28 Mar
2014
28 Mar
'14
11:18 a.m.
On Wed, Mar 26, 2014 at 9:39 AM, eddan.com <eddan(a)sudoroom.tv> wrote:
While I agree with concerns about top-down ownership,
I think it is important to recognize their success in regards to diversity. Both in terms
of who works there during the day and the kind of events they hold, I have been impressed
by how connected the place is to the community - at any point in time you'll see a
majority of people of color and more often more women than men
That was not my experience, but I've only been to one of their handful
of events (Oakland Data Day). I heard mixed reviews of their other
events and can't comment on them. I could never afford the price of
being there during the day, so I wouldn't know.
I am refreshingly surprised that you care about this, Eddan. I think
all Sudoers need to look critically at our work from an intersectional
feminist, anti-racist and anti-colonial frame. That especially
includes being accountable to our privileges and learning to replace
oppressive silencing behavior with ally behavior. How's that Sudo
men's group going, btw?
both areas in which Sudo Room has struggled with since
its inception.
To be clear, it is women, people of color, queers and other oppressed
groups who have struggled to be supported and represented at Sudoroom.
I feel like saying the organization has struggled is a rhetorical
erasure that adds to this problem. There are actually a lot of us, but
we face a structural bias.
Additionally, I think there may be some
misunderstanding about what having an open knowledge, commons-oriented set of agreements.
The logic of open knowledge systems is to celebrate the spread of these norms as they
become more widely adopted - concern about 'copying and pasting' seem to
perpetuate an exclusive rights kind of thinking.
Pretty sure Hol was being tongue-in-cheek. As I said in reply at the
meeting, "it's more of a ctrl-x"
28 Mar
28 Mar
12:10 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
To be clear, it is women, people of color, queers and
other oppressed
groups who have struggled to be supported and represented at Sudoroom.
I feel like saying the organization has struggled is a rhetorical
erasure that adds to this problem. There are actually a lot of us, but
we face a structural bias.
I would like to hear more about what we can do to change the structure of the organization
to be less biased, then implement all changes seen as necessary corrections
Additionally, I think there may be some
misunderstanding about what having an open
knowledge, commons-oriented set of
agreements. The logic of open knowledge systems
is to celebrate the spread of these norms as they become more widely adopted - concern
about 'copying and pasting' seem to perpetuate an exclusive rights kind of
thinking.
Pretty sure Hol was being tongue-in-cheek. As I said in reply at the
meeting, "it's more of a ctrl-x" 
12:51 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
On Fri, Mar 14, 2014 at 8:11 PM, Danny Spitzberg <stationaery(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
So, my question: has there been any discussion around
membership
recruitment/ retention/ rebooting?
Pardon the formalism creepiness...
From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religious_populations
This is a *list of religious populations* by proportion and population.
Estimates made by reliable sources differ. The
CIA's World Factbook gives
the population as 7,021,836,029 (July 2012 est.) and the distribution of
religions as Christian 31.59% (of which Roman Catholic 18.85%, Protestant
8.15%, Orthodox 4.96%, Anglican 1.26%), Muslim 23.2%, Hindu 15.0%, Buddhist
7.1%, Sikh 0.35%, Jewish 0.2%, Bahá'í 0.11%, other religions 10.95%,
non-religious 9.66%, atheists 2.01%. (2010
est.).<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religious_populations#cite_n…
The difference between Christians (31%) and Jews (0.2%) is evangelism: it's
part of Christian culture and against Jewish tradition. Evangelism,
outreach, spreading the good word, marketing, enrolling, recruiting works
faster than simple word-of-mouth or generational breeding (having big
families with lots of little sudoers running around). Evangelism also
compounds (exponential growth as newbies in turn evangelize).
This is just a social hack. We can do it. We can make the new Sudoer's
journey easier to understand, our rites of passage crisper, and draft a
communications plan to attract those who should become Sudoers.
Do we have a sense of whom to recruit? Can we sketch our idea of those
people well enough to find them?
Do we have confidence that our rites, rituals, and passages serve, among
other purposes, as sufficient to effectively indoctrinate and socialize
candidates into full sudoers?
Before we do much more than host a table at First Fridays, we might want to
consider who we want to join our party and how we might do better at
onboarding newbies.
- phil
1:49 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
re: Impact Hub.
I spent a month there, attended numerous events and spoke with the
organizers, room tenants, and members. My observations:
It's a business.
Like many for-good businesses, the Impact Hub adds a layer of societal
benefit to its for-profit bottom line. Others have described this but I'll
add that the Impact Hub Oakland is just a local component of an
international network of such spaces, each culturally adapted to the local
scene.
Their landlord is independent from who they are or what they do (the way I
hope Sudo Room's is from ours).
As to the prices, they are pricy if you make $12/hour. Not so much if you
bill $100/hour. They have to find a mix of paying customers that keep them
liquid. They probably make their monthly nut by renting out the fifteen+
private offices (there's a waiting list). For those flying solo, they offer
differential pricing to maximize revenue subject to capacity (if they could
fill the floor every day at $1000/day, they would; since they can't, they
sell some seats at $400/month, others for less).
This is a real estate play. Their competitor is http://www.regus.com which
rents office space by the hour/day/week/month, no questions asked so long
as your corporate check clears. Impact Hub's advantage is that they pick
cheaper digs, offer fewer amenities, but still are a step up from meetings
at Farley's. And they come with a light veneer of social responsibility,
which matters to some people.
As a place to dock and meet for work, it's a clean, well lighted place for
(mostly) free agents.
Impact Hub is done for the next two years. They're full and now they have
to optimize for steady low-cost low-churn operations. They may have new
growth opportunity as their block is rebuilt with more retail, office, and
residential construction. But for now, they are baked.
What can Sudo learn from them?
*Business models can be put at the service of a higher cause. *
For example, we might have (raised the money and built out the space and
rented the offices) so ongoing costs were covered. (Playing landlord.) But
our choices would differ: We'd likely recruit different office tenants,
define classes of membership according to our own expectations (full
sudoers who subscribe to and affirm our values vs. tenants vs. guests).
We'd provision the space differently, of course (more power-tool
friendly).
*Small teams can run a huge space. *
I think they started with three people and now have fewer than eight FTE,
including an event coordinator and AV/electrical guy. They are open more
than fourteen hours a day, seven days a week.
*The External Community Layer is worth money. *
They worked their professional, social, religious, and political networks
to forge ties between Impact Hub Oakland and hundreds of other groups.
Through reciprocity and trust-building they strengthened those ties. So
when it came time to Kickstart and then when it came time to move and
relaunch Uptown, their community rallied. They rallied because they felt
aligned and connected to the people and the cause.
*The External Community != Internal Community*They are actively cultivating
their own in-house community among the people who show up frequently. For
now it is mostly social and collegial but it's the natural first step for
trust-building within the building.
*People like to work at Ikea. *
The place feels roomy, spare, very clean, coordinated, well lit, with fresh
coffee, lots of power outlets, reasonable Wi-Fi, and minimal noise (no cafe
Muzak). It has lots of nooks and crannies if the main floor doesn't suit
you. There are four small quiet "phone booth" rooms for taking noisy mobile
or video calls away from the quiet work areas. A conversation yurt. A
bungee cord hammock. A classroom big enough for thirty. Liberal use of
whiteboard paint, markers, and post-its. Two large configurable commons
areas; I've seen them rearranged for product launch parties, hackathons,
spirtual workshops, birthday parties.
6:29 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
ew, don' tripp - aren't there better coding to work on?
Sudo Room is an open, non-hierarchical, collaborative community of
humans, including tech developers, citizen scientists, activists,
artists--and all combinations in between and beyond!--who are
interested in and working towards social change. Our goal is to create
the first inclusive, dedicated hackerspace in downtown Oakland, to
share ideas and projects in citizen science, digital citizenship and
literacy, environmental sustainability, community engagement, and
self-government.
Sudo Room is committed to access, empowerment, transparency, and
public/social good. Sudoers have a great diversity of interests and we
emphasize respect and solidarity among ourselves and with others.
And from https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association/Membership
Membership includes 24/7 access to the space with a personal access
method, for example code and/or rfid. (Which is, minimum of 10
"dollars" per month)
Unanimous consent
Non-members can use the space as much as they want when other members
are present, but cannot access the space when no members are there and
have to leave when the last member leaves.
Discussion, mostly vibe-y
To empower members to deal with problematic non-members, non-members
can be thrown out at any time by a member if that members feels that
the non-member is being a problem, _unless_ some other member present
in the space is willing to vouch for the non-member as a guest.
Non-members being asked to leave must be told that they can further
discuss the incident at a Wednesday meeting or on the mailing list.
Discussion: Some way of logging the incident?
Like some people went into the public school room and locked
themselves in.... https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Sleepers
SYNHAK Akron:
We exist as a free public resource. If you have an idea that needs
realized, it can happen at SYNHAK.
Hackerspace Santa Barbara:
After having tools stolen by a guest, they made it so that a guest has
to leave when the last member does for the night. I went with my
sleeping bag down the street a ways.
IF YOU ARE STEALING TOOLS FROM A FREE TOOL SHOP YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG.
Saw another one that was that they have 12 members who are financially
soluble, and then encourage free users to come by and use the space.
That they're set. ACCESSIBILITY
Would be even better if one had a treehouse. Or develop the
hackerspace to not have rent.
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Hacking_hackerspaces
Alternative society: it's like this : https://soundcloud.com/nebulous-nymph
It's like this: https://sudoroom.org/wiki/mesh -
https://peoplesopen.net/ to get to free wifi for the people
It's like this: http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/communities_and_ecovillages/
On 3/28/14, Phil Wolff <pwolff(a)gmail.com> wrote:
re: Impact Hub.
I spent a month there, attended numerous events and spoke with the
organizers, room tenants, and members. My observations:
It's a business.
Like many for-good businesses, the Impact Hub adds a layer of societal
benefit to its for-profit bottom line. Others have described this but I'll
add that the Impact Hub Oakland is just a local component of an
international network of such spaces, each culturally adapted to the local
scene.
Their landlord is independent from who they are or what they do (the way I
hope Sudo Room's is from ours).
As to the prices, they are pricy if you make $12/hour. Not so much if you
bill $100/hour. They have to find a mix of paying customers that keep them
liquid. They probably make their monthly nut by renting out the fifteen+
private offices (there's a waiting list). For those flying solo, they offer
differential pricing to maximize revenue subject to capacity (if they could
fill the floor every day at $1000/day, they would; since they can't, they
sell some seats at $400/month, others for less).
This is a real estate play. Their competitor is http://www.regus.com which
rents office space by the hour/day/week/month, no questions asked so long
as your corporate check clears. Impact Hub's advantage is that they pick
cheaper digs, offer fewer amenities, but still are a step up from meetings
at Farley's. And they come with a light veneer of social responsibility,
which matters to some people.
As a place to dock and meet for work, it's a clean, well lighted place for
(mostly) free agents.
Impact Hub is done for the next two years. They're full and now they have
to optimize for steady low-cost low-churn operations. They may have new
growth opportunity as their block is rebuilt with more retail, office, and
residential construction. But for now, they are baked.
What can Sudo learn from them?
*Business models can be put at the service of a higher cause. *
For example, we might have (raised the money and built out the space and
rented the offices) so ongoing costs were covered. (Playing landlord.) But
our choices would differ: We'd likely recruit different office tenants,
define classes of membership according to our own expectations (full
sudoers who subscribe to and affirm our values vs. tenants vs. guests).
We'd provision the space differently, of course (more power-tool
friendly).
*Small teams can run a huge space. *
I think they started with three people and now have fewer than eight FTE,
including an event coordinator and AV/electrical guy. They are open more
than fourteen hours a day, seven days a week.
*The External Community Layer is worth money. *
They worked their professional, social, religious, and political networks
to forge ties between Impact Hub Oakland and hundreds of other groups.
Through reciprocity and trust-building they strengthened those ties. So
when it came time to Kickstart and then when it came time to move and
relaunch Uptown, their community rallied. They rallied because they felt
aligned and connected to the people and the cause.
*The External Community != Internal Community*They are actively cultivating
their own in-house community among the people who show up frequently. For
now it is mostly social and collegial but it's the natural first step for
trust-building within the building.
*People like to work at Ikea. *
The place feels roomy, spare, very clean, coordinated, well lit, with fresh
coffee, lots of power outlets, reasonable Wi-Fi, and minimal noise (no cafe
Muzak). It has lots of nooks and crannies if the main floor doesn't suit
you. There are four small quiet "phone booth" rooms for taking noisy mobile
or video calls away from the quiet work areas. A conversation yurt. A
bungee cord hammock. A classroom big enough for thirty. Liberal use of
whiteboard paint, markers, and post-its. Two large configurable commons
areas; I've seen them rearranged for product launch parties, hackathons,
spirtual workshops, birthday parties.
--
Eddie Miller, BU '10
eddiemill(a)gmail.com | 440-935-5434
Facebook.com/eddiemill | Twitter.com/eddiemill
11:42 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
Phil sums it up- some people just want an office, they provide that, at a
price competitive with other offices. Simple as that.
On Fri, Mar 28, 2014 at 6:29 PM, Eddie Che <eddiemill(a)gmail.com> wrote:
ew, don' tripp - aren't there better coding to
work on?
Sudo Room is an open, non-hierarchical, collaborative community of
humans, including tech developers, citizen scientists, activists,
artists--and all combinations in between and beyond!--who are
interested in and working towards social change. Our goal is to create
the first inclusive, dedicated hackerspace in downtown Oakland, to
share ideas and projects in citizen science, digital citizenship and
literacy, environmental sustainability, community engagement, and
self-government.
Sudo Room is committed to access, empowerment, transparency, and
public/social good. Sudoers have a great diversity of interests and we
emphasize respect and solidarity among ourselves and with others.
And from https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association/Membership
Membership includes 24/7 access to the space with a personal access
method, for example code and/or rfid. (Which is, minimum of 10
"dollars" per month)
Unanimous consent
Non-members can use the space as much as they want when other members
are present, but cannot access the space when no members are there and
have to leave when the last member leaves.
Discussion, mostly vibe-y
To empower members to deal with problematic non-members, non-members
can be thrown out at any time by a member if that members feels that
the non-member is being a problem, _unless_ some other member present
in the space is willing to vouch for the non-member as a guest.
Non-members being asked to leave must be told that they can further
discuss the incident at a Wednesday meeting or on the mailing list.
Discussion: Some way of logging the incident?
Like some people went into the public school room and locked
themselves in.... https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Sleepers
SYNHAK Akron:
We exist as a free public resource. If you have an idea that needs
realized, it can happen at SYNHAK.
Hackerspace Santa Barbara:
After having tools stolen by a guest, they made it so that a guest has
to leave when the last member does for the night. I went with my
sleeping bag down the street a ways.
IF YOU ARE STEALING TOOLS FROM A FREE TOOL SHOP YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG.
Saw another one that was that they have 12 members who are financially
soluble, and then encourage free users to come by and use the space.
That they're set. ACCESSIBILITY
Would be even better if one had a treehouse. Or develop the
hackerspace to not have rent.
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Hacking_hackerspaces
Alternative society: it's like this :
https://soundcloud.com/nebulous-nymph
It's like this: https://sudoroom.org/wiki/mesh -
https://peoplesopen.net/ to get to free wifi for the people
It's like this:
http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/communities_and_ecovillages/
On 3/28/14, Phil Wolff <pwolff(a)gmail.com> wrote:
re: Impact Hub.
I spent a month there, attended numerous events and spoke with the
organizers, room tenants, and members. My observations:
It's a business.
Like many for-good businesses, the Impact Hub adds a layer of societal
benefit to its for-profit bottom line. Others have described this but
I'll
add that the Impact Hub Oakland is just a local
component of an
international network of such spaces, each culturally adapted to the
local
scene.
Their landlord is independent from who they are or what they do (the way
I
hope Sudo Room's is from ours).
As to the prices, they are pricy if you make $12/hour. Not so much if you
bill $100/hour. They have to find a mix of paying customers that keep
them
liquid. They probably make their monthly nut by
renting out the fifteen+
private offices (there's a waiting list). For those flying solo, they
offer
differential pricing to maximize revenue subject
to capacity (if they
could
fill the floor every day at $1000/day, they
would; since they can't, they
sell some seats at $400/month, others for less).
This is a real estate play. Their competitor is http://www.regus.comwhich
rents office space by the hour/day/week/month, no questions asked so long
as your corporate check clears. Impact Hub's advantage is that they pick
cheaper digs, offer fewer amenities, but still are a step up from
meetings
at Farley's. And they come with a light
veneer of social responsibility,
which matters to some people.
As a place to dock and meet for work, it's a clean, well lighted place
for
(mostly) free agents.
Impact Hub is done for the next two years. They're full and now they have
to optimize for steady low-cost low-churn operations. They may have new
growth opportunity as their block is rebuilt with more retail, office,
and
residential construction. But for now, they are
baked.
What can Sudo learn from them?
*Business models can be put at the service of a higher cause. *
For example, we might have (raised the money and built out the space and
rented the offices) so ongoing costs were covered. (Playing landlord.)
But
our choices would differ: We'd likely recruit
different office tenants,
define classes of membership according to our own expectations (full
sudoers who subscribe to and affirm our values vs. tenants vs. guests).
We'd provision the space differently, of course (more power-tool
friendly).
*Small teams can run a huge space. *
I think they started with three people and now have fewer than eight FTE,
including an event coordinator and AV/electrical guy. They are open more
than fourteen hours a day, seven days a week.
*The External Community Layer is worth money. *
They worked their professional, social, religious, and political networks
to forge ties between Impact Hub Oakland and hundreds of other groups.
Through reciprocity and trust-building they strengthened those ties. So
when it came time to Kickstart and then when it came time to move and
relaunch Uptown, their community rallied. They rallied because they felt
aligned and connected to the people and the cause.
*The External Community != Internal Community*They are actively
cultivating
their own in-house community among the people who
show up frequently. For
now it is mostly social and collegial but it's the natural first step for
trust-building within the building.
*People like to work at Ikea. *
The place feels roomy, spare, very clean, coordinated, well lit, with
fresh
coffee, lots of power outlets, reasonable Wi-Fi,
and minimal noise (no
cafe
Muzak). It has lots of nooks and crannies if the
main floor doesn't suit
you. There are four small quiet "phone booth" rooms for taking noisy
mobile
or video calls away from the quiet work areas. A
conversation yurt. A
bungee cord hammock. A classroom big enough for thirty. Liberal use of
whiteboard paint, markers, and post-its. Two large configurable commons
areas; I've seen them rearranged for product launch parties, hackathons,
spirtual workshops, birthday parties.
--
Eddie Miller, BU '10
eddiemill(a)gmail.com | 440-935-5434
Facebook.com/eddiemill | Twitter.com/eddiemill
_______________________________________________
sudo-discuss mailing list
sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org
https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
3 Apr
3 Apr
5 p.m.
New subject: membership reboot?
Co-working real estate may be the nature of the HUB business model, but
that is an oversimplication. The Hub is also an active site of
controversial dialogue among authentic Oakland stakeholders.
For example, last night the HUB hosted another Oakland
Reconstructed<https://www.facebook.com/events/727972357230147/>panel
with over 200 long-time Oakland/ east bay residents in attendance to
hear directors of Greelining.org and EBASE
<http://www.workingeastbay.org/> discuss
the city's future – the guests were overwhelmingly people of color asking
questions "what if the face of gentrification looks like me?" and "what
are
the policies in place that enable 80% foreclosures" and, most bitingly,
"how did 60% of the good, middle-wage jobs lost during the recession get
replace 1-for-1 by low- and minimum-wage jobs?" The main rallying point was
building jobs by and for Oakland residents so they can keep their
livelihood. Added to this were calls to join a labor union and organize and
be organized for inclusive development.
My interest in the HUB is motivated by what we might learn around
membership, but it goes further to value brought to Oakland. Clearly, the
HUB folks are convening their membership with what Phil refers to as the
"External Community Layer" – consisting of dialogue like what I'm
summarizing here – is worth much more than money paid for co-working access.
My main allegiance is to Sudoers and our peers. Yesterday I drove up to
Sacramento and filed to incorporate for the Omni Oakland Collective and am
dedicated to our advancement.
Thanks to everyone for the contributions thus far, especially in the spirit
of learning, much like Phil's take-aways (with sections and headers!).
Onward,
Danny
On Fri, Mar 28, 2014 at 11:42 PM, Jehan Tremback
<jehan.tremback(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:
Phil sums it up- some people just want an office, they
provide that, at a
price competitive with other offices. Simple as that.
On Fri, Mar 28, 2014 at 6:29 PM, Eddie Che <eddiemill(a)gmail.com> wrote:
ew, don' tripp - aren't there better
coding to work on?
Sudo Room is an open, non-hierarchical, collaborative community of
humans, including tech developers, citizen scientists, activists,
artists--and all combinations in between and beyond!--who are
interested in and working towards social change. Our goal is to create
the first inclusive, dedicated hackerspace in downtown Oakland, to
share ideas and projects in citizen science, digital citizenship and
literacy, environmental sustainability, community engagement, and
self-government.
Sudo Room is committed to access, empowerment, transparency, and
public/social good. Sudoers have a great diversity of interests and we
emphasize respect and solidarity among ourselves and with others.
And from https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association/Membership
Membership includes 24/7 access to the space with a personal access
method, for example code and/or rfid. (Which is, minimum of 10
"dollars" per month)
Unanimous consent
Non-members can use the space as much as they want when other members
are present, but cannot access the space when no members are there and
have to leave when the last member leaves.
Discussion, mostly vibe-y
To empower members to deal with problematic non-members, non-members
can be thrown out at any time by a member if that members feels that
the non-member is being a problem, _unless_ some other member present
in the space is willing to vouch for the non-member as a guest.
Non-members being asked to leave must be told that they can further
discuss the incident at a Wednesday meeting or on the mailing list.
Discussion: Some way of logging the incident?
Like some people went into the public school room and locked
themselves in.... https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Sleepers
SYNHAK Akron:
We exist as a free public resource. If you have an idea that needs
realized, it can happen at SYNHAK.
Hackerspace Santa Barbara:
After having tools stolen by a guest, they made it so that a guest has
to leave when the last member does for the night. I went with my
sleeping bag down the street a ways.
IF YOU ARE STEALING TOOLS FROM A FREE TOOL SHOP YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG.
Saw another one that was that they have 12 members who are financially
soluble, and then encourage free users to come by and use the space.
That they're set. ACCESSIBILITY
Would be even better if one had a treehouse. Or develop the
hackerspace to not have rent.
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Hacking_hackerspaces
Alternative society: it's like this :
https://soundcloud.com/nebulous-nymph
It's like this: https://sudoroom.org/wiki/mesh -
https://peoplesopen.net/ to get to free wifi for the people
It's like this:
http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/communities_and_ecovillages/
On 3/28/14, Phil Wolff <pwolff(a)gmail.com> wrote:
_______________________________________________
sudo-discuss mailing list
sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org
https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
re: Impact Hub.
I spent a month there, attended numerous events and spoke with the
organizers, room tenants, and members. My observations:
It's a business.
Like many for-good businesses, the Impact Hub adds a layer of societal
benefit to its for-profit bottom line. Others have described this but
I'll
add that the Impact Hub Oakland is just a local
component of an
international network of such spaces, each culturally adapted to the
local
scene.
Their landlord is independent from who they are or what they do (the
way I
hope Sudo Room's is from ours).
As to the prices, they are pricy if you make $12/hour. Not so much if
you
bill $100/hour. They have to find a mix of paying
customers that keep
them
liquid. They probably make their monthly nut by
renting out the fifteen+
private offices (there's a waiting list). For those flying solo, they
offer
differential pricing to maximize revenue subject
to capacity (if they
could
fill the floor every day at $1000/day, they
would; since they can't,
they
sell some seats at $400/month, others for less).
This is a real estate play. Their competitor is http://www.regus.comwhich
rents office space by the hour/day/week/month, no questions asked so
long
as your corporate check clears. Impact Hub's
advantage is that they pick
cheaper digs, offer fewer amenities, but still are a step up from
meetings
at Farley's. And they come with a light
veneer of social responsibility,
which matters to some people.
As a place to dock and meet for work, it's a clean, well lighted place
for
(mostly) free agents.
Impact Hub is done for the next two years. They're full and now they
have
to optimize for steady low-cost low-churn
operations. They may have new
growth opportunity as their block is rebuilt with more retail, office,
and
residential construction. But for now, they are
baked.
What can Sudo learn from them?
*Business models can be put at the service of a higher cause. *
For example, we might have (raised the money and built out the space and
rented the offices) so ongoing costs were covered. (Playing landlord.)
But
our choices would differ: We'd likely recruit
different office tenants,
define classes of membership according to our own expectations (full
sudoers who subscribe to and affirm our values vs. tenants vs. guests).
We'd provision the space differently, of course (more power-tool
friendly).
*Small teams can run a huge space. *
I think they started with three people and now have fewer than eight
FTE,
including an event coordinator and AV/electrical
guy. They are open more
than fourteen hours a day, seven days a week.
*The External Community Layer is worth money. *
They worked their professional, social, religious, and political
networks
to forge ties between Impact Hub Oakland and
hundreds of other groups.
Through reciprocity and trust-building they strengthened those ties. So
when it came time to Kickstart and then when it came time to move and
relaunch Uptown, their community rallied. They rallied because they felt
aligned and connected to the people and the cause.
*The External Community != Internal Community*They are actively
cultivating
their own in-house community among the people who
show up frequently.
For
now it is mostly social and collegial but
it's the natural first step
for
trust-building within the building.
*People like to work at Ikea. *
The place feels roomy, spare, very clean, coordinated, well lit, with
fresh
coffee, lots of power outlets, reasonable Wi-Fi,
and minimal noise (no
cafe
Muzak). It has lots of nooks and crannies if the
main floor doesn't suit
you. There are four small quiet "phone booth" rooms for taking noisy
mobile
or video calls away from the quiet work areas. A
conversation yurt. A
bungee cord hammock. A classroom big enough for thirty. Liberal use of
whiteboard paint, markers, and post-its. Two large configurable commons
areas; I've seen them rearranged for product launch parties, hackathons,
spirtual workshops, birthday parties.
--
Eddie Miller, BU '10
eddiemill(a)gmail.com | 440-935-5434
Facebook.com/eddiemill | Twitter.com/eddiemill
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participants (6)
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Danny Spitzberg -
Eddie Che -
Hol Gaskill -
Jehan Tremback -
Phil Wolff -
Yar