OSP README.MD

This document is adressed to the OSP members themselves, and any external persons who would engage in a work collaboration with OSP and thereby work as OSP.

This document goal is to be a first window into OSP activities rather than list everything deeply, but to say: if something should be known or made accessible, there should be something there about it.

🪢 Code of Conduct

To write this Recipe of Internal Order, we gathered existing ROIs and codes of conduct that we felt are matching with our organisation and principles. Some sentences are taken as they were found, some were reformulated to adapt to OSP. You can find references to those at the bottom of this section.

We believe a Code of Conduct is never finished. Therefore, we approach ours as a living document, (re)written as a collaborative effort, informed by experiences, and in conversation with our visitors, participants and collaborators and the references listed below.

Before reading the points below, one should know that taking all into account is sometimes easier said than done.

Responsibilities

Engaging with OSP as collective brings responsibilities, here are a few that we want to put focus on. This should be taken in account for example when handling a long-term project in a smaller OSP team, as well as in a meeting moment with the larger group.

• Caring for physical and digital environments (cleaning/tidying/updating/etc.)
• Leaving physical, emotional and conceptual room for other people.
• Being mindful of how you take up space both in meetings but also more generally within the community, also in relation to your gender identity and background.
• Appreciating divergence in pace, points of view, backgrounds, references, needs and limits.
• If someone calls us out on something, we try to listen, pause, perhaps apologize and thank them for sharing their concerns. We take responsibility to educate ourselves if we are not aware and are hearing something new.
• Taking in account the work that is not paid.
• Caring for language gaps. This is a multi-lingual environment. We are mindful of the fact that English is not the native language for many of us. Therefore, we try to use simple language and avoid jargon to keep things accessible for everyone.
• Welcoming multiple processes of (un)learning. The exchange of information, experience and knowledge comes in many forms.
• When starting a project as OSP, thinking about ways to connect the project to OSP history and future, trying to find ways to go in harmony with the collective current situations and desires.
• Never hesitating to ask question to members.

• Acknowledging that power asymmetries are part of collectivities, and that to deal with the resulting frictions is a two-way process. More specifically, people giving space/agency should go with other people using the space/agency, and reciprocally:

  • people listening should go with other people voicing things
  • people giving access to information should go with people searching for, or asking for that information
  • people sharing knowledge should go with people being eager to learn

  More on that can be found in this document https://www.calameo.com/read/0000312396e60cba3ee01 (french only, should provide translation)

• Commision work may sometimes trigger differences. A collaboration agreement document https://collaboration.osp.kitchen was actualised (during the retreat 2024). This can be used as a tool to communicate with collaborators.

Everyday self-updates

Those probably apply in most situations, it is always good to remind ourselves of them.

• Respecting other beings, present or not, human or not.
• Making an effort not to speak for others or interrupt
• Trying to not be solely guided by your preconceptions.
• Taking time to actually listen.
• Asking before assuming.
• Recognizing that words and ways of speaking impact people in various ways.
• Refusing and deconstructing sexism, racism, queer antagonism, ableism, ageism and other kinds of oppression.

Unacceptable behaviour

In addition to any point previously stated, we specifically do not tolerate any racism, sexism, agism, ableism, LGBTQ+ phobia, fatphobia etc. in our space.

Exclusionary social behaviours: In the form of well-actually's, feigned surprise, backseat driving and subtle-isms. We borrow these social rules from Recurse and find them very helpful in communities that engage in technical practices and learning. Feigned surprise, for example: Dan: "What’s the command line?" Carol: "Wait, you’ve never used the command line?".

If you encounter any problems, you can reach any other member you trust to talk about it. This member will act as your contact person, and try to listen, and help you as they can. An intervention procedure will be established with the contact person. If you are someone's contact person at any point, you should try to listen without preconception and without projecting what you think about a situation. You should act in a way that will help to solve the issue and make people confortable again, if possible.

References

• Constant https://constantvzw.org/sponge/s/?u=https://constantvzw.org/wefts/
• Plotter station code of conduct http://plotterstation.osp.kitchen/pages/plot-with-us.html
• Varia CoC: https://varia.zone/en/pages/code-of-conduct.html
• H&D CoC: https://hackersanddesigners.nl/code-of-conduct
• https://queer-code.org/coc
• https://www.freebsd.org/internal/code-of-conduct/
• https://ecotones.caveat.be/osp.html
• https://www.recurse.com/social-rules

🏡 The studio

OSP Weekly Meets

We gather once a week for an OSP meet. We all have different rythms and involvements in OSP, this is why being able to have a physical meeting in the studio is needed to synchronize each others. Participating in the meeting is required to shape the always changing collective together. However it can happen that one can not join for a meet, and that is ok.

In term of presence, we do a meet if at least 3 members can be present. Before the meet, an agenda of what is going to be discussed - current projects, subsidies applications, answering commisons, internal organisation - can be filled by any members. In order to have an organised discussion, we try to precise for each points if it is about content, process or decision. Notes are taken during the meeting, and things can be added by absent members if needed, currently on https://pads.osp.kitchen/

1. We choose a timekeeper, a facilitator and a notetaker before every meet.
2. Together we assign a time window to every point on the agenda.
3. We add the time and see if it feels ok to go for such a meet, and/or what we want to prioritize.

It takes between 1h and 2h. We can always rediscuss the timeframe for the meet, taking in account everybody schedules.

Daily life

The rhythm of the day can be quite different from one day to the next. Most of us have commitments outside OSP and are not present every day. You can have an overview on OSP members agendas on the Nextcloud agenda. This is where each of us note and plan OSP meetings and working sessions.

We enjoy eating lunch together in the common area. It’s also an opportunity to chat with other members of the Meyboom plateau. For sure there is no pressure here, you might just prefer to have lunch on your side.

We have coffee and tea for the studio. You can find the coffee in the freezer of the shared kitchen and tea inside the studio. Feel free to make coffee or tea for yourself of for everyone whenever you want to. We have a set of cups in the studio but you can also use those from the kitchen. Everyone clean their dishes in the kitchen after they used cups/glasses or else.

There are plants in the studio. We try to water it once or twice a week. One person does it - for now it is Gijs. If you don't know if it was already watered this week, feel free to check and do it if you have time.

Meyboom

Our studio is part of Meyboom artist-run-spaces (http://meyboom.osp.kitchen/) and (https://www.instagram.com/meyboom_artist_run_spaces/)

Meyboom brings together a community of individuals and collectives working in different fields that has continually evolved since its formation in the year 2013. Formerly located in Vaartstraat, World Trade Center 1, then in the previous headquarters of Actiris in the city center; we are now inhabiting the second level of the building Pacheco 34, located on > Boulevard Pachécolaan 34 between the central and north station in the city of Brussels — a place we want to make a permanent address for our community.

Meyboom is currently in the process of forming a more intimate community, and creating its own ASBL/VZW. Once a month there is a floor meeting also called serious apero, where we discuss commnity organisation, renting, etc. The Meyboom meet pad can be found here: http://pads.osp.kitchen/p/meiboom-meets.

We try to organise in advance so that at least one OSP is part of the serious apero.

For the cleaning of the common spaces, there is a turn. See the calendar in the kitchen.

You can follow live activity of the group on Telegram Meyboom artist-run-spaces, once invited. A mailing list also brings collective informations meiboom@lists.osp.kitchen. To subscribe https://tumulte.domainepublic.net/mailman3/postorius/lists/meiboom.lists.osp.kitchen/

Networks

OSP has a long history of satelitte members that are now part of different collectives or parrallele research projects. We share practice connections and friendships with notably

• Constant vzw (https://constantvzw.org/), a non-profit organisation based in Brussels since 1997 and active in the fields of art, media and technology. OSP originated from a side-project of Constant, and since OSP became its own structure we continue to collaborate from time to time. Certain members where in both OSP and Constant at some time such as Femke Snelting.
• Speculoos (https://www.speculoos.com/), a graphic design studio that share with OSP an expertise on F/LOSS culture and historically certain members such as Pierre Huygebeart (now: satelitte OSP member), and Ludi Loiseau (past Speculoos member).
• Varia https://varia.zone is a space for developing collective approaches to everyday technology in Rotterdam. As varia members, we maintain and facilitate a collective infrastructure from which we generate questions, opinions, modifications, help and action. We work with free software, organise events and collaborate in different constellations. Certain OSP members have been or are also part of Varia.
• Luuse (https://www.luuse.io/), a graphic design studio that share with OSP an expertise on F/LOSS culture and historically certain members such as Antoine Gelgon (now: satellite OSP member).
• Meyboom artists run space (http://meyboom.osp.kitchen/) is the group gathering all artists of our studio floor.
• State Of the Arts https://state-of-the-arts.net/ is an open platform to reimagine the conditions that shape the art world today. Some of their active members are also on Meyboom artist run space.
• Médor (https://medor.coop/) is a Belgian, independent, inclusive, participatory investigative journalism magazine. Pierre, Ludi, Alex and Sarah are part of the founding members of Médor since 2015. In addition, Doriane and Amélie are actively part of many issues layouting.
• Domaine Public (https://www.domainepublic.net/) is an independant and self-managed internet hosting structure. We do often work with them for project and they host and maintain most of our collective tools (pads, Nextcloud, gitlab). Denis is one of our main contact there info@domainepublic.net. They also initiated other linked projects like sereies of events/presentations every second Mondays of the month at Le DK, Rue de Danemark 70b à Saint Gilles; and a magazine called Curseurs https://www.curseurs.be/.
• The Institutes of Technology of The Public Interests https://titipi.org is a group that brings together our resources and build a temporary institution that can address, engage in and resist the disruptive and inequitable impact of complex global technology regimes and infrastructures. Femke Snelting, one of our board member and part of the first patch at the initiative of OSP, is part of this research project.
• Foam (https://foam.net/), is a transdisciplinary network working across art, science, nature and everyday life. Nik Gafney, one of our board member, is at the initiative of this project.

🌬️ HOSTING & COMMUNICATION

gitlab

OSP uses a lot the constant gitlab instance gitlab.constant.org, though is of course not limited to it.

There is an OSP group gitlab.constantvzw.org/osp, of which you have to be added after creating an account (click on 'register' here), so you can create and manage project in this group.

A nomenclature is used there to categorize the projects:

• work. for commission
• workshop. for workshop
• tools. for self-made software and tools
• foundry. for fonts
• research. for experimentation, documentation, etc
• residency. for residency
• osp. if OSP is the subject

If it makes sence to split a work project in different repository, you could do like this

• work.project.www
• work.project.posters

This naming is link to our website categories and the way there are automatically split thought Visual Culture, the tool we use to display icebergs, readmes and repo logs on osp.kitchen To have your repo showing up on osp.kitchen you have to make it public and add a public hook through the settings of the gitlab repo, in the webhooks section, add http://webhook.osp.kitchen

nextcloud

OSP has its own nextcloud instance at cloud.osp.kitchen.

One member that already is in the nextcloud and has an account with admin right, can create you an account, and add this account to the OSP group to ensure that you can access the shared document. Note that nextcloud identifyer can not be modified after their creation (but profile name can).

To have this cloud synched locally you can install Nextcloud Desktop version.

To avoid getting tangled up in sharing levels, the easiest thing to do is to share the new root folders with the whole OSP group. When it comes to cleaning up, it's better to work from the web interface rather than locally.

To share a folder, click on the profile circle that initiated it and adjust the sharing type in the right-hand bar. (More info with screenshots to come here)

calendars

We make uses of the nextcloud calendar functionnality. You can create your own calendar there and share it with the OSP group. It is possible to import it in thunderbird, along with others member's calendar, in this way we can more easily see the availibity of everyone when fixing a meeting, for example.

To import a calendar, click on the chain icon and copy the internal link. To share it with the other, click on the chain and add osp group in the share field.

mails

mailing list

There is a OSP mailing list on constant server osp@lists.constantvzw.org. It is a public mailing list set up to maintain contact between all members and the public. These members are welcome to register. This mailing list invites to share works in progress, references, findings related to OSP asbl's field of practice.

It can be managed through a web-interface at https://boucan.domainepublic.net/mailman3/postorius/lists/osp.lists.constantvzw.org/

You have to create an account there to manage it https://boucan.domainepublic.net/mailman3/accounts/signup/?next=/mailman3/hyperkitty/

This correspond to the miam@osp.kitchen address. (check the list there)

miam@osp.kitchen works as the main email contact adress for OSP. Mails sent there are forwarded to the mailing list osp@lists.constantvzw.org. So if we get a collaboration proposition on miam@osp.kitchen, everybody who subscribed to the mailing list get's it.

cookwithus@osp.kitchen

admin@osp.kitchen Only used for admin mails.

osp.kitchen personnal adresses

OSP's domain name osp.kitchen is registered at gandi. If you want to manage osp.kitchen mail adresses you can do it through the gandi web-interface by connecting with the osp account.

1. connect through admin.gandi.net
2. select DOMAIN on the left
3. select osp.kitchen
4. select EMAIL in the topbar
5. click modify and enter the forwarding email address

There are also name@osp.kitchen custom individual mails adresses. Those adresses are forward only, meaning mail sent there are forwarded to another personnal adress. If you want to write a mail from this adress, you can add it in your mail client as an identity. For thunderbird see https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/using-identities.

TODO : Add an how to on how to use alias. (Gijs)

element

element.io is a decentralized communication application, based on the matrix protocol. We use two channels to communicate together, OSP and OSP live, the second one only contains the effective members, active in OSP on a daily basis. Because it's a matrix channel, you can use an other client. So first you need a matrix account and then we can invite you to join the channel.

etherpad & ethertoff

TODO: explain what is ethertoff, link to some documentation

TODO: explain difference between write.osp.kitchen and pads.osp.kitchen

To make an account on write.osp.kitchen

1. connect from a staff status account (you can use the osp one)
2. go to write.osp.kitchen/admin
3. add user, and pick a name and password
4. save and continue editing
   1. add them as staff status (optionnal, if they need access to the admin panel)
   2. add them to the osp group so they can be seen the etherpad API
5. save
6. sent them their name and password

🔑 ADMIN & INVOICES

Invoicing

OSP sends the invoice to the collaborator. Once it is paid the members who worked on the project send their invoice to OSP. The admin team prepares project invoices in collaboration with / on request of the project team. We always need the address to make the invoice out to, and a VAT-number (if the collaborator has one).

The project team or admin team sends the invoice. At the moment admin team is GIjs and Ludi, they can be reached at admin@osp.kitchen.

buffer

OSP takes an overhead of 25% of the project budget, this money is used for the costs of OSP like rent and internal work (for example administration, the retreat and subsidy writing) and is used to feed a financial buffer. The buffer allows to pay the members before collaborators have paid. How the 25% is spent is decided through the budget. Currently (fall '23) we are eating from the financial buffer, so prepayment of invoices is difficult.

days at 225

Currently OSP pays its member 225€ ex. VAT per day for internal work. This amount is derived from our previous daily rate (300€ - 25%). On the short term it would be ideal to increase this to be in line with the current daily rate of OSP.

budget

The budget for 2023 is available here: https://cloud.osp.kitchen/f/811875

The budget has three sheets, the overview sheet summarizes the revenue and expenses and the balance for the year.

The sheet 'Costs' lists the budgets for expenses. The fixed costs are expenses on material and services OSP acquires. The internal OSP works lists tasks which are remunerated. Some tasks are listed, but have no budget associated with them. We intend to pay fo these tasks in the future.

The sheet 'Projects' lists the projects which are scheduled for the year, for each project we list the total project budget, the overhead for OSP and the amount the members active in that project can divide.

The budget is prepared in the run up to the yearly general assembly in May, during the assembly we present a budget for the ongoing year, and a projection for the year after.

admin

TODO: how to access the admin interface / document and their roles

odoo

OSP uses Odoo for its adminsitration. We generate OSP's invoices through the tool and track our revenue and expenses. At the moment members from the administration team have access to it.

TODO: link to some documentation of how it works ?

montly payment system

During the retreat of 2022 we started an experiment with a monthly payment system: participants get paid a fixed amount per month, this should be balanced with revenue through projects or internal work. The monthly payment allows for a predicatable income. The monthly payment system is projected through a spreadsheet and administred in Odoo.

⚙️ STUDIO TECH

wifi

There are two networks availble Hacktiris_common_5G and MEYBOOM_WIFI. While the former is only available in the studio it is faster than the latter.

Both networks use the password hackt1r15/S.

OKI C830 (laser printer)

The IP address of the printer is 192.168.1.48. The printer has a web-interface which is a way to print PDF-files without installing the driver. For incidental printing or if all else fails.

• Make sure the printer is on.
• Connect to the wifi
• open the cups management interface by navigating to http://localhost:631/ in a browser
• select 'administration' in the top navigation.
• ( possibly you have to enter your login credentials now )
• click 'add printer'
• There should be two printers under 'discovered network printers'. The're both the OKI but over different connections. The one with the less information (no serial number) uses the ip-address of the printer, I prefer this one. Anyways, select one of the two.
• Set the name / location etc. to your liking and click 'continue'
• The driver is probably not installed by default, so it's best to use the 'Or Provide a PPD File' field and pick the attached PPD-file. ( Brand and model are then automatically selected )
• For available tray select: (2 optional tray)
• For duplex select: installed
• Set other default options if you wish and select 'Set default options'

If all fails, there's also a web-printing feature where you can print PDF's and postscript files through the printers web-interface on http://192.168.3.3

Shutting down the printer It's important to turn the printer off by first holding the 'shutdown/reset' button on the front. And only when it says you can turn it off with the power switch to do so.

Apparently there are some shutdown procedures and it might damage the pinter if it's turned off directly using the power-switch.

plotters dialogues

Add links to our pad? Swiss knife? to install Chiplottle.

scanner

The scanner can be used by connecting it to your computer with its usb-cable. Linux distributions should support it out of the box. It can be a bit finnicky to connect. For me it has worked best to:

1. Plug-in the USB-cable;
2. Turn on the scanner;
3. Wait until the green status led stops blinking;
4. Start the scanning application.

visual-culture

OSP website uses visual-culture to broadcast its gitlab activity in the homepage of osp.kitchen.

TODO: explain how it works, link to proper documentation and how to put it in place with the webhook

blog

OSP has a blog at blog.osp.kitchen.

This blog was the first public instance of OSP as a collectivity (before the creation of the ASBL structure). It first was a wordpress, then get translated into a pelican website (python based static website generator).

The content, templates and structure of the blog is on this repo https://gitlab.constantvzw.org/osp/tools.osp-blog.www.

So to post to the blog you can push on this repo. It is important that every blog post are first proof-read by at least one OSP member who did not wrote it.

vps

TODO: how to ssh, where are the stuff,

How to setup a new subdomain for a static webpage look here http://pads.osp.kitchen/p/SwissArmyKnife

🕸️ ASBL

ASBL repository

The documents that constitute OSP ASBL are gathered in a repository gitlab.constantvzw.org/osp/osp.meta.association.

Those documents are important to read as they state the soil type in which OSP grows, and can be modified if/as needed. The readme of this repo presents the different document in it and their role. TODO: actually the readme of this repo is in french... maybe we should join an english version to that

It has a discussion git branch that allow to propose modifications, yet not validate them as the official documents.

Statutes are a legal obligation, and we need to pay to 150€ per language (nl and fr) to change them.

The recipe of internal order in this repository states which type of member exists inside OSP. To become an effective member, you should first become an adherent member, both of those categories have their conditions and process of validation.

The registery state the lists of member and their position relatively to OSP.