June 13, 2023 3-4:30 p.m. Mountain Time Free webinar In the aftermath of a chaotic Twitter takeover, many people have moved away from centralized social media platforms to a new set of social platforms that are open-source, decentralized, and user-centered—like Bluesky, Mastodon, and Nostr. This shift highlights a pressing need for more trustworthy civic spaces. But civic-minded social platforms are nothing new. The advent of Open Social Media has been many years in the making. This webinar presents some of Open Social Media's origin stories from speakers who have been involved in the development, culture, and communities of their platforms. We will explore how queer experiences and activist movements, for instance, have played a vital role in shaping the design and direction of emerging platforms. Speakers: Facilitated by Nathan Schneider and Skylar Hew. The Open Social Media event series is organized by the Media Economies Design Lab at the University of Colorado Boulder, made possible by a generous gift from Colorado ReWild. The illustration above, "Network of Friends" by kkgas, is licensed through Stocksy, a cooperative stock platform.