# A brief history of OuiShare

It all started in 2011 in Paris. Scroll through our timeline below to read more about how OuiShare has evolved since 2011!

***And here in short:*** In Fall 2011, a small group of collaborative economy enthusiasts started meeting every month in Paris for potluck dinners. Most of these people had met through Antonin, who had launched the first French blog about collaborative consumption the year before, and was curating a Facebook group we were using to share ideas and knowledge about the collaborative economy. Conversations were passionate, and there was a shared feeling they could lead to something more.

From this collective energy, one core idea emerged: we wanted to better understand the change underway and accelerate the transition to a more meaningful society by empowering the pioneers of the collaborative economy from across the globe.

On January 2nd, 2012, we decided to give this project a name, and that was the official birth of OuiShare. The very first OuiShare Drink in Paris brought together 100 collaborative economy enthusiasts, and was soon followed by other meetups in other cities.

Later in May we invited them all to join us for very first OuiShare Summit in Paris. This milestone event officialized the global scope of the project, as well as the foundation of OuiShare as a non-profit organization (association) co-founded by four people: Flore, Antonin, Edwin and Benjamin, who had been leading the development of OuiShare over the past months.

After this, OuiShare quickly spread beyond the borders of Europe, to Latin America and the Middle East, thanks to an amazing international team of Connectors.

*Would you like to make **changes or improvements** to this handbook?* [***Read how here.*** ](/contributing-to-this-handbook.md)


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