Community Night DIGITAL-Navigating Corona Times 12.05. // 19:30// in English

This FAQ Session and Community Evening aims to help navigate public and private support programmes and initiatives that help artists and cultural workers during Corona times in Berlin, discuss various administrative questions related to them (taxes, social security etc.), and share experiences and examples - in English. We are moving the Community Evenings for the time being to a digital space, to an online meeting room hosted on our own server, so that we can respect everyone's privacy as well as possible.

We would like to address the questions of artists and other self-employed cultural/music workers who have difficulties finding information which aid programme they might be eligible for, how to apply, or where to turn for support. In particular -  people who don't speak German, who don't have a German passport, who may not be eligible for certain programmes etc.

As part of the session, we also aim to try and answer your questions related to how the aid programmes relate to other administrative frameworks, such as visa, unemployment benefits, taxes, Gema fees etc. (where we can of course, we probably won't know everything).

The session is organized as a Q&A, so there will be lots of time for you all to ask your questions – in chat format. And the answers will hopefully be relevant for many others as well.

Over the past few weeks, our colleagues at Kreativ Kultur Berlin have offered regular group FAQ sessions in German about the different financial aid programmes to help during Corona times for artists, self-employed and „Kleinunternehmer“ in the cultural and creative scenes in Berlin – and we strongly recommend to participate in their sessions as well. However, there is not so much information available in English – hence the idea for this meetup.

The session is organized in collaboration between Music Pool Berlin and Touring Artists.

Speakers:

Sebastian Hoffmann - supervises the touring artists help desk service for internationally mobile artists. The touring artists help desk service is a cooperation of ITI Germany (International Theatre Institute) and IGBK (International Association of Art) with SMartDe – Netzwerk für Kreative e.V., supported by the Federal Government's Commissioner for Culture and the Media. In the music scene of Berlin, Sebastian is a jury member for Musicboard's support tour funding program, stages concerts as part of the collective Fourtrack on Stage at Schokoladen and brings to life the Down by the River Festival as one of the programmers and organisers. From 2012 to 2016, he was an agent at Paper & Iron Booking.

Berlin Collective Action: Nightlife Emergency Fund - The fund exists to provide emergency financial aid to at-risk nightlife workers in Berlin — those whose livelihoods have been severely impacted by COVID-19, and especially those who do not have access to other support systems. Many collectives and organisations active in music and nightlife have joined to stand in solidarity with the most vulnerable in the community, and try to provide some relief for those who are not eligible for state support, and so often fall through the cracks in times of crisis.

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Organizational Info & Registration

Digital Community Evening - Guidelines for Participants

Welcome to our Music Pool digital meeting space!

Meeting Room URL: https://musicpoolberlin.collocall.de/b/and-xjf-urz

(best use a Firefox or Chrome browser)

In order for us all to have a great experience of the meeting, and can find our way easily once we are inside the meeting room – please follow the guidelines and directions:

• To enter the meeting room, just enter the specified URL in your browser. There is no need to download any app. The meeting room is browser based.
• When you access the meeting room, you will be asked if you want to join with audio, or if you want to only listen. Please click „listen only“ / „nur zuhören“.
• You will get to a waiting room first, and then we'll let you all in once we start the programme. We start at 19:30. If you are late, we will still let you in of course, but we encourage you to be on time.
• You need to specify a name in order to enter the room. This does not necessarily have to be your real name, if you prefer to join anonymously.
• Your microphone is muted when you enter the meeting room. Please keep it that way. All participants' microphones and cameras should remain muted throughout the entire session. Otherwise we can all hear you drinking your tea etc.
• What does the meeting room look like?
  • When you enter, you see the speakers on video on the main screen, as well as the presented media. You can minimize and maximize the presented media yourself on the right side of the screen.
  • In the left column, you can navigate between the public chat, the meeting notes, and the list of participants. The meeting notes contain the meeting guidelines.
• How can you ask questions?
  • We would like to organize the Q&A session via the public chat. Please post your question into the chat. The moderator will then pick up the questions one by one, and the speakers will answer them on video.
• If you have any technical or organizational difficulties during the meeting, you can contact Kirsten Grebasch, the meeting admin, visible in the sidebar on the left, in a private chat.
• The meeting admin can also dismiss participants, in case of disturbance.
• It goes without saying that all expressions of racism, sexism or other type of pejorative and structurally marginalizing remarks and hate comments have no space in our community evenings. Please be respectful, friendly and kind with each other.

With using Collocall, all GDPR guidelines protecting your privacy will be observed.

We hope you enjoy our first digital community evening! It's also the first time for us from the organizational side, so we are excited and hope all will work well.