💾☀️ Permacomputing + Solarpunk Meetup (moved to 9/29!)
2025-09-29 18:30 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
The Permacomputing + Solarpunk meetup is every other third Wednesday at Iffy Books! You can join us in person (404 S. 20th St., PHL) or remotely via Jitsi Meet.
➡️ Virtual meetup link
From Permacomputing.net: Permacomputing is a more sustainable approach to computer and network technology inspired by permaculture. Permacomputing is both a concept and a community of practice oriented around issues of resilience and regenerativity in digital technology. In a time where computing epitomizes industrial waste, permacomputing encourages a more sustainable approach, maximizing hardware lifespans, minimizing energy use and focussing on the use of already available computational resources. We do this because humans are part of nature and technology is an extension of humans, and we acknowledge that technology has been used to harm nature. We want to find out how we can practice good relations with the Earth by learning from ecological systems to leverage and re-center existing technologies and practices. We are also interested in investigating what a permacomputing way of life could be, and what sort of transformative computational culture and aesthetics it could bring forward. If you want to know more, please start reading about what is permacomputing in essence, and then dive into its principles.
Permacomputing Aesthetics: Potential and Limits of Design Constraints in Computational Culture by Mansoux, Howell, Barok, and Heikkilä (2023)

✏️ The Writing Room
2025-09-30 17:00 - 19:30, 2025-10-07 17:00 - 19:30, 2025-10-14 17:00 - 19:30, 2025-10-21 17:00 - 19:30, 2025-10-28 17:00 - 19:30, 2025-11-04 17:00 - 19:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Come co-work with other writers in three 40-minute units of silent writing. Writers and projects of any type welcome. 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins between units. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc.

🙂 DC215 Meetup: Serialization Vulnerabilities with Razdex
2025-10-01 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Microsoft announced that the BinaryFormatter class is insecure and cannot be made secure, but how bad can it be?
How about a remote code execution exploit?
Join us at DC215 where you’ll see a demo of this attack and how it’s also exposed through JSON and Newtonsoft.
Demos and code samples are in C#, but this exploit is possible in any insecure deserialization process. By the end of this talk, you’ll know what to look for in your code and how to prevent it. If you’re a red teamer or pen tester you’ll add another attack vector to your toolkit.
Here’s the Meetup link.

🖼️ Block Printing Workshop
2025-10-02 17:30 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Join us on Thursday, October 2nd from 5:30–8:30 p.m. and learn the basics of block printing. We’ll use Speedy Carve blocks to create designs, then we’ll make prints using a manual press. Thanks to Bryn for putting it together!
Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. Sorry.
Here's a link to future workshops in this series!

Photo CC-BY mosmanlibrary

💻 Philly 2600 Meetup
2025-10-03 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
> The Philly 2600 meeting is a monthly gathering of local hackers, phreaks, nerds, geeks, activists, tinkerers, developers, infosec professionals, and other interesting people.

🏠 IndieWeb Homebrew Website Club
2025-10-05 18:00 - 20:00, 2025-11-02 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Homebrew Website Club is a growing world-wide network of meetups for everyone who wants to take back their web experience from social media silos, and own their online identities & content, or just want support with blogging!

🚧 Make Your First Website
2025-10-08 18:00 - 20:00, 2025-10-22 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Make a home page like it’s 1999! Join us at Iffy Books for a new workshop called Make Your First Website, led by Ragman a.k.a. Richard Green. You’ll learn the basics of HTML and create a static site on the free hosting service Neocities. No experience necessary!
Please bring a laptop if you have one. We’re suggesting a $5–$20 donation for this workshop, no one turned away for lack of funds.
Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. We'll offer it again soon!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

⚙️ Neo-Luddite Reading Group: 'Slow Down or Die: The Economics of Degrowth' by Timothée Parrique
2025-10-09 18:30 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
➡️ Virtual Meetup Link
Discord: Email neoluddite@victorgom.es for an invite!
Full schedule: victorgom.es/neoluddite
If you’re joining for the first time, I’d suggest you read this before anything else for brief context: What the Luddites Really Fought Against by Richard Conniff.The only expectation is that you read the chapter(s) of the book that’s listed for that meeting. You’re still welcome to participate if you haven’t done the readings as long as you are mindful. For each chapter, I’ve also noted some optional readings for context, so I’d suggest checking those out rather than reading ahead in the book. And remember, if you ever find yourself struggling with any of the readings or concepts, reach out! Either directly to me over email or to the entire group over discord.

☀️ Solar Music Synth Workshop
2025-10-10 12:00 - 13:00, 2025-10-24 12:00 - 13:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Join us and build a tiny solar-powered square wave generator on a breadboard. No soldering required! The workshop is free to attend, but you’ll need to purchase a kit for $12.50 to complete the project.
Here’s a link to the how-to zine we’ll use.
And here’s a diagram of the oscillator circuit we’ll build:

Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. We'll offer it again soon!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

⚡️ Beginner Soldering: Flashing LED Circuit
2025-10-10 13:00 - 14:00, 2025-10-24 13:00 - 14:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
In this workshop you’ll learn the basics of soldering by building a tiny oscillator circuit with two transistors and two LED lights. No previous experience needed!
Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. Sorry.
Here's a link to future workshops in this series!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

🚂 Model Internet Club
2025-10-11 10:30 - 12:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
The Model Internet Club is back! Join us every third Saturday from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. for an informal meetup focused on building small-scale computer networks.
No registration needed for this event! If we run out of space we can expand into our back yard area.

👁️ Intelligence History Reading Group: 'The Fort Bragg Cartel' by Seth Harp
2025-10-15 19:00 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
On Wednesday, October 15th at 7 p.m. we’ll meet to discuss The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces by Seth Harp (2025). We’ll cover the whole book.
🎧 Get the audiobook on Libro.fm

🚫 USB Data Blocker Soldering Class
2025-10-16 17:30 - 18:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Charging your phone in a public place can be stressful. What if someone is collecting your metadata for marketing purposes? What if they’re copying your files or installing malware? A USB data blocker can help! It’s a little adapter with the data terminals left disconnected, so you can charge your phone anywhere without fear.
This is a relatively quick soldering project, perfect for total beginners. We’ll have soldering irons and supplies to share.
Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. We'll offer it again soon!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

📡 Meshtastic 101
2025-10-18 10:30 - 12:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Join us for an introduction to Meshtastic, an application that lets you send private text messages over the air using pocket-sized LoRa radio transceivers. We’ll show you how to flash the latest Meshtastic firmware to the device, customize the settings, and start chatting with your friends.
Here’s a link to our zine on LoRa + Meshtastic.
Register:
Registration for this event is now closed. We'll offer it again soon!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

🗣️ Poetry Reading: Nora Fulton & Mark Francis Johnson
2025-10-18 19:00 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
Doors at 7, reading at 7:30. Stay tuned for details!

⚙️ DIY Macro Keyboard Workshop
2025-10-23 14:30 - 16:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
For this workshop you’ll use a Pi Pico board and CircuitPython to create a programmable mechanical keyboard with two keys. No soldering experience necessary!
To complete this project you’ll need to buy a kit for $14. Here’s what’s included:
• RP2040/Pi Pico board
• 2 mechanical keyboard switches
• 2 key caps
• oak base with pilot holes
• 4 stripped wires (2″)
• 1 mm heat shrink tubing (3″)
• 4 M2 screws
• 4 M2 spacer rings
• sandpaper square
➡️ Instructions & links
Register
Registration for this event is now closed. We'll offer it again soon!
This workshop is now full. We'll offer it again soon!

🎤 Tabling at PPM Fest
2025-10-25 12:00 - 17:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
On Saturday, 10/25 we’ll be tabling at the People Power Media Fest, presented by PhillyCAM.
Stay tuned for details!

🪐 Speculative Futures Reading Group: 'The Tainted Cup' by Robert Jackson Bennett
2025-10-29 19:00 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
For our October 29th meeting we’ll discuss The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. (We originally planned to read Planetes Book 1 by Makoto Yukimura this month, but we moved it to November 26th.)

🎧 Get the audiobook on Libro.fm

In Daretana’s greatest mansion, a high imperial officer lies dead–killed, to all appearances, when a tree erupted from his body. Even here at the Empire’s borders, where contagions abound and the blood of the leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death both terrifying and impossible.

Assigned to investigate is Ana Dolabra, a detective whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities. Rumor has it that she wears a blindfold at all times, and that she can solve impossible cases without even stepping outside the walls of her home.

At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol, magically altered in ways that make him the perfect aide to Ana’s brilliance. Din is at turns scandalized, perplexed, and utterly infuriated by his new superior–but as the case unfolds and he watches Ana’s mind leap from one startling deduction to the next, he must admit that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.

As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra–and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.

By an “endlessly inventive” ( Vulture) author with a “wicked sense of humor” (NPR), The Tainted Cup mixes the charms of detective fiction with brilliant world-building to deliver a fiendishly clever mystery that’s at once instantly recognizable and thrillingly new.

Robert Jackson Bennett is the author of the Founders Trilogy and the Divine Cities Trilogy, which were both Hugo Award finalists in the Best Series category. The first book in the Divine Cities Trilogy, City of Stairs, was also a finalist for the World Fantasy and Locus awards, and the second, City of Blades, was a finalist for the World Fantasy, Locus, and British Fantasy awards. His previous novels, which include American Elsewhere and The Company Man, have received the Edgar Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the Philip K. Dick Citation of Excellence. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his family.

🍂 Philly Zine Fest
2025-11-01 11:00 - 17:00 | Mitten Hall at Temple Univesity, 1913 N Broad St., Philadelphia, PA, 19122, United States
Join us for another Philly zine fest! Saturday November 1st, 2025 at Temple University’s Mitten Hall from 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.! Organized by Philly Soapbox.

💾☀️ Permacomputing + Solarpunk Meetup
2025-11-05 18:30 - 20:00 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
The Permacomputing + Solarpunk meetup is the first Wednesday every other month at Iffy Books! You can join us in person (404 S. 20th St., PHL) or remotely via Jitsi Meet.
➡️ Virtual meetup link
From Permacomputing.net: Permacomputing is a more sustainable approach to computer and network technology inspired by permaculture. Permacomputing is both a concept and a community of practice oriented around issues of resilience and regenerativity in digital technology. In a time where computing epitomizes industrial waste, permacomputing encourages a more sustainable approach, maximizing hardware lifespans, minimizing energy use and focussing on the use of already available computational resources. We do this because humans are part of nature and technology is an extension of humans, and we acknowledge that technology has been used to harm nature. We want to find out how we can practice good relations with the Earth by learning from ecological systems to leverage and re-center existing technologies and practices. We are also interested in investigating what a permacomputing way of life could be, and what sort of transformative computational culture and aesthetics it could bring forward. If you want to know more, please start reading about what is permacomputing in essence, and then dive into its principles.
Permacomputing Aesthetics: Potential and Limits of Design Constraints in Computational Culture by Mansoux, Howell, Barok, and Heikkilä (2023)

🤔 FAFIO Meetup: DIY Steganography
2025-11-06 18:30 - 20:30 | Iffy Books, 404 S. 20th St., Philadelphia, 19146, United States
FAFIO is a new meetup for folks who want to learn new tech skills but aren’t sure where to start. Let’s fuck around and figure it out!
This session the focus will be on steganography, a way to conceal secret messages in digital photos. You’ll need a computer if you want to try it. More info here: Steganography for Everyone
Feel free to come and work on something else!
