Iffy Books

For our November reading group we'll discuss Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler. See you there!

Join us Saturday, December 3rd  at 2:00 p.m. for a reading & discussion with Mary F.E. Ebeling, author of Afterlives of Data: Life and Debt Under Capitalist Surveillance (University of California Press, 2022). ➡️ Video Stream Link What our health data tell American capitalism about our value—and how that controls our lives. Afterlives of Data follows […]

Want to get some writing done? Come co-work with other writers from 5–8 p.m. at Iffy Books. Writers and projects of any type are welcome. The session will be organized into three 40-minute units of silent writing with 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins in-between. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc. See you there!

Modular Synths 101: In this crash course you will learn the basics of sound design with a modular synthesizer.  We will cover all the basic components from shaping sound waves to the end of chain effects, a little synth history, and debate west coast vs east coast style!  No experience needed. This is an introductory […]

Join us at Saturday, December 10th at 6:00 a.m. (yes, really) until noon and participate in UnTechCon 1! It's a virtual unconference organized by Geeks for Social Change in the UK. We'll have coffee and donuts! UnTechCon 1 FAQ Learn more and buy tickets for UnTechCon Register for the meetup:

On Sunday, December 11th at 3:30 p.m. we'll host an electronics workshop for beginners! We'll use A Beginner’s Guide to Circuits by Øyvind Nydal Dahl as our guide, and we'll have kits for sale with all the components you'll need. We'll also have parts everyone can share. Stay tuned for more info and registration! Register: […]

Want to get some writing done? Come co-work with other writers from 5–8 p.m. at Iffy Books. Writers and projects of any type are welcome. The session will be organized into three 40-minute units of silent writing with 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins in-between. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc. See you there!

On Thursday, November 13th from 6–9 p.m. we'll host a meetup for folks who are learning about the command line. Bring a laptop if you have one! Any OS is fine: macOS, Windows, or Linux. We'll have drinks and snacks! This will be an informal meetup, without a set program or start time. We'll have […]

Our next permacomputing meetup is on Sunday, December 18th at 1:00 PM EST. You can join us in person at Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St. #3E, PHL) or via Jitsi audio stream. ➡️ Jitsi Stream Link

Iffy Market is on! Presented by Iffy Books and Bonk, with help from Vox Populi. When: Wednesday, December 21st from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. Where: The Black Box space at Vox Populi, across the hall from Iffy Books Address: 319 N. 11th St., PHL (3rd floor) Books & Zines:Dead Drop DistroHere and Now ZinesIffy […]

Want to get some writing done? Come co-work with other writers from 5–8 p.m. at Iffy Books. Writers and projects of any type are welcome. The session will be organized into three 40-minute units of silent writing with 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins in-between. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc. See you there!

We'll be open from noon to 6 p.m. on New Year's Day! Stop by and see our new space on the second floor (room 2I).

Want to get some writing done? Come co-work with other writers from 5–8 p.m. at Iffy Books. Writers and projects of any type are welcome. The session will be organized into three 40-minute units of silent writing with 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins in-between. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc. See you there!

Does your kid have a toy that's so loud it's driving you up the wall? Are you just curious about electronics and sound? Join us January 7th at 1 p.m. for a hands-on workshop on how to quiet or silence kids' electronic toys. Bring an electronic toy to modify and we'll walk you through the […]

Want to get some writing done? Come co-work with other writers from 5–8 p.m. at Iffy Books. Writers and projects of any type are welcome. The session will be organized into three 40-minute units of silent writing with 10-minute breaks and accountability check-ins in-between. BYO coffee, water, computer chargers, notepads, etc. See you there!

On Thursday, January 12th from 6–8 p.m. we’ll host a meetup for folks who are learning about the command line. Bring a laptop if you have one! Any OS is fine: macOS, Windows, or Linux. This will be an informal meetup, without a set program or start time. We’ll have a few command-line experts on […]

On Friday, January 13th we're having a party in our new space. It's bigger, with windows! We're in the same building, on the second floor in 2I. Stay tuned for more details.

On Saturday, January 14th (3:30–5:30 p.m.) we're running our workshop Spread ideas with a pocket wi-fi portal. You'll learn to program a Wemos D1 development board (based on an ESP8266 chip) to make a wi-fi access point with a web server. Anyone who connects to the wi-fi network will see a web page made by […]

On Sunday, January 15th at 3:30 p.m. we’re hosting an electronics workshop for beginners! We’ll use A Beginner’s Guide to Circuits by Øyvind Nydal Dahl as our guide. This workshop is free to attend, but you'll need to buy an electronics kit for $10 to complete the projects. The kit contains the parts you'll need to […]

On Saturday, January 21st we’re running an audio digitization clinic! Bring a cassette tape or record from noon to 7 p.m. and we’ll help you make a digital copy. If you bring a laptop, we'll show you how to do it yourself. We'll also have a computer available to share. Sign up for for a […]

We're hosting a permacomputing meetup on Sunday, January 22nd at 1:00 PM EST. You can join us in person at Iffy Books (319 N. 11th St. #2I, PHL) or via Jitsi audio stream. ➡️ Jitsi Stream Link Here's a recording from our December Meetup: https://kolektiva.media/w/84RnX8VkpePQsG3P7Kt9Jv

For our January reading group, we'll discuss Ada Palmer's Too Like the Lightning, a utopian vision of a world that has radically reimagined, among other things, transportation, citizenship, and communication. See you Wednesday, January 25th at 7 p.m.! This event is free. Donations accepted.

On Thursday, January 26th at 6:30 p.m. we'll play a round of the tabletop storytelling game Solarpunk Futures.Solarpunk Futures is a storytelling game where players imagine the pathways to a desirable world from the perspective of a utopian future. Players use a deck of cards to remember Ancestors and work together using Tools and Values to overcome a set of real-world Challenges. Through […]

Wednesdays 5–8PM (except the last week 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.

On Saturday, February 4th we're hosting a data destruction event at Iffy Books. Join us at 1 p.m. for a workshop on several command-line tools for securely deleting data on magnetic drives (shred, wipe, and srm). We'll also discuss full-disk encryption. Bring a laptop and/or external hard drive for hands-on practice! From 2 p.m. to […]

Join us at 3:30 p.m. on Sunday, February 5th and make your own MP3 boombox! We'll use the DFPlayer Mini MP3 player board (below), which has an SD card slot and a built-in 3-watt amplifier. You'll set up the MP3 player controls on a breadboard, connect speakers and a battery, and mount everything in a […]

Philly ABC is back with our regular letter-writing events this month featuring Alex Stokes, an antifascist prisoner sentenced to 20 years for defending himself and others from armed Proud Boys at the New York State Capitol on January 6th. Alex is a journalist and artist from Albany, NY. He began documenting social unrest in 2014, […]

Wednesdays 5–8PM (except the last week 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.

Chip Set is a DIY electronics meetup at Iffy Books on the second and fourth Thursday of each month (starting February 2023). 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 […]

Are you curious about Mastodon and the fediverse? Join us Saturday, February 11th at 1:00 p.m. for an introduction to federated social media with Nelson Chu Pavlosky. Nelson is an admin and moderator at jawns.club, a Philly-centric Mastodon server. You’ll learn about Mastodon's history, how it compares to legacy social media (e.g., Twitter), and how […]

On February 11th and 12th we're hosting a two-day workshop on how to build a tent-safe heater that can burn isopropyl alcohol or ethanol. Workshop Day 1: Making the burner Workshop Day 2: Testing, wicking, caging  Register: Note: We have limited supplies for this event. Don't register unless you're sure you can make it to […]

Our next permacomputing meetup is on Sunday, February 12th at 1:00 PM EST. 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 […]

On February 11th and 12th we're hosting a two-day workshop on how to build a tent-safe heater that burns isopropyl alcohol or ethanol. Workshop Day 1: Making the burner Workshop Day 2: Testing, wicking, caging  ➡️ Register here image by heater bloc via twitter