Offer/Need Machine

Offer/Need Machine (ONM) is a digital platform designed to promote a culture of generosity among creatives. The platform allows artists, designers, and other arts-focused professionals to offer their expertise as a "one-hour gift" to support another creative. ONM aims to counter big tech monopolization and explore social technologies governed by its users. By leveraging solidarity and gift economy principles, ONM seeks to create a more respectful, considerate, and caring community of cultural producers. The project is a response to the changing definition of what it means to be a professional artist, where making a living solely from one's individual artistic production is near impossible. ONM's team secured funding from the Canada Council for the Arts Digital Strategy Fund to develop a prototype. The project's inspiration stems from the team's obsession with mushrooms and mycelium networks and how natural systems are able to detect and transfer resources. ONM is rooted in theoretical models of collectivity informed by biological systems, but the team conducted thorough market research to position their project. ONM's distinctive feature is the care protocols built into its infrastructure, which creates possibilities for new types of interaction and potential long-term networks to emerge. The platform is not meant to be transactional but more fluid and organic, and exchanges are accountable to the needs of its users. ONM hopes to make space for creatives to advocate for and bolster their value as creative workers while creating a more resilient network of cultural producers.