Meeting Notes 2021-05-12

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Sudo Room Meeting, 2021-05-12 7pm

Info

Attendees

  • cel
  • yar
  • kira
  • jake
  • tim
  • jenny
  • juul
  • mike
  • adam
  • angle
  • carl
  • alex

Notes

Do We Exist?

PROPOSAL: What is the situation & what NEEDS to be done for sudoroom to continue existing?

  • Yar: Do we want Sudo Room to exist and stuff?
  • Someone: Sure
  • yar: Are we sure? Because we're not acting like it.
  • Jake: I was there last night.
  • Yar: me too.
  • Adam and Mike wave - visible in camera of Jake
  • cel (Charles) says hello

Fundraising

  • Tim: What is the status of the card access for Sudo Room members to the Omni Commons building?
  • Jake: All the cards were disabled a while ago.
  • Tim: So cards were disabled, but they want Sudo Room to pay rent? At the same time, Omni Commons has not been paying mortage or property taxes. yet they're asking us to pay rent while we are locked out the building. Does anyone have any comments on this situation?
  • Yar: Omni has closed access and will probably not open up for a month or too.
  • Tim: Another concern is that since Omni Commons has not paid propery taxes on the building, it's possible it could be foreclosed on by the county next year. And they could owe $250K in back taxes. Furthermore, they would have to come up with a minumim of 70$ cash in time to comnitne
  • Yar: If you are interested, I can invite you to the meetings. They happen on Tuesdays.
  • People are aware of it.
  • will be rescheduling Finance WG meetings so they are not happening at beginning of the week, midday :P
  • Tim: I know, but it doesn't seem like to continue for a year.
  • Yar; but people may have more situational awareness on the subject than you. If you want to go into it, they can. Just don't know if Sudo Room is best place for it.
  • Tim: they are asking Sudo Room.
    • Tim: Where is it going to?
  • Yar: Omni's operational costs. Not rent, but loan payment. They want to be confident that we can pay back the loan.
  • It's important that we show them we have the income flowing.
  • Tim: I understand, just trying to understand what we can ...
    • If applying for loan, anyone can see behind on prop taxes. And lien attached.
  • It doesn't look that good if going to get loan and behind 5 years.
  • We are nonprofit. Applied for exemption Feb 2017.
  • It's put as a disputed asset. I suggest...
  • Tim: How about fundraiser for Sudo Room to pay off past balances?
  • Jake: GoFundMe suggested because doesn't have threshold. For basically $20k, say Sudo Room needs this money to stay viable.
  • It should be obvious why we need it; there has been shutdown... people leaving homes...
    • So we just have to set that up and put it out there.
  • cel reports stabilizing the mumble-jitsi bridge, apologies earlier was bad. someone says thanks.
    • The problem was that the video was not disabled on the bridge, which was taking up bandwidth.


Bitcoin

  • Alex: Bitcoin Wallets. Wallet for donations?
    • Jenny: yes, we have it, the address on a locked page on the wiki. Marc to join later. Bitcoin donations can be sent to it. I think would be best opportunity for Sudo Room to accrue donations.
  • Alex: is there an existing balance that we can tap into?
  • cel: it has balance, also in altcoins

almost $6000...

  • jake: we should do it right now. becase elon suddenly realized it it's anti-environmental. there is no SEC to shut him down for manipulating the value. so now would be the time.
  • yar: i agree, let's do it.
    • jenny: and he is one of the backers of...
  • jake: he's use using it to make money ... not surprising
  • yar: just a few weeks after he said can buy a tesla to buy it
  • jake: he just used his platform to magnify the value of it... then go on tv to say bad... obviously already sold it... no regulation
  • Marc joins
  • jake: ... good idea to make a new bitcoin address because just one person has access to it.
    • ... carl knew someone who knew people who might want to donate. could suggest it to noisebridge...
  • jake: definitely. thought there was an email
  • carl: i don't know where they're from. maybe hacker dojo. i'll send an email. no idea how much. could be $100
  • cel: ... other forked coins
  • yar: marc, can you confirm access and can sell?
  • marc: have access, but cannot sell. can transfer.
  • jake: i'm willing.
  • jake to send address to marc.
  • yar: great, sounds like we'll have a lot more money. huge. thank you.
  • 7:44 jake's internet scheduled downtime
  • yar: when come back, will have memory?
  • jake: resets...
  • cel: HNS (handshake coins)?
  • jake: can. need to check notes. have seed phrase...
    • jenny: ...
      • marc: sudo mesh's..
  • jake: i'm willing to donate mine, but don't know how. i have scripts and passphrase
  • jenny: related idea: sudo mesh could pay some of sudo room's invoices. sudo * mesh has the money, and not using it right now.
  • ?: we wouldn't say no
    • jake: i consent
      • yar?: i also consent
  • jake?: not a great time to sell
    • jenny: how to actually sell?
  • marc: simple if you have the right ideas
  • jenny: ... when have an actually sudo mesh
  • cel: sounds like HNS to think about after bitcoin
  • yar: sell Bitcoin will go a long way. at least for next several months. but we * should make a plan to pay back and stay current. we're still in the ... red.


SudoRoom Rent Shortfall, Situation with Omni, Repair Work

  • carl: wanted to ask about numbers. regarding sudo debt and omni... how is the omni doing?
  • yar: i can answer. let's start with sudo room. right now owes $12000. that is going to go up to $14000 in a couple weeks when our rent ("charitble contribution") is next due. currently have $2800 in bank account ready to be transfered. and the omni delegates are considering possibly.... they have asked us to get current by august. if we can't, it's possibly we might lose our omni membership. not just us but true of all groups that are behind. considering that we're not even pulling enough money to stay current right now, my idea is that we should make a gofundme for $20k to run through july, that would mean good until july. simultaneously, we should make a plan to have our income line up with our expenses ... a august. two plans: to catch up, and to stay caught up. makes sense?
  • marc: sounds good.
  • carl: then in the wider omni collective, i'm assuming there are other groups behind... how is the omni doing in general?
  • yar: no one is as behind as sudo room
  • jenny: but sudo room pays 10x them
  • yar: ... even in terms of months... but omni is going to be okay. if the loan application is rejected, it will be a crisis. but we're hoping it will not be rejected. we worked hard on it and are in a good position(?)
  • jenny: no where near ... 2016 crisis... we're being scrutinized for these applications. something like $90k in the bank, kind of a pittance of savings for a $2M building with much needed improvements in next 2-3 years, like the roof.
  • yar: we're asking for a $1.1M loan. a little extra for capital improvements.
  • jake: ... circuit breakers?
  • alex: monthly shortfall?
  • jenny: $700 ... based on last april's profit and loss... thanks to everyone who contributed, made improvements...
  • jake: i had a little burst of activity, tried to log into stripe, to see if people i could think of who i thought were donating, to decide whether to send them an email... got stuck because of 2FA. got through that. might ...
  • jenny: ... year, requires 2f-auth. but backup code in our passpack. can choose to auth another way.
  • jake: back. next disappear at 7:56, 8:02, 8:08, 8:14. ... monkey brains ... roof antenna
  • jake: ... money situation ... to replace the federal pacific breakers. found one insurance company that will insure but charge alot.
  • yar: not a company, but a gov agency set up as insurer of last resort.
  • jake: good to know, thank you. i assume there is some value to shop around for an insurance policy. and value in replacing the breakers. several of us volunteers have gone in and stuck our hands in them, half way through ridding the omni of this dangerous equipment. i was eventually convinced by ... deep space nine station ... voice of reason...
  • yar: i identify with cisco(?) better
  • jake: what is your personal star trek pronoun ...jenny a picard
  • jenny: make it so
  • jake: so i was willing to accept a compromise: i'll allow the professionals to allow... 2 breaker boxes in room in corner where power comes in building. but i want to do all the others. we've got them identified and we're gonna do it.
  • jenny: then we can petition omni to let off some rent
  • jake: exactly. and they could do it already since we've already done several breaker boxes. so i'd like to formally introduce this idea to this clear quorum of sudoers... 2 ciscos, some bridge, carl. i want us to consent to a numerical figure to the omni as a bill: we did this work and its done. and we can do these others. so omni at their meeting can say looks good, let's give them twice as much.
  • yar: i like this idea... and i'm not opposed to it. i think first of all it would be a little tone-deaf for us to call the work finished - since all the work we've done so far still require some follow-up work to make nice like a professional would do. so i'd like to wait until we can make it nice. before we ask for money for that, we should probably remove the panel entirely and add a junction box... it would be so much better. what we focused on so far is making them safer, and they are. but they're not as nice; think we should wait until we can raise the standard. i think we should ask for this money but also get caught up in parallel and use that as savings
  • jake: i didn't hear everything but object...
    • jenny: to be contrarian?
      • jake: didn't hear...
        • yar re-summarizes.
          • jake: what? no.
  • yar: i think if we're going to be paid we should do it to professional standards.
    • jake: i hear that but disagree a professional would not consider ... this acceptable
      • ... can ask a professional. but specifically would not ask K... Walt... [Kierans?]
      • ... who wrote an email recently and said "well i doubt your volunteers have precision torque calibrated tools" gross fear-mongering. i would like to have a neutral (he is not as he has expressed strong) party, like david keanon...
  • jenny: keenan has looked at a million panels
  • jake: ... or someone he designates, to evaluate it, and i'll go with what they say.
  • alex: we should get it to the bar so we can ask for more money... as if it were "gold-plated"
  • jake: we can gold-plate stuff, but someone needs to donate the gold... someone needs to get the gold
    • alex: if money... gold... then it's worth doing?
      • ...agree
  • jake: agree, get neutral party like DK or designee to look at BAA and see if the job is done. then don't need to do more work on that.
  • yar: don't think it's necessary to go to that length. can ask for money and they'll give it to us - just need to ask in a way that sounds reasonable. i think we can get to that point with all the panels. it's probably going to be me actually arguing on that on the "floor", so want to make sure things are defensible for the sake of my reputation.
  • jake: so let's get david keanon or his designee to ...
  • yar: the original estimates from kent kates (not the person jake's upset about) estimated $2k to replace AC, which Jake and Alex apparently did yesterday - well, they deactivated it - and $2500 to replace panel BAA, which they did yesterday; $3000 to replace AA, which they didi a couple weeks ago, and another $5000 to replace AD and AE, which are coming up - next on the list.
  • jake: very nice
  • alex: is this being documented?
  • jenny: awesome, thank you.
  • alex: just totalled it up.. about $7.
  • jake: let's do it.
  • yar: $7500
  • jake: let's do it
  • jenny: also omnicommmons.org/electrical i believe has images of the panels.
  • jake: i updated it last night
  • jenny: amazing.
  • jake: anyone good at wiki wants to fix a bug?
  • yar: i'm getting to it...
  • jenny: i can handle it.

talking about star treck... DS9...

  • yar: big question: are we going to set up this gofundme?
  • ?: is there a better platform that accepts cryptocurrency?
  • ?: don't know
  • yar: i think we should have something that takes both crypto and fiat dollars, but is just as easy to use as gofundme
  • jenny: it could be done in tandem, adding the wallet address to the campaign. gofundme has the amplication effect.
  • we could make a video... make ourselves seem desparate... but not too desparate.
  • yar?: socially acceptable to desparate right now
  • alex: thread-bare hackers with ancient laptops
  • alex: we've discussed a bunch of one-time big contributions to get us out of the hole. main issue seems to be month-to-month.
  • ?: yes.
  • jenny: cel did you do something with sudo-humans?
  • cel: not really. but also want to mention opencollective for consideration.
  • jenny: i was going to mention that too. if sudo-humans is dead, let's go with that.
  • marc: i am evaluating systems - access control and payment things that other hackerspaces have been maintaining. made a list. there is one from a place in australia that looks pretty good.
  • alex: how significant is the software [vs. other membership concerns]... if had perfect software, would be okay?
  • jenny?: unclear... hard to say until we look at the data from stripe. how many members have unsubcribed, or their debit card got unhinged...
  • jake: it doesn't super matter whether one or the other. if people aren't paying, it's a good time to contact people, and ask how would you feel about volunteering... to catch up. this is basically church. you don't tithe to your hackerspace,you go to hell, have to run windows...
  • yar: ...fix other peoples windows.
  • marc: https://sudoroom.org/wiki/List_of_existing_hackerspace_access_control_software
  • alex: ...
  • marc: it's definitely a priority. can have the other discussion as well.
  • yar: priority is the gofundme. then we'll have a couple months to talk about how to get back arrears. to summarize my thoughts about attracting people, it is to be cleaner. in particular have a clean floor one inch thick expoxy to the walls so no mouse holes everywhere.
  • tim?: also good to have more remote participation.
  • jenny: yeah, bring the inter-hackerspace tv back into action.
  • alex: sounds like we have to do the software.
  • jenny: marc will make suggestions. launching gofundme... part of that will be ... perks for certain tiers of donations. could be access to ... one-on-one tutorial/demo/teaching session on e.g. how to use laser cutter (which would entail fixing laser cutter).
  • alex: what about a welding robot as a perk?
  • jenny: ?
  • yar: i see what you did there.
  • ... how about mitch altman's tv as a perk.
  • alex: the dream things are not a bad idea as a perk.
  • ...: and the tv-be-gone
  • marc: highest donation gets exempt from lottery of who gets to take away the robot arm
  • yar: it would take up less space if we hung it from the rafters upside down
  • jenny: don't think that particular roof section is load-bearing. it's dicy
  • marc: roof would take up less space if we did that.
  • yar: what if the arm took a structural role in supporting the roof. a flying buttress...
  • jake: how dare you, what are you talking about, it has feelings.
  • jenny: doesn't it have googly eyes?
  • jake: it needs to feel you with its arm to feel its feelings, that's how it feels you
  • yar: hasn't been turned on in past 5 years.
  • jake: i'm just going to pretend i didn't hear anything disparaging the robot arm... one of the best things in the hackerspace. would much rather hear things people want to do with it... we have python libraries... serial port... have build accessories... have a giant laser for it, router, plasma cutter...
  • marc: but it hasn't been working
  • yar: valid to question if it hasn't been in use ... put it somewhere else... maybe someone has a room.
  • jake: okay, i'll take it... it works. but if people don't think it's a cool thing
  • jenny: remember things have been shut down for a year. just because has been stagnant for a long time, doesn't mean it can't be revived.
  • jake: ...
  • yar: it's cool, but so many other foundational issues we're facing
  • jenny: foundational issue taking up time and energy... towards the goal of floor.
  • yar: want to do floor.
  • jake: robot arm will help you do floor. it's an arm.
  • yar: is it going to wear shoes while it.... brushes the epoxy
  • jenny: ...
  • yar: you're being ridiculuous. okay if jokes. but seriously... not helping epoxy the floor
  • jenny: removing the robot arm not helping us either.
  • yar: fine with putting 2x4s around it and epoxy around it. fine, but will need to orient it to not get in the way of the concrete grinding machines that we're going to use.
  • jake: so you're saying you object to the robot arm's orientation?
  • alex?: why wasn't the robot arm invited to the meeting?
  • jenny: #rightsforrobots
  • marc: because it's been breaking the rules not wearing a room and being in sudo room all this time.
  • ...

more star trek talk. season 1... 2... rick berman...

  • yar: who's going to set up this fundraiser?
  • jenny: should probably start with a collaborative doc to get some language and images together... i can start that. if anyone's interested in making some video clips and collaborated... liberated lens... i can share with ... when people are in the space.
  • marc: i'm also up to do some filming. have we agreed on rules for being sudo room? are we going to do the same thing CCL's doing?
  • jenny: yes, there is a current thread for omni reopening policy on omni-discuss list. this is something we'll need to have a concrete proposal on. not sure if patrick is going to do it. but by and large following CCL's lead is a good plan. copy-paste them.
  • marc: should do same thing as CCL - thing to read temperature at door, don't need to buy another one. check in sheet, so if someone tests COVID-19 positive, can see who was in the space at the same time as them. then people keep their distance.
  • yar: hard to control access, because sudo room gets passed through, vs. CCL is off to the side.
  • jenny: agenda item: doors and access system. we are supposedly implementing an actual door access system at the doorway to sudo/CCL. the door is there. panic bar(?) is installed. marc knows some things.
  • alex: marc, jake, david keanon and i had exchanges.... hardware/software... sudo doors: hardware currently on the door to CCL. what to do about the door to the basement?
  • marc: it's not a fire door is it?
  • jenny; it's not a primary egress point but it is an egress point. there is a panic bar from the basement to sudo
    • ?: there is? no
  • jenny: well, there is already ... at other doors. don't think it's a necessary egress point.
  • alex: access control to sudo/ccl door and leaving that one open...
  • marc: no, not leaving open unless in the space
  • jenny: lock is on the basement side... we can switch it out. not a great door. good for sneakily going from basement to sudo...
  • yar: it's a bad door. for inspections, david keanon specifically instructed me to keep it closed and act like it's not there, like it's just a wall.
  • alex: so we're planning to seal that door off?
  • yar: i think it can be useful.
  • jenny: i use it all the time
  • yar: ... i was ... in the basement ... kept going to sudo room to get parts. but if not ones in sudo room, it should be locked.
  • alex: from sudo room's side
  • yar: yes.
  • yar: basement is meant to be common space
    • jenny: lock may need to be switched to the sudo room side. i'm pretty sure it is on the basement side.
  • jake: ... did we finish what to do about asking omni to give credit for work already done? does anything need to be done to make that happen?
  • yar: i think we should come to a solid proposal to lift it. at next week's delegate's meeting, i'll float the idea, and see what the response is
    • alex: good idea
  • jake: before, i'll ask keanon to look through at the 3-4 things we've done, and be willing to look at this and say it's true they fixed the 3 or 4 boxes or whatever.
  • yar: like whatever ... would have done.
  • jake: to say sudo room would like to be compensated for the work ... as follows.
  • yar: it think david keanon is a better person to do it, vs. a licensed electrician...
  • jenny; technically i think david is still a sudo room member, so some bias there. but he joined every collective... in 2014.

jenny: should we bring up the NOMA N? Mutual Aid proposal?

  • yar: so i can do something other than abstain at omni meetings
  • yar: if anyone wants to be delegate, i'm ready to be replaced... for years
  • jenny: we have a delegates mailing list. so whenever sudo room consenses on a delegate, we can coordinate on who reps sudo room at any given delegates meeting. those are twice a month. i can't... yar's sudo room delegate. i'm sudo room board member? if anyone wants to be board members... but delegate's more important.
  • yar: ... which i've been bad about... doing too many things.
  • jake: thank you for doing those things.
    • thank you!
  • marc: i think i'm on the allowed list for sudo/ccl(?)
  • jenny: i could do mesh if you want to do sudo for a bit. or jake. or alex or ?
  • ?: doesn't need to just be one person. ccl has two, and they trade off. just need to coordinate between each other.
  • jenny: or if we start having these sudo room meetings on the regular, we can decide a day before the omni meetings who should rep sudo room in the delegates.
  • jake: what do i do with the $5K of bitcoin?
  • bitcoins are being transferred.
  • marc: i'm not best person, because places to buy/sell like to have IDs, which i don't have, as a non-citizen.

yar: i don't understand. we're transferring it to a wallet you set up jake?

  • jake: yes. it's a wallet that a company controls.
  • ? what company?
  • jake: coinbase.
  • jake: when we decide to put funds into babylon.
    • eventually our bank will take it...

cel mentions bitcoin forks and multisig.

  • jenny thanks cel for taking notes & setting up mtg & knowing things about cryptocurrencies :D
  • cel: probably should have separate wallets for the different bitcoin forks.
    • jenny: i hereby nominate cel to role of security officer...
      • cel appreciates the suggestion...

Events, Meetings, Network Bandwidth Issues

  • cel: should change meeting time?
    • juul: think should, because overlapping with CCL. we could change the time, or the day.
    • jenny: don't say tuesday, because that's sudo mesh
    • marc: and hack night
  • jenny: and thursday is omni... but if we did it earlier... omni meetings start at 7 (PST). maybe tuesdays are fine. traditionally we have sudo mesh at 8pm.
  • marc: we could do tuesdays if people are up for it. or later on wednesdays. or earlier.
  • yar: from experience at the commons wg, it was difficult to manage the bridge. especially if you're one of the people there physically. especially as omni's internet is slow.
  • jenny: situation with that... can't get the fiber yet because they're not offering business connections.
  • marc: we can't because it's more expensive...
  • jake: drill down the floor to where they have the BART dark fiber
  • marc: why slow? is it a problem with our ISP, or us?
  • yar: just because the pipe we're paying for is not thick enough. i think throughput is the problem. we're paying for copper..
  • marc: no, it's a VDSL... close to the cnter.... 30Mbits down, 20Mbits up.
  • jenny: i think we recorded it as 20MBps up
    • marc: we can just call them.
      • yar: i've always had issues trying to do any real-time application at omni
  • jenny: maybe we could have an in-person meeting to investigate.
  • yar: i think a meetup would be useful. one of the private networks went down last summer.. there are machines still inaccessible.
  • jenny: i didn't see that.
  • yar: on sysadmins list. think pipe is too little.
  • jake: ... can't.
  • ?: have meeting...
  • marc: sunday?
  • alex: should be a time convenient for whoever knows the infrastructure. probably marc and yar
  • jenny: and daniel.
  • yar: i don't want to be there on sundays, but i'm happy to call in. most of the information i can just give over the phone.
  • alex: sunday should be okay for me. if you want to do that
  • alex: what would be helpful would be a summary of things broken.
  • yar: i can't send email to sudo-discuss. do we want sudo-sys? or should it just be put on sudo-discuss.
  • jenny: ... either we could make a push to add more folks to the sysadmins list. or we could redirect the emails that come into it to sudo room or something. there are randos... i think it's still valuable to have a somewhat secure list... maybe something to add to sudo room out-of-hibernation tasks to try to pull more folks onto the list. but maybe 70% of people on that list are no longer involved.
  • marc: IIRC it's about $300/month to get commercial fiber. i can check if the prices changed. i've been doing research on access points to replace the current ones. first ... working great. also ordered some the haven't arrived yet.
  • alex: when i was at omni last, daniel mentioned someone had rack mount switches willing to donate. any use?
  • marc: only use is if someone sells them to donate.
  • jake: are they PoE powered, or generated PoE?
  • alex: i think they generate PoE
  • yar: but they consume power, put out heat...
  • marc: we do need PoE routers... that's how we ... only have one left.
  • alex: does someone want to contact daniel? i don't think anyone's going to sell them on ebay
  • jake: craigslist! i'll do it
  • alex: really? you should do it. totally.
  • jenny: can i recruit you to help marc and i clear out this... good stuff
  • jenny: only 8 people on the sysadmins list. 4 out of 8 are no longer involved with omni/sudo in any way whatsover. wow, a very useless sysadmins list. the only useful people on here are yar, marc, myself, and david keenan.
  • cel: thought was talking about sudo-sys list
  • jenny: omni sysdmins list. should remove ... folks not involved. ... i'll send an email out.
  • ... meeting time?
  • cel: weekly or monthly
  • let's do it weekly. 6pm. wednesday 6pm? previous reason was it takes time to get from work...
  • jake: people don't want to work.
  • cel asks about the mumble bridging attempt. should it be attempted again or not worth it?
  • jenny: what are advantages to have a mumble bridge? low bandwidth situations... other reasons. a lot of people internationally use it. i do in my work.
  • alex: web-based vs need for separate app. only reason to prefer it over mumble.
  • yar: if traffic from mumble goes through sudo room, it will be more than our bandwidth. but if peer-to-peer...
  • marc: mumble is extremely low bandwidth
  • jake: i think we should give mumble more of a chance. appreciate cel's endorsement of it. some hesitation to use it because it's not a browser thing - but it could be worth it if it performs better. but don't think sudo room is best place for a server for it.
  • jenny: i think it is the right place for a server for it. one of primary reasons to use something like mumble is if communication blocked by state gov, etc. having IP addresses associated with servers isn't a benefit... not really a use case for sudo room right now, but would be good to model. providing a multiplicity of things to connect to ... that don't rely on ip blocks by state goverments
  • yar: going, bye
  • cel: bandwidth limit?
  • marc: think it's fine. we're going to upgrade to it the connection. i prefer mumble.
  • carl's background... the cubatron.
  • marc: it's a video bandwidth embiggenator.
  • carl talks about how hayward techies are still having meetings.
  • jenny suggests writing an upbraiding email to sudo-discuss
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