Iffy Books | 404 S. 20th St., PHL

🎤 Audio Recording Basics
2023-06-11 13:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Sunday, June 11 at 1 p.m. we’re running a free workshop on the basics of recording audio. We’ll discuss mic technique, audio hardware, recording conditions, and software options. Everyone will get a chance to make a recording with Audacity and start editing with Reaper.
We’ll have a computer available for everyone who signs up.
Register:

This event is free. Donations accepted.
Photo CC-BY Tm

🎉 Rail Park Block Party 2023
2023-06-10 12:00 - 17:00 | The Rail Park, 1300 Noble Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Rail Park Block Party 2023
Sat, June 10th
12–5 p.m. at The Rail Park
1300 Noble Street, PHL
Free

What’s more Philly than a block party? Join us on June 10, 2023 for The Rail Park’s Annual Block Party for a day filled with live music, local vendors, food trucks serving up delicious treats and plenty of activities for all ages. Whether you want to dance the day away, explore the park’s beautiful views and greenery, or just soak up the sun with friends, we’ve got you covered.
You won’t want to miss our live musical performances featuring some of the city’s most talented artists and bands curated by Philly’s own Chill Moody.
Best of all, you’ll be supporting the Friends of the Rail Park, a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving and enhancing this iconic public space for generations to come. So, bring your family, friends, and neighbors, and join us for a day of celebration, community, and fun!
We can’t wait to see you there!

Register on Eventbrite!

🚂 Model Internet Club
2023-06-09 18:00 - 21:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
The Model Internet Club meets again on Friday, June 9th at 6 p.m. Our goal is to build an offline network for fun and learning. We’ll have routers, switches, servers, and plenty of Ethernet on hand.

⚡️ Beginner Soldering Workshop
2023-06-08 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Thursday, June 8th at 6:00 p.m. we’re running a soldering workshop for beginners! Anyone can attend for free, but you’ll need to buy a circuit board with components for $6 to complete the project. Here’s what’s included in the kit:

1 x Weevil-shaped PCB
2 x LEDs
1 x 47k Ohm resistor
1 x miniature photocell
1 x 2N3904 transistor
2 x 220 Ohm resistors
1 x CR2032 coin cell battery
1 x 20mm coin cell battery holder

Register:

✏️ The Writing Room
2023-06-07 17:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Wednesdays 5–8 p.m.
(5–7 p.m. the last Wednesday of the month)
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.

🪄 Intro to ImageMagick
2023-06-03 15:30 - 17:30 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Saturday, June 3rd at 3:30 p.m. we’re running a workshop on ImageMagick, an essential command-line tool for converting between image formats and applying custom compression and filters.
Register:

🔐 Philly 2600 Meetup + TOOOL Meetup
2023-06-02 18:00 - 21:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
The Philly 2600 meetup will be at Iffy Books on Friday, June 2nd, starting at 6:00 p.m.
> The Philly 2600 meeting is a monthly gathering of local hackers, phreaks, nerds, geeks, activists, tinkerers, developers, infosec professionals, and other interesting people.
We’re also hosting a meetup for the Philadelphia Chapter of the Open Organization of Lockpickers:
> Come join us for our monthly First Friday Open Pick Night at Iffy Books! Whether you’re a novice who just stumbled upon LockpickingLawyer, a seasoned safecracker, or somewhere in between, come join us for a evening of fun as we pop some locks.

📚 Reading Group: The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi
2023-05-31 19:00 - 20:30 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Wednesday, May 31st at 7 p.m. we’ll meet to discuss The Water Knife (2015) by Paolo Bacigalupi.

✏️ The Writing Room at Iffy Books
2023-05-31 17:00 - 19:00, 2023-05-24 17:00 - 20:00, 2023-05-17 17:00 - 20:00, 2023-05-10 17:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States

📡 Virtual Meshtastic Meetup
2023-05-30 19:00 - 21:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
We’re hosting a virtual meetup on Tuesday, May 30th at 7 p.m. to help Meshtastic users get connected. Our goal is to make a wireless chat network across the PHL area using low-power LoRa radios.
To join the network, you’ll need a LoRa radio such as a Heltec LoRa32, LILYGO LoRa32, or LILYGO T-Beam. Here’s a full list of compatible devices.
➡️ Join the meetup

📙 A Poetry Reading with John DeWitt, Mark Francis Johnson & Rosa van Hensbergen
2023-05-28 17:00 - 19:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Hi all!

I’m kind of feeling this “cold month of May” thing, reminds me of one of my favorite Cocteau Twins tracks.

That said, anticipate a HOT HOT reading in the early evening of Sunday, May 28th, at Philadelphia’s fabulous Iffy Books. I’m really humbled to be hosting some of my favorite poets!

John DeWitt is a poet and researcher living in Marseille. He is author of 20 20 Pretzels (Materials, 2020) and The Neckless Spokesperson of the Garden of Earthly Delights (Face Press, 2019), as well as a doctoral dissertation on the work of Clark Coolidge.

Mark Francis Johnson‘s latest books are Blown Study (Erotoplasty Editions, 2022) and Doleful Hoo-Ha (Intrinsic Coat, 2022). He lives in Philadelphia.

Rosa van Hensbergen is a researcher, translator, writer, and performance maker. She is Assistant Professor of East Asian Languages and Literatures at Yale, where she teaches and researches modern and contemporary Japanese and American literature and performance. She has five poetry pamphlets published, and she publishes other poets’ work through her small press, Tipped Press.

We’ll be gathering around 5p with the reading beginning at 5:30p at Iffy, which is located at 319 N. 11th St #2I. Attached is a flyer in my typical style— please distribute freely to any and all interested parties.

Love and solidarity until then!
ted

🎥 Machines in Flames (2022)
2023-05-27 20:00 - 22:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Saturday, 5/27 we’re screening the film Machines in Flames at 8 p.m., followed by a virtual Q&A with the filmmakers.
Machines in Flames (2022, 50min) finds a secret history of destruction by following the footsteps of a clandestine group of French computer workers from the 1980s.
In 1980s Toulouse, an elusive group began bombing computer companies. ‘CLODO’ disappeared after three years, without ever being caught or ever to be heard of again. Two film makers launch an investigation into CLODO, looking for answers, motivations and identities, but are soon frustrated by a collective that struck in the dead of night, leaving in their tracks only ashes and the sporadic line of cryptic graffiti. The film combines archival traces, a viral desktop choreography, and late-night video recordings of CLODO’s targets into a meditation on computation, destruction, and the lure of archives.
Presented by the South Philly Autonomous Cinema Association.

💻 Router Hack Day & Used Electronics Sale
2023-05-27 13:00 - 18:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
• Command for opening serial connection with router:
minicom -D /dev/ttyUSB0 -c on
• Firmware download for Tenda FH1206 router
• Docker command for decompressing firmware with unblob:
docker run \n–rm \n–pull always \n-v /Users/iffybooks/Documents/Router_firmware/output:/data/output \n-v /Users/iffybooks/Documents/Router_firmware/input:/data/input \nghcr.io/onekey-sec/unblob:latest –report firmware_reoirt.json /data/input/firmware.bin
• Jim’s unsqhashfs instructions
On May 27th we’re spending the whole afternoon (1–6 p.m) hacking away at an old Tenda FH1206 router, with the goal of installing open firmware such as OpenWrt or FreshTomato. We have plenty of routers to go around, which we’re selling for $8 each. Proceeds will be split evenly between Philly Community Wireless and Iffy Books.
This will be an informal event, more like a hackathon than a structured workshop. We recommend bringing a laptop if you have one.
We’ll also be selling used electronics, including desktop computers, monitors, peripherals, cables, and TS-7600 single-board computers. Come early before they’re picked over!
1–3 p.m. Orientation
We’ll show you how to examine the router firmware and gain root access via telnet.
3–5 p.m. Soldering session
You’ll learn to access your router’s serial shell, which requires soldering a few wires to the board.
5:00 p.m. Progress reports
We’ll go around the room and talk about what we’ve learned.
The routers we’re trying to hack were sold under the name Atlas Media AMW-DBR1200AC, but they’re actually repackaged Tenda FH1206 routers.
Here’s a blog post with our progress on the router so far.
And here are more details to get you started:
• FCC page for Atlas Media AMW-DBR1200AC
• User manual for Atlas Media AMW-DBR1200AC
• Firmware for Atlas Media AMW-DBR1200AC router
• FCC page for Tenda FH1206
• Tenda FH1206 manual
• Firmware for Tenda FH1206 router
• Wireless Cat page with hardware details
• unblob, a program you can use to decompress the firmware files
• OpenWrt build for a similar Tenda router
• CPU details: Broadcom BCM5358B0

📙 Sebastian Castillo & Caroline Rayner Book Release
2023-05-25 19:30 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Please join us to celebrate the release of Salmon and The Moan Wilds on May 25th at 7:30 p.m. With readings by Sebastian Castillo, Caroline Rayner, Ted Rees, Oscar d’Artois & Alina Pleskova. Hosted by Lucy K. Shaw.

⚡️ Chip Set: A DIY Electronics Meetup
2023-05-25 18:00 - 20:00, 2023-05-11 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Chip Set is a DIY electronics meetup at Iffy Books on the second and fourth Thursday of each month. If you’re interested in circuits, microcontrollers, and/or single-board computers, stop by and make some friends! All ages and skill levels are welcome, including total newbies.

This is an informal meetup, without a set topic or agenda. Feel free to bring a project to show the group!

Photo by Raimond Spekking (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Bleeding Control Basics
2023-05-23 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Presented by Untitled Medical Collective in association with Philly SRA, Bleeding Control Basics will go over first aid as it applies to severe bleeding. We will cover scene safety, injury assessment, basic bleeding control, and tourniquet application. This class doesn’t provide any kind of certification, and is just meant to provide essential information to as many people as possible.
If you have any questions about class content, reach out to untitledmedical@proton.me.
Register:

💾🌾 Iffy Books Permacomputing Meetup
2023-05-21 13:00 - 15:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Our next permacomputing meetup is on Sunday, May 21st at 1:00 PM EDT. You can join us in person at Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St. #2I, PHL) or via Jitsi audio stream.

➡️ Jitsi Stream 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.

🪡 Hands-On Darning Workshop
2023-05-20 13:00 - 16:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Saturday, May 20th at 1:00 p.m. we’re hosting a darning workshop and mending session. Total beginners welcome!
Register:

📡 Meshtastic 101
2023-05-19 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Friday, May 19th at 6:00 p.m. we’re hosting an introduction to Meshtastic, an application that lets you send private text messages over the air using pocket-sized LoRa radios.
Here’s a link to our updated zine on LoRa + Meshtastic. (We’re still working on it; we’ll post a PDF version soon.)
If you have a LoRa radio (or reserve one below), we’ll show you how to flash the latest Meshtastic firmware to the device and customize the settings. If you don’t have a LoRa radio, you’re still welcome to attend!
Note that we have two antenna options: The slim antenna is smaller, and fits neatly inside the Heltec LoRa32 V3’s plastic case. The other antenna is slightly too big for the case, so you’ll need to attach it to the outside with a rubber band. The larger antenna comes with an SMA adapter, making it easy to swap in different antennas in the future.
Register:

⚡️ Beginner Soldering Workshop
2023-05-18 18:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Thursday, May 18th at 6:00 p.m. we’re running a soldering workshop for beginners! Anyone can attend for free, but you’ll need to buy a circuit board with components for $6 to complete the project. Here’s what’s included in the kit:

1 x Weevil-shaped PCB
2 x LEDs
1 x 47k Ohm resistor
1 x miniature photocell
1 x 2N3904 transistor
2 x 220 Ohm resistors
1 x CR2032 coin cell battery
1 x 20mm coin cell battery holder

Register:

PHL Virtual Meshtastic Meetup
2023-05-16 19:00 - 21:00 | Jitsi Meet (iffybooks.club), 19107
We’re hosting a virtual meetup on Tuesday, May 16th at 7 p.m. to help Meshtastic users get connected. Our goal is to make a wireless chat network across the PHL area using low-power LoRa radios.
➡️ Jitsi Meet Link
To join the Meshtastic chat, you’ll need a LoRa radio such as a Heltec LoRa32, LILYGO LoRa32, or LILYGO T-Beam. Here’s a full list of compatible devices. If you don’t have a LoRa radio, you’re still welcome to join the meetup.
Here are a few things we’re hoping to accomplish:
• Flash the latest stable Meshtastic firmware, version 2.1.5.23272da.
• Decide on a channel setting (e.g., Long Range Fast or Very Long Range Slow).
• Discuss Meshtastic device roles (client, router, router client, etc.).
• Set up a shared encryption key.
• Chat!
Here’s our zine on LoRa + Meshtastic from summer 2022, which is now slightly out of date. We’re working on a new version.

☀️🔋 Let’s Make a Solar-Powered Chat Network (overflow workshop)
2023-05-14 13:00 - 15:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
On Sunday, May 14th at 1:00 p.m. we’ll re-run our workshop ‘Let’s Make a Solar-Powered Chat Network’ for anyone who didn’t make it to the workshop the day before. We don’t have funding for this event, so you’ll need to buy a solar chat node kit from the shop (details below) or bring your own hardware.
Here’s the workshop announcement:
We’re looking for help to build a wireless, solar-powered chat network across the Philly area! Are you interested in learning about off-grid solar power? Do you have a sunny place on your roof, in your yard, or near an upstairs window where you can leave a small radio transceiver? This workshop is for you!
You’ll assemble solar-powered LoRa node, mount it in a weatherproof enclosure (provided by you), and use the Meshtastic app to start sending encrypted text messages. Here’s what the kit contains:
• Heltec LoRa32 v3 w/case
• 5V 6W monocrystalline solar panel
• TP4056 battery charger module w/ header pins
• 18650 lithium-ion battery
• Battery clip
• MCP1700-3302E low-dropout (LDO) regulator
• 100uF electrolytic capacitor
• 100nF ceramic capacitor
• Micro breadboard
• 1.25mm JST connectors
• DuPont jump wires
• USB-C cable
• USB extension cable
• Heat shrink tubing
This workshop includes some light soldering, suitable for beginners. We’ll provide soldering irons and lead-free solder. If you don’t feel comfortable soldering, we have a solder-free option for assembling the kit.
To complete this project, you’ll need to bring a weatherproof enclosure for your LoRa node. An opaque, light-colored material is best to keep the temperature down. Avoid metal containers, which may block radio communication. At the workshop we’ll show you how to cut a hole in the bottom of your enclosure to pass a power cable through. Here are some items that would make good enclosures:
• a plastic ammo box from Harbor Freight
• a waterproof container for boating, such as an Otter Box
• an empty Gatorade bottle painted white
• a food storage container with a good seal
• a plastic bucket with lid
Register:

🚂 Model Internet Club
2023-05-13 17:00 - 20:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
The Model Internet Club meets again on Saturday, May 13th at 5 p.m. Our goal is to build an offline network for fun and learning. We’ll have routers, switches, servers, and plenty of Ethernet on hand.
For this month’s meeting, we’re asking folks to make websites ahead of time that they can share on the network. All you need is an HTML file called index.html and any additional pages and image files you want to include. If you want, you can upload your tiny website using the form below (max size 5MB).
Making a website ahead of time is optional. If you’ve never used HTML before, you can start with this guide. For design inspiration, check out this gallery of GeoCities homepages from the ’90s.
Photo CC-BY Andrew Russell
Upload your website in advance (optional):

☀️🔋 Let’s Make a Solar-Powered Chat Network
2023-05-13 13:00 - 15:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
We’re looking for help to build a wireless, solar-powered chat network across the Philly area! Are you interested in learning about off-grid solar power? Do you have a sunny place on your roof, in your yard, or near an upstairs window where you can leave a small radio transceiver? This workshop may be for you!
Each participant will receive a free kit with all the parts needed to build a solar-powered LoRa node. You’ll assemble the kit, mount it in a weatherproof enclosure (provided by you), and use the Meshtastic app to start sending encrypted text messages. Here’s what the kit contains:
• Heltec LoRa32 v3 w/case
• 5V 6W monocrystalline solar panel
• TP4056 battery charger module w/ header pins
• 18650 lithium-ion battery
• Battery clip
• MCP1700-3302E low-dropout (LDO) regulator
• 100uF electrolytic capacitor
• 100nF ceramic capacitor
• Micro breadboard
• 1.25mm JST connectors
• DuPont jump wires
• USB-C cable
• USB extension cable
• Heat shrink tubing
This workshop includes some light soldering, suitable for beginners. We’ll provide soldering irons and lead-free solder. If you don’t feel comfortable soldering, we have a solder-free option for assembling the kit.
To complete this project, you’ll need to bring a weatherproof enclosure for your LoRa node. An opaque, light-colored material is best to keep the temperature down. Avoid metal containers, which may block radio communication. At the workshop we’ll show you how to cut a hole in the bottom of your enclosure to pass a power cable through. Here are some items that would make good enclosures:
• a plastic ammo box from Harbor Freight
• a waterproof container for boating, such as an Otter Box
• an empty Gatorade bottle painted white
• a food storage container with a good seal
• a plastic bucket with lid
Registration opens Monday, April 3rd at 8:30 p.m. We’re expecting this workshop to fill up quickly, so we’re keeping a waiting list. If you register but can’t attend, let us know ASAP at iffybooks@iffybooks.net. We can’t reserve kits for folks who miss the workshop, but Iffy Books will have a limited number for sale after the event.
Supplies for this workshop are funded by a grant from the Engaged Humanities Studio at Swarthmore College.
Register:
Registration for this free workshop is full. Thanks for your interest! You can join the waiting list here.
We’re also offering a paid version of the workshop on Sunday, May 14th at 1:00 p.m.

🎤 Fast Forward Open Mic
2023-05-12 19:00 - 21:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Friday, May 12, 7:00–9:00pm
hosted by Dream Poet for Hire
With featured performances by:
Alex Smith
Line on Some Trip (L.O.S.T.)
and Cameron Stuart
Accessibility: 1st Floor is up 5 stairs, Iffy Books is on 2nd floor by elevator

☀️ Make a Solar Zoetrope
2023-05-07 13:00 - 15:00 | Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St.), 319 N. 11th St. #2I, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, United States
Join us on Sunday, May 7th at 1:00 p.m. and make your own solar-powered zoetrope! This workshop is suitable for beginners and kids. No experience necessary.
A zoetrope is one of several pre-film animation devices that produce the illusion of motion by displaying a sequence of drawings or photographs showing progressive phases of that motion. (Wikipedia)
Anyone can attend and draw animated clips for free. To build a zoetrope, you’ll need to buy a kit for $7.50.
Register:
