Branch: an online magazine by and for people who dream of a sustainable internet

Green Tech South West welcomes Michelle Thorne, Managing Editor of Branch magazine to tell us all about the website, by and for people who dream of a sustainable and just internet.

Branch is a space for personal reflection, critical engagement with technology, and experimentation; to uplift fresh thinking for how to green the web technically, aesthetically, and politically.

The articles strive to connect sustainability to root causes and to inequalities experienced at different intersections—gender, race, class, ability, and so on. Creating change requires all kinds of practices, so contributors include climate activists, open source technologists, indigenous leaders, artists, energy scientists, and degrowth experts.

Branch hope to not only articulate what these desirable futures are, but also to embody them with specific tools and art. That’s why Branch is a carbon-aware website. The site adapts to and reflects the physical infrastructure of the internet and the energy behind it. Utilizing data from a grid intensity API and the user’s location.

Michelle will talk about how to organize a movement using fractal organizing, art, personal transformation and technology built with their values.

Branch is also a proud winner of the Arts Electronica Award for Digital Humanity prize in 2021.

https://branch.climateaction.tech
https://calls.ars.electronica.art/prix/winners/8535/

ABOUT MICHELLE
Michelle Thorne is a Senior Program Officer at Mozilla. She leads OpenDoTT, a doctoral research program for the internet of things.

Michelle is interested in climate justice and a fossil-free internet. As a Senior Program Officer at the Mozilla Foundation, Michelle leads a PhD program on Open Design of Trust Things (OpenDoTT) with Northumbria University and research initiatives in Mozilla’s Sustainability Program.

https://michellethorne.cc/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/thornet

This is a free online event streaming via the CrowdCast platform. You will see the link once you RSVP. The evening before the event, we'll email those that RSVPed with more details about what to expect when using CrowdCast.

Our schedule is as follows:

🔓 12.20pm - CrowdCast room opens

👋 12.30pm - Event starts with a welcome from your meet-up organisers, Ellen, Hannah and Mike

📢 12.35pm - Our famous 60 second intros - a chance for attendees to introduce themselves, ask for help and tell us about something the group might find interesting

💚 12.45pm - Michelle's talk

❓ 1.15pm - Questions

🗓️ 1.25pm - Round-up, other community notices and next event announcement

The event will be recorded and will be available along with the slides to view shortly afterwards.

Sponsored by:
ADLIB recruitment - https://www.adlib-recruitment.co.uk

Supported by:
Future Leap Network - https://www.thefutureeconomynetwork.co.uk
Climate Action Tech - https://www.climateaction.tech