Invest in Open Infrastructure (IOI) is an initiative dedicated to improving funding and resourcing for open technologies and systems supporting research and scholarship.
IOI has issued a call for proposals for its Open Infrastructure Fund, marking the next step in its Collective Funding Pilot. This call will provide funding to projects that support the development of open research infrastructure services to strengthen sustainability and resilience and increase the adoption of open infrastructure that underpins research and knowledge creation.
Through this call, grants of $5,000 to $25,000 for projects up to two years will be awarded to support the following areas:
Capacity Building: To improve the technical reliability and security of open infrastructure services, including activities such as but not limited to creating and updating documentation to make it easier to onboard new contributors, maintainers, and users; training institutional staff and users on implementing and using (a new version of) the infrastructure; and organizing events to strengthen relationships/networks among contributors, maintainers, and/or user communities.
Strengthening Community Governance: Funding can be used to set up and/or strengthen governance structures and bodies to ensure that the infrastructure service acts per its values of openness, transparency, and accountability. This includes activities such as but is not limited to organizing community workshops to discuss governance needs and (re)design governance structures, convening a dedicated committee/working group of key stakeholders to lead work on diversifying governance and work on improving governance processes, e.g., reviewing and evolving bylaws and other policies.
Critical Shared Infrastructure: Funding can be used for efforts that would push people to directly collaborate across and work with existing systems, including but not limited to shared technical development across two or more open infrastructure teams to enhance interoperability and adaptation and customization of existing infrastructure service(s) to serve a local community's needs, including language localization.
Applicants may apply as individuals or representatives of an organization but must be at least 18. Applicants can apply individually or as a team and be based anywhere except Russia.
For complete program guidelines and application instructions, see the Invest in Open Infrastructure website.
