Global Service jam
Amsterdam 2012
The Jam
On the 24th of February 2012 people from all around the globe met in over 40 countries, for a 48 hour Jam
The Global Service Jam works in just the same way as a music Jam session, but It's an ideas Jam. You don't over analyse it, you don't discuss it to death, you Jam. You bounce your ideas off other people, and play around with what comes back. Together, you build something which none of you could have built alone. I worked with people we had never met before, bouncing ideas off one another and building on what bounces back. And it's not just talking - we were there to transform ideas into a concrete design.
My Service Jam
2012 Theme: Hidden Treasure
The theme for this years Global service Jam was announced as Hidden treasure. The Jam produced some truly diverse and fascinating projects. What resulted was a fearless approach that led to projects that are not very formed, yet in their fun and naivety groups reconsidered what a service could be, what it is based on and how might it function. There wasn't quite the time to consider all the real life constraints and those questions such as 'but would people actually do that?'. From what I saw projects were created out of a personal desire for change, from re considering Religion as a service to promoting broccoli, and a common theme through out all these projects was this personal motivation to explore and to discover themselves and their communities.
As for my self, I worked with a group on the theme of religion. My group consisted of a truly diverse set of individuals, with one common observation. That society had moved on and evolved where as religion hadn't. This resulted in the 6 of us being very curious about different religions and their various beliefs, yet not being able to commit to the everything any specific religion stood for. We wanted to explore how Faith would function to people today, with the constraints of society and politics. Through our own opinions and experiences and some interviews in a local park on a rather sunny but cold afternoon, we discovered in fact that people are beginning to cultivate their own idea of faith. An autonomous mash up of various religions, experiences and beliefs. People are no longer relying on temples or churches to find faith, but making their own mind up, to some extent people are creating groups or events for like minded people.
From this we wanted to create a platform for this new form of faith, to connect and share and explore what fith is for people today and what that might look like. We ended up with 'Faithbook'. Essentially a form of a social network website that people could define their idea of faith. The fundamental difference with this site is that one person can't create a group, and people can not follow one individual. You can't randomly post to someone you 'follow' in a sense your ideas are self created and you can't be preached to. It's not perfect and I'm sure people could pick holes in the ideas all day long, yet personally it was an incredibly rewarding weekend to work with people to consider what services are, even religion.
I could elaborate but in the nature of the Service Jam I am going to stop talking and let you explore your self:
Pictures from the Amsterdam Jam: https://www.flickr.com/photos/adamsjam2012/sets/72157629450524909/
The Global site where the projects can be found: http://planet.globalservicejam.org/
... and remember what ever project your working on, or thoughts you have about the world there is surely a relevant project to discover from over 40 countries all created in 48 hours… enjoy discovering some hidden treasures.