Application
We invite community builders, engineers, designers, cryptographers, researchers, technologists, labor organizers, journalists, policymakers, members of vulnerable communities, and advocates for digital safety, bodily autonomy, privacy, and more to apply.
Visa information: We recommend checking ahead of time if you have specific visa support needs. A list of countries with visa-exempt entry into Taiwan can be found on the BOCA website.
Applications are currently closed; decisions will be sent out by 17 Jan, 2025.
Application Guidance
In terms of roles, we see most people likely falling under one or more of the following:
- Builder: building technical applications and/or infrastructure, looking for general technical proficiency as well as in cryptography (zero-knowledge, multi-party computation, fully homomorphic encryption, verifiable networks, etc.). Outputs may include technical prototypes; maintenance, such as making boilerplates, tutorials, technical documentation; proofs-of-concepts; educational workshops or materials, etc.
- Community Organizer: member of a community with privacy needs, looking for demonstrated leadership and advocacy in domains such as labor, journalism, whistleblowing, community organizing, etc. Outputs may include conducting participatory co-design sessions with their community and publishing reports, findings, learnings, etc.; compiling resource guides for their community in collaboration with our privacy experts; organizing public-facing workshops on relevant topics, etc.
- Researcher: including privacy and cryptography research (ZK, MPC, FHE, etc.) as well as community-focused research (social sciences, anthropology, participatory co-design, etc.). Outputs may include publishing research and writing (papers, blog posts, etc.), conducting participatory co-design sessions and documenting processes and findings, novel research of any form, technical writing; etc.
- Designer: including participatory and community co-design, UX researcher, interface design, etc. Outputs can include participatory co-design sessions, reports/findings/etc., mockups, publishing research and writing, conducting and publishing UX research, e.g. on privacy tools and interfaces
And to note, we hope for a lot of cross-collaboration and cross-education among our residents. These roles are meant to be descriptive, so even if—or perhaps especially if—your work falls outside of one of these categories, we would love to hear from you.
In terms of what we select on, we want to prioritize:
- Expertise in a specific domain, e.g. privacy, cryptography, participatory co-design, UX design, community organizing, journalism, labor unions, policy, or other relevant topics
- Culture and community, e.g. values of collaboration, co-learning, open-source and public goods, curiosity, equity, inclusion
- For the holistic cohort: diversity of backgrounds, perspectives, proficiencies, skillsets, communities, cultures, locations, etc.; potential for long-term collaboration in the ecosystem; community impact
For a successful residency, we value both high quality collaborative outputs as well as longer-term relationship and community building.
External Funding
Those looking for external funding may look into:
- The Ethereum Foundation’s Ecosystem Support Program offers a Small Grants program.
- The NLNet Foundation maintains an Active funds program for projects focused on “open hardware, open software, open data or open standards.”
- The Open Tech Fund has also compiled a large list of potential funds and Alternative Sources of Suppprt for funding projects in “internet freedom, journalism, software development, and human rights.”