No notes, just support for this rad idea. You can just do stuff!
Direct link: https://www.maker-works.com/operations-book
Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/Intentional-Makerspace-Operations-Dal...
You will probably want an onboarding process with liability waiver. This is partly materials for parents to help them understand what their kids will be up to at your house. You're going to host other people in your place and there is liability that comes along with that.
You will need to figure out how to keep your computer club from devolving into a lan party (unless that's what you want) and focused on learning opportunities by providing guided learning opportunities. LLMs are really good for helping you develop these activities based on an idea, including digging down into the details. Some things that kids might be into: building adder circuits in Minecraft with redstone (requires a basis in binary math and logic gates, which you can teach on paper and in minecraft). Scratch programs to fulfill certain goals (build a gravity model and get a spaceship to orbit; make a clone of a simple platformer video game they like; etc).
After you have some ideas for projects/classes, you're going to want to write up a schedule so parents can help their kids get there. You should also provide volunteer opportunities so kids (and possibly their parents) can help out - maintain the website, fix the computers, etc. This not only helps lessen your workload, it also gives them a sense of community, that they're not just coming to hang out, they're responsible. Make sure to have community standards around cleaning up after yourself and enforce them.
So, maybe after having a couple of scheduled classes, put out a call for donation of old computer hardware, and maybe have the kids try to assemble some working systems from whatever you get. Good luck!
There's https://devhack.net/ in Seattle's U-District as well as Black Lodge Research https://www.blacklodgeresearch.org/ over in Redmond
They're both a far cry from what you're describing. But a lot of it is just putting the work in to build and foster a community around such a thing. Maintaining positive vibes among all members and making it a "third space" for those that want one
Please feel free to drop in again whenever you're in Seattle!
Oh, I must have misunderstood what hacker space means. I imagined a place full of gizmos to tinker with and hardware/firmware/software wizards doing all sorts of crazy coding and circuit-boarding stuff, like in the demo scene.
> "Shared anything brings out the worst in people"
> "the stubborn and mentally ill"
So on point... thank you for the reminders on these realities... Not sure how many times I'm going to need to learn my lesson with all this... (happens in the art hippie world too, and elsewhere I'm sure)
There's got to be some better way to keep it simple and break out of all that though right? Like keeping it a benevolent dictatorship? That doesn't seem great either obviously...
I like the Tuesday Rule.
They need to be programmed.
Whenever you are in leadership position my opinion is that one should adopt a public and private persona. You can do cheery whatever BS to keep people feeling like they “psychologically belong” and whatever woke lingo is hip in HR.
Behind the scenes, you need to ensure single responsibility principle applies to everyone. They need to do one or only a few things, but each thing they do should be what they’re good and capable at. Just fire or kick out people who are annoying. If you think they’re a huge stinker on social media who might ruin things more, adapt and put them doing something else. If they are really hopeless then hopefully they fuck up in that role and you can fire them, or you can just let them organically drop off.
You can’t let feels get in the way when you’re in charge. A follower operates on feelings.
As one of the founders of the hackerspace you've visited out in seattle & a fellow recurser that you might've heard about the space from, I can drop to you some of my notes & learnings from two years in of devhack.
the biggest piece of advice by far that I pulled from a bunch of european-style hackerspaces (& HacDC, my formative hackspace) has been: Just do it. Find a physical space, start doing meetups, promote it a bit and cool folks will find you.
https://fahrplan.events.ccc.de/congress/2007/Fahrplan/attach...
We at devhack took a very word-of-mouth based approach to promotion and that has prevented what a lot of comments here are trying to mitigate in terms of attracting the wrong crowd too quickly -- although I think there's lots of value in creating a space which supports eccentric folks / ppl with diverse backgrounds.
Founding a hackspace is a very learn-as-you-go experience, has been very fulfilling and has had plenty of hiccups that we've had to react to as they come. The most important part is to have fun and create a fun space for you and your friends.
Also, put a roller rink in your space. very important and wish we had that
First of all I’m not a corporate ladder climbing rat because I’d rather be the captain of the ship or THE GUY. It’s not about being nice it’s about completing the mission.
Second, corporate psychopaths are usually not self-aware in the way I am. They do it out of selfishness purely for themselves, not for any other greater purpose that drives them (some ego shit). So I agree that those people are just selfish assholes and they hinder everyone in the long run. It’s not a good way to run.
Ultimately, I do it because I’m a mission leader. The mission is greater than me, and as such it is greater than any or all individual on the team. If I’m dedicating a huge portion of my time to leading some effort, then either I’ll shape my team or replace as necessary.
I’m not motivated my money nor “dominance” because those aren’t that interesting. And I could give no less fks about corporate ladders and proving myself.
If anything I’m dangerous to dishonest people because they’re the ones who will doom the mission. Time is most important to me because I don’t get it back. Building something meaningful as a founder or leader takes time, and I don’t like wasting time and by extension effort without efficient resource optimization.
Sorry if I’m harsh. When I was a team lead at $job I learned that most of this “be kind” and do a drum circle (anything but the actual work!) nonsense is window dressing for mediocrity and I just… I hated it. No dead weight. No babysitting. And no illusions. I will go to war together with someone if they’re real and capable of sticking to the mission.
[1]Dweeb Den entry on Hackerspaces.org: https://wiki.hackerspaces.org/DweebDen
[2]Here's a png of the card I found: https://imgur.com/a/dweeb-den-card-S027r5I
I'm likely going to be switching into gear with the physical space towards the end of September but I'll try to find you on Zulip and say hello before then : )