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Welcome to November'25 Edition of GIGinsights!
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This autumn has been a season of transformation and collective imagination! 🍂
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From co-designing the future of libraries at Barcelona Design Week to delving into Solarpunk visions that turn makerspaces into laboratories for regenerative futures, the GIG network is building more accessible, sustainable, and equitable futures together. With our upcoming community call on P2P financing just around the corner, it's an exciting time to engage with the possibilities emerging from our global network.
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Ready to explore the innovations, insights, and collaborations shaping our community? Let's dive in! 🌍✨
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General Updates From the GIG Community and Team Members 📰
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make-a-thek at Barcelona Design Week
During Barcelona Design Week, the make-a-thek consortium joined the MAKING (IN) COMMONS conference organised by Distributed Design and FabLab Barcelona, bringing the make-a-thek project to life through a hands-on workshop! Together, we co-designed the future of the Camp de l’Arpa Library, one of the make-a-thek pilot sites, using the first version of our analog co-design kit.
With educational cards and 3D miniatures, librarians, makers, and designers collaborated to explore how public libraries can evolve into accessible, creative, and community-driven spaces.
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[INVITE] Community call: P2P financing models in cooperative ecosystems
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Join us on November 27th at 14:00 CEST for a special Community Call co-hosted with Platform Coops eG exploring peer-to-peer financing models in cooperative ecosystems.
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We'll discuss how communities can fund, sustain, and govern collective projects through decentralised and inclusive mechanisms—tracing a path from collective spending to community-based currencies that reflect shared values and strengthen solidarity.
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OpenFlexure: Democratising Science through distributed innovation
This November, we're highlighting OpenFlexure—a GIG member project transforming access to medical-grade scientific tools in low-resource settings. Born at the University of Bath with GIG members Julian Stirling and Joe Knapper on the core team, OpenFlexure proves world-class microscopes don't need to be expensive. Using just a 3D printer, standard optical parts, and a Raspberry Pi, anyone can build a high-precision microscope for a fraction of traditional costs. From malaria diagnostics in Africa to university labs in Southeast Asia, OpenFlexure microscopes have been fabricated in over 50 countries!
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Community call recap: Solarpunk visions for makerspaces
Our latest community call explored Solarpunk—not as escapism, but as a framework for building regenerative futures. Led by GIG member, Paweł Ngei, we explored how makerspaces can become laboratories for collective imagination. Key highlights from this session include how Solarpunk makes invisible community-driven innovation accessible to broader publics and how speculative fiction can be a method of care, helping communities process ecological anxiety and imagine survival as transformation.
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Community call recap: Exploring reciprocity as a resource
We recently hosted a community call with GIG member Rebecca Saltman, founder of Value Flow, exploring reciprocity as a resource beyond money. Rebecca introduced reciprocity marketplaces, highlighting how people often mistake financial requests for actual needs. She emphasised framing exchanges as community-driven processes rich in connections, encouraging participants to reflect on and share their genuine needs. This sparked dynamic exchanges that demonstrated the power of non-monetary reciprocity!
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Special dedication: newly nominated members 🌍
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We're delighted to introduce new members joining our global community—all nominated by existing GIG members for their exceptional work and shared commitment to our mission. Please join us in welcoming them! 👋
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Events:
UN Global Compact presents a live webinar providing expert context and nuance to the main headlines from COP30 and sharing priorities and opportunities for corporate action to drive progress in 2026.
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This event is for open source professionals, including developers, technologists, and community leaders, offering a vital platform for collaboration, information sharing, and problem-solving. The summit fosters open source innovation and a sustainable ecosystem..
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Europe's biggest and most relaxed hacker party, net culture party and tech conference in Hamburg. This annual four-day conference on technology, society and utopia offers a huge playground for hacking, soldering, tinkering, educating, learning, partying and networking.
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Conference bringing together over 600 participants from politics, tech, and civil society, with over one hundred speakers addressing the most pressing challenges in democracy and digital governance.
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Opportunities:
European Commission-funded grants between €5,000 and €50,000 for internet commons development across the technology spectrum. Projects must use free or open source licenses, promoting digital security and public ownership of internet infrastructure with scale-up potential.
Deadline: December 1, 2025
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Call for talks, workshops, performances, art and exhibitions for Open Hardware Summit 2026 in Berlin, Germany.. Open to all topics in open source hardware including electronics, mechanics, digital fabrication, fashion technology, and IP law. Multiple submissions permitted. First-time speakers can request mentorship.
Deadline: December 21, 2025
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Funding for innovative global internet freedom projects that counter censorship or surveillance. Supports technology development, applied research, digital security projects, and community convenings. Open to organizations and individuals worldwide.
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Deadline: Rolling applications
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Knowledge Highlights 📰
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From precision fermentation to modular geothermal energy, this exciting report explores breakthrough technologies tackling the planet’s most urgent environmental challenges and how they could reduce emissions, restore ecosystems and enable sustainable resource use.
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Neil Selwyn's Digital Degrowth is a call to completely rethink our digital futures in these fast-changing times. It explores how degrowth thinking and alternate forms of “radically sustainable computing” might support sustainable and equitable ways of living with digital technologies.
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Support GIG 🎯
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We invite you to join us in driving innovation for social impact worldwide as a supporting member.
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Why Support GIG? 🤝
- Drive long-term growth and sustainability for a global network of innovators.
- Promote inclusive, sustainable innovation through knowledge exchange and learning.
- Advance open hardware research and distributed manufacturing.
- Strengthen grassroots climate resilience efforts worldwide.
Ways to Support 🌟
Here are the suggested annual contributions:
Small Organisations: €300
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For organisations with fewer than 50 employees or under €1 million budget
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Large Organisations: €3,000+
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For organisations with 50+ employees or €1 million+ budget
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Contribute now or contact us to learn how your support can help social innovators create lasting change in communities worldwide.
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👀 Stay tuned for more exciting updates next month! 💌
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