This project is in its early stages, so the following outlines our goals.
shrikenet is online community software for small organizations like schools, churches, clubs, and sports teams. It's designed so that (1) organizations can interact directly with their members; and (2) members can interact safely, without pressure, at times of their own choosing.
organization <--> member
shrikenet is an organization owned network. And yes, it's designed to be an alternative to vendor owned networks like Facebook and Twitter. By definition, vendor owned networks force organizations and their members to interact with one another via a middleman, the vendor.
organization <--> vendor <--> member
This vendor middleman model has several problems:
- inappropriate content;
- invasive advertising;
- unsafe discourse (bullying, scams, predators, etc.);
- deplatforming (censorship);
- muddled flow of information (vendor optimized);
- poor organization support;
- dependence on vendor;
- vendor's rights to organization content; and
- vendor's collection and sales of organization data.
shrikenet doesn't have these problems.
Organizations use shrikenet to run their own online communities using their own rules.
shrikenet is the members one stop shop to find out what's happening with their organization. Members can check-up on their organization, at their convenience, in a manner that suits them.
This project is licensed using the GNU Affero General Public License.
This license was chosen since we wanted the benefits of GNU's Licenses and this is their recommended version for software that runs over a network.
The project's design documentation is in the docs folder of the repository.
The shrikenet name is inspired from a prominent character in Dan Simmons Hyperion Cantos series of science fiction novels. The name was chosen because it's fairly unique, it's short, and Eugene thinks the Shrike is cool.