Note Details
- Stage: seed 🌱
- Type: note
- Topics: decentralization community
- shared a common passion
- Infoshop (chapter 6, the starfish and the spider)
An infoshop is a community-run, volunteer-operated space that serves as a resource center, library, meeting place, and distribution point for independent media. Rooted in anarchist and DIY culture, infoshops emerged in the 1980s and 1990s as physical hubs for countercultural movements — places where zines, radical literature, event flyers, and activist resources were freely available. Unlike commercial bookstores or institutional libraries, infoshops operate on principles of mutual aid, horizontal organization, and open access.
In The Starfish and the Spider by Ori Brafman and Rod Beckstrom, infoshops are discussed as a prime example of decentralized organization. Chapter 6 explores how these spaces function without a central authority: there is no CEO, no headquarters dictating policy. Each infoshop is autonomous, connected to others only by shared values and passion. If one closes, the network continues. This mirrors the starfish metaphor — cut off an arm and it regenerates — as opposed to spider organizations that collapse when you remove the head.
The infoshop model anticipates many patterns now visible in digital spaces: open-source communities, DAOs, and decentralized knowledge networks all share the same DNA of leaderless coordination bound by common purpose. The key insight from Brafman and Beckstrom is that what holds these structures together is not hierarchy but shared passion and a catalytic spark — someone who inspires action without claiming authority.