Meeting Notes 2017 11 14

Introductions

• Invite a knowledgeable volunteer to explain what Noisebridge is about:

Trent - An imaginary future from the past that people believe existed from 1995 to 2001

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'."

• Introduce any experimental or unusual moderation techniques that may be using during the meeting like: direct responses, limited speaking time, orderless stack, &c.
• Round of introductions (remember, announcements come later):
  • What's your name
  • What do you do
  • What do you maintain at Noisebridge?
  • if you are new: how did you hear about Noisebridge?

Trent (he/him), Living in my cyber future by buying things/consumerism

Lizzie (she/her), Audio electronics and music and computer security

Darryl (they/them), Functional programming and laser stuff and teach laser stuff

J (he/she) - Kane from kung fu, roams earth, solves problems.

Paddy (he/him) - regular visitor.

Ryan (He/ElJefe)- does game dev, enjoys hanging out at Noisebridge

Marco (he) - building a search engine for (code learning?) resources

Zach (he) - likes to build things, learn things, meet new people, and help out noisebridge (and move it if that's what's going on)

Rich (he) - likes to hack around, playing w/ an rpi currently. Making real things w/ hims programming knowledge

Lucas - likes networking. Been here a few times before

Kelly (she/her) - does infosec and 3d printing stuff.

Cole (he) - makes robots

Kevin (they/them) - likes microcontroller stuff, is helping out w/ circuit hacking mondays

Patrick (he/him) - fight computer security for a living

Scotty (he/him) - writing memory back to permanent storage. it's super great. He even remembers people.

Short announcements and events

• Darryl - functional programming talk tomorrow by one of the creators of Haskell - it's going to be rad
• Ryan - currently making some makerspaces over at SF city college and would love input from others after the meeting
• Patrick - New Space working group meeting on hopefully every Saturday, 6pm now to deal w/ relocation and/or dealing w/ legal stuff to stay here (skipping Thanksgiving weekend Saturday), slack channel is #new-space
• Kelly - Thanksgiving potluck! Sign up on the whiteboard by the entrance!
• Scotty - New microscope! From China! Plug it in, play with it, have fun! And be sure to re-cover w/ the dust cover. Can be used for anything, not just electronics! Has a camera and HDMI output, so hook it up to a TV!
• This Saturday (18 Nov), Plastic Manufacturing for Women/Unmen, taught by Ruth! Details on meetup too

Safe Space

• Darryl - we want people to be as comfortable as possible in the space, so when topics or behavior in the space make people uncomfortable they are within their right to ask that it stop. This doesn't translate into topics being off-limits, it just means that you should be considerate both to those around you and also the people that you're with. If you're uncomfortable you can find someone at Noisebridge that you trust or mention it in the #space-guardians channel. If you're comfortable doing so you can also ask someone to leave.
• Lizzie - sometimes it's not easy or clear asking someone to leave and so you can ask one of the people with their hands raised to help you out.

J

Scotty

Darryl

Lizzie

Zach

Kevin

Ryan

Trent

Trent: Victoria likes to say: It's ok to talk about stuff even if its controversial, involves violence, etc. but just like how in the woodshop you'd tell people before using a loud tool so they don't damage their ears, you should also tell people around you when talking about disturbing topics, etc.

Participation

• Darryl - everyone can participate at Noisebridge
• Scotty - but we also chat online right?
• Darryl - yep we have a Slack and the best way to get access is to just hang around a bit and get to know people. Once you know someone they're likely to invite you anyway. There's also #noisebridge on Freenode which is mostly empty.
• J - great way to get to know people is to show up to classes and events because most of the people get into Noisebridge this way, it's how they start their participation
• Darryl - works for me - came to CHM
• Scotty - and how to you get access anytime you want? One of the ways is becoming a Philanthropist.

Philanthropists

• Paddy - someone who contributes to the space, who is recommended by a member
• Trent - how do you lose access?
• Paddy - being unexcellent, stopping your dues.
• Trent - we have auto-hiatus these days, but Members who have cause can revoke your Philanthropist status
• Scotty - they get 24 access, and can renew 30 day tokens
• Trent - don't let people borrow your key, that's one way to lose it.
• Scotty - we have Paddy's application tonight. Sponsored by J. Any objections? ... Questions?
• J - I suggested that he should apply because he works a lot for the space in particular late at night. Coming for at least two years, helped with Makerfaire, CHM, metalshop, helped build the metalshop tables. Helped us get the vending machines, the kiln. Gone above and beyond the call of duty and would like to be able to hack here late. And so I recommended philanthropy.
• Scotty - Cool will leave it up to you to get that sorted

~ applause for Paddy ~

Membership Binder

• Darryl - A member is one who has gotten a neural implant so you can communicate with our lord Consenso. It's someone who has a serious commitment to the future of the space and its longeity. The big difference from Philanthropy is that you can sign off on Philanthropy or Membership applications. You can grant 30 day access and not just renew, and participate in the big C Consensus process to the fullest extent. You can remove Philanthropy status from people.
• Scotty - counterpoint: you don't need to be a member to do anything at Noisebridge or even to participate in a very serious way. We've had many integral people in the space who are not members, even to the point that we just assumed they were a member due to their work and awesomeness.
• Darryl - yep I remember Scotty applying because people just presumed he was one. I decided it the other night when Steve pretty much filled it out for me.
• Ryan - You don't need to be a member to participate in consensus discussions, or to propose something.
• Scotty - the weight that you have in the consensus process is not strictly related to being a member, it's more about your participation in the community.

Financial Report

TODO

Consensus

• Parick - Outside these walls in the default world, we have great ways of making decisons that usually result in the winning side very happy, and everyone else sad. Consensus is the decision process that NB uses to make big decisions, like where should we move, should we sign a lease, what rules we have and to change. For everything else, we have doocracy and don't need to have elongated discussions about it. It's a decision process where we bring proposals to the meeting and solidify them into a proposal. We discuss them to solidfy them until it doesn't change for two meetings. Then it comes up for consensus. T?he only proposal that will pass consensus is one that all the members agree to. If you have a proposal comes up that you disagree to, you have an obligation to make a counterproposal that both you and the person propsing can live with. There is the ablity to block consesnsu. This is a nuclear option. It's saying "if you let this pass, fuck you, I quit noisebridge. This thing will cost the community my participation in NB." It usually doesn't get used.

Everyone is free to participate in the consensus process, and the molding of the process.

Concensus proposals are rare. Proposals are on the wiki. 99.X% of decisions don't need big C consensus, but it exists for when we need it.

• invite a knowledgeable volunteer to give a brief primer on consensus process
• It is important that everyone in attendance understands at least:
  • Blocking with verbalized principled objections.
  • Why we use consensus over other approaches to decision making.
  • How consensus isn't a legislative process
  • Why consensus isn't applicable to some things like conflict resolution, resolution of time sinks, and the like.

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.)

Proposals for next week

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

Patrick: I propose NB establishes two separate funds for possible moving.

That Noisebridge establish two new funds.

CONSENSUS ITEM TEXT

1. A holding fee fund of $5,000 which will be used to "hold" properties forlease or sale that Noisebridge might consider in the future. These funds wouldallow us time to engage in a full capital C consensus process relating to the ultimate lease or purchase decision about our new space.

2. A moving fund. This fund will collect money specifically for the costs associated in moving, renting, or purchasing a new space for Noisebridge. Should an agreement be reached with the current landlords at 2169 this money would be directed either to rent or to building improvements as required.

END CONSENSUS ITEM TEXT

Patrick 1. alloc 5k from general fund into a holding fee fund, b/c in the process of doing the final consensus process, we might need to put some money down to prevent the location from going to some other party. Unlikely that it'll be exhausted, but is prudent.

   Lizzie: Can we have a process for when this will be spent?
   Patrick: Probably just little c consensus?
   Lizzie/Trent: Can we spell that out?
   Patrick: It seems unlikely that we'll just arbitrarily spend it
   Trent: Good opportunity to record the way of doing things that is historically verbal
   Lizzie: Good to head off an argument over how many spaces we spend this on, etc.
   Scotty: Whats the range usually?
   Trent: Victoria said she used 1k for a personal apt, at least
 

2. Moving fund. Looking at many options for financing leasing or buying. There'll be lots of fees, costs, to do this. This fund would be where we collect money donated specifically for the purposes of moving, etc. incl. legal fees to lawyers to figure out our current situation. This fund will start empty or w/ nominal amt for current legal rep. Will add a project to donate.noisebridge.net. If the fund is not expended and we get a lease, we can convert to rent money or general fund.

 Scotty: Maybe we shouldn't call it a moving fund b/c its for more than just moving costs, but also possibly buying a building, legal fees, etc.
 
 Trent: Is the purpose of this being separate b/c its going to be quite large ultimately?
 Patrick: Yes
 Trent: We should spell this out in the proposal text, that this is the purpose of it, and why it's separate.
 Trent: Also will this be specifically earmarked for moving??
 Patrick: Yes

Trent is apathetic.

Discussion

Longer discussion items belong here. This is the last part of the meeting so that people can break off and continue their discussion afterwards.

Discussion Items

If any important discussion happens, it should be happening after forward progress is made during consensus.

Ryan: Can we make a page or something on requirements or a guide for people who want to help out looking for locations for a possible new Noisebridge location? I have quite a few friends in the real estate business who've given me tips on looking around for stuff and I'm just curious what requirements we have.

Patrick: That's one of the things we set out to decide on on Saturday. There werent' many controversial items.

J: Everything is in the wiki, slack channel (#new-space), and the Google spreadsheet

Patrick: Meetings every Saturday on this, so please come.