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Social Knowledge Sharing for Artists, Academics, and Activists

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Mysilio Team

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  • Tani Olhanoski - CEO
    • 8+ yrs startup bizOps, artist, founder, community builder
    • Buttercoin, Zipline, Bolt,

The Nexus Center�

  • Travis Vachon - CTO
    • 20+ yrs web development
    • Copious, Circle CI, Colab Coop�
  • Ian Davis - C3PO
    • 12+ yrs infrastructure engineering, AI
    • Prismatic!, Circle CI, WeWork

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Funding Source

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Grant for the Web is a grant program funded by the Interledger Foundation, Mozilla, and the Creative Commons

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Founded the with mission to explore alternative business models for the Web, using the new Web Monetization standard

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Mysilio has received a $100k Flagship Level grant in 2022 to build a prototype of a Web Monetized Digital Knowledge Commons

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We’ve partnered with Dr. Antara Haldar of Cambridge University to build a knowledge commons from her post-capitalist economic research

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Building a Web Monetized Digital Knowledge Commons using Social Linked Data

Goals of the project:�

  • Increase the sharing of research and data across interdisciplinary channels�
  • Prototype a financially sustainable knowledge commons�
  • Prove out the economic model for Web Monetization of shared resources�
  • Create an interactive knowledge portal for post-capitalist economic research�
  • Recruit additional stakeholders to contribute to knowledge commons

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What is a Digital Knowledge Commons?

Elinor Ostrom's first knowledge commons project sought to solve:

  1. "Digital preservation of high quality information"
  2. "Self publication"
  3. "Multimedia storage"
  4. "Serves as the primary reference tool for interdisciplinary research"

Sounds like great goals to us!

From Understand Knowledge as a Commons by Elinor Ostrom

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Ostrom isn’t alone in these goals

VTArtWorks came to us in need of a platform that would address both the immediate and long-term problems outlined [in their whitepaper], simultaneously providing:�

  • A central news source for the interdisciplinary field of CCD
  • A journal-style source for the field (e.g. providing critical reflection and careful, long-form writing)
  • Software tools for documenting CCD projects
  • Archival access to a database of completed CCD projects
  • Entry portals for practitioners from outside the CCD field
  • Training resources for those interested in CCD
  • Information about funding opportunities and strategies
  • Networking tools to connect with communities and professionals outside the field
  • One-stop shop for CCD research purposes (academics)

�* CCD stands for Community Cultural Development

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Key Stakeholders

Bob Leonard,

VTArtWorks & CCX

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Critical Connections (CCX) is a platform to support the interdisciplinary collaboration of various Community Cultural Development orgs

Dr. Michael Loadenthal,

The Prosecution Project

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The Prosecution Project (tPP) is a long-term, Open-Source Intelligence research platform tracking and providing an analysis of felony criminal cases involving illegal political violence occurring in the United States since 1990.

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Dr. Antara Haldar, �Limen, Cambridge University

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Primary Stakeholder & Grant partner

The Limen project to publish an interactive digital collection of alternative law and economics research provided by Dr. Haldar.

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The Technology

Solid is a new implementation of existing web standards that provides users with full control over their individual data and identities. It stores data in RDF, so it is ideal for interoperable, open data ecosystems.��

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IPFS is used when organizations require the hosting of censorship-resistant content online.��

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Web Monetization is a new web standard that enables micropayments, tipping, and a variety of other monetization methods for online content. It is built on the Interledger protocol which enables seamless conversion of value between blockchains.

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Web Monetization

  • Built on the Interledger Protocol - enables cross-chain payments (both fiat and crypto)�
  • Web Monetization API provides payment streaming and micro-tipping functionality�
  • Reward content creators as their content is being consumed
    • Attention-based, non-ad revenue
    • Experimenting with new business models for the Web�
  • Funding many projects through Grant for the Web + ILP-enabled Financial Services grants

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Mysilio Garden

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Open Questions

  • What kind of curation flow is needed to manage a shared knowledge commons? Who has the permission to approve / reject new contributions? Is there a draft stage where ideas get discussed before being published to the public commons?�
  • What custom data should be tracked? As an example, the Prosecution Project has more than 50 custom fields they code for each case they review like length of sentence, age of defendant, etc.�
  • What is the best way to visually represent the connections between the ideas in individual datasets? Between ideas in datasets that exist across multiple orgs?�
  • How will contributions to the dataset be fairly rewarded? What is the underlying economic model at play?

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The Knowledge Ecosystem of the Web

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The Pattern Language for Digital Gardens

  1. Topography over Timelines
  2. Continuous Growth
  3. Imperfection & Learning in Public
  4. Playful, Personal, and Experimental
  5. Intercropping & Content Diversity
  6. Independent Ownership

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Digital Gardens in the age of Decentralized Tech

  • Bi-directional links enabled a whole new evolution of knowledge management UX
  • But what happens when we want to link content across organizations and spaces?
  • Decentralized user-controlled storage (such as IPFS, Solid) is making a new design paradigm possible
  • Also presents huge new challenges for shared data governance
    • Thankfully the work of Elinor Ostrom provides a great foundation for thinking through these challenges!

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Text vs. Visual Interfaces

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Memory Palaces & Immersive Knowledge Gardens

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The Evolution of Knowledge Ecosystems of the Web

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Stay in touch!