Meeting Notes 2019 09 17
These are the notes from the The XXXth Meeting of Noisebridge.
https://pad.riseup.net/p/nbmeeting
Date: 9/17/19 (2019-09-17) Note-taker: Sage, Jaguar
Moderators: Ryan Sternlicht
Meeting Summary
- Fundraising Update: no updates.
- Announcements:
* Friday through Sunday (Sep 20, 21, 22): 9th ave. global sound healing institute. * Sept 23rd: Circuit Hacking Monday SURFACE MOUNTED TECH (SMT) with Nick P. $20 for components. * OCTOBER 12th SATURDAY: NB fundraiser (!!) --- Comedy show, raffle (?), need volenteers. * Dec 21st: planning a fundraiser (!!) --- panel about social justice and climate change. * October 5th, 6th: Hacker Dojo 10th anniversery * Legacy Film fest this weekend
- Finances: no updates.
- New members: none.
- New philanthropists: nope.
- Consensus Items:
* Current: (1) access to NB bank account * Proposals: (1) Approve New Lease When it is given to us, (2) Purchace new Laser Tube (150W vs 100W).
- Discussion Items:
* Noisebridge Improvement Hackathon
Introductions
- Ryan Sternlicht: coming to nb for 5 years now. I like helping take care of nb, as well as
help out with VR setup in the back. Use he/him pronouns. ok. and... what direction should we go?
- Victor T: coming to nb for a year now. trying to put on a fundraiser soon.
- Jay: taking notes
- Drew N: he/him. new californian. involved in the makerspace community back home. here to see things
- Sage: she/her. currently planning a fundraiser here at nb. social justice and climate change.
- Noah: he/him. new to the area as of three weeks ago. prev: involved in other maker spaces. wood work, all the things.
- Marco: came here first time in summer 2016. comes a lot, every few months. software dev. likes to do stuff with led's & electronics. started getting more engaged teaching people coding. works on open source projects. HE/HIM.
- Ait: Syrian refugee, coding, animation, Them pronouns
- David: first time at noisebridge, into VR development for 30 years. make flight simulator systems that I'm delivering to NASA. Starving for bandwidth. HE/HIM.
- Christopher: unemployeed, tech shop refugee. new place to hangout. shopping for machine tools.
- Robert: half-ass participation. trying to get stuff done. #tech-shop-refugee. lost a job because of that shit. robotics, CHM instructor, IOT stuff. I'm a him/her.
Short announcements and events
60-second description per item in bulletpoint.
- David: 9th ave. global sound healing institute. Friday through Sunday. Reasearch on how sound impacts the body
- Victor: there is a NB fundraiser Oct 12th (Saturday). Comedy show. encourage people to demo any like, tech projects they have going on. Potentally a raffle. OCTOBER 12th SATURDAY. encourage tickets at the door. donations to iZAC? putting in lots of effort promoting it. Embedded deep in the comedy culture here. High level comedians booked for the show. NEED VOLUNTEERS for: chairs, sound, door. Anyone to make art / robotics for the show? potentailly help graphic design for the flyer? If we have a GD that wants to give up their time... On Slack, Discuss, it's already obeen posted on meetup.com...
- Sage: currently planning a fundraiser, Dec 21st. Intersection of coloniosium and climate change. It's a panel: Angerious, professior of ethnic studies. ???, Merideth ?? --- sociail inequality. Protecting (@TODO update this!!)
- Robert: Next monday, CHM, there is an advanced SMT class (Nick P is leading that). I'll be helping a bit. it's $20. come on in. It's on meetup. if you show up, then there may or may not be enough things. $20 for Surface Mounting tech. Comes with components. He is going to be doing all the SM on the big screen so everyone can see what's going on.... if you want to learn SMT come on by, it's pretty chill. that's it.
- Ryan: (1) hacker dojo is holding their 10th aniversery party and commeration on Oct 5th and 6th, from 11am to 6pm in Santa Clara. Theres going to be a number of talks, musical guests, as well as some demos and other certain things (???). They're also interested if any nbers want to present or give any talks. Probs going to bring a demo and give a talk myself. so. if you like supporting the bay arear hacker community I recomment going to this event. Hacker Dojo went through some issues, but starting to come around. A great time to support them. (2) this weekend is the legacy film fest on aging. it's a film fest I help out with every year. going to be at new peolpe cinima in japan town. film fest focused on, um, aging and death, and vereything related: scientific studies, how they're treated, how they live. it's a good film fest that discusses issues few peolpe talk about. You canno't escape it (death). (3) this isn't an announcement. I just want to know: is there going to be a 5 minute of fame this thursday? document curious from france that want to record a bit of it. they want to have NB in their travel documentary. << Marco: is there going to be a 5mof? >> *discussions of 5MoF*
Excellence
Our One Rule is to Be Excellent to Each Other.
(What does that mean? How does the Anti-Harassment Policy fit into this? Are we SURE we know what being Excellent is? This is an important and fundamental conversation at Noisebridge, so let's give it like 120 seconds.)
Victor; once I heard a good descriptoin form a member. it's about being proactive in goodness. it's not just about being here and not upsetting anyone. the whole place relies on it. donations. excellence is going above and beyond. not just treating it like a space. something to be a part of and contribute to.
Ryan: I'll add a couple little things. You got to the point with our one rule: be excellent to each other.
Robert: not pooping in the woodshop
Ryan: pls don't mention that every week. that usually derails the conversation.
Victor: how many times has that happened?
Ryan: One? I'm not sure who.
Ryan: We want people to be excellent to each other. not harass each other. to be cursious to each other . clean up after yourself. if someone changes... change something in the space, and people are unhappy.... responsible to undo that change. you also. if people look like they're uncomfortable around someone... it's perfectly excellent to step in and break apart whatever the issue is. if you every feel uncomfortable with anything in the space / don't want to say anything. pls find a phil/member in the space that you know that you can have help you. um. their is um. uh. ok. um. yeah, so. just be nice to everyone. be. treat everyone like your family pretty much. everyone here is here to do something weather it's to relax, unwind, workd on a project. be curtious to each other.
Ryan: Ok, does someone want to explain what participation at nb is?
Participation
Everyone at Noisebridge is a participant at Noisebridge.
(What does that mean? How do you get a door key? Access to Slack, Discuss, etc?)
Marco: yeah, participation at noisebridge can be many ways. Both by opening the door to people, and giveng a tour. if not comfortable with that, ask if someone can help giving a tour. can be organicing an event, or workshop. could mean cleaning up. weekly trash night: don't ignore that it's weekly trash night. if you feel like you'd like to have specific equipment here, that it doesn't exist yet. bring it up at the meeting, or do something, or bring it up, as long as you're excellent and don't destroy something. e.g. the Music area got a lot bigger. yeah, it also means online participation, discussions, e.g. discuss.noisebridge.info or the slack channel. um, yeah,
Ryan: I have a couple things to add. nb runts through do-ocracy. do what you want when you want, as long as you are excellent to each other. participation is mostly a docracy. work on projects with others, or yourself. do what you want, make nb what you'd like it to be. everything works through doocracy and consensus. most things, if you're trying to help out the space, try to do things through small-C consensus (discuss with other people in the space) so that you know people are on board with that change or that modification. will dicuss Big-C in a bit.
Philanthropists
A Philanthropist at Noisebridge has earned enough trust from the community to open and close the space.
Ryan: would someone like to explain what a philanthropist is?
Victor: from what I understand, it's someone that donates and takes care of the space. um. it's not quite a member. like a keeper of the space. um, yeah, it's all I understand.
Ryan: that's pretty accurate, but. it pretty much is. all of our "tiers" are pretty much trust based. being a philanthropist is the main tier of being trusted in the space. being a philanthropist means you have 24/7 access to the space. means you need to know how to open/close the space. willing to take care of the space, um, as well as know how to give tours, um. how to, um, guide people to certain things that they might be triing to find weather they. even if you don't know how to do that. if you can guide them to someone you know that probably knows how to... that's just as excellent. you are right that philanthropist's typically donate. regular donation: $80/mo, but we also hav ea variable scale, um, lower than that for if someone is having monetary issues. that all gets worked out with the treasurer. Would anyone like to add anything?
Ait: do you need a member to sponser you?
Ryan: need a member to sponser you. at a general meeting like this, your application will be brought up to the space, and, it's highly recommended. It's very. It's nice if both the sponsor and the philanthropist are there at the meeting so the rest of the community can confirm with them. as well as, um, yeah, I think that's it for that. I"ll go through and see any any of these people are here... KAZ GRANT... KEN ADDLER.... IRN JUSTICE.... DEAN..... ok, none of them are here. not going to get confirmed this week. um, ok, htat's it. going to membership. Would someone like to explain what a capital M member is?
Ryan: ok I'll explain it.
Membership Binder
Membership in Noisebridge entails community Trust in Consensus.
(What does that mean? What do we expect from Members? How do you become a Member? etc)
Ryan: Big M higher form of philanthrophy. a lot more responsiblity to the spaec. have to know how to take care of the space with a lot od detail. know how to contact certain people who take care of certain portions of the space. be available as possible to help wout with people in the space as well as um, becoming a member allows you to, um, block big-C consensus items from passing, so. becoming a Member is a larger deal than a philanthropist. takes two weeks of being brought up at a general meeting like this. on the second week, they will. you will leave the room, and um. they will discuss weather. the community will discuss weather you are fit to be a member. other members present will choose weather to block your membership application.
Ait: is that a members privilage to block?
Ryan: to block consensus items, which we will chat about in a bit.
Ryan: for two weeks after you become a member, you can be blocked. you can have your membership revoked for any reason for two weeks. after that you will become a member and then, um, currently membership, for the most part, is a continuious thing until you declare at a meeting that you dont' want to be a member anymore, or um, the community can discuss weather to revoke your membership. we do not have any member applications currently, um, yeah!
Financial Report
Anarchist societies under a capitalist state need money to survive and thrive, yo.
- Funds in bank: Around $173k
- Noisetor (See the bulletpoints at the bottom of http://noisetor.net/finances/#summary):
- Any other details by those participating in handling our financials
- The latest financial reports from the treasurer are available at https://noisebridge.net/wiki/Finances
Fundraising Update
How's it all going
Ryan: no fundraising update
Consensus
Consensus is how the Noisebridge Membership may change how Noisebridge works.
(How does Consensus work? What types of things are good for formal Consensus? What is small-c consensus? What is a "block"?)
Ryan: can a volunteer explain what conensus is? yeah, I need to copy the consensus items.
Marco: I can explain the basics from how I understand it. most things at nb are do-ocracy. some bigger decisions, like investing money in repairing the elevator, even things like where to move are brought up at the weekly meeting, um, if I"m correct. not exactly sure on what majority they need to be approved if someone else can explain this.
Ryan: big thigns like moving, investing money in the elevator, they're brought up at two meetings. the first meeting is when you propose the consensus item. discussed at that meeting. at the second weekd it's brought up again, discusses, at the end of that discussion it can be... (M)embers are allowed to choose weather they block the item from passing. it's unclear how many members need to be present, and um, if it does get blocked, that. Blocking a consensus item is a big deal. blocking means that Noisebridge will be dead to you if it passes. You do have to explain why you're blocking. Usually a block would. Some of the time a block will reset the whole item proposal so it would need to go through another two week. Another time a person might want a couple of things to change. Tabled to next week. Outside the meeting can be discussed what changes need to be made
- mutes mary*
Proposals from last week
(Add any items which are consensed upon or someone has raised a principle objection for to the Consensus Items History page.)
| Date First Discussed | Proposed By | Informal Title | Summary | Author of this Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| fill | me | in | thank | you |
| 09/10/19 | Ryan Sternlicht | Approve New Lease When it is given to us |
|
Ryan Sternlicht |
| 09/10/19 | Ryan Sternlicht | Purchace new Laser Tube |
|
Ryan Sternlicht |
Ryan: last week we have two consensues items. (1) approve new lease when it's given to us. Our lease ended Aug 31st. We did not get a new lease on this place because landlord lost his phone, and we lost communicatin with them for over a week. We really are working with the landlord currently to negotiate the current lease. very interested with us staying. we have a couple different proposals for our new lease, which, I"ll scroll up to. want to remove ELEVATOR CLAUSE. this has caused most of the issues in the past year. previously, before we had this, the elevator was in barely functional order, then, and, the landlord did not do a ton to make sure it was consistently working. we took over certain repairs of it. but then a number of things happened that caused the city to get angry with us, um, because there was miscommunications as to weather our elevator was up to code, and if we could use it or not. HAS BEEN REPAIRED, but need inspector to go over it. After, we would pay our portion of the clause from the lease. This is. probably going to be $10k. so for our next lease: WANT to get rid of this, but will have to have a higher rent. Most likely option: $7000 for a 2yr lease without the elevator clause. $7000/mo. We also really. Want a 2/yr option added on at...
Ryan: I'm currently the only member present in the space. do not want to bring this up for consensus. going to table this discussion to next week so more people can talk about it. going to be posting it to discuss. OK. and then our second. from last week, our second consensus item:
Ryan: Purchase a new laser tube. Current laser it down for the count due to it's laser tube beineg very low power at the moment. can barely burn through paper. it's as powerful as a 1w laser pointer, or, acutally no, not even 1watt. it's not working. we want to buy a new one where. we're estimating the cost of a 100w tube to be around. or. all of the tubes seems to be $800 -- $2000 based on quality of the tube. Discussion: do we want a 100w tube like we had before, or a 150W. since there are no other members here, I'm going to table this one to next week as well. I'm going to say: I'm in the camp that we spend the extra money to get a 150W tube so we can cut through slightly thicker materials. but before we get that tube installed, we should upgrade our venting system because that's part of othe reason, it seems, that the laser has been down recently. smoke, soot, dust, has been staying in the machine enough that it's damanged the mirrors and lenses and other critical things that keep the laser functional. improving the lasers venting system, I think, should happen at the same time. Any comments?
Marco: yeah, um, actually have a question. once or twice people were coming for the laser cutter. only heard that the laser cutter doesn't work anymore. What should we tell people that want to use the laser cutter? come to the meeting?
Ryan: probably both of those. If you need a lser of this style: Hacker Dojo has one. Human Made has one. Our laser is cheaper than every other laser by a massive margin. Might increase the laser cost to $10/hr. LAser costs, like, $8/hr. loosing donations to the laser cutter. because we were charging $5/hr, or, recommended charge. as well as bring your own materials, or, good luck with our weird material collection. we should definitely let people know it's down, and it's going to be a couple of weeks until it's fixed. estimate early October, um, yeah.
Ryan: OK, going to table that consensues item until next week.
Proposals for next week
(Add any new items for consensus to the Current Consensus Items page.) - access to NB bank account (message from Ruth)...
Ryan: Is this current consensus item in the wiki yet? (NB bank account).
Ryan: I do agree that this is very critical to make sure that donations are properly being handled and being put into hte account on a regular basis. A lot of people have mentioned that we really should have a more regular deposit of cash donations as well as more people who can be, I can't remember the term.... emergency monetary issues, e.g. treasurer gets hurt, or, all of a sudden the financial market crashes, and we have to start trading, like, Mate.
- laughs*
Ryan: ok. so let's discuss this a little bit. so that it may be, could be brought up in more detail at the next meeting. do people think, currently... currently we have two maybe three people that can actually access our bank account. like, we have a large number of people that can access our financial records, like our finaial records, as well as our fundraising and monetary systems (i.e. stripe, paypal, bitcoin). very few have access to our bank account, which is used for reimbursement for people who donate stuff, and use our general fund for reimbursement, as well as when we have events and when we want to pay guests, or big purchases like a new laser tube, elevator stuff, or stuff like that. it's critical that people have access to this... trusted people... what do people think?
Marco: Read ruth's message on this?
Hi people at Noisebridge meeting, I'm Ruth, you may have seen me in the sewing area with or without baby Lee. I'm also on the Noisebridge board and have coordinated lease stuff with the landlord in the past. Right now we're running low on people who regularly show up to Noisebridge and also are signors on the Wells Fargo bank account. I think it would be best if Tyler as treasurer were a signor (he only has read access right now), and also myself as backup. The recent events that have prompted this are that we haven't paid the August and September rent due to the auto pay turning off as our lease ends, and no one having either time or access to deal with it. Luckily John has time to go to the bank to pay the rent tomorrow in person (from a new York bank branch), so we'll be ok this time, but for the future it would be good for Tyler and I to be signors to make it easier. As part of the process for adding people to the bank account, we need to have a record of meeting notes saying that we should be added. (The remaining process is for John and Nicole to sign something as administrators, and we also need two signors to go to the bank with Tyler and I in person before we can be added.)Please discuss at the meeting whether or not you think it should be a good idea for Tyler and separately me to be added to the bank account, and record it in the meeting notes.Sorry I couldn't make it to the meeting tonight.Ruth
Ryan: I'll read it out loud
- reads message above *
Ryan: I think that's a good idea. it's critical that we have this as people can see now. and also, for people who might not know ruthr or tyler, ruth has been coming to noisebridge for a long time. very instrumental in taking care of certain things. sewing area, laser cutter, runs numerious events. ran our social media for awhile. has been very helpful. on our board. um, and she is also a member, um, and then Tyler. Tyler is somewhat new to the space. only about a year, but his financial assistance with our historial financial records has been one of the key things that has allowed us to reinvigorate our moneypary system so it's all up to things that allows us to apply for grants that require a multi-year history of our background. Made treasurer two months ago. has been working extremely hard on keeping the noisebridge finances in order. um. so. having our treasurer not have access to our money is kind of bad
- laughter*
Victor: what do you mean?
Ryan: He can look at the money in the box, but can't spend it. Anyone else want to comment?
Ryan: I think that's good for this topic. So. That will. That's in the meeting notes. Next meeting we can consensus on that, hopefully, so that we can pay our rent and stuff like that. um. so, yeah. I"m pretty sure that's everything for the regular stuff.
Discussion
Ryan: anyone have discussion items other than the noisebridge reboot hackathon? need to change that name else people will freak out. any other topics of discussion?
Sage: For planning the fundraiser, you mentioned there is a slack like I need to get on? The treasurer mentioned something else?
Ryan: I'll help out after the meeting and hosting events at noisebridge...
Discussion Item 1
- Noisebridge Improvement Hackathon
Flyer at entrance: What is Noisebridge & events the next week/weeks
Flyer in the space: What is Noisebridge & Philantropy & membership explainer & how to use the machines (laser cutter, etc.)
Update meetup descriptions (for example: weekly meeting)
Add missing meetups on NB page
Let marry Poppins inform about upcoming events at Noisebridge (script)
Reorganize wiki
Go to events and promote noisebridge
repeat hackathon every quarter or every 6 months
fix Falschentaschen
new art
update website:
Remove not in use social networks & make existing ones more visible
Show upcoming events via meetup api in header
Show most recent photos from Flickr, twitter, etc.
Show (new) photos of the difference areas in the space
Meeting notes via landing page
Show projects
Show most recent discuss posts
Announcements (both related to Noisebridge and other spaces/events)
The one rule - “Be excellent to each other”, what it means:
No harassment,
if something makes people uncomfortable, undo it
If someone feels uncomfortable, say something
If someone makes you feel uncomfortable - talk with members
What means Do-ocracy?
How to access Noisebridge:
Just come by, as often as you like, its a public space for excellent people!
Consensus items - how to suggest one
Show number of new meeting notes ...
Ryan: noisebridge improvement hackathon. let's first have the person who brought it up explain what he things would be good.
marco: things that are a. not really working over the past few weeks. thinking about how to improve on this. e.g. building a better landing page with the upcoming events, e.g. meeting notes, how nb operates, do-ocracy. flyers at the entrance door explaining what nb is. explain upcoming events, so folks have understandings. e.g. tours, what to mention, what nb is. notice that some of the tours have been explaining that it's a coworking space vs. an anarchist hacker space. would be a good chance to come together to organize and discuss. this weekend? next weekend? posting it on meetup and the different channels that we have. yeah, probably this weekend on sunday if there is nothing on the schedule.
Ryan: have a couple quick things. I. after talking. talked with numerious people of the past year with issues, I, scrubbed through the wiki, the nb wiki. found that it's extremely disorgranized. have 1,300 pages that are literally redirect link pages, that literally can be deleted. we have multiple, pretty much, our wiki is not useful to the general community to let people know how to use our tools. every tool we have the space should have a wiki page, like. the manual, what quirks that machine has, uh, um, what what we need to do to replace parts. who takes care of it consistently. we have pages on how to participate at things like this. whe weeky is pretty much not something people use right now. dangerious when people might be using osme of our expensive, or high power tools, like our table saw: e.g. this is not a normal table saw! *explains Saw Stop*. Costs $120 every time it happens, has happened a few times. not because people are choppin' their fingers, but the materials they're using (metal and plastics). I've updated the wiki page after we got the saw a year later (was showing the old saw).... ok, that's enough about the wiki sorry. All the other things mentioned as well are critiacal as well...
Ryan: We are not a private business office. we are a community space that you can come and use, um, our social outreach is pretty dismal currently other than like, some people here mention nb at events, like, if you want we can make business cards for people. we have, um, a number of us present talks around the bar area. you guys can do that too. you are awesome people, um. you, you don't have to be a philanthropist or a member to say you are a member of the community here. You, yeah, tell your friends, invite people here, um, let people know about, like, projects you've done using our space. um. yeah. um, improving communication with the outside world with whatever method suits you...
Marco: yeah, um, was wondering if anyone has any additonal thoughts on this? how do people feel about us adding an event to our meetup event.
Victor: for like, the nb improvement hackathon?
Marco: yeah, revitalizing nb
Victor: put it off, it like. Make a huge impact with this first event. What I'm saying: don't schedule it for this weekend or whatever.
Marco: was thinking of a one time event, but a repeting event is interesting
Ryan: have mini reboots every two years, have cleaning days every 6 months. about cleaning the physical space. our digital and social space hasn't been cleaned in 5, or who knows how many years. it's probably something we should do twice a year. would be good. have most of the wiki reboot hackathon... it's not hard editing a wiki. Then there's things like improving our social media, we need a ton of new photos of the space. Literally everything has moved (other than the woodshop). we're better than sudo room ( *laughter* ) they have four photos online. took thousands that I need to send them. everything is in the wrong place vs. the internet photos.
Victor: how hard is it to restore flaschen's old format?
Ryan: We can literally remove that, and move the crates into the center.
- discussion of putting flaschen back*
Ryan: it used to be closed.
Ryan: that's small-c. the hard part is that it's custom....
Victor: next meeting?
Ryan: Any other ideas that we can do at a hackathon like this?
Ryan: Oh, I just remembered a couple of things. New art: T-shirts, finally make our guild badges. things like that.
Marco: yeah, also. talk to ?? about it. Made entrance sign.
Victor: maybe she would be interested in fundraiser?
Marco: yeah, uhh.
Ryan: if there are no other comments, or anything, then this meeting will end? Any more anythings?
Marco: Do-Ocracy makes things happen.
Ryan: would like to participate, but think we should wait another week or two so it can be sent out (gather interest). weekend makes the most sense. if we can have some sort of food (pizza) for people that would be good. I do not have time to make salsa, sorry.
Marco: plenty to do.
Ryan: OK...
End of Meeting
Ryan: MEETING adjourned