Meeting Notes 2011 10 04

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HOWTO run a meeting.[edit]

Pick a moderator, and a note-taker. The note-taker should:

  • write notes in this page, put them back up online when they're done,
  • edit the Current Consensus Items if anything is decided to be up for consensus next week (stuff raised for consensus this week should be publicised for a final decision next week)
  • edit the Consensus Items History if anything was consensed or failed to consense this week.
  • tell treasurer@noisebridge.net and secretary@noisebridge.net if there are new members.

Moderator should:

  • make sure everyone gets a chance to speak
  • speak minimally themselves
  • keep the meeting moving! you're in charge of summarising the consensus, and/or suggesting things that need to be done!
  • get the membership binders and ensure they are returned to the black desk

Agenda[edit]

The 181st Meeting of Noisebridge

Note-taker: FIXME YOUR NAME HERE

Moderator: FIXME THEIR NAME HERE


Introduction and Names[edit]

  • What Noisebridge is about: "Noisebridge is a 501c3 nonprofit that provides a space for creation, collaboration, and learning about technology and creative projects. Noisebridge provides space, power tools, and infrastructure to help the public learn new skills and create cool things. Noisebridge continues to exist through and depends entirely on membership fees and donations. Our code of conduct is 'Be excellent to each other'."
  • Round of introductions: What's your name, what do you do, and if you are new, how did you hear about Noisebridge? Start with the moderator and go left.
  • A brief primer on consensus process: We agree and so should you! Only paid-up members can block consensus.

Short Announcements[edit]

Cool new projects? Something you'd like people to know? Say now, but keep it short!

New or Stale Events[edit]

Is there anything new happening at the space? Is there anything that has stopped happening at the space?

  • October 12th 19:30 - dorkbot - People doing strange things with electricity
  • October 15th - 16th - Hackmeet - A two-day unconference and skillshare

Financial Report[edit]

Funds in bank:

  • Hacker Prom

Membership Binder[edit]

  • Read off any names from the binder for the past month. Write a check on every open application.
  • Anyone up for joining this week (ie have four checks by their name + have two sponsors) should introduce themselves then leave the area in search of gifts (traditionally beer and a lime) for the rest of the group. The rest of the meeting should consense on whether they may join.

Consensus items[edit]

New: Lighting spending proposal.

(Add any new items for consensus to the Current Consensus Items page.)

Discussion Items[edit]

SuperQ - update on lighting/power issues

banning rob 2.0 (rlh)

End of Meeting[edit]

  • PGP Key Signing could happen now, check the list to see who wants in on the action.
  • Put back the membership binder in the black desk.
  • Save the meeting notes to the wiki.
  • Send a copy of the meeting notes to the discussion list.
  • Copy the Meeting Notes Template for next week's agenda and update the main wiki page's link to it.
  • Enjoy a cocktail with your fellow hacker or robot.

Meeting Notes[edit]

In Attendance[edit]

  • Moderator: Nick "Far" Farr
  • Note taker: Rubin110, and Leif for parts when rubin was speaking
  • mct
  • Aaron Murray - Here from a company called @wearefractal
  • Tom - Fights for the user
  • Rachel - Makes interface devices out of fabric
  • Miloh - Pees unicorns
  • Evan - Just another member of the community
  • Mike Kan - Techlaundererer
  • Matt - HTML5 development platform for games called something
  • Jacob - ARD
  • Carl - I'm here
  • Ducan - Here and alive
  • Leif - Lives at Nosebridge
  • Ben - Hi
  • Carlos - perl hacker
  • Daniel - CCC Clonge
  • Contra - Adhersion (node js)
  • Mel - HTMLFiv5
  • Zack - Seeks Charisma

What is Noisebridge[edit]

Nick: Noisebridge one of the most special hack spaces in the world, it's about tech and community and awesome things, and that's why people come to Noisebridge. We make the world a better place, and it fucking works, some how we function correctly and that isn't supposed to happen. Noisebridge makes people do shit around the world.

Consensus Process[edit]

Consensus process is a thing we do, please see insert wiki page here.

Short Announcements[edit]

Nodejs guy: We're developers on Nodejs, open js nodejs.com,

Daniel: Member of the national CCC. Cologne CCC (C4) just got a new space, it's big, it's awesome, go check it out, they'll have a party, there will be party clowns, Clubmate is 1EURO there. The CCC is the Chaos Computer Club, founded in the 80s, someone started, inspiration for hackerspace in general.

Leif: I was at the OccupySF meeting, there are a bunch of people there with tents, at the front of 101 Market St, they have an understanding with the police that they're ok to be there if they get up by 7AM (sit/lie law). The camp is going to continue to grow. General assembly at 6PM every night but on Saturday when it is at noon. They work on consensus, interesting stuff, go check it out, they don't have clubmate.

If you want to support them without showing up there, their paypal is borked, working on donations on line. (suggestion is made (not) to use Noisebridge as a front).

Their website is occupysf.com. their goal is to provide attention to a large variety of issues. Also check out the stream of the NYC encampment at http://livestream.com/globalrevolution it's a big deal.

html5 guy on the mic: If anyone wants free music, http://getgroovr.com is a music application I did not write

Jake is missing his midi controller, looks like an IBM M keyboard, see list archive for details and an epic thread.

Jake: Looking for a 12V light, the occupysf guys would appreciate one.

New or stale events[edit]

Dorkbot: Wednesday the 12th, awesome, Jake likes to drive a hundred times faster

Hackmeet: Oct 15th and 16th, awesome

Rachel: There are things you should know about running an event at the space, link to wiki

Matt: Game jam again this weekend, wanting to work on his html5 platform, hosting this Saturday. Expecting about 25 - 30 people, should be in the calendar.

Miloh: Going to do something with 15 collage kids, they're going to build some "electronics"

Financial Report[edit]

Kelly was unavailable but generally Noisebridge is still up!

Rubin: Hacker Prom - We made about $1500, half of that is going to Noisetor and the other half to the space. It was a fun time!

Rachel: Jof will cut the baby in half

New Members[edit]

  • Dan Coate - Brings Hackers the movie into our reality. Not present tonight.

Discussion Items[edit]

Lighting spending proposal[edit]

Ben: 100 - 200 a month for lighting billed each month. Working with the city with getting new lighting in the space to save us on power costs. Proposing to spend $1000 in addition to what PG&E will gift/rebate to us to help us in the long run to save 100 - 150 each month.

Duncan: Last month we had a proposal for $700? Where's that shit?

Ben: No, we're talking about spending money in addition to PG&E to buy lights for NB, not to spend money on a meter. Half for new ballasts and half for LED lighting, costing a total of 3000 - 4000, plus (user) labor time to install. In total Noisebridge will most like spend $1000. Ben will get back with the name for the PG&E program, San Francisco department of environment

Rachel: Who's committed to help with this?

Ben: Jim, and several people, don't have an official list for this, will happen when the graphs and charts and cost stuff happens

Banning Rob 2.0/Dank (no full name?)[edit]

Rachel: So there's this guy and he's a problem, we've been talking with him, lots of people, talk to him about why people have been responding negatively to him. He was willing to take that and left that night. Comes back late at night since them and is using the space as a lounge after the bars close. Really rude, not a good person. Has been asked time and time again to have him not come back. We've only banned one person so far and this might be a good time to polish that process.

Leif: I think the notion of practicing banning people is really troublesome. The things I've asked him not to do here he's not done again here. Asked him to stop fucking with the computers here, and he did.

Miloh: He never fixed them.

Leif: Well that's kinda my fault too, I said I would and still haven’t.

Rachel: I think he's problematic and he keeps on coming back here. No one really knows how this banning system works.

Leif: That's the point

Rachel: That's wrong and it should work we should have a system.

Nick: How does it work?

Rachel: Let's take the last 6 months, we've been having more and more conflicts with individuals. I'm getting the sense with the community that sometimes Noisebridge doesn't feel like a good place for hacking, and I've been hearing that in a lot of different contexts. We need to exercise Noisebridge's ability to make the space better, community. People show up here at 4AM drunk and make the space unexcellent. He's been here making problems and he doesn't belong here.

Leif: I’m not here at 2AM a lot so I don't know about then, but when I’ve seen him here in the day time he has been hacking on computers.

Nick proposes a “stack” system for moderating the discussion. People who wish to speak raise their hand, added to a list. People speak in order.

Leif proposes pointing fingers motion direct response to what someone on the stack just said. Nick and Lief agree direct responses should be no longer than two sentences.

Mike Kan: There used to be a public computer that people used, used for electronic hacking (HONK), helps for other people to work on projects, it's a valuable asset here at Noisebridge so you don't have to bring your own computer here. Rob just slumped in there and destroyed the machine. Rob laughed at me about making the machine not suck, he didn't do anything but destroy the content in the machine.

Jake: I have a lot of respect on Rachel's point of views. I have a lot of sympathy for Rob, his school might have treated him poorly, put him on behavior modification program and as a consequence might have bad social skills. I think he's trying, it's still ok for us to decide to ban him.

Miloh: What does that mean?

Jake: I think we were going to get onto the mailing list so that we could discuss what's wrong with him in the space. He tried to come to the space when no one was here so he wouldn't bother people. He feels this place is a value to him because he wants to be around computer hackers.

Quinn: It's often a big mistake for people who are having a rough time to not hit bottom. We shouldn’t become the kind of space where people aren’t allowed to hit their bottom.

Rachel: One of the reasons I brought this up is because people object to the way he acts and that he doesn't listen. Several times we've had talks with him about getting on the mailing list and coming to the Tuesday meetings, but he doesn't. He's demonstrating a pattern about not being interested in rectifying his behavior. What's important is establishing a standard of acceptable behavior at Noisebridge.

Rubin: Could we first address Leif's concern about not having a good way to ban people?

Leif: I don't know what to say about that, we don't have a specific process, we did this one before through consensus, and that means everyone has a say in the process. And historically there's a lot of information about not closing Noisebridge off to people. I think it's very difficult to ban people from Noisebridge and that's a feature.

Tom: My comment is about antisocial behaviour. Doing good works doesn't mitigate bad things. I think we should expect people to do mostly good things. But if someone does bad things, and say they're going to do good things, that doesn’t rectify the antisocial behavior. If I fix 6 boxes and throw someone out of the window, that doesn't make me a good person.

Leif: Yes.

Zack: I don't know the whole Rob history, my experiences with him were not pleasant ones. I think Jake makes a good point about people who have bad social skills, but that's different from having raising your voice and being rude to people. That said, I noticed that the space over there is much cleaner since things have happened to Rob for him to not be here. It was clean, he showed up, made it messy, and I asked him politely to clean it. He never did, and a lot of other people had to clean up after him. I don't know the history other people have had with him, but this is what happened to me. As far as the banning process goes, I don't want to open a whole new ball of wax, there was a incident here banning someone else, and I think it went really well. There should be a discussion about the process involved around that, I think if someone is being a dick, there should be a process to ban them. There are good people here, it's all positive, it's great. It's a wonderful space. One way to keep it that way is to not welcome bad people like that in the space.

Jake: If what we're talking about is for general discussion, that's fine, but if we're talking an eye towards consensus items then we need to learn about consensus items, we need to talk about the blocks brought on by Jay, including what Rubin brought up. I cannot see how they would apply to Jay and not Rob.

Rachel: One of my concerns about bringing this up was to determine how to do it.

Rubin: So, uh, I would appreciate it if we could split up the discussion items to starting a discussion about your want to formalize the banning process, because we don't have one. That should be a completely different issue we should discuss separately from this item. It is an issue that we will probably need to discuss for a month. Saying that, I feel like this process works, because we're talking about all these instances separately. Saying that, I feel like yes, there is a separation between here and Rob 2.0. I don't want to talk about the whole Jay thing, because that’s completely separate. Rob's kind of a dick, a lot of us have talked to him about it and asked him not to come back. I got to the point where I was about to physically remove him; Andy convinced me not to. He was here working on the machine Mike talked about him destroying, was asleep in the chair at the machine. I poked him, told him not to sleep here. Next day he was still there sleeping, midday. Second time that day, he was asleep again. Andy and I asked him to leave, he said he had to finish stuff. He was unresponsive to what we were saying. Andy said, “Fuck Noisebridge,” and left. I talked to Rob some more, he asked for 15 more minutes, so I waited and came back. He was asleep again and drooling. Told him to GTFO that moment. He ignored me a while longer. When I returned, he said that I was being unexcellent to him and it would be excellent if I bought him coffee. I gave him another 15 minutes. He eventually left. I asked him to not come back; he has been back since.

Miloh: When was this?

Rubin: Weeks ago

Jake: My point is I can't see how this is different than banning Jay, could you please address that? We need to talk about how you blocked banning Jay.

Rubin: My consensus proposal is that we are discussing banning Rob right now. We should put it on the mailing list, and invite Rob over to discuss it with anyone who wants to ban him.

Jake: We did that with Jay!

mct: The reason why I blocked Jay's banning is because of the way it went about. Jay already decided to remove himself. From my POV, we brought up banning him after he had already gone away.

Jake: Not true, we brought it up when he was here

mct: agree to disagree, my view is we didn't then.

15 minute time out smoke break.

Nick Farr: This is my idea of what's going on. There's presently three issues.

1. Coming up with a procedure for banning people

2. Banning Jay

3. Banning Rob 2.0

Leif: I'm opposed to banning people hastily and without good cause. We should talk to Rob and try to get him to a meeting, and let him know we're discussing banning him.

Nick: And we're in the process with establishing a line of communication

Rachel: Impossible

Nick: And ironically, I believe I might know how to get in contact with Rob soon. I believe the thing we can accomplish tonight is to wrap up the discussion about banning Rob and leave the other two issues for a later time.

Rachel: And so the reason why I put Rob 2.0 on the agenda this week is so that we can discuss it now and have it for consensus next week.

Nick: We will have an email address for you to get him here to discuss that next week.

Mike: And I feel like this place has been of better quality without him. Noisebridge is not equipped to deal with issues better left to mental health institutions.

Rachel: I have some things to talk about... Tom talked about good actions versus bad actions. There's a third aspect to that, which is a trend. Whatever state is someone gets here, just as long as they're making an effort, getting an A for effort. Lack of effort which is why I think Rob should be banned

Rachel: So the reason why I didn't propose discussing the banning process was because no one wanted to talk about that months ago. Many people didn't want to talk about it. I feel like people aren't going to use it unless we need it. Tuesday after the meeting a few weeks ago, after there was a crazy lady here, we all discussed some issues we had regarding some general issues we have as a community. (Point of order: Note taker indicated that Rachel wanted to correct this statement in the notes after the meeting.)

In the last six months we had three people we talked about banning. In the 6 months prior to that, we had none, and that doesn't include two people we had to call the cops on. We're seeing an increase of people coming through the space, and thus an increase of ban-worthy people coming through the space. I feel like we should refine the process in dealing with those people. This is why I'm bringing it up for discussion.

Leif: As you know we've only banned one person, but there's been plenty of other people who've been asked to leave, and have. I'm not sure what those other two people were about. Consensus is not always the way to solve these issues, we've solved them lots of times without using the consensus process.

Rachel: Wish was removed by calling the police, she was an immediate problem. Rob isn't immediate which is why we're having this discussion. I don't think you're addressing my problems.

Leif: Do you think we need to consensus on banning Wish?

Rachel: Wish hasn't come back, Rob has. He's been here often when you haven't been here, and Rob has and he's been a problem. In the year and a half that I've been here I've seen a serious increase in harmful people coming here. It is not clear how to use the consensus process to deal with this issue. People like Rob alienate awesome people like Andy. Andy left Noisebridge because of Rob and that’s not ok! We can’t lose awesome people by not dealing with disruptive people like Rob. We're turning into a bus station, and that's not ok.

Rubin: I'm really bad at taking notes.

Rubin: When NB first got a space, we didn't have any processes and we discussed creating some and eventually decided not to. We decided not to solve problems before they came up. We started committees and that’s how our membership process was formed. Anyone who showed up initially could become a members. The first task was membership process, second was how to remove. We had some ideas, but never consented on them, because we didn't need it then. Some ideas, are on the wiki and the mailing list.

At the time I was like, this is a shame, but I found that Noisebridge was functioning and when we did have problems with people it was easy to say gtfo and they left. Now there are crazies and NB and there will be more. I am one or two of them. I think your request to formalize something around that is valid, whether it is specifically banning or just dealing with people who shouldn't be here. I would like to work with you to form a committee to create something we can eventually consensus on.

Rachel: I prefer a project-based approach where we learn from each case. I'd like to come up with a consensus item for next week for banning Rob 2.0

Rubin: Not talking about that now, wanna start a committee?

Rachel: I don't have time for that right now.

Nick: So, you want to bring this up as an item for next week.

Rachel: Yes, already on the notes for next week. As I understand it the requirement is it be up for discussion for a week.

Rubin: I am in support of you, what I would like to see happen is we get a hold of rob and let him know we're all pissed at him and want him not to come back.

Rachel: I'm trying to get his contact info and will write to him.

Rubin: What I would like to see happen is we try to get a hold of him and give him an opportunity to come talk to us; tell him why we're pissed and give him an opportunity to come to our next meeting. If we don't get a response, I'm ok with consenting.

Rachel: If he can't come he should have a proxy. If we're trying to ban someone, and can't get a hold of him, he should have a proxy, right?

Tom: It shouldn't be possible for someone to avoid being banned just because nobody wants to proxy.

Rubin: He should have the opportunity to attend or have a proxy. If he doesn't respond, fuck it. We should try to have a discussion with him in an orderly fashion. If he feels like he's being wronged, which I don't, we can continue on from there. It should be clear. If we don't try to have this discussion, I am opposed to banning him.

Rachel and Rubin will discuss what to email him.

Jake: We should do this same process for jay. Should talk about banning him next week, offer to let him attend or have a proxy.

Rachel: The difference in what we're doing between this and that is we're discussing Rob's banning now, and will discuss it again next week. In this new cycle of trying to ban Jay, we should take two weeks again. Discuss next week, consensus a week after. Make sense?

Jake: No, we've discussed it 3 times now, and I always get told that we can’t put it on the agenda because we haven’t discussed it yet. I've always made it clear I think we should ban Jay. Nobody wants him to come back. There is no discussion to have. The only issue is the proper process. What I'm expressing is I don't understand the process, no matter how hard I try people tell me I'm doing it wrong. They tell me I need to go back in time a week and announce it ahead of time.

Rubin: I'd like to invite you to this committee I seem to be forming, to hear your say on how it should work. I'm in full support of you bringing up banning Jay, but as I told you before I'm blocking it until Jay reappears in the space and is actually a problem again.

Jake: This is ridiculous. how do you know he hasn't come back? I think he has, I think he took my keyboard, I want to ban him.

Rubin: Do you have evidence to prove that?

Evan: If no one else comes up, I will serve as Proxy for Rob 2.0.

Nick asks if anyone else needs to speak still. Just Rubin.

Rubin: I've stated this before, you or anyone else is welcome to talk to me about the issue [of banning Jay] outside of a meeting, so we don't need to waste everyone's time. Jay stated to our secretary in an email he will not come back, and I've not seen any evidence of that happening. You said you were giving up on this, and I think it's ironic you're not.

Jake: No, I said I was giving up on you, you're being unreasonable. If we can ban Rob 2.0, we should ban Jay too. I want to put an item on for discussion. I want the same thing for Rob as for Jay next week.

Interruptions about consensus vs discussion

Jake: I want an item for consensus next week.

Nick: I believe the conclusion is there will be two consensus items for next week, banning Jay and Rob. Tom will take notes. Any objections to that?

No objections noted.