[sudo-discuss] membership reboot?

Fri Mar 28 10:21:31 PDT 2014

I also don't really know much about the hub, beyond the discussion here.
But, I want to comment about the idea that "hacker culture" is something
that is being appropriated. Pretty much every aspect of "hacker culture"
was appropriated a long time ago.

For example, if you are talking about the Steven Levy's Hackers (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers:_Heroes_of_the_Computer_Revolution )
or more specifically the TMRC MIT "hackers" who coined the word, keep in
mind that these people were in college. They didn't have real jobs, not out
of some ethic, but because they were full time college students at MIT.
Sure some of the original og hackers championed the free software movement
and famously spoke out against one of their own, Bill Gates, deciding to
make money form code (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Letter_to_Hobbyists), but in the end
a lot of the computer hobbyists joined huge corporations
or ended up helping to start them. The idea of a start-up needing a
"visionary" and a "hacker" isn't a modern .com concept, it started with
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, Bill Gates and Paul Allen, and ended up
amassing some of the largest fortunes on the planet.

If you are taking about the "hackers" who broke in computer systems (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_computer_security_hacker_history).
These people quickly became obsessed with attention and status. Which
eventual lead to huge arrests in the 90's (much like we saw recently with
luzsec), movies like Wargames and Hackers, and a twisted (in my view) ethic
that says that white hat hacking (hacking for corporations or the
government) is somehow more ethical than hacking in the spirit of
exploration and/or activism ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvXk5xCM6PM ).

Hacker spaces came originally out of this second group, btw, with the most
famous example being The L0pht (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L0pht ) which
started as a space for exploration, but quickly became a company for profit.

So lets not pretend that hacker culture is somthing pure and innocent we
need to protect at all costs. Do what you do, create new movements and
spaces, but the idea that we need to protect hacker culture is something
that would have been nice to have in 1976, but today doesn't really have
any meaning, at least in my view.

--Andrew

On Fri, Mar 28, 2014 at 1:00 AM, David Keenan <dkeenan44 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Im not entirely up on this 'Hub', but in my view, the economic question is
> still being invisibilized. At 400 a month, who exactly is being served by
> this Hub in our community? Employing people of color and having gender
> balance, while great, does not address this question, namely the question
> of creating a space for everyone including poor people, regardless if
> creed, who could buy one laptop a month at that price.
>
> When they opened, i swung by to find out what they were all about. I asked
> if the woman of color behind the counter if they were a nonprofit, to which
> she replied: "Oh no. We are DEFINITELY for-profit'. I remember coming into
> Sudo and telling that to Anthony..
>
> I worry that what we're seeing here is a way another way to monetize
> social space, the IRL social space of hackers and the
> traditional subculture that attends it. Its funny because I feel like bay
> area hackerspaces effervesced in part as a response to the appropriation
> and corporatization of hacker culture in the workplace, ie the viral
> business model adoption of 'startup culture'. Now, hackerspaces themselves,
> once refuges of sorts, are being recuperated (in the Situationist reading)
> or mythologized (in a structuralist, Barthes-ian reading) by these same
> forces. Except that theyre not hackerspaces, theyre 'co-working' spaces..
> spaces with no culture, except the fukture of work - finding work,
> 'networking', making yourself more marketable - nothing 'wrong' with that
> per se, except that its also a subtle if effective reframing of hacker
> culture into one thats perhaps entirely framed by money and capital and
> helping yourself, rather than learning cause its just fun, or helping
> others, or caring..or about community in the traditional sense.
>
> Ie it serms to me, albiet from afar, thst its far more a business, than a
> community; a model, not a culture; about helping yourself, rather than
> helping others.
>
> Thats my worry anyway - not a critique as such, just my worry.
>
>
> On Thursday, March 27, 2014, Jehan Tremback <jehan.tremback at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Eddan's got it right:
>>
>> "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."
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 26, 2014 at 9:39 AM, eddan.com <eddan at 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 - both areas in which Sudo Room has struggled with since its
>>> inception.
>>>
>>> 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.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mar 24, 2014, at 8:55 PM, Yar wrote:
>>>
>>> > On Fri, Mar 14, 2014 at 8:11 PM, Danny Spitzberg <
>>> stationaery at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> >> I'm currently renewing my HUB membership (already
>>> >> 3 years in, a really open-minded organizer is has their community
>>> engagement
>>> >> role) and was prompted to click agree/disagree with the following:
>>> >>
>>> >> [snip]
>>> >>
>>> >> So, my question: has there been any discussion around membership
>>> >> recruitment/ retention/ rebooting?
>>> >
>>> > I added this to our meeting agenda on a whim. Most of the discussion
>>> > was me being bitter about their co-option of language. Hol had the
>>> > quote of the night: "they're ctrl-v-ing the hell out of us", referring
>>> > to the Kopimist cut-and-paste mantra.
>>> >
>>> > I'd always been skeptical of them. Their fundraiser got 100k in one
>>> > night, and they charge $400/month for their co-working space. They
>>> > have paid positions, and their leadership appears hierarchical and
>>> > opaque. For example, there is no mailing list, only a glitzy
>>> > "newsletter". While I was inspired by their hosting Oakland Data Day,
>>> > I felt most of the value came from volunteer attendees. In other
>>> > words, where is that money going?
>>> >
>>> > This ridiculous video didn't help me take the "impact hub" concept
>>> > seriously: http://vimeo.com/35373512
>>> >
>>> > Put simply, Sudoroom is a grassroots organization and always will be.
>>> > Our ultimate goal is to serve our communities. I believe the HUB's
>>> > ultimate goal is to extract rent from our communities.
>>> >
>>> > After reading on Oakland Wiki yesterday that their building is owned
>>> > by Signature, the same developers behind Brooklyn Basin, I believe all
>>> > hypothetical good faith I had in that project has vanished. It's
>>> > marketing, marketing, marketing. You could argue the HUB is not their
>>> > landlord, but then why are they naming their new building complex "The
>>> > Hive"? It turns out this "hive" also includes the 5 story condo
>>> > building a block from Sudo that has literally had a "now selling" sign
>>> > since we moved in two years ago. This is absolutely a collaboration
>>> > between speculators and gentrifiers in my mind, and I think it is
>>> > extremely gross and fucked up.
>>> >
>>> > To be honest, I think we'd be very wise as an organization to
>>> > explicitly distance ourselves from these kinds of projects.
>>> > _______________________________________________
>>> > sudo-discuss mailing list
>>> > sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>>> > https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> sudo-discuss mailing list
>>> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>>> https://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>>
>>
>>
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>

-- 
-------
Andrew Lowe
Cell: 831-332-2507
http://roshambomedia.com
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