Meeting Notes 2026 02 24

These are the notes from the The 854th Meeting of Noisebridge.

Date	2026 2 24
Note-taker[s] (aliases):	Julius, Zacchaeus, Daniel, Nthmost
Moderator[s]	Jet

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Next Meeting Edit redirect [Next meeting]

Meeting Summary

• Fundraising Update: None
• Announcements: Naomi challenged Loren to a duel; Caitlin challenged everyone to arm wrestling; 5MoF hosted monthly on 3rd Thursday starting March 19th
• Finances: None
• New members: Ellie
• New associates: None
• Consensus Items: None
• Discussion Items: 1. Birthday space rental for February 28th - declined due to short notice and lack of member familiarity with event organizer, 2. Welding Class March 4-8 - space prep and logistics planning underway with Naomi as point of contact until Friday then WE-Z, 3. Woodshop keypad - deferred to woodshop guild to develop proposal with focus on guild structure and regular meetings over technical lock solutions

Attendance: Wheezy, Ellie, Caitlyn, Daniel, Zacchaeus, Steve, Jo, Julius, Ren, Elan, Naomi, Chris Blitzkrieg, Wright, Mina, Sara, Cory, Anh, Jet, Loren, JD

Introductions

Wheezy they/them - They them learning verilog. Love Music, love hacking.
Ellie - Loves software infra and motorcycles
Caitlyn - I bring booze to Noisebridge
Daniel He/Him - whacky gamified donation displays
Zacchae - Worked on the matrix server, and it seems like it's working!
Steve he/him - new here and proposes to bring chemicals
Jo she/her - new here. Done some laser cutting and wood shop
Julius he/him - mostly does things that fly trying to get a areo/dynamics session going!
Ren - Tries to make shit happen and build things
Elan He/him/they/them - likes hacking on software thigns and noisebridge things
Naomi/nthmost she/her - I like to work on creative applications of retro technology, like phones.
Chris Blitzcrieg - woodhosp come to woodshop wednesdays
Wright - does lazer stuff.  Interested in woodworking
Mina - New in here and interested in AI and likes SF and China and happy to be here
Sara - New here and does marketting
Cory He/him - old here and build robots and teaches to build robots
Anh she/her - design
Jet they/them - likes that people bring nice liqour
Loren he/him - online, User:Mcint/WikiMaxxing
JD -- online, afk

Short announcements and events

Naomi: challenging Loren to a duel

Caitlin: challenging everyone to arm wrestling

Jet: I am hosting 5mof on March 19th. It is going to be hosted EVERY month on the 3rd Thursday of the month. Hoping to get 40 people. If you have the bravery, and there is ANYTHING you would be willing to talk about for 5 minuts, please sign up.

Excellence

Our One Rule is to Be Excellent to Each Other.

Wheezy - Saying please

Caitlyn - Saying thank you

Joe - Cleaning up after yourself

Elan - If you ever feel you're too tired to clean up after yourself you should have headed out earlier!

What does that mean? Please see our page on Excellence !

Anti-Harassment Policy & Community Standards of Excellence

Noisebridge has an Anti-Harassment Policy!

Everyone is expected to follow the Anti-Harassment Policy, please familiarize yourself with it.

For approachable & specific guidelines see: Community Standards

Please note: https://safespace.noisebridge.net/ is one way to quickly raise issues which will be seen by people in Discord.

Brief Kudos

Naomi - To Chris (blitzkrieg) for arranging to get these particular shelves and doing the lion's share of the work on Saturday.

Jet - Naomi for setting up the Beyla sound system upstairs.

Loren - Kudos to Naomi for setting up the asterisk phone system. People should think about cool things to do with that.

Wheezy - Zacchae and Loren for working on Matrix bridging. bring the memes!

Guilds & WGs

Rubber Ducky Guild (Naomi): The little guy sitting on top of the stairs has been named. MC Escher.

Woodshop Guild (Chris): We have a new router that hasn't been set up. I would like to consider limiting access similarly to the laser cutter.

New Members/Associate Members

Chris (blitzkrieg) - access member from last week, we just didn't follow through.

Ellie - Sponsored by Naomi

Discussion Items

1: Birthday space rental

On topic:	Birthday Party for Mary
From/Raised by:	Dennis
Seeking:	rental -- decision or advice on feasibility

I run a third-space which is closing. I got a request for a rental. They wanted a nerdy vibe. It seemed like a match for noisebridge. Since my space is closing, I don't need the funding anymore. We had Daniel, Travis onboard.

Jet: what requirements do you have from the space. What are you expecting to happen?

Dennis: Noisebridge will provide the space. I was thinking of the meeting room upstairs. The big open area (RNA Lounge). The person was talking about bringing some food, some snacks. They will be bringing music.

Attendance estimate is 40 people

8pm to 1am on February 28th (Saturday)

Naomi: expectations of exclusivity?

Jet: Are you guys thinking of buying insurance for the event? There are tools and things.

Dennis: I've been to noisebridge. I've been a regular there. The request I got for the space, it's never been rowdy. I wouldn't want that for my space either.

JD: Sounds like you have a space you've used for this before. Has this person done an event there before? (No.) Do you have member sponsors? If there's alcohol, then we need to make sure there are no minors, we need to know that the volume of music isn't too loud. But 40 people is a lot. It would probably spill out of the space.

Dennis: No member sponsors. That would have to be arranged. And I guess it would spill over to the kitchen. I've been around noisebridge about a year and a half. I do not know the person who is.

Cory: Just curious why you were choosing noisebridge? Is there any way you are going to be taking advantage

Dennis: I want something nerdy that gives vibes of a nerdy house party. And noisebridge was the only other space.

Julius: im leaning on no because Mary is not familiar with noisebridge. So the guests would be a aquantince of an aquantince. Especially on short notice.

Corey: Given that it's in four days, and the person hasn't been there, I don't want to discourage them, but maybe we can reschedule, take time to invite them here. Make sure they understand what they're getting.

Loren: People are discussing how to rent the space. But we have members to pay to access the space, so renting to *other* people for them to take over the space kind of goes away from what members are expecting. 450 is our daily operating expenses, so when you consider the overhead of people doing unpaid labor to clean the space/supervise, I don't think it makes sense for us to go to deep into that.

Daniel: Given how little activity there usually is during that time, I think exclusive use of the space isn't a huge deal. The issue I see is with people coming in who have never been here, we are most of the way to being on the sidewalk. Normally the people who come here are cool with that, but I wouldn't want people to come and they think they rented an event space, and they're not getting a real event space.

Tea time

3: Woodshop keypad

On topic:	Woodshop keypad
From/Raised by:	Chris Blitzkey
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

I just want to float the idea of a keypad. The sewing shop already has one, and the Jukis will stitch your hand down to the table, but they won't cut your hand OFF.

Zacchae: I see a lot of people who come here to use the wood shop, and I don't see a lot of people who come in to use it consistently. So I'm wondering if we have enough people who can keep it accessable.

Julius: When i first came to NB i was able to go into the woodshop and make something in 10 minutes. it was pretty magical. i would be sad to see that kind of radical openness fade away.

Daniel: More and more rooms are getting locked up. I think it would be sad if most parts of the space were locked up. Ken floated an idea of having tags that are required to turn things on. As far as things going missing, that's sort of how nosiebridge is. If there is a specic small thing that you don't want to go missing, you can have a specific labeled area and stick attached. I've seen that work. I did it with a tiny thing that would have gone missing in like seven days, and it's been here for six months.

Elan: It would be good to have people learn some basic stuff. There were some people here earlier who were using it without running the air handler. And since we are entering the QR code era, maybe there could be a way to ping the wood shop trainers

Naomi: there are a lot of technical solutions with locking doors and things, but the sociological solution is the formation of an actual guild. So taking it from teaching people a thing, to actually giving a sense of ownership over time. I think there are equitable ways to put a lock on the door. Maybe RFID. And putting up signage.

Julius: Agrees with Daniel. Thinks safety concerns are the most important. Theft is inevitable and should be considered a reasonable cost to our radically open culture.

Cory: I think that the stakeholders need to take ownership. We are going way off on a tangent deciding things that the woodworking guild should be deciding and bringing to the general meeting.

Naomi: anarcho-syndicalism. The guilds were intended to function in a sort of a fractal way - each is a mini Noisebridge. we give guilds authority over their resources b/c they have the best idea of how to invest in what they have a shared stake in. The reason there is a lock on the sewing room door is that we authorized the sewing guild to take ownership. And the lock on the door is almost always unlocked by the way -- just like Noisebridge itself. so in practice, guild rooms stay as open as Noisebridge.

Loren: The 3d printer room also operates that way. In the beginning, it was locked all the time but now the door mostly stays open.

Julius: the organization is lacking and investing in the shelving and designating nad labeling and inventorying things can help things from disappearing. I have alot of peg board 4' by 4' of pegboard, for anyone thatneeds it

Chris: not great pegboard because of dust. so when things get dusty it gets rusty. dust pulls in moisture. I don't love peg board for other reasons. for organizations, I have a lot of things I want to do. I'd like to build or buy cabinets and label things. "this is where you have a handsaw" etc.

Naomi: the only things that keeps us organizated is people knowing who each other are and have a watering hole we can go to. Having a woodshop wednesdays is like having a guild meeting. It is a guild and your job (to Chris [but also implicitly others in the guild who have more knowledge]) is to make more masters

Elan: The concepts of guilds i nebulous and that JD, Ken, and Yourself )to chris) were the people running it.

Naomi: just because a cluster of people are the most dominant in a space does not mean it is a functioning guild. This is important because there are practices of being a guild. having a regular watering hole (schelling point) every week where you can find someone. and having to talk to. Having bottlenecks to get something done that involves talking to someone. that are not high friction and promotes makinng relationships. and meeting people. and determinig if its a healthy guild. it's more than teaching people how to use machines but also teaching people how to be teachers. The infra meetup is our best example of a well functioning guild.

Ren: It's basically making sure things are gatekept, but making sure the entry is really really inexpensive

Loren: I think of the infra meetup as a meetup so that I remain specifically responsible for it. It's very tempting for meetings to become just a list of desires with high variance wrt to people's ability to get it done. The way I think of it, the guild meets afterward, and that's when the work gets done.

Naomi: sure, that's your structure, that's how you've implemented it. they are similar.

Loren: they can be different things and i like to keep the distinction.

2: Welding Class - March 4-8 - prep, goals, opportunity

On topic:	Welding Class - March 4-8 - prep, goals, opportunity
From/Raised by:	Loren, Naomi
Seeking:	announce, commit to plan/goals,

Three stages: what is the event? Each day is 12 hours. Do we know how to sign up? Reduced rates for noisebridge members?

https://www.sugarmetalcustoms.com/

We need to clear 1200 sq ft of space for them. We measured (before we added shelves) that if we pushed everything to the wall, we would have enough space.

What can we do (how can we better direct + leverage work needed for cleaning) into improvement of the hackitorium downstairs.

(Some electronics + sewing stuff should be present downstairs for accessiblity.)

How can people benefit, take part? March 4 - 8 (Wed - Sun) - (10 am - 8 pm)?

Loren: What is the prep for our agreement with them. Do NB members get a discount on classes?

Naomi: let's belay that question, i don't remember and we probably have that info stashed away somewhere else

Loren: Having Naomi speak to what we can do to this, what is our dream afterwards.

Someone remembers Zack saying NB members will be able to take classes at reduced (possibly no-) cost.

The space will be used intensively for (10?) hours per day.

@nthmost is point of contact UNTIL FRIDAY, then it's @WE-Z for outside group --

(Zach /@OkZach has dropped and run as one does with cobalt-60).

(Zach did not want to be on-point for this from the beginning, that was the agreement - he did his part as he claimed he would. --nthmost)

Julius: design for space should include a straight walking line from front to back of the space, be able to walk straight back to the woodshop. (unfortunately missed a lot of detail, Julius "grandstanded" [his word] for a while about his dream of having the electronics lab move downstairs as we all hemm and haww about it as we're hearing this for the first time --nthmost)

Jet: that's a hot take!

(The knitting machine controversy comes up again)

Ren: How long is it going to take to get it started? Can we start a clock now? (Basically: can we set a deadline for someone getting it going - if the clock runs out we sell it?)

Jet: should we write consensus Item about the knitting machine...

Naomi: i don't think this should be a consensus item...?

LX: would strongly caution against moving all the electronics upstairs preventing handicapped ppl from being able to use the electronics upstairs.

Elan: NB16 something - elevator something? (sorry, notetakers all went on strike --nthmost)

Corey: i was on the elevator council, not sure if this is the right time to talk about elevators

Ren: if electronics are upstairs then it's harder to fix things that are downstairs

Ken: people use the tools downstairs all the time, i can attest. we can keep them in both places.

Julius: looking at how the "accessible" sewing machine was treated, i don't think having split concerns really works - all or nothing

Julius: for now, let's pack down a bunch of electronics stuff and put it up on the shelves

LX: game stuff... don't quite understand the problem w/ having a sewing machine downstairs but OK... let's at least keep electronics somewhat downstairs. and w.r.t. upcoming events. March 11 is GDC NB party. So we need a concerted effort between the 8th and 11th to pull the space back together after the Welding event. Definitely want a better Gamebridge area but we need a deepdive discussion about this.

Jet: advise talking w/ Gamebridge about it

Naomi: we'll need to do another sweep and measure of the space (rattling off a number of things that could be dismantled, junked, moved, or reconsidered as to their proper place)

(group feels motivated to action, Jet jumps to the Flaschentaschen. ppl start gathering scrap wood to make room to move the laser cutter. Ken goes to dismantle the DIY CNC machine but then Coreyfro steps in front of Ken's crossbow to rescue this machine all while everyone goes "no, Corey, don't do it!" and he carries it off to his truck anyway. Ren and Wheezy help lots of stuff. Naomi takes apart a shelf storing "air" in plastic storage buckets and moves buckets up to next to the music room. Busted chairs get kicked to the curb.)

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!

• What wiki pages need updating? What new wiki pages do we need? Discovered from the meeting.