A better communications option?

Hi all,

We’d like to tell you all about a new organising tool that has appeared online, which we believe to be a good idea for the www-features collective to start using.

As most of you know, The Riseup Collective (based in Seattle with collective members world wide) provides a variety of services for activists around the world, including to a range of Indymedia collectives. They have, for some time know, been working on a new software web application called ‘Crabgrass’. It is specifically designed for group and network organizing, and tailored to the needs of the global justice movement. The long term goal of the Crabgrass project is to “provide the technical tools to facilitate active, confederal, and directly democratic social change networks”.

Its a social network created specifically for groups like us. Basically, its faster, better, more secure and more fun than what we’re currently using: an email list.

So, although it is another new thing and people generally are a bit reluctant to try new technology, we’re hoping that with this tool we can communicate more efficiently and securely. We believe this would prove to be an improvement to the way in which we’re doing things now.

To try it out, go to: https://we.riseup.net/ (please note it is still in development)

  1. sign up here if you’re a new user
  2. login to crabgrass
  3. join the www-features group: we.riseup.net/www-features

Hoping to hear peoples view on this,

undersigned 1
bradley
undersigned 3?

More information about Crabgrass, see:
we.riseup.net/crabgrass/about


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- Why should we use Crabgrass?

While social movements have grown more adept at using the web to communicate publicly, we are still mostly using inadequate tools to communicate amongst ourselves. Most groups rely heavily on email, lists, and wikis— but these tools are not suited for the complexity of relationships that activist organizations face in the real world.

There are many existing social networking websites out there. However, these offerings are geared toward the needs of advertisers or informal social groups. There are also many existing web services for group collaboration. These sites are typically designed for small businesses and do not match the needs of movement organizations.

Most importantly, Crabgrass is software libre. As such, it can be provided as a service by radical tech collectives such as riseup.net.

- What Crabgrass Does:

Crabgrass enables social change organizations to get things done, get the word out, collaborate and network.

All of these elements are implemented from a social networking perspective. Events, for example, allow one to RSVP, see who is coming or watching, and send to your contact’s calendar.

- Tools

- In the near future, we also hope to add:

The long term goal is to provide the technical tools to facilitate active, confederal, and directly democratic social change networks. This phase will include tools for:

- Who is creating crabgrass?

(note: these links won’t work until public profiles are working).

- What does the name mean?