The ways in
Wherever you are standing, there is a door. Find yours.
A working proposal, not an offer. Whimsible is being built in the open and is not filed yet. You can still join now: the way out exists from the first day, the stakes are low, and nothing about your money changes until the filing, which only makes what is already happening make sense on paper.
The three words
Community is everyone around it: you came to play, you follow along, you buy things. Nobody knocks for that. You are already in it. If you have questions, knock anyway; a person answers.
Cohort is taking part in what the cooperative offers, and comes in two kinds. The member: free to join, remembered here with a key, the tools, the market, a stall of your own, the zine, a say. And the one who wants a place and the marketing: a bed in the garden, a page or a whole site at your own domain, the search layer under it and a spot on the marketing page, without being a member or a collaborator. Your venture can plug in later, by the way out rule, when you choose and once Whimsible is filed.
Collaborators also come in two kinds. A person offering what they do: services or time, whether or not they pay anything; an unpaid membership, an offering. And an organization or business whose whole thing wants in; the people working inside it get the benefits whether they join on their own or not. Everyone joining right now comes in as a collaborator: you give your input and you vote. Founders are collaborators who have built a working relationship with us. That is a process, not a form; until then, decisions beyond a vote stay with the one holding the pen.
What joining means right now
- You knock at the gate: what you are interested in joining for, what you think would benefit you, what you are contributing or want to, your questions. A person reads it.
- We write back, and we talk. The conversation is the application.
- You make your bed. Your own page, or whole place, in the garden beds, written with your key or read from files you keep anywhere. We host it; you keep it.
- A line goes in the ledger: who, what you brought, which door, when. Until the filing it is a promise in a file, not a share. Contribution never gets erased, so what you bring now is weighed as what it was.
- When Whimsible is filed, the line becomes membership on the terms you can already read in the papers. You choose then, again, with the real documents in front of you.
And the way out is always the same: you leave with what you came with, plus what you grew unless your leaving costs everyone more than you grew. Try it before you ever join.
What the pool is for, in the order it is coming
- Our own selling platform. Being built today; already half built. The jewelry box and the till on our sites are the first pieces of it.
- Shared marketing. Everyone who markets themselves markets you, and you do the same for them. The sitemaps, the tree, the beds and the links between every place are the first pieces of that.
- Finding each other, and building more. The connected capacity to find artists doing other things as we grow, to join together and build more things, to expand and to recruit.
- Legal cover and insurance, bought once for everyone. Health insurance included.
- Microloans, new ideas, investment in you. The pool is where a new idea gets its start and where a member gets backed.
Which door is yours
I came to play, follow along, or buy things
The door
Community. You are in it already; nobody knocks for that.
Now
Nothing to do. Make a key in the purse if you want to be remembered across phones; it never asks for more than a name. If you want to subscribe and have a vote, that is the Cohort door: knock.
At the filing
Nothing changes for you unless you want it to.
I have a skill and no business yet
The door
Collaborators, to help build this; or Cohort, if what you want is membership and a vote.
Now
Knock. Say the skill and what you would do with backing. Make your bed. Your contribution is the skill and the time; the ledger records it from the first day it is used.
At the filing
Membership on the papers' terms. A contribution of skill is still a contribution: the bookkeeper who does eleven members' books at cost is in the ledger as exactly that.
What you keep
Everything you came with, always. What you grew, by the way out rule.
I run something by myself (a sole proprietor, a craft, a practice)
The door
Cohort, with your venture plugged in when you choose; or Collaborators first, to help build this. The easiest case either way.
Now
Knock, talk, make your bed. Keep running your thing exactly as you do; nothing about your money moves. Say what you would bring: the business, the tools, the mailing list, the name, or only part of it. You choose what to bring in, and only what is in is protected.
At the filing
What you bring is held for your benefit and under your stewardship, like a living trust for many people, revocable by leaving. The legal form of the plug is being settled with the lawyers (likely ownership of a separate entity for a business, a recorded interest for intellectual property); your venture keeps its own books, account and contracts so its debts stay its own.
What you keep
Your half, your living, your costs: out of reach, always. The exit rule for the rest.
I have an LLC
The door
Cohort, with your venture plugged in when you choose; or Collaborators first.
Now
Knock, talk, make your bed. Nothing in your operating agreement changes yet.
At the filing
The operating agreement is amended so the LLC's ownership, or an interest in it, is what Whimsible holds for you. You stay the one running it. Workers inside it, if any, are Cohort too, with a vote in its governance.
I have a corporation
The door
Cohort, with your venture plugged in when you choose; or Collaborators first.
Now
Knock, talk, make your bed.
At the filing
A staged transition: an employee ownership style move or a staged buyback, on the playbooks that already exist for that. Slower than the other doors and done with the lawyers in the room.
I run a nonprofit
The door
Collaborators. There is no direct conversion of a nonprofit into a cooperative, so you stand beside us and build.
Now
Knock, talk, make your bed. Work beside us.
At the filing
If you ever want all the way in: dissolution with prior agreement that the assets go to a cooperative that demonstrably continues the mission, with the state attorney general's sign off. Catching a nonprofit young, before restricted assets pile up, is the cleanest case.
I own a business with employees, or I work for one
The door
Cohort, for the business and the people in it; either side can start it.
Now
Knock. We show what the business would gain; the only ask is to lessen impact that is not beneficial. Then the sit down with real numbers, and every person decides individually.
At the filing, two routes
The owners want in: workers are offered ownership alongside the owners, starting from where they stand; shares are percentages weighed by impact and by what the business can carry. The owners will not: the workers form their own worker cooperative inside Whimsible, with the federation behind them, and keep their labor law protections by organizing as both at once. The owners' business stays theirs until they sell.
We are another cooperative, collective or organization
The door
Collaborators, which is anybody including organizations. Two ways once filed: aligned (adopt the model, stay financially separate) or integrated (come inside the holding company and the shared mutual aid).
Now
Knock. Make your bed for your organization. Tell us which way.
At the filing
Aligned needs nothing but an agreement. Integrated is a conversation with both sets of lawyers.
I want to put money in and nothing else
The door
Cohort. There are no angel investors here; there are members contributing at a different rate. Money is a contribution like any other, in the ledger with a date.
Now
Knock and say so. Nobody can take money for a membership before the filing, and we will not.
At the filing
Memberships up to a thousand dollars each need no securities registration in California; above that is a conversation.
The questions asked inside, once you are in
Not at the gate. These are how decisions get made here: What do you want to make happen? What does it touch? Where does it go? How else can it be done? What do we notice? An effect is never a veto; it is where the next question gets asked.
Knock The garden beds The papers