We co-created DWeb Camp Cascadia 2026

From July 30th to August 3rd 2026 we got over 100 DWebbers together for our second DWeb Camp Cascadia at the Salt Spring Island Farmers Institute. Under the theme of Co-Adapt, Co-Create, Co-Here we learned and talked about many topics from decentralized technology to community practices to land stewardship and economic justice.

Thursday

Camp opened at noon for the arrival day to help everybody get situated and set up. With some ferries being delayed, the registration table stayed open until late at night but we did get everybody settled in successfully. A few folks also did make it to the performance of "Terry Riley's In C" by the Of Sound Minds orchestra in the nearby Ganges village.

Friday

Every morning, Boyd from Stretch Yoga Studio got us started into the day with an hour of yoga. Breakfast, like all the other delicious meals were sourced from local farmers and prepared by the wonderful "After Eight Catering". After a few opening words and a daily meditation by Eve from Apple Tree Meditation, camp was officially on its way.

Kicking us off was Wesley talking about Personal Digital Archiving and Ese leading a Solarpunk Visioning session. Then Trav Fryer talked about Custo, a kiosk for fostering and archiving the relationships between people and things. We also had some impromptu demos for various local-first apps that people were working on or excited about.

After lunch, it was time for the unconference part of the day, facilitated by Emily and Ivar using open space technology. Anybody could submit a session and then gather with whoever else was interested in the topic in one of many spaces around the farmers institute.

In the evening people gathered in the exhibition hall for board game night, trying out many different games. This included play testing "Games for Commons: a Post-Collapse Monopoly" currently being developed by members of the community.

In the chill-out area, Garret took us on a journey into the fascinating world of microscopic organisms. It was a great way to wind down for the day.

All notes from Friday can be found here.

Saturday

After a windy night, we had our morning routines locked for the second day of camp. In the Exhibition Hall, Brewster Kale started us into the day with an introduction to Onion Press, an open-source desktop app that turns your laptop into a WordPress site and the Wayback Machine makes it always-on.

The Picnic Area was all about cooperatives and community. Dawn gave us an overview of the history and traditions of cooperatives and how they look like in practice, followed by Andy talking about how co-operative ownership might be a way to make open source projects more sustainable.

Just before lunch, LX gave us an introduction to Folk Technology, a movement born out of last years DWeb Camp Cascadia to build tech for living beings and in the exhibition hall, Emily ran a workshop on Neurographic-inspired Art.

After lunch it was time for the second day of unconference. You'd think that all the good topics were already pitched the first day but that was not the case at all. We ended up with even more sessions than the day before and it was hard to choose which ones to go to!

After dinner and under the setting sun, DJ Graham Van Pelt put the vinyl on deck and invited us all to a boogie woogie dance party. With colourful lights, bubbles and a disco ball, the dance floor was packed right up until quiet time.

All notes from Saturday can be found here.

Sunday

Yoga, Breakfast, Meditation, morning sessions. We're pros at this now. At the circus tent, Terry and Terri invited us to sit with our "Ick"periences, talking about values alignment as a practical filter. In the Picnic Area, the Placed-Based Regenerative Agriculture Panel brought together agriculture, smallholders, homesteaders and agroforesters from the bioregion to share their experience.

While the morning sessions were happening, local artist Peter Hatch was welcoming people in the exhibition hall to "Hours. Minutes. Seconds.", an immersive sound installation exploring how time is felt, measured, and embodied in everyday life.

On the other side of the exhibition hall, folks could also wander the final form of the D:Food web that Jenni started back at DWeb Camp in Germany and brought all the way to Salt Spring Island to continue at Cascadia Camp.

It all came together in the final workshop of camp. In "The Emerald Edge" we explored collaboration between islanders, the bioregion and the greater DWeb community.

The second half of the day was all about field trips around the island. In the eco-friendly shuttles from Tour Salt Spring, campers had the choice between four different field trips.

• At Xwaaqw'um, we visited Indigenous-led restoration work including camas cultivation and wetland restoration, wandered through the forest, and swam in the ocean.
• We toured Jane Squier's epic resource-efficient greenhouse cultivating cold-hardy citrus and avocado.
• After Nick Jones spoke to the 'why' of regenerative agriculture earlier in the day, we got to explore the 'how' through a walking tour of this 80 acre family homestead and working farm which provides Salt Spring with plants, livestock, produce and soil.
• We visited the Entelechy EcoVillage to explore the land and construction on it, the reasoning behind the community's choices, key aspects of their future vision, followed by a Q & A and the installation of a Meshcore repeater.

All notes from Sunday can be found here.

Last but not least it was time for the open mic night. After talking all weekend about everything from low level protocol design to permaculture we got to see and celebrate the creative and artistic sides of each other. From seasoned stage veterans to many first time performers it was a silly, saucy, cheerful, heartfelt, honest and generally wonderful close to this years camp.

Overall, DWeb Camp Cascadia 2026 felt like a great success, where all the new inspiration and connection could really be felt when saying our goodbyes on Monday morning.

Mark your calendars for August 13th - 16th 2027 to meet again next year!

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