Dual currency pilot at HUB Brussels, 2010-2012

This is the introductory text published on and about an community exchange platform implemented at the HUB Brussels in 2010. With the closure of the HUB Brussels this pilot has been discontinued. A funding applications for the scaling and further development of the ideas from can be downloaded here(May 2010).

Let´s build our Hub community, one exchange at a time!

This platform gives you two new features to help you connect with other Hub-Members, promote your business, do what you enjoy doing and create value for yourself and the Hub community.

The first feature is a market-place that allows you to post offers and wants.Think of it as an online edition of “Hub classifieds”.
Here you can promote your professional services and you can offer the things you enjoy doing apart from your day-job. For example:
Looking for somebody to go canoeing with?
Looking for a garden you can bring to flourish?
Wanting to put your handyman skills to use for another Hub-member?
Who wants to finally start to learn Spanish? And who in the Hub can teach it?

Offers and wants can be placed and searched by any member. Once you find what you are looking for, you make contact with offering/requesting member and start your exchange.

The second feature are the Hub Currencies. There are two currencies we use to facilitate, track and acknowledge the value created between members: The Hubees(Hbs) and the Huney(Hn). Instead of always calculating and economizing with your ever scarce Euros, you can use these new currencies to “pay” each other with for your formal and informal exchanges within the community. But we rather say “acknowledge the exchange” because here, we would like to offer you a new way to think about your relationships and the value we create as a community.

The Hubee is basically a time-currency. One Hubee is equivalent to one hour of services. You earn Hubees when you provide a service for another Hub member. You can spend it again for one hour of services from any other community member.

This purely quantitative currency (only measuring the time invested) is complemented by the Huney, a qualitative currency to acknowledge all values that cannot be measured and counted so easily.
The amount of Huney you receive from other Hub members shows the wealth in social-capital that you bring to the community.
It is a bit like the reputation you can earn on social networks and online auctions. But we will not only rate how “well” you provided your service, but this system is open to acknowledge and say Thank you! for all the contributions that normally go unnoticed: The smile someone gave you this morning, the helpful hand you provided during last nights event, the beauty of the mural one of the hosts painted in the Hub… the Huney flowing through the community visualizes what makes our Hub this awesome space to work at!

Every month you can give 30 Huneys to others, one at a time. But this should not limit you in your usage of this platform: for every exchange you do in Hubees you will get one Huney on your account and on more to give.

For more explanations, please see the User Manual .

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