As many of our members and fellow travellers must be aware, Cosmos Co-op is at a crossroads. We have had an influx of capital which we are using to drive development of the co-op, but that money won’t last forever. So we are encouraging members and fans to help us attract new members. As part of this effort, here is a place to talk about fresh ideas for invigorating what is on offer.
There are roughly six areas where we traditionally have ongoing activities:
- The Forum
- The Reading Groups
- The Writing Groups
- Untimely Books
- Metapsychosis
- Online Discussion activities on broader topics
In addition to this, we have also been working on developing
- Local hubs
And our governance activities have been greatly extended
- Governance
Finally we are developing a range of services with an Educational or Technical focus:
- Courses, workshops and tutorials
- Ressources to assist writers
While these are strengths of our community’s actions over the years, some are undergoing changes that we are trying to address. For example, the online discussion groups activity has been waning for some time, the result of changes in how people engage with the internet among other reasons. So we are looking for ideas to enhance our efforts in these ten areas, and in some cases look to change our practices.
Here are some ideas to start with.
The Forum: The forum is currently primarily a text-based tool and there are things text is good for. @ellenkdance has launched a soapbox thread for folks to use to rant, something which could be done in video or audio but also within the realm of text. We can also extend the text-based focus to a stronger video presence, but for that, folk need to post video content. That can be done by linking to video posts on Vimeo or Youtube, for example.
Metapsychosis: We are also thinking of ways to attract specialized communities, for example multilingual communities, trans groups (for whom we need to demonstrate certain levels of safety), writer communities, and others. A good place to start is via Calls for Submissions for Metapsychosis, such as the Call for Nonbinary texts about to be released. We are launching this initiative in three languages, an initial attempt to attract non-English speakers to our community as well. Another area we are looking at is the fascination many of our members have for oracles (e.g. Tarot, I ching, astrology, etc.) for which there is a worldwide community we could potentially engage with. A Call for Submissions on texts or drawings in relation to Oracles might be another initiative we could undertake.
Local hubs: Currently our local hubs (Boulder/Longmont, Boston, Quebec City, etc.) are organized in relation to our writing and publishing practices (poetry readings, literary salons, music), but more could be done with these. One idea, still a little embryonic, is to focus on our visionary activities and use them to “spin off” change activities, perhaps in relation to local groups.
Writing Groups: We currently have one active writing group, but are looking to create a second one for scriptwriting. Specialized groups like these could be a real boon and take advantage of our members’ talents. Several of the books we published and promote through Untimely Books were initially developed during earlier stages by both our writing and reading groups.
Online Discussion Activities: Already there are sessions organized to promote sharing creative activities. One idea along these lines is to organize a kind of “Designer Central” activity. As a designer myself, I am often faced with challenges for which ways forward can be challenging to work out. Sessions where design problems are posed and others participate in brainstorming solutions would be an interesting and useful effort.
We should also be using the Cosmos logo and a kind of logline to represent Cosmos in our other activities online.
Other ideas? Volunteers, even?