Soma
Communities

Protocols

The written rules and practices a community adopts, from agreements to rituals, and how one is drafted, ratified, published and retired.
Draft. This page is a preview of the new guide. Its illustrations are drafts still in review.

A protocol is a rule or a practice a community writes down and agrees on: how members behave, how a meeting runs, what to do when something goes wrong. Once ratified, it's part of how the community works, and other communities can adopt it too.

Kinds of protocol

Seven objects on a shelf: a sealed scroll with a pen, a card with steps, a forked signpost, a balance scale, a blank form, a ring with a bell and an arrow, and a parcel passed between two pairs of hands.
  • Agreement
  • Procedure
  • Scenario
  • Policy
  • Template
  • Ritual
  • Delivery

Seven kinds of protocol, each for a different kind of rule.

  • Agreement: a commitment members sign, such as a code of conduct.
  • Procedure: step-by-step instructions, such as how a meeting runs or how a newcomer is welcomed.
  • Scenario: an if-then playbook, such as how a dispute is resolved or how to respond to an incident.
  • Policy: a rule the community applies to itself, such as a quorum, a limit or a rotation.
  • Template: a reusable structure, such as a project brief or a report format.
  • Ritual: a procedure on a schedule, such as a weekly meeting or a yearly election.
  • Delivery: ordered steps through named intermediaries, with evidence at each step, as used in the market.

A protocol applies to one member, to a project, to the whole community, or is published for other communities to use.

A protocol's life

Six scenes: a member writing at a laptop; members marking up a printed draft with notes; members queuing to drop ballots in a box; a sealed document placed on a shared shelf; people in two different neighbourhoods each taking a copy; a sealed document filed away in an archive box.
  1. Draft
  2. Review
  3. Vote
  4. Ratify and publish
  5. Adopt
  6. Retire

From a draft to a rule other communities can adopt, and finally to the archive.

  1. Draft. A member writes it under Protocols. While it's a draft or under review it can still be changed.
  2. Review. Submitted for review, it's open for members' comments.
  3. Vote. Submitted again, it becomes a ratification proposal with two options, Ratify or Reject, decided like any other proposal (see Decide together).
  4. Ratify and publish. If ratify wins, the protocol is in force for the community. A ratified protocol can then be published, so other communities can find it.
  5. Adopt. Another community finds a published protocol under Discover and adopts it; a member can also adopt one for themselves, and you can carry a protocol to another community you belong to. Some projects require members to have adopted a protocol before they join.
  6. Retire. A protocol that's no longer wanted is retired: it isn't offered for new adoption, but nothing is deleted. The community's history keeps it, and members who adopted it keep it until they choose to drop it.

Decide together

[object Object]

Features and settings

The features a community turns on, their settings, and how members can stop a change they don't want.