Pro bono advice for work worth supporting.
Each month, we offer two pro bono advisory sessions to small businesses, nonprofits and open-source projects. We help clarify the problem, assess whether software can help and identify a practical next step.
An officina is a workshop—the kind where you bring in the thing that is not working and someone who knows the trade looks at it with you. Officina Aperta is that door, left open twice a month for people who would not otherwise be able to knock.
Advice and technical direction—not free implementation. We will not build the software for you. We will help you understand what you actually need, whether software is the right answer at all, and what the sensible first step is. That is usually the part that is hardest to buy and easiest for us to give.
Why we do it
Small businesses
Because we have been proudly small ourselves. We know what it is to have a real problem and no budget for the advice that would solve it. Helping is simply the right thing to do.
Nonprofits and open source
Because they do work that helps society, and they are usually run by people carrying more than their share. A few hours of good technical direction can go a long way there.
And for ourselves
To keep learning, and to keep an eye open on what is happening outside our usual projects. Conversations with people solving unfamiliar problems are how we stay useful.
Who can apply
The conditions are deliberately specific. We would rather be clear about them than have you spend time on an application that cannot go anywhere.
- Small businesses with revenue between €20K and €100K in the previous year. If you have an idea but no revenue yet, come back when you do. There is nothing wrong with your idea—it is simply that our advice is most useful once there is real work, real customers and real friction to look at.
- Nonprofits of any kind, any size, any field.
- Open-source projects with at least 1,000 GitHub stars, or 1,000 monthly downloads, or a comparable metric that shows people depend on the project.
Applications are reviewed individually. Two sessions a month is what we can honestly sustain alongside our client work, so we read every request and choose the ones where we think we can genuinely help.
What a session looks like
You describe the problem in your own words: the process that is eating your week, the tool you were told to buy, the architecture decision you cannot get a straight answer on. We ask questions, and then we tell you what we think—including when the answer is that you do not need software, or that the thing you are about to build is not worth building.
If we cannot help, we will say so, and we will try to point you at someone who can.
How to apply
Fill in the application form. It asks who you are, which of the three categories you fall into and the number or link that shows it, and what the problem is. A few honest paragraphs are worth more than a polished pitch.
Bring us the problem that slows you down.
Tell us what is getting in the way and which category you are applying under. We read every application ourselves and answer either way.
