Brexit, campaigns for free movement and migrants’ rights, and Stop Trump. Exciting speaker TBA.
And then we’ll spend the rest of the evening getting to know each other and having a nice time.
Please make sure to get a ticket through the Eventbrite in order to give us an idea of actual numbers.
Register ↗We invite you, whether you’re in London or afar, to a weekend of learning, making, and doing to advance Open Research Data. The event is hosted by SPARC and the NIH as part of an international celebration for Open Data Day.
At its heart, Open Research Data is about making it easy for you and others to see, use and share data (to find out more, read this). This simple idea is powering some of the largest breakthroughs of our time and our event aims to celebrate and accelerate the power of Open Research Data.
We invite you, whether new or old to Open Research Data, scholar or citizen, in London or across the globe, to join us for this weekend to make, hack, contribute, try, teach, design, test, learn (or just about anything!) in the name of Open Research Data.
In London, we’ll provide fast wifi, power (both for your laptops and your bodies) and a program that will spark ideas and collaborations for the weekend.
If you can’t make it to London, join us online from wherever you are. We’ll be documenting and discussing ideas before, during, and after the event for remote participants. As a remote participant, expect to be able to pitch and discuss your ideas for the weekend with all attendees!
Program
Each day will run 9am - 6pm. We’ll provide breakfast, lunch, and snacks (including coffee, of course) with informal dinner & drinks each evening. The program is designed to be lightweight and flexible to allow the maximum time for doing.
Day one
- 9-10 am: Breakfast
- 10-12 am: Introductions & opening / pitches
- 12-1 pm: Lunch
- 1-6pm: Working with occasional lightning talks
Day two
- 9-10 am: Breakfast
- 10-12 am: Working with occasional lightning talks
- 12-1 pm: Lunch
- 1-6 pm: Working with occasional lightning talks
Ideas for the Weekend
We’re organizing ideas & more details on the program here. It’s up for you to decide how you spend the weekend, but if you’re short on ideas, here are some of ours:
- Trying to find / reuse an open data set
- Building engaging (and open) visualizations of open research data
- Adding some field-specific examples to Data Carpentry lessons
- Building a software library (Python module/ R package/ Ruby gem etc.) to facilitate access to and processing of open data from specific sources
- Building a set of Wikidata SPARQL queries for a specific field
- Harvesting data from the supplementary files of scholarly publications
- Participating in research-related activities that others are planning for Open Data Day
- A data-centric walk around the neighbourhood
- Improving documentation for any of the above
- Adding a “research data” section to the Open Data Handbook
- Improving Wikipedia pages around or with open research data
- Writing data management plans
- Writing data-centric grant proposals
- Make your own data FAIR
- Test out reproducible computational tools such as Binder, R-Shiny, CodeOcean [we can supply a list of resources]
- Prototype a tool to leverage the open datasets in eLife or in repositories (Zenodo, Dataverse, etc)
- Prototype a tool to make it easy for researchers to share/discover/consume comprehensive, open and FAIR data
- Devise a mechanism to incentivise deposition, review and reuse of datasets
EXPLORE OPEN COMPANY DATA & MAP CORPORATE NETWORKS
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism.
We’re turning the monthly FlashHacks into every few months to make sure we can accommodate more people & partner with NGOs. We’ll be releasing more information in the lead up to the event!
We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach. OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 125 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up as that will be our main port for communication and work: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗
Since the last People Before Pixels meetup, almost a year ago, a lot has happened politically and in how we design public sector services. But we’ve seen the rise of one question that now seems to dominates both: who do you work for?
The language we use to describe the people who use public sector services has been changing. ‘Human centred design’ has turned to ‘user experience’ and now to ‘designing for citizens’. How has this impacted the way we include people who use digital services? How do we talk about individual users as a group of people? And how do these groupings change our expectations of their behaviour? Will designing for citizens empower people using public sector services? What are the user needs for empowerment and how will we design for it?
Speaker: Rose Rees Jones @rosebotanic
I will be kickstarting a new round of monthly people before pixels with this discussion. This meetup welcomes anyone who is interested.
As always my fifteen minute talk will be followed lively conversation and drinks.
Doors: 6.30pm
Talk: 7.00pm
If you’d like to speak at this event or host a future event let me know: @rosebotanic, #pb4pixels
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗How can machine learning affect the political process?
Short talks, followed by drinks & discussion. Speakers TBC.
If you’d be interested in speaking at this or future meetups, please contact Shad.
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aiandpolitics/
Register ↗Due to strong demand, registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ai-politics-episode-ii-tickets-32095092285
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗An evening of short talks and conversations around Parliament, data and democracy.
If you’re a librarian, statistician, academic, historian, technologist, designer or just interested please come along.
Speakers
- Dan Barrett - head of data and search at Parliament Digital Service - www.twitter.com/dasbarrett
- Tony Hirst - Open Data Journalist https://www.twitter.com/psychemedia
- Michelle Isme - Product Manager @gdsteam working on open registers https://www.twitter.com/icoo
- Oli Hawkins - Statistical researcher at the House of Commons Library https://www.twitter.com/olihawkins
- Steve Goodrich - Senior Research Officer at Transparency International UK https://www.twitter.com/stevejgoodrich
- Megan Lucero - Director of the Data Lab at @TBIJ // Formerly Data Journalism Editor at @thetimes and @thesundaytimes https://www.twitter.com/megan_lucero
- James Smith - Head of @ODILabs, party leader of @havesomenew, founder of @CleanwebUK, and chair of @CDCSSGUK https://www.twitter.com/floppy
How can digital tools be used to make information on agriculture development funding more accessible, and more actionable?
Join us to hear pitches from expert developers from across the world - sharing their plans to use state-of-the-art technology to improve aid and agriculture data.
This session is a public culmination of a week-long tool accelerator. Hear insights from our panel of judges, and provide your questions and feedback through an audience-choice session.
About the Initiative for Open Ag Funding
The Initiative for Open Ag Funding supports efforts to tackle hunger and food insecurity by improving the availability and quality of agricultural investment data. We know that in 2014 roughly $8.3 billion of official development assistance (ODA) was disbursed for agricultural-related development. However, we cannot accurately say where it was spent, who benefited or what that assistance achieved.
The Initiative for Open Ag Funding is aimed at ensuring that agriculture and food security practitioners have the data they need to answer those questions, with the ultimate goal of increasing the effectiveness of efforts in the sector. By improving access to this data, organizations will be better able to coordinate, find partners, identify promising approaches and target their assistance.
To that end, we are hosting a four day tool development workshop where specialist software developers will explore agriculture-relevant data needs, and build a series of prototype tools to address them. These include:
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Improving the workflow for geocoding IATI data;
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Approaches to merge improvements into IATI data without requiring updates to publisher’s source systems;
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Improved API and query-tools for access to enhanced agriculture funding data;
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Greater awareness of IATI amongst key stakeholders;
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Improved user-friendly interfaces for access to open agriculture funding data.
Join us on the final day to hear the outcomes of the challenge, as the development teams present their ideas on how we can use data to tackle world hunger.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We are not the only sufferers of ugly referendums. In Colombia, a recent national vote to end a fifty year war with the FARC guerrillas failed by 50.2% to 49.8%.
Ed Maklouf has just returned from three months living with and studying the political processes of remote Colombian communities: the FARC guerrillas, indigenous Arhuaco indians and Amazonian indians, afrodescendiente communities, and citizens of Bogota, Cali, and Medellin.
Come and hear about the history of their local decision-making processes, how their communities understood and responded to the peace referendum, and Ed’s experiments augmenting their politics with new technology. A talk followed by discussion.
Ed is writing a book about consensus “Hands Up - the history of voting” and is the founder of Gather, a social impact startup that makes democracy tech for citizen science, citizen reporting, and voting/consensus. He studied group communication at Stanford University, developed the Siine Keyboard, and now aims to improve collective agreements using both technology and historical research.
Register ↗- Workshop: 1pm-5pm
- Meetup: Digital Democracy & EU (drinks and pizza!) 5pm-7pm
How well are we using online and digital technology to take part in politics? Do platforms already exist for engaging with politics from a local to European level, or do we need to create something new? If so what, and how?
Bring your ears and your ideas to explore with others which online tools/platforms could be most powerful for people to engage with politicians and help you get your opinions heard where it matters.
You’ll have the opportunity to meet a variety of international people with expertise in the field of digital democracy, but we want to hear your expertise too. We hope you will develop thoughts and ideas about how you would like to engage in politics and input your ideas - whether you know a little or a lot!
Be part of an international programme - this event is part of a series being run in Paris, Iceland, Latvia, Slovenia, Amsterdam, Athens and Brussels as part of a European Commission funded investigation into how best to engage people with legislation making. It aims to explore the tools available and crowdsource the requirements for engaging citizens.
How do we give power to the people - could digital democracy be the answer? Be part of deciding the future. Priority on the waitlist for tickets will be given to people aged 30 and under.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗How can machine learning affect the political process?
Short talks, followed by drinks & discussion.
https://etherpad.net/p/AI+Politics
Speakers:
Jonathan Penn - Jonnie Penn is a doctoral candidate and Rausing, Williamson and Lipton scholar at the University of Cambridge. His current research explores the history of artificial intelligence, 1950-69.
Dhruv Ghulati - Dhruv is the CEO and Co-Founder of Factmata, an artificial intelligence startup solving the problem of automatic fact checking, rumour detection and fake news detection using natural language processing. Dhruv will be talking about the role of fact checking and fake news in today’s society.
Sam Applebee - Sam is the founder of Super Global, a social enterprise connecting humanitarian projects with expert technologists. At AI startup Satalia he explores the role of organisational purpose for AI companies. He holds an MSc in Global Governance. Sam will talk about openings for AI-stack technologies in civil society, and pose some challenges to cooperation.
Others TBC. If you’d be interested in speaking at this or future meetups, please contact Shad.
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aiandpolitics/
Register ↗Due to strong demand, registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ai-politics-episode-i-tickets-31060675316
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The Housing crisis is a ‘wicked’ problem, with multiple causes and effects. Clearly though, a key piece of the puzzle lies in the way we finance the development of new homes. Throughout much of the 20th century, we have largely been dependent on the speculative land development to finance the delivery of new homes, typically financed by short-term loans from major banks.
As that model becomes increasingly less viable in many areas, as other diverse modes of development grow and as digital technology allows more kinds of lending and contract-making, what new innovative models can we imagine to finance homes and neighbourhoods in the 21st century?
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Through hundreds of Freedom of Information requests, Debt Resistance UK have obtained a dataset of LOBO loan contracts. These are risky and expensive loans miss-sold to local authority by financial institutions, to the detriment of public services.
We’ve already processed much of the information, but by opening it up to others we can realise its value. So join us on the hack day, to make new analyses or visualisations, to help complete the dataset or just to get to know others working on pressing issues in local finance.
All of the data will be published online. Some is already there. See the council of Newham as an example: http://lada.debtresistance.uk/local-authorities/newham/
People with all kinds of skillsets are welcome. We will provide clear step-by-step guides on how to participate for those who prefer it.
People in London are getting together at Newspeak House, but the hackathon will be run online so you can participate from any part of the country as long as you have an internet connection.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗To avoid over-crowding, entrance will be strictly limited to people who »»» sign up in advance «««
This event is the second of a series of joint meetups between GlobalNet21 and London Futurists.
An important debate over ethical principles has become overdue. Should the widespread disruptions of the digital age alter our conceptions about morality and ethics? Which ethical principles from previous eras should we continue to uphold (perhaps with extra urgency)? Are there new considerations and realisations that we would want to inform our decisions about the future of technology and the future of humanity? In such discussions, what should our starting point be?
Rapidly advancing technology is placing within our reach unprecedented power to remake human bodies, human minds, and human society. Age-old constraints and limitations are being swept aside. But just because we now have the opportunity to remould human character, it does not follow that we should take these steps. If our viewpoint is too short-sighted, or too techno-centric, we might miss the bigger picture. We might edit key features of human nature in ways we’ll soon come to regret. Like King Midas of old, we may discover that our wishes have devastatingly bad consequences.
This is no mere academic discussion. It has profound real-world consequences. Engineers are awaiting input from philosophers for the “moral guidance” modules of powerful new robots and AIs. Politicians, likewise, are looking around for assistance in drafting legislation governing new technology. What advice should we be offering?
The panellists:
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Dr. Stephen Minger, former Chief Scientist, GE Healthcare Life Sciences, and former Senior Lecturer in Stem Cell Biology at Kings College London
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Others to be announced
About London Futurists:
From http://www.meetup.com/London-Futurists/
This group is for people who are interested in the future and maybe want to help shape it.
The acceleration of technology means that the near future may bring radical changes to all of us. Major developments in technologies like anti-aging, nanotech, genetics, computing, robotics, and geo-engineering are going to make the next few years very exciting - and possibly also very dangerous. We could gain god-like powers - but we might also lose sight of our humanity, and destroy everything that we used to hold dear.
What’s your view? Are things improving? Too slowly or too quickly? Are we are entering a new golden age? Or is the potential “Technological Singularity” something to fear? What does it mean to talk about “Human 2.0” and “Humanity+”? Or perhaps you view such talk as techno-hype? Maybe you just like the practical side of technology and want to find out more about possible paradigm shifts?
Anybody is welcome to this group - you don’t have to be a Techno Geek or work for some futuristic company to be in our group. The future applies to us all!
Come join in the debate - have your opinions voiced and maybe make some interesting new friends.
All we ask is that members treat each other with the respect they would want for themselves. Our group has members of many ages and backrounds. We have many different perspectives on what the future may bring and like to share different ideas with each other. We approach the future with a open mind and sense of humility. Our group mission is to introduce you to some of the ideas, advancements and people who are making our future happen today.
About GlobalNet21:
From http://www.meetup.com/GlobalNet21/:
“GlobalNet21 is the leading forum in the UK for discussing the major issues in the 21st Century. We share a common concern for the sustainability of both our planet and the people on it. With almost 20,000 network members in the UK and abroad, we are making the debate, and democracy, more accessible by enlarging the Public Square and using social networks.
“As well as a network of individuals we have also set up a collaborative network of organisations to exchange good practice and transfer knowledge so that we can learn from each other. This network is cross boundary and includes local authorities, housing associations, universities, community groups and social enterprises. Our aim is through dialogue to celebrate diversity and develop community self-resilience and sustainability at a time of unprecedented social and environmental change.”
Register ↗To avoid over-crowding, entrance will be strictly limited to people who »»» sign up in advance «««
A consortium of voluntary sector funders are soliciting a major review of local level activity, particularly as regards to digital strategy. Come and contribute to the report in the first of a series of facilitated workshops, where we will review examples of innovative projects and present new user research for discussion.
In this session, we’ll look at “Slipham”, a project simulating a fictional London borough.
Our previous workshop in May at the Centre for Ageing Better was attended by 45 people from over 30 organisations, and focused on how we could help older people discover the ecosystem of digital services aimed at improving their wellbeing.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Come to the second of our series of talks given by members of the Open Rights Group community.
Ever since the Snowden revelations in June 2013 there has been a growing awareness of the depth and breadth of the data we generate and how it renders us into ever more traceable objects of surveillance. The profoundly asymmetrical, political economic dimensions of the production and circulations of data have led to deeply problematic power relations wherein every keystroke, website visited or application downloaded are now rich sites of potential surplus value. With the proliferation of mobile platforms, digital footprints are expanding rapidly, especially those of young people. More…
Speaker: Jennifer Pybus, Senior Lecturer in Advertising at London College of Communication
There will time for a Q&A afterwards before we de-camp to the pub. Please come along and bring any interested friends.
Register ↗Food, drink & festivities! Come and celebrate the end of a very long year.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗This month we will be learning how to scrape data from the web using Nightmare.js, a node.js-based browser automation library.
Make sure to bring a laptop, as we will be following a tutorial together as a group. No programming experience is required.
After the tutorial, we will be staying in Newspeak House for an early Christmas party to celebrate the end of the year. Since we have no sponsor this month, it’s BYOB (Bring Your Own Beer or other beverage). There’s an off-licence a few doors down.
Be sure to check out the collaborative hackpad and add links to cool data journalism-related stuff you’ve seen in the last month for the show & tell section!
Schedule:
- 7:00 Doors open
- 7:30 Show & tell
- 7:45 Tutorial
- 9:00 Christmas party!
Have ideas about what we should cover next year? Add them here.
Register ↗Dr Shamil Chandaria will lead a discussion on:
- Understanding longevity trends
- The science of life extension
- The importance of developing super-wellbeing in conjunction with super-longevity and super-intelligence
- Social and economic implications of super-longevity
Shamil is a philosopher, entrepreneur and technology investor. He is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Philosophy within the School of Advanced Study at the University of London and Senior Advisor at Google DeepMind.
We’ll also have a talk from Katz Kiely on how we can better help people manage change and the importance of autonomy and a feeling of fairness in helping people thrive in change. Katz is a communication strategist who has worked with the UN, Ogilvy and other international organisations.
Exponential View events are hand-curated, participatory events tackling the most interesting and challenging questions of the day.
Your brains will be challenged and contribution expected, so we will serve dinner and drinks during the evening to keep you fuelled up.
Register ↗
Tom Steinberg (@steiny) has decided to start a book club/reading group for Newspeak House folk and their most thoughtful friends.
The club will meet once every 6 weeks, and will focus on books that relate to politics, activism, techno-social change, the news media, government innovation and failure.
Next up, a book about the moment when Britain truly became a democracy for the first time, and the amazingly tense and occasionally surreal events that it took to get us there. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, well, that’s absolutely perfect! That means you should really enjoy reading our second bookclub book ‘Perilous Question’ by Antonia Fraser.
Register ↗Drop tom an email to [email protected] so he knows you’re interested.
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Technological advance has long promised a world of leisure and liberation. Yet, embedded within class relations and capitalist production, for the mass of people automation has meant ever-intensifying exploitation.
Can technology’s revolutionary potential be captured for a different future, or will it remain wedded to the domination of capital?
Michael Roberts, radical economist and author of ‘The Long Depression’, discusses past and future technology in relation to the class struggle and capitalist crises.
Nick Srnicek, author of ‘Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work’, argues liberation can only be achieved through the acceleration of technological innovation.
Register ↗
Pol.is is currently in use by the vTaiwan initiative, through which hundreds of thousands have taken part in forming government policy on contentious issues such as regulation of Uber and AirBnB. Following the success of vTaiwan, Pol.is is now being experimented with by movements around the world. Attend this workshop to experiment with the platform and see what it can do.
More details tbc
Recommended reading:
- vTaiwan: Public Participation Methods on the Cyberunk Frontier of Democracy
- wiki.p2pfoundation.net/V-Taiwan_Process
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. Did you know that OpenCorporates has millions of records on non-profits and community contributors have created corporate groupings on them?
We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach. OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up as that will be our main port for communication and work: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Come to the first of our series of talks given by members of the ORG community.
We’ll be kicking off with a session on surveillance and totalitarianism in literature, and how the nightmarish world of George Orwell’s ‘1984’ can still be seen as relevant for the digital age. The talk will be lead by Dr. Simon Willmetts, lecturer in American Studies at the University of Hull.
There will time for a Q&A afterwards before we de-camp to the pub. Please come along and bring any interested friends.
Register ↗Artifical intelligence and deep learning are both interesting topics no matter where you choose to apply them. Many have thought of the considerations of AI in education, music, security and automation, but not a lot of practical thought has been put into AI and politics. At AI + Politics, we’re aiming to build politically disruptive AI. Though what does this mean? This could mean anything from an AI politician to a deep learning algorithm that changes people’s political persuasions over time.
Some of the tools you may consider using at this hack are Tensorflow, Keras, Alchemy & OpenCog.
Come along and build something with AI that will advance the inevitable robot apocalypse.
Register ↗Outlandish are a digital co-op, who this year decided to give away some of their hard-earned income to run a funding program (the Outlandish Fellowship) for grassroots tech for good projects.
Through running this program, a number of fundamental questions arose, such as:
- What are our shared values?
- How do we best use resources to promote the change we want to see?
- How do we define ‘good’?
- Why do accountants find it so difficult to grasp the idea of giving money away?
We’d like to explore these and other related questions with the broader tech for good community both as an input to building the community and to encourage enquiry and discovery. To do this we’re hosting an event to mark the end of the experiment that was the Outlandish Fellowship. This will be a space to discuss, reflect and have your ideas and opinions heard in a group setting.
This will be an interactive event, held by an experienced facilitator, and is designed to bring together and involve anyone who would self-identify as being involved in tech for good, be that as a hacktivist, startup founder, freelance developer, member of a charity/NGO, funding organisation or anyone else missing from this list.
We would especially like to hear the voices of the under-represented in this space, e.g. female / non-white / non-cis developers, and from non-techie people, e.g. activists / campaigners who rely on tech.
We will also hear from members of Outlandish on their experience of setting up the fellowship, why they didn’t just spend their surplus on Kickstarter projects, and how sociocracy and tools like Loomio were used in the process.
The event will finish with drinks, while we listen to some rapid talks from the creators of the projects that were funded by the fellowship: Balu, Beehive, CoPitch, Cyclestreets, HelpText and Project Tide.
We really look forward to seeing you there; please direct any questions you have about the event to Matt ([email protected]).
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Learn the LIVES data standard & lessons from scaling the standard in the US
What is LIVES?
The LIVES data standard presents restaurant inspection data from various jurisdictions in the same data standard, even if their score format differs. LIVES originated with the innovative public health and open data work of San Francisco and New York City, was coordinated with Yelp (the restaurant review website), and evolved from a 1.0 to a 2.0 standard in August, 2015. Over the last few years, the LIVES data standard launched restaurant inspection data in multiple open data portals and were ingested into restaurant information websites like Yelp. Governments use LIVES track, benchmark, and share their restaurant inspection data. A flexible and compelling open data standard, LIVES has lessons for anyone working with open data or in public health/food safety.
What will I learn?
At this workshop, you’ll learn the following:
- The basics of mapping to, implementing the LIVES data standard
- How to strategically engage stakeholders and potential data standard users
- Lessons from LIVES on developing and evolving successful data standards
- How data standards like LIVES can serve citizens AND governments, lowering costs, improving processes, and improving outcomes for citizens
Participants will receive:
- An interactive workshop on LIVES
- Access to LIVES best practices guide
- Slide deck for sharing LIVES with stakeholders
- One free hour of Smarter Civic consulting time (included in paid tickets)
- Post-workshop happy hour
Who is hosting the LIVES workshop?
Meet Sarah Schacht, principal consultant with Smarter Civic. Schacht is a two time foodborne illness survivor who created the 2.0 versioning of the LIVES data standard in coordination with other LIVES stakeholders like Yelp. Her work as Public Health Data Advisor at Socrata led 10 governments, from small cities to national agencies, through the implementation process of the LIVES data standard. With more than a decade of experience in open government, civic technology, and open data, Schacht’s a published author (Open Government, by O’Reilly Publishing), public speaker (including Open Knowledge Fest & Con), and advisor to civil society (Transparency and Accountability Initiative) and governments in the US and internationally.
Through Smarter Civic, Schacht brings lessons from evolving the LIVES data standard, scaling its use, and implementing the standard for government launch and private sector ingest.
Register ↗It’s the second Hackney Hack Night!
This time, we’re focusing on the care system.
Here’s roughly what we will do:
7pm - Share interesting news, databases, tools, project ideas. Find collaborators, if necessary.
8-10pm - Work time. Develop your ideas.
Things to bring
Laptop, pen and paper, or whatever tools you want to work with. Drinks & snacks to share!
What to do now
See what other people are interested in doing, and add any ideas you might have: https://hackpad.com/Hackney-Hack-Night-Carehack-JTuhbkHzoPK
Register ↗We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach.
OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. We’re switching things up this time and will be running an API workshop as well as an investigation into a large multi-national corporation.
1800 - 1900 INTRODUCTION TO OPENCORPORATES & CURRENT PROJECTS
1900 - 2045 CORPORATE NETWORK & GROUPINGS: Arcadia Group & much more
2045 - 21:30 PUBLISH CORPORATE NETWORKS
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up as that will be our main port for communication and work: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗
Newspeak House is a surveillance themed club that collects data on its members.
Let’s see if we can find out anything useful from the data.
Who should you connect with? What news story is most important to the community? Can we invent something to benefit decentralised communities everywhere?
Register ↗Attendance is limited so please Register Now
Join us in this meeting where we discuss how businesses can work with the voluntary and community organisations in our local areas and what is the best way to do that.
How can large and small businesses work with community groups and voluntary organisations to bring about social change? Is that possible and how can it be done?
This is the topic of this meeting where we will look at
• the current state of business (big and small) and its relationships with local communities, charitable and other organisations and debate if language and practices of CSR is enough.
• the changing and evolving perspectives and practices of micro and SME business and what does this suggest in terms of strengthening social responsibility expressed through cultivating good will with VC organisations/social groups in civil society
• Explore ways of overcoming challenges, possibilities/prospects for future action.
This will be a collaborative meeting with presentations and workshop activity offering Event Space, Advisory input, making connections and contacts to bring to event and sourcing possible speakers.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Comics, the Internet and Freedom of Information
If FOI sounds like a bit of a dry subject, prepare to have your expectations challenged. We’ll be looking at the stories, scandals and changes FOI has kickstarted around the world, as well as some of the more edgy requests. When does an FOI request become something more?
We’ll also welcome Finnish artists Siiri Viljakka and Lauri Tuomi-Nikula, who’ll be explaining how comics might just be the best medium for educating a new generation of FOI users, and how the internet could be the saviour of FOI – a fundamental human right that celebrates its 250th anniversary this year.
Register ↗
The launch of a month-long celebration of open source software. We’ll be kicking off at 18:30 with an introduction and a basic guide on GitHub, finding projects to support and submitting pull requests.
It’s simple! First sign up on the Hacktoberfest site. If you open up four pull requests between October 1 and October 31, you’ll win a free, limited edition Hacktoberfest T-shirt. (Pull requests do not have to be merged and accepted; as long as they’ve been opened between the very start of October 1 and the very end of October 31, they count towards a free T-shirt.)
No contribution is too small—bug fixes and documentation updates are valid ways of participating.
Connect with other Hacktoberfest participants (Hacktobefestants?) by using the hashtag, #Hacktoberfest, on your social media platform of choice.
Please read our Events Code of Conduct before attending as it will be enforced. You can find it here: http://hackcodeofconduct.org/hacktoberfestldn
Register ↗A recent report by the Open Data Institute recommended that Parliament focus on its data rather than building new tools.
There is a community that already exists - you! - that is building tools to make the business of Parliament appeal to normal people.
Parliamentary Digital Service has started to build the next iteration of a data service for Parliament. How can we make it better?
- What would you like us to do to so that you can appeal better to normal people?
- What data do you want from Parliament so that you can serve the user needs that you know about? Or the user needs that Parliament can’t (or shouldn’t) serve?
- How do you use data from Parliament at the moment (if at all)?
- What formats do you want?
- What data from other organisations would you like to link Parliament’s data with?
- How should we communicate what we are doing?
People attending from Parliament:
- Dan Barrett - head of data and search - @dasbarrett
- Samu Lang - technical lead
- Michael Smethurst - data architect - @fantasticlife
- Julie Byrne - development lead - @julietouring
- Ganesh Senthi - product manager - @gansenthi
- Rebecca Appleyard - software engineer - @rklappleyard
Collaborate document here: https://etherpad.net/p/nwspkParliamentDataWorkshop
Register ↗
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗About Humanising Tech: Humanising Tech is a community of 700+ UK-based researchers, technologists, therapists and industries practitioners interested in the convergence of human cognition, social behaviour, data analysis, artificial intelligence and mental health. We believe in making better AI products by better understanding humans.
Spectacular advances have been made in computing recently, with topics like Deep Learning regularly grabbing the headlines. However we still have a lot to learn about the human psyche, starting with interpreting our own - sometimes elusive - emotive and cognitive processes, before such technologies can become truly integrated into human-computer interfaces and useful in our day-to-day lives. Humanising Tech regularly hosts multidisciplinary lectures and meetups. We promote research and collaborations. On the long term, we hope to facilitate the creation exponential technologies, experiments and experiences that improve human understanding and human well-being.
About this event: Although they have historically been regarded as diseases, neurological differences (including for example Dyspraxia, Dyslexia, ADHD, Dyscalculia, Autistic Spectrum, Tourette Syndrome, etc.) are increasingly recognised and respected as any other kind of human variation. Neurodiversity activists reject the idea that Autism, amongst others, should be cured, advocating instead for celebrating autistic forms of self-expression.
At Humanising Tech, we are always looking for ways to transcend the limitations of our “normative” brains and stretch our imagination. We have therefore invited friends from Auticon, the UCL, Status Today and more to help us think of challenges and opportunities around Autism, and reflect on the idea of neurodiversity.
We will ask them what do we know about how autistic people’s brains are wired? How do autistic people experiences differ from other people? Can technology help reduce misunderstandings between autistic and non-autistic people? Will understanding autistic people’s brains help us design better AI products? And, generally speaking, what can people with “normative” brain learn from autistic people?
Speakers and panellists:
- Ray Cole, CEO Auticon
- Dr. Anna Remington, Assistant Professor @ UCL Centre for Autism and Education
- Penelope Bellegarde, Data consultant and Analytics Lead
- Ankur Modi, CEO Status Today
A discussion of the tools for Direct Digital Democracy, inspired by the accomplishments in Taiwan and Spain as well as tools that could help the grass-root movement Momentum UK.
Speakers
- Colin Megillcolin-magil (CEO & co-founder Pol.is) – The only way is Taiwan – the winning powers of Pol.is
- Dr Paolo Gerbaudo (Director Digital Culture Research Centre at Kings College London) author of “The Tweets & The Streets” –Podemos: 3 lessons from Spain
- Alena Ivanova (Momentum Tower Hamlets) Organiser for the New Economy Network
- Dr Richard Barbrook (Centre for Study of Democracy, Westminster University and Cybersalon.org) Author of “The Net Model of Media Freedom”
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Tom Steinberg (@steiny) has decided to start a book club/reading group for Newspeak House folk and their most thoughtful friends.
The club will meet once every 6 weeks, and will focus on books that relate to politics, activism, techno-social change, the news media, government innovation and failure.
The first book, selected by Tom, will be Bury the Chains by Adam Hochschild. Thereafter we can debate what books to choose in a more democratic fashion.
Register ↗Drop tom an email to [email protected] so he knows you’re interested.
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗To avoid over-crowding, entrance will be strictly limited to people who »»» sign up in advance «««
This event is the first of an envisioned series of joint meetups between GlobalNet21 and London Futurists.
What will the world look like in ten or twenty years time as the digital revolution explodes around us? And how might we best steer this revolution for positive social outcome?
The meeting will be chaired by Francis Sealey of GlobalNet21 who will explain the collaborative venture. David Wood, chair of London Futurists, will set the context by providing a critical evaluation of one of the most significant and controversial books of 2016: “Homo Deus - A brief history of tomorrow”, by historian Yuval Noah Harari.
Harari’s book is a good starting point for this discussion as it raises some significant questions about our digital futures:
“Homo Deus explores the projects, dreams and nightmares that will shape the twenty-first century – from overcoming death to creating artificial life. It asks the fundamental questions: Where do we go from here? And how will we protect this fragile world from our own destructive powers? This is the next stage of evolution. This is Homo Deus.”
And to quote from The Guardian,
“Just as the 19th century created the working class, the coming century will create the useless class. Billions of people are likely to have no military or economic function. Providing food and shelter should be possible but how to give meaning to their lives will be the huge political question.”
Among the destructive powers that Harari highlights is the accumulation of data by companies such as Google and Facebook, and our increasing reliance on data-crunching algorithms in more and more areas of life. At the same time, online networks, with all-seeing powers of information gathering, are replacing traditional institutions. It’s perhaps no surprise that voters around the world have sensed a disturbing “loss of control” - control now lies with algorithms, rather than with conscious human deliberation.
In his review of Homo Deus, David Wood will assess the strengths of Harari’s argument, and issue a call to steer the digital revolution for positive social outcome.
This review will be followed by a group discussion to identify a number of specific topics for priority attention in future joint meetups - topics that the audience assess to be inadequately understood or to lack meaningful action plans. Examples could be drawn from the thinking of Harari, other recent writers, and the collective insight of the members of GlobalNet21 and London Futurists.
About London Futurists:
From http://www.meetup.com/London-Futurists/
This group is for people who are interested in the future and maybe want to help shape it.
The acceleration of technology means that the near future may bring radical changes to all of us. Major developments in technologies like anti-aging, nanotech, genetics, computing, robotics, and geo-engineering are going to make the next few years very exciting - and possibly also very dangerous. We could gain god-like powers - but we might also lose sight of our humanity, and destroy everything that we used to hold dear.
What’s your view? Are things improving? Too slowly or too quickly? Are we are entering a new golden age? Or is the potential “Technological Singularity” something to fear? What does it mean to talk about “Human 2.0” and “Humanity+”? Or perhaps you view such talk as techno-hype? Maybe you just like the practical side of technology and want to find out more about possible paradigm shifts?
Anybody is welcome to this group - you don’t have to be a Techno Geek or work for some futuristic company to be in our group. The future applies to us all!
Come join in the debate - have your opinions voiced and maybe make some interesting new friends.
All we ask is that members treat each other with the respect they would want for themselves. Our group has members of many ages and backrounds. We have many different perspectives on what the future may bring and like to share different ideas with each other. We approach the future with a open mind and sense of humility. Our group mission is to introduce you to some of the ideas, advancements and people who are making our future happen today.
About GlobalNet21:
From http://www.meetup.com/GlobalNet21/:
“GlobalNet21 is the leading forum in the UK for discussing the major issues in the 21st Century. We share a common concern for the sustainability of both our planet and the people on it. With almost 20,000 network members in the UK and abroad, we are making the debate, and democracy, more accessible by enlarging the Public Square and using social networks.
“As well as a network of individuals we have also set up a collaborative network of organisations to exchange good practice and transfer knowledge so that we can learn from each other. This network is cross boundary and includes local authorities, housing associations, universities, community groups and social enterprises. Our aim is through dialogue to celebrate diversity and develop community self-resilience and sustainability at a time of unprecedented social and environmental change.”
Register ↗To avoid over-crowding, entrance will be strictly limited to people who »»» sign up in advance «««
We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach.
OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. We’re switching things up this time and will be running an API workshop as well as an investigation into a large multi-national corporation.
1800 - 1900 INTRODUCTION TO OPENCORPORATES & CURRENT PROJECTS
1900 - 2045 CORPORATE NETWORK & GROUPINGS: Arcadia Group & much more
2045 - 21:30 PUBLISH CORPORATE NETWORKS
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up as that will be our main port for communication and work: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗
A meetup for people working on civic technology, empowering citizens, and government transformation.
This month we’ll be talking about policies!
Covering how they’re written, who writes them, any innovation in the space and whether accountability exists after they’re put out in the world. Speakers include…
Policy Lab (@policylabuk) is bringing new policy tools, research and techniques to the UK Government. Really exciting, and much needed innovations.
The Institute for Government (@instituteforgov) is an independent charity working to increase government effectiveness. If they were on mastermind, policy making would be their expert topic.
GovTracker (@GovTrackerUK) was setup by four brilliant 17 year-olds and aims to track whether the UK government has broken or fulfilled its promises.
Register ↗
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We’re here to help you into the world of politics. If you want background info on how it works, simple explanation of recent laws, or info on what is going on right now – this is your site.
A get together to meet and say thank you to those who have helped, will help or are interested in Simple Politics.
There’ll be free drinks, stand up comedy and live Who’s Who (a fun identity guessing game that has absolutely nothing to do with the world famous Hasbro ‘Guess Who’).
Register ↗
Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Drones & Open: September Meet Up
Drones are increasingly being used in areas such as medicine to save lives, in conservation, to take spectacular aerial images and more controversially in defence and surveillance. With plans to expand their use even further into our everyday lives to deliver goods and services, how can open data make a difference in their development and use?
Short talks from:
Rufus Pollock, Open Knowledge International – Welcome and introductions
Ben Huss-Smickler, SOHUS - Capturing data with drones
Alexander Burwitz, Nitrofirex - Aerial fire fighting
Ed Leon Klinger and Antton Peña, Flock - Data driven risk analysis for drones
We welcome talks and discussion across the full spectrum of open knowledge including open data, open hardware, open education, open science, open geodata, open infrastructure and open government.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗The Fourth Group are a new group working together to create a new politics in the context of the fourth industrial revolution:
“The fourth industrial revolution is fundamentally reshaping the global economy and societies, and we are shifting the way we live, work, and play. How can we use the technological advancements of this age to create a new politics?
Building upon the momentum from the ideas in our Facebook group and first meetup, we are hosting our first Politech Hackathon to bring some of the buzzing ideas being discussed to life. We want to bring together people from the political and technology sectors to create a new politics in the context of the fourth industrial revolution. These two communities will be leading the forefront in shaping the future and it only makes sense to be collaborating now.
Over the course of a weekend, participants will ideate and prototype products, services, or platforms around the themes of efficiency, accountability, and political organisation. Want to help change the future of politics? Come and join us to imagine the new technologies to do this.”
Registration (£5.50) is required: https://billetto.co.uk/en/events/politech-hackathon
Register ↗A party to welcome our newest fellow Shad Mughal.
Shad is a hacker and designer that has been organising and participating in civic hacks for years. He attended ParliHack from its second year. On top of this he worked as part of a team at the Refugees United hackathon in 2013 to help implement an SMS verification system for lost refugees looking to reconnect with their families securely.
Follow him on Twitter @_sh4d
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A meetup for people working on civic technology, empowering citizens, and government transformation.
This month we’ll be talking about the future of the media. Talks:
“Proposals for regulation, reform, and accountability” - Josef Davies-Coates, @jdaviescoates, Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom and Media Democracy Meetup
“How the hell has traditional media survived this long?” - Kirsty Styles, @kirstystyles1, Editor at New Statesman Tech
“Being an upstart indie content creator” - Christian Payne, @documentally, documentalist, technologist, activist.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach. OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. For this event, we’re looking at AVIVA, G4S and Sodexo. If you CAN code and have never written a bot - this is an excellent opportunity to learn! If you can’t code but would still like to participate - there is plenty to do. We’ve got a brand new CORPORATE GROUPINGS feature which makes it really easy to create large corporate networks.
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗This week hundreds of Deliveroo couriers won a 6 day wildcat strike against Deliveroo’s new zero-hours pay scheme and courier victimisation.
This meeting is for those drivers and cycle couriers to meet and discuss our next steps.
** This is no longer going ahead today - may be rescheduled in future **
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗As the aftermath of the Brexit vote begins to unfold and nationalism continues to be on the rise all across Europe, it is more important than ever to animate our hopes in the possibility of transnational democracy. At this timely moment, European Alternatives invites you to a free screening and discussion of David Bernet’s fascinating film ‘Democracy’.
A David and Goliath story, ‘Democracy’ offers a captivating insight into the fight between citizen rights and big business, which meet on the EU’s legislative battleground over the making of the biggest data protection law in history. Following Green MEP Jan Philipp Albrecht and EU commissioner Viviane Reding for 30 months in their negotiations with activists, lobbyists and EU institutions, the documentary gives a first ever insight in European democracy in the making on this scale. It is a film about hope, persistence and power that provides both, an aesthetic and educational insight into topical debates around data protection and transnational politics alike.
‘Democracy’ raises a number of topical questions including “How does big data and surveillance influence our society?”, “What role can transnational alliances play in protecting citizen right?” and “How can democracy work across Europe?”, which we want to informally discuss after the screening.
We look forward to seeing you there!
“A wholly original film” (The Guardian)
“An utterly compelling, heroic, humorous, suspenseful and ultimately satisfying 100 minutes” (OpenDemocracy)
Register ↗Momentum, the movement that supports Jeremy Corbyn, has teamed up with Outlandish, a tech co-op from North London, to put on a hackathon to produce tech projects for social change.
The aim of the hack day is to bring together techies, Momentum members, and techie Momentum members and other experienced campaigners to build grassroots campaigning tools. We have some gaps we know about and ideas for things we’d like to create - and we’re really open to all your ideas that we might never even have thought of.
We’ll discuss the different ideas, and create teams to do a little bit of initial work on them. There are two £1,000 prizes for the most feasible and useful projects to help with delivery so that the tools are used to make a difference for the upcoming Labour leadership vote. Any other projects delivered from this session will be gratefully received and used to make a difference.
Draft agenda:
10.45am: Registration and introductions
11.15am: Welcome from Momentum and Outlandish. What kind of tools are we looking for? Who will use them and for what?
11.30am: Planning and brainstorm
1pm: Lunch
2pm: Build - quick mini-projects and proofs-of-concept
4pm: Presentations
5pm: Go home/to the pub/to the park
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗A meetup for people working on civic technology, empowering citizens, and government transformation.
Time to just hang out and enjoy an evening with nothing to do but get to know each other and chat about the topics of the day.. so erm, something about civic tech, democra-tech(?), future cities, campaign tech, govtech, impact, tech-for-good… what did we miss?
No speakers or presentations, just you, and a cool drink :)
See you all there,
Mevan & Josh
(talks return for CB14 on August 31st!)
Register ↗It’s the second Hackney Hack Night!
We’ll get an update on projects from the first time around and start brainstorming on a new round of projects.
Here’s roughly what we will do:
7pm - Show & Tell. Share interesting news, databases, tools (including projects from last month’s meeting with theme: housing)
7:45pm - Pitches. Share your project ideas and find team members.
8-10pm - Work time. Develop your ideas.
Things to bring
Laptop, pen and paper, or whatever tools you want to work with. You can also BYOB, but we will provide some drinks and stationery.
What to do now
See what other people are interested in doing, and add any ideas you might have: Hackpad
Register ↗Many of us are feeling confused and worried about Brexit. But we must also recognise that now is a time of immense opportunity. People are listening; people are asking questions; people are talking. Now is the time to put ourselves out there, to engage in conversation, and to start to provide answers to those questions.
In the run up to the referendum, you may have seen claims by the “Leave” campaign that exiting the EU would mean that we would no longer have to worry about the threats posed by TTIP and CETA. Actually, it is more important now than ever to continue raising our voices for trade justice.
With the reality of Brexit looming, it is unlikely that our MEPs will get a say on what happens with TTIP or CETA. But these deals are part of a much bigger framework seeking to rewrite the rules of the global economy. No country will be immune. And as our government sets out to renegotiate our position in the post-Brexit world, they will certainly be looking to negotiate our own trade deals that will be the same or worse than TTIP and CETA. Whether the threats to our democracy, public services, human rights, environment and capacity for creative and free expression come under the transitory heading of ‘TTIP’, ‘CETA’, or a brand new deal negotiated by the Tories, the threats remain the same.
There is a pressing need now: to come together, to support each other, to answer each other’s questions, and to strategise about what Brexit means for the campaign for trade justice. So we are rescheduling this party, and instead we will be meeting on Thursday, 28th July from 18:30 - 23:00 at Newspeak House (133 Bethnal Green Rd, London E2 7DG). Join us for an evening of open discussion with wine, music, answers and action planning - discussion from 19:00 - 21:00, but all are welcome to come before and stay after to socialise.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House, open to members and non-members alike.
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House!
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach. OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data!
Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. For this event, we’re looking at AVIVA, G4S and Sodexo. If you CAN code and have never written a bot - this is an excellent opportunity to learn! If you can’t code but would still like to participate - there is plenty to do. We’ve got a brand new CORPORATE GROUPINGS feature which makes it really easy to create large corporate networks.
Hope to see you all there.
p.s. if you’re not on Slack already, please do sign up: slack.opencorporates.com
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House!
This week, crepes! BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗Using some of the videos from the Whistle Blowers Interview Archive, we’ll take a hands on approach to explore key concepts, ideas and techniques to identify narrative points, test out story ideas, and craft a compelling story.
This workshop focuses on the underlying evergreen storytelling principles that transcend the medium, so no knowledge of video editing required, just curiosity towards story telling principles and techniques. Participants will be divided into groups of 3 to 4 people. The aim for each group is to produce a 3 to 5 minute video, given 3 short video interviews (roughly 15 min each) accompanied by their corresponding time-coded transcriptions.
Key story telling principles and techniques will be introduced to facilitate the process.
The aim of the workshop is for the participants to gain a hands on insight into the process of interviewed based documentary story crafting rather then producing a polished final product.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House!
This week, crepes! BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Ration Club is run by volunteers from the community. If you’d be interested in cooking, contact [email protected]
Register ↗In 2013, the Government Digital Service introduced the Technology Code of Practice: a document giving guidance for government departments on how to design, buy and build technology and digital services.
Government technology has changed a lot since then, and GDS is planning an updated version. In advance of that, they are publishing a draft version to give the public the opportunity to comment. Come to a workshop at Newspeak House to discuss and give feedback.
Bring a laptop, if you can.
Register ↗A rolling hackathon for journalists, technologists, urbanists and citizens interested in Hackney issues. The idea is to create a space for people to pitch, create, and develop projects together. We do a new theme each month. Our theme this month is Housing.
Schedule
7pm - Show & Tell. Share interesting news, databases, tools. 7:45pm - Pitches. Share your project ideas and find team members. 8-10pm - Work time. Develop your ideas.
If you already have pitch ideas, add them on this Hackpad. It also contains a more detailed schedule.
Things to bring
Laptop, pen and paper, or whatever tools you want to work with. You can also BYOB, but we will provide some drinks and stationery. There are off-licences and supermarkets within a five-minute walk.
Register ↗Find out about the projects of the first cohort of Outlandish Fellowships (Not to be confused with Newspeak House Fellowships!)
Register ↗We live in the era of transnational companies. If Panama Papers proved one thing - the world of business is complex, opaque and in critical need of transparency. Not just transparency but radical transparency, so we know who controls companies and how far their networks reach.
OpenCorporates has always been a community-led initiative, and we would not have reached 100 million companies in over 100 jurisdictions worldwide without our community. You have joined the battle by writing bots, finding datasets, talking about us at events and working with us to convince governments to open up their data.
Clearly, if we are to win the battle to make a closed world open, we can only do so together. These events are a great opportunity to roll your sleeves up and get stuck into the nitty gritty of opening up data! Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for an evening of civic activism. If you CAN code and have never written a bot - this is an excellent opportunity to learn! This is not a good place to learn HOW TO CODE though.
If you can’t code but would still like to participate - there is plenty to do. We’ve got a brand new CORPORATE GROUPINGS feature which makes it really easy to create large corporate networks. We’re looking at AVIVA, G4S and Sodexo at the moment.
Register ↗A meetup for people working on civic technology, empowering citizens, and government transformation.
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House!
BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Register ↗Calling angry technologists. We think we know something other people don’t. Let’s do a bit of a post-mortem of the referendum, and talk about how we might be able to apply our skills to make politics better so we can start feeling proud of our country again. Even those of you who wanted brexit can’t be happy with what happened in the campaigns.
Required reading: So You Want To Reform Democracy
To help us keep track of numbers, please register on facebook
Register ↗Communal meals at Newspeak House! BYOB, suggested donation £5.
Mor Rubenstein will be making Shakshuka, Israeli salad and Pitas (all veggie friendly).
Register ↗An event to bring together people who work in the privacy space from different perspectives - policy people, techies, activists, and academics at big companies, startups, universities, libraries, NGO’s, foundations, civil society and more.
Register ↗Speakers will include:
Simon Bowers from The Guardian who worked on the Panama Papers
Lovisa Moller a researcher from Action Aid on Tax Justice talking about the network of binding treaties that the UK has with developing countries.
David Mihalyi - Economic Analyst at the Natural Resource Governance Institute will highlight the work they have done around monitoring the extractive sector with open data
Whilst this event has a specific focus, as always, the meet ups are for anyone interested in openness in any form - from genes to geodata, sonnets to statistics and we cover the full spectrum including open data, open hardware, open education, open science, open geodata, open infrastructure and open government.
Register ↗ORG London will be showing the Scenes of Reason documentary ‘The Haystack,’ a film which examines surveillance in Britain today, particularly in light of the debates in Parliament surrounding the Investigatory Powers Bill.
The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Olivia Cappuccini, founder of Scenes of Reason, which describes itself as an ‘independent media organisation that decodes news in an accessible, impartial and engaging format.’
Olivia will be joined by Ed Johnson Williams, campaigner at Open Rights Group.
Please join us for what should be a fascinating exploration of a controversial and hotly-debated subject.
Drinks and refreshments to be provided. Please do spread the word and feel free to bring guests.
Register ↗Everything we do begins with a thought. When you want to make a change in the world you find like-thinking people, but how do we move people from enthusaism to action?
In today’s highly volatile political and economic environment, better understanding and engaging people at the grass roots level, be they political communities or markets, has become essential.
Join us for a rare glimpse into one of the most powerful methodologies for understanding human perception, motivation, and behaviors—collectively known as thinking.
In this talk John Furey, Founder of MindTime, will share a simple, actionable model that you can immediately use in your own efforts to engage and motivate people. He will also speak about creating collaboration in political action groups or any group who wants to align, and deliver, with a common purpose.
By attending this event you will also undertand your own thinking better. Start by taking the MindTime profile at https://www.mindtimemaps.com/start/newspeakhousetalk/ and see your own thinking profile, then join in the discussion on the night.
As anyone who has tried to get a group of people to work together will understand, creating forward movement towards change is one of the hardest things to achieve. John Furey’s insights and knowledge have been instrumental in the success of hundreds of people based initiatives over the past 20 years.
Come and judge for yourself if what other’s have said is true… “lightbulbs were popping across a room of 120 agency decision-makers.” “It had everyone talking in the halls.” “This is magic…it gives you a better understanding of people as a whole.” “I tend to be a skeptic. But this got my attention like none other. It nails people’s work styles and the group dynamics.”
Register ↗Drop in with your laptop, charger and enthusiasm to join us for a day of liberating datasets from the clutches of closed data. If you can code and have never written a bot - this is an excellent opportunity to learn! This is not a good place to learn HOW TO CODE though.
If you can’t code but would still like to participate - there is plenty to do. We’ve got a brand new CORPORATE GROUPINGS feature which makes it really easy to create large corporate networks.
Register ↗A meetup for people working on civic technology, empowering citizens, and government transformation. Speakers:
• Paul Hilder on the newly formed CrowdPac (UK) which lets you fund the political change you want to see, be it campaigns or candidates.
• Joe Reddington on AzuleJoe a free tool that helps give a voice to people with communication difficulties.
• Tim Morley on PledgeBank.com, possibly the granddaddy of conditional commitment websites. What it did, and what we learned from it.
Register ↗Following the Launch of Digital Bill of Rights campaign in the House of Commons on 12th May 2016, join us for the post-launch debrief and creation of the roadmap to getting the Bill to the House of Commons.
• How you can all pitch in to write a Bill of Digital Rights – Lucy Willis, author of upcoming “Collaborative Futures”
• Raising Money for Fun and Laws “10 things they don’t teach you at Oxford PPP” – Jon Bains
• Debrief from House of Commons launch – Jon Bains
Register ↗There has never been a better time to develop ideas for using technology to solve some of the toughest challenges we face in the world today. So how do you get a ‘tech for good’ idea off the ground? Bethnal Green Ventures (BGV) is an early stage investor and support programme for tech for good founders. We provide investment, support and intensive mentoring to great teams with ideas for using technology to tackle big social and environmental problems.
This event will give you a full understanding of the BGV accelerator programme. You’ll get the chance to meet some of the startups we’ve supported and learn what it’s like to be part of the growing BGV community. You’ll also get a 20 minute 1:1 session with a BGV team member or mentor to chat through your idea and cover off any unanswered questions you might have.
6.00pm Welcome and registration
6.15pm What happens at BGV
Who do we support? What does the 12 week programme entail? How much do we invest? Who are our mentors? What other support do we offer? What does it mean to be part of the BGV community?
6.30pm Stories from our startups
Meet other tech for good founders who have been through the BGV programme. Learn from their experiences first hand and hear their tips for getting the most out of BGV.
6.45pm Q&A panel with founders and mentors
7.00pm Networking and 20 minute 1:1 sessions
Meet with fellow founders and chat with some of the BGV startups. During this time you’ll also be allocated a 20 minute slot to meet 1:1 with BGV team members and mentors.
9.00pm Event close
Register ↗Rewiring the Sharing Economy
High-tech tools of exploitation are being repurposed to build a fairer economy.
The digital platforms that have become the connective tissue of our lives - the likes of Airbnb and Google - have proven to tend towards monopolies, monetisation of surveillance and disregard for labour standards.
But what stops us from using the Internet’s power for collective action to usurp them with alternatives?
What if taxi drivers were to seize control of their own platform and run it democratically? And what would an Amazon look like, were it not only to push wares, but to distribute power and accountability?
Outlandish invites you to an evening of discussions on the opportunities and challenges of making the vision of Platform Co-operativism a reality in the UK and abroad.
Are you part of one yourself? Do you know of any interesting examples from the UK? Get in touch!
Register ↗