Meeting Notes 2022 10 04

These are the notes from the The 694th Meeting of Noisebridge.

Date: 2022_10_04

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Note-takers: Mark, xw, Sam

Moderators: Mark

• One or two bullet points of high-level meeting summary.

Meeting Summary

FILL OUT AT END OF MEETING AND SEND TO MAILING LIST

• Fundraising Update: Fundraising events planned for October 15th, and 24th, and possibly Halloween night? We're spending faster than we're earning.
• Announcements: pre-ROScon meetup next Thursday, club mate palette coming tomorrow, someone wants to have a cybersecurity meetup
• Finances: 250k in the bank, still net negative cashflow
• New members: 2 awaiting applications, they weren't present at the meeting tho
• New philanthropists:mikayla
• Consensus Items: 2 consensus items passed - the one from May about vaccinations, and a new one about recouping noisetor funds
• Discussion Items: potential future poetry event, potential couch in the music room, home assistant project, door policy and culture, solar power event/ petition

Introductions

• Ask people to share their name, access needs, and preferred gender pronouns during their intro, i.e.:
• Mark/Arity - he - I make games & do game related things, secretarial duties
• Matt/xw - he - Computer job during day, usually on weekends too lazy to be productive
• John - makes wood things
• Brandon - does Poetry circle at 16th and Mission in the BART plaza
• Matthew - single entity aimlessly wandering and learning
• Adriel - he - music stuff
• Moof - they - music stuff as well
• Mike - I dont come very often, here to get more info about an upcoming Founders meetup, wants Alex Handy's contact info (who started MADE)
• Guy (rugyoga) works on 3D printers
• Sam - electronics
• Dana - was involved a lot more a long time ago! Getting involved in Circuit Hacking Monday (CHM) again and various other stuff!
• Cloud - yet to find my niche, i often work through Biology studies, hang out in voice chat in Discord a lot!
• Morgan - neurotech, biotech, AI computing

Excellence

Our One Rule is to Be Excellent to Each Other.

John - when you are aiming for perfection, but you know you arent really gonna reach it, but you are trying anyway! Its that reachable stuff!

Matthew - Your capacity to be the best you can be!

Mike - Its about being respectful and helpful. One has to know how to ask for help or acknowledge that they need help.

One big crazy super crowded community. Easy to step on each other's toes. Conflicts can arise in shared spaces, ensure you're familiar with the steps we have in place to resolve conflict.

Short announcements and events

• Circuit Hacking Monday on October 24 will likely be Halloween themed. Come bring your stuff, sew and put LEDs on your costume, 3DP or laser cut accessories. Work on your spooky projection mapping. Make your 12-ft tall skeleton animatronic. Halloween hacking night! Oct. 24th! Its on a Monday! Circuit hacking, costumes, decorations etc!

• Tomorrow we are receiving a pallete of Club Mate. If you're around in the afternoon help is needed to move it in. We have a palette jack

• Next Thursday - pre-ROScon meetup!

Check noisebridge.net for regularly occuring events!

Question around potential security / cyber-security meetup.

Guilds

• What are guilds - briefly describe
• Guilds are essentially user-groups at NoiseBridge. Groups that maintain resources at NoiseBridge. Look into holocracy if you are interested in more
• The idea is that you have organizers and maintainers based around interests and niches

• The music room is clean! -the new music guild, currently adriel and moof

New Members/Associate Members

What are they? Is anyone trying to become a Member or Associate Member? If not move on. No long discussions. Adriel: You can become an associate member if you get one member to sign off for you. You can become a full member if you get an additional member to sign off for you. It is a 4 week process.

To be an associate or full member is very similar. Both financial terms and precense support the community. Keep it going, show up, etc. Just make noisebridge a place whewre people can show up and do shit. Taking stewardship of the place -- cleaning up messes other people may have made.

Mark: To make it clear, people who walk through the gate are de-facto noisebridgers. There is a more formal program you can join if you want to take on responsibility in exchange for more "powers". Like becoming an admin user.

Full members get the power to block consensus which is a formal decision-making thing we do.

I see a few new membership applications. Is there a micheala here? Is there a mark? (someone knows michaela but we don't know mark). Another form filled out w/o a sponsor.

You need a sponsor to sign your form, so it is best to come in person so you can get to know them and they can get to know you.

Is there an Elena here? Elena is not here.

Adriel: How does sponsorship work?

Mark: That person has to be an existing member and signs off on your application.

Does it have to be big-M member to sponsor you or can associates do it?

Online: Has to be big-M.

Mark: None if these applicants are here so we do not need to process these today.

Financial Report

Anarchist societies under a capitalist state need money to survive and thrive, yo.

Emeline: We are finaly beginning to regain control of our finances, we gained control of two bank accounts, we are in negative amounts per month, but for now we have savings. We have to sign the books for the 20th, wwe are filing taxes in november and will know more about that by then. We are at about 250,000 total, I have not checked donation boxes

Loren - $64.06 was in cash boxes

• Funds in bank: About $250k total, good shape

• Noisetor (See the bulletpoints at the bottom of http://noisetor.net/finances/#summary):

   This link is broken?

• Any other details by those participating in handling our financials

Lots of members don't pay dues and we need to figure that out. Seems like an audit for this is critical given how quickly we're exhausting funds.

Our expenses are going up all the time! We need to raise money!

• The latest financial reports from the treasurer are available at https://noisebridge.net/wiki/Finances

Spending Needs

Gotta spend money on XYZ (i.e. Gate, wiring etc.). WHO CAN SIGN THE CHECK OR LEND THE CREDIT CARD!?!?! It doesn't matter if we agree to do something and it can’t be paid for.

Music guild requests between 350-400$ on an audio interface. Music room currently has 2 firewire interfaces, not useful for modern computers. Need a USB one. Focusright Scarlet 18i20 is being sought: https://www.ebay.com/itm/124044462058

Want to try and sell some of the unused equipment from the music room to raise money to offset the cost.

Emeline - we have a similar situation in the sewing room!

NB GARAGE SALE LETS GOOOOOOOO

CHM needs some more kits, almost out! Will likely be around $1k. Will sell kits to net NB money!

Fundraising Update

How's it all going Matthew - there's a sleep outside day to raise awareness for homelessness. Noisebridge could participate and it could be good PR. https://www.sleepout.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.event&eventID=959

Adriel: I don't know what name they go by in IRL, but pan-galacticgb (Paolo), me and his band and one other person are going to be putting on a fundraising music show on Oct 15. I was thinking we might want to do some other fundraising event during Halloween.

Mark: Lets all work together on that Halloween hacknight.

Adriel: I was thinking some kind of party that weekend. Maybe we can sell pizza at a markup with the expectation that it is a donation to the space. Let Moof know if interested in helping plan the party!

Moof: Generally, we (Music Guild) would be done to put on charity shows.

Big C Consensus Items

Nobody likes 3 hour meetings, only explain if people ask

Consensus Items

Only for talking about Big C consensus items, small c consensus items should be discussed with people at the space at the time of the change/new item.

ITEM 1 Move NoiseTor money to Noisebridge

"This will transfer money from the closed NoiseTor account to Noisebridge's bank account. The amount of money is not known yet, Liz investigating with the former Noisetor owner (Andy?)."

TJ - I was informed that we closed Noisetor for sometime and the money was sent to someone's personal account hastily due to poor financial planning. We wanted to Consense to reclaim that and return the money.

What's the current status?

Liz is talking to Andy (old school Noisebridger) who ran the thing and has the money currently.

Its not like he's not offering to give it back - getting access was just complicated. And Liz can't attend meetings bc they are too late and wanted to make sure everyone's cool with it.

(Mark counts down...)

IT IS CONSENSED

ITEM 2

Vaccine consensus item proposed in May has not been revisited. For new people, we decided to be pro vaccination and say we want everyone here to be vaccinated. Because we respect people's privacy, we won't use IDs to check but we do ask that people be vaccinated.

Given that the vast majority of people don't lie about this thing. (Mark trolls and says hackers do)

This consensus item has wording that says it must be explicitly renewed every so often.

Honor system seems to have worked so far.

"COVID-19 vaccination requirement; honor system preferred Until explicitly undone by fresh Consensus: When taking appropriate responsibility for introducing a new person into the physical space, it is expected that vaccination status may be explicitly discussed (briefly and respectfully) to communicate the clear Consensus of Noisebridge that for safety of all participants, people not currently vaccinated against COVID-19 may not be permitted to come inside without good reason for any exception. Respecting preference for anonymity and discouraging pointless "papers please" scenarios should generally preclude checking vaccine cards and especially any associated demands for identification without good reason for any exception (such as special events or legal requirements)"

Discussion

Discussion Item 1

Brandon: Poetry Circle event

Representing a group named 16th & Mission. Basically I am just here on behalf of the group to request May 24 to possibly do a show here if it's alright with y'all. We wanted to approach you early to make sure we aren't stepping on your toes. Obviously we don't have details worked out yet.

probably about an hour or so of poetry, a handful of readers

Moof: I can vouch that it is a very excellent thing.

Mark: You are very welcome to host that sort of thing here. We have a stage and a working PA here.

What you do generally is you set up the event yourself. You make a page for it on the wiki, put the links to the page in the events section. Assuming you've done due diligence that there is not a conflict. Post it and then announce it in the various social platforms. If you want help with mailing lists we can help you. The wiki has a "how to set up and event" page and you can follow that. Come to a meeting or two a couple meetings before and announce during the announcement section - that is good advance notice.

A good practice right now assuming it is like this in May is to post in the woodshop channels to ask them not to be working during the event. Maybe post a flyer saying "an event is running at XYZ time please avoid using tools."

It is first come first served as far as staking out dates for events. If you need anything, ask in the events support channel in Discord.

Discussion Item 2

Moof: Music Guild wants to get a couch off craigslist and needs a truck or van, and needs small c consensus for the earlier spending need! We have a place in the music room for it and feel it would be an excellent addition. Please contact Moof in the Discord for coordination.

Loren - we have taken couches out of the music room in the past, as ppl have used them to sleep on. As recently as within the last six months.

TANGENT Moof: Emeline says we require small-c consensus for the purchase of audio interface as discussed earlier in the meeting.

Mark - does anyone object?

crickets END OF TANGENT

TJ - a lot of us are giving a hesitant "yes" to the couch

The more the room is actively used for music, the less chance the couch will be abused. And it seems the room is getting good, frequent use and stewardship as of late.

OTHER TANGENT

John offeres his services as a handy creator of things to various noisebridge projects that need it!

END TANGENT

Discussion Item 3

Rajah: setting up a prototype home assistant server. Re: access control: should keep to a playground/sandbox area? Asking before starting.

When I was introduced to home assistants, I would buy something like a smartbulb and flash it and connect it to an ESP32 or something else. But you don't want those running on an accessible network - usually it is better to have it on a separate network.

I don't know how the NB network works and how I should connect such devices. I think this could be helpful as far as turning lights off in the space. But I don't want to be sending/sharing passwords - I don't want ot be an admin.

Mark: If you set something up, you have to maintain it.

Rajah: But this is a security thing so you don't want the wrong person to have access. I can set up my own network and connect it to the NB network on another day.

TJ: A question here is how we are keeping up NB passwords. Currently we are doing a password retrieval of many accounts. Emeline, is there another way to set up another Bitfolder (sp?) page for IT passwords?

Loren: For alot of stuff in the space, we just have password "noisebridge" on everything. Until you have a problem, just make the password "noisebridge".

Rajah: I don't mind doing that. Just for this you need people from the internet to have access into this system. I guess what I'm getting to is that I know there's an open wifi network.

TJ: <xw is summarizing> We don't really have separation and just keep things relatively open.

Rajah: If its all one I have no problem with using the open NB network.

Loren - the hard part is the intial process of building it. Worry about setting up passwords later

Mark sets up channel in discord. Start discussing!

Discussion Item 4

Door status?

TJ wants some organization around our opening hours and stuff like that. Proposed consensus item:

Current wording:

   - We should be open to the public as often as we can. That being said, the front gate door should be closed at all times, and it is Excellent to introduce all new Noisebridgers via tour. Because of this, Noisebridge will have open doors only when a Noisebridger is present and ready to receive.
   
   Eric - Just a side note re: access: When the light is turned on in the print shop, SHED lights up. Hmmmm
   
   Mike - I remember back when Members had a card and they had to let each person in the gate with the card. 
   Mark - then they had to manually open the upstairs door for them and greet them.
   
   Mike - If you have a group that is meeting like in a class, they should be able to temporarily allow open access via the gate (unique code per class?)

re: being too busy to answer. It is important to exercise our freedom to not answer the door all the time.

TJ - I'd like to get a sense of the room, are people saying we are too closed to people generally? Are lots of people coming over and not being able to get in?

Emeline - I have been around and not let people in because I was busy and in the space by myself, but these people felt entitled to come in when I looked out the window to see who it was.

TJ - I've heard people talk about missing stuff at the space, and because lots of people come around and seemingly havent been greeted properly, they appear to just be wandering around. Possibly suspicious behavior. Not necessarily malicious, but there's some kinf of implication there. I don't want to put words in peoples' mouths about this though.

Loren - this could be a place for guilds to step up and assign responsibilities?

TJ - don't wish to solve manufactured problems - is this an actual real issue we are having?

Loren - there is always the option of letting us act by not acting. I'm very sensitive to not doing work we don't have people.

Mark - I think what this consensus item does is explicitly say what is excellent vs unexcellent. 

TJ - there historically has been no explicit guidance. But this could very well be an overreaction.

(Discussion about cultural norms and what is generally considered "excellent")

Conversation around this potential item will continue online

Discussion Item 5 =

small-C consensus to sign a Petition

https://www.savecaliforniasolar.org/oct11

Mark - It's good to ask NBers to sign things and exercise their political will. I don't think it is good to ask NB to do anything like that. I think we try to be as politically neutral as possible as an organization because there are many political viewpoints within this community. And this is a political thing because you are asking politicians to do things.

Do-ocratic Task Board

Participation also means doing stuff to contribute to the space. Propose new tasks or pick some tasks from Github, from what needs to be done around you, or whatever, and see if someone will sign up to work on that task. Anyone can sign up and it's a great way to show you are contributing!

End of Meeting

Note taker posts the notes

• Clean and tidy the meeting notes including removing all these really verbose instructions.
• Fill out the short summary at the top listing just announcements, consensus items, discussion topics, and names of new members and philanthropists.
• Copy paste the notes to the next meeting page. (They will become Last meeting at midnight.)
• Email the meeting summary to Noisebridge Discuss and Noisebridge Announce lists.
• CC on the email treasurer@noisebridge.net and secretary@noisebridge.net if there are new members and philanthropists.
• Edit the Current Consensus Items if anything is proposed for consensus next week.
• Edit the Consensus Items History if anything was reached consensus or failed to reach consensus this week.

Fun things to do after

• Do a 10 minute cleanup, bring dishes up stairs and wash them, clean the bathroom
• Have some beers on the patio
• Prepare the next weeks' meeting notes
• Lick the walls. Or just draw on them
• sing the Hackernationale (this almost never happens)