Worldwide Jellyweek 2013 captures the essence of active collaboration, with the potential of dozens of cross-community, -national, and -regional networks to be forged.
The event’s strong focus on community – and its origins from the humble Jelly – have meant many coworking spaces have jumped on board to offer free coworking days throughout the week. But there are a number of events going on in various venues:
Coworking Croatia has organized a full day event, with a ‘Know How? Show How!’ Workshop, a ‘Cowork it Out’ session in the afternoon, and a movie screening, followed by an ‘After-cowork party’, in the evening. The whole day will also be open for anyone to go and give coworking a go. (Tuesday 15th)
Leslie Starr has teamed up with Tau coworking space in Toulouse, Afriworkers and Jena-Pouli, expert in semi-rural coworking, to host a Franco-African dialogue, with the aim of introducing people who are working on similar projects. The dialogue will be streamed on YouTube and a Gogle Hangout set up, presenting an opportunity for local groups to promote their current projects. (Friday 18th, 4pm)
Leila País de Miranda will be heading back to her native Brazil to host a co-cooking event. She’s inviting her neighbors and networks and anyone else interested to gather and prepare a communal meal. (14th – 20th January, 10-20pm)
In Berin, documenting all the fun, a rally surrounding some of the jellies will be organized, with interviews and broadcasts in different venues collated to paint a picture of what’s going on around the city. A Jellyweek documentary may ensue. There will also be a Beam2Berlin tele-presence and Google Hangouts. (14th – 20th January)
There are also Jellyweek events organized in Morocco, Australia, Japan, Egypt, Pakistan, the Swedish Arctic Circle… and room for more.
Helping’s old-fashioned. Just get involved.
Putting on an event like Jellyweek – even if it the majority of activities are self organized, is no easy task. But when asking Anni and Leila how people could help, they were adamant that there would be no ‘helping’ necessary. The event – Anni and Leila stressed – is not for them, But about doing something for themselves and their communities.
‘Help?’ Asked Leila. ‘We don’t want help. We want people to get involved!’
Nor are they looking for financial support. ‘Getting sponsors is the old way of doing things,’ said Leila. ‘We don’t want this ‘the money’s there, so you go there’ attitude. We want people who are really interested to contribute … it’s ‘glocal’ thinking. They are the conversations that really matter, for solving problems together.’
Instead, here are five ways to get involved, support glocal action, and promote your project:
Create an event: It can be as big or as small as you like and take any form. Register on the Jellyweek Google map. If you’re having trouble, send an email to
Attend an event: There are hundreds of events going on in cities all over the world. You can browse the complete list on the Google map.
Wear the t-shirt: Spark conversations about Jellyweek and your event and order a t-shirt at cost price, courtesy of Spreadshirt.
Volunteer: You can help spread the word about Jellyweek by inviting your networks to like the facebook page or circulating the online materials to different communities to print and translate – or do this yourself.
Follow on Facebook and Twitter. Get connected on the social media groups, share ideas and make contacts. Tweet about Worldwide Jellyweek using the #JW2013 hashtag.
