"Because what you don't know can kill you."
We are a grassroots "knowledge service provider" for independent media, community groups, small businesses, churches, unions, cooperatives and other grassroots organizations. Our expertise is in open source (free) web publishing technologies. We help our clients use these powerful tools to better communicate with the communities they serve.
Our mission is to help propagate an organic news & information network to serve the interests of our communities. We take our inspiration from the collaborative nature of open source software development. This development model produced Linux, a powerful free computer operating system that began life in the early '90s as a few humble lines of code. Almost overnight, a talented team of "hackers" from all over the globe began contributing their creativity toward making Linux a success. Today Linux challenges the dominance of tech titans like Microsoft.
We believe an open source "citizen's media network" can become the foundation for a new democratic "social operating system." A growing network of people from small business and community organizations will emerge as this operating system's "hackers." This organic media network, created by citizens for citizens, can grow to challenge the political and social influence currently exerted by a handful of undemocratic, profit-focused media corporations.
A citizen's media network can only emerge after we, the people, build the infrastructure to support it. Our contribution toward this goal is to help you transform your existing website into a powerful news, information and communications platform. Fortunately open source technology is available to help us accomplish this task. Although free, the best of these tools are at least as good as similar proprietary software systems.
Because effectively communicating online is not just a good idea; it's essential to your mission. The folks you serve expect nothing less. You probably already knew that. But now you can actually deliver on those expectations because the technologies you need are free. Better yet, we'll show you how to select and use the tools best suited for your needs.
We need you as a subscriber. That means you give us a modest amount of cash each month to keep us on retainer. In doing so, you'll help us continue the work we're doing.
When you subscribe to us, we become your knowledge service provider. We'll guide you in using powerful open source publishing tools to improve your ability to communicate on the web. These free technologies let you transform your current site into a powerful web-based communications platform. For just peanuts you will get the kind of knowledge that big corporations pay high-powered consulting firms outlandish fees to provide. Even so, those gold-plated consulting firms have no understanding of reality at the grassroots. We do.
