Heavy storm clouds over a dark, forested ridgeline.

creative media laboratory · Indigenist research co-operative

a co-creative partnership for good, not profit.

We are researchers, filmmakers, photographers, writers, artists and coders. We don’t make things for you. We make them with you, then make them work for you, with or without our help.

We work mostly from Tūhoe whenua and Arrarnta Country, special places to us, where we are Indigenous to. We pass our respect forward to custodians and caretakers in our acknowledgement.

the
pathway

Five steps towards something that is yours: your data, your stories, your tools, on your terms. You can stop at any one of them.

౷
kōrero

We start with a yarn. No brief, no pitch deck. Who you are, what you carry, what you want to keep safe.

cuppa optional
߷
wānanga

Research with your community, not about it. We listen for what the kaupapa needs before anyone reaches for a tool.

the research is the relationship
፨
co-create

Film, software, writing and infrastructure, in whatever mix fits. The answer is rarely just hosting, and never just ours.

many hands, many disciplines
⟿
make it together

We build side by side, test it with the people it is for, and go round again until it sits right.

round and round, on purpose
⧜
hand it over

Built to be looked after by you, without leaning on a third party. Documented, open, yours to carry forward.

or we keep minding it. happy to yarn about that too

what we make, with you

The Albion, a corner pub with an ornate facade and a vertical hotel pub sign, under a cloudy sky.

film · documentary

stories told from inside

Documentary and short film, made on Country with the people whose story it is.

infrastructure

sovereign hosting

Servers, email, storage and sites that answer to you, not to a platform across the ocean.

software · gpl

free, open apps

Tools built in the open, licensed so nobody can take them away from you.

research

reports that come home

Indigenist research whose findings go back to community first, in words people use.

print

zines & writing

Essays, zines and small runs. Things you can hold, pass on, and leave on a kitchen table.

wānanga

skills that stay

Training for your people, so the knowledge to run it lives with you once we step back.

photography

pictures worth keeping

Professional shoots for your kaupapa, and the personal ones too: whānau, hui, the everyday.

audio

voices, kept

Podcasts, kapa haka, field recordings, and oral knowledge recorded and held so it carries on.

from the field

We work where the story lives, and bring the lab with us.

The carved front of a meeting house on a marae, its red carvings and painted rafters under a bright sky. — from the marae to the market, we’re here with you

A window mural reading STOLEN LAND, with two smiling figures in bold black and white lines.

say kia ora

our kōrero, together

Your kōrero is a taonga. We look after it.

1
It comes straight to us. This page talks only to ursa.nz. No big tech company sits between you and us, and nobody else reads along.
2
It is sealed end to end. Your message is locked in your browser and only the co-operative can open it.
3
It stays yours. Ask us to let it go and we will. We are not building an audience. We are after a relationship.

why digital sovereignty

Your knowledge, your data, your say.

Digital sovereignty means the people a story or dataset comes from decide where it lives, who sees it and how it’s used. As Indigenous people we know what our knowledge is worth. So everything we make is built to put that decision back with the people we make it with.

sovereignty was never ceded.

We recognise Māori as Tangata Whenua of Aotearoa. We recognise the sovereignty of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples throughout Australia. We are humbled by the custodianship of Elders and Kaumātua past and present. When we create on Country, we engage Custodians with deep respect and gratitude.