[ml] Supporting Noisebridge Financially

[Jared Dunne]

It turns out that Noisebridge is starting to get low on funds for paying
rent and keeping the lights on.  This was brought to our attention during
Wednesday's meeting when a member (Rubin?) was polling everyone in the space
about membership/donation history, while also clueing us in about the
financial situation.  I was curious about how NB is funded so I looked into
it more.  Here's the summary of the key points from Tuesday's members
meeting minutes where the financial concerns were first raised.

   - After paying December's Rent, Noisebridge will only have one month's
   expenses in the bank.
      - Normally, they try to keep it at 3 months buffer, so this is the
      reason for concern.
      - Noisebridge costs about $165/day to operate.
      - There is no magic endowment funding the space.
      - The members' dues paid have dropped off over the last few months
      - If you are a member, double check you are up to date with your dues
      and your paypal autopay hasn't mysteriously stopped as it has for others.
      - If you aren't a member, consider joining but if that seems like a
      hassle or you don't want consensus rights, you can just pay "dues" via
      regular donation if that's more your style.
      - "If you're here a lot, you should be paying dues" was the consensus
      [which seems reasonable]
      - The suggestion was raised that usergroups (like ours?) should
   contribute to the space financially.
      - Members also raised concerns of lack of engagement between groups
      and NB membership
      - Members suggest that outreach to groups might help this
      - An idea to "sponsor a day of NB" was raised, and a few members
   picked days in December to "sponsor" (at $165/each)
   - Idea of a suggested $5 dayuse donation was raised for encouraging
   regular, but infrequent users to contribute to the space.

Basically, I just wanted to shed some light on the issue within our group.
I know that our group collectively brings a lot of value to Noisebridge, but
it seems that there is a need for us to contribute financially as well.
Individually, that means contributing what you feel you can via dues or
donations.  Collectively, I suspect our group could help add to the coffers
as well.  Some ideas in that vein follow.  Chime in if you have other ideas!

   - Simply shedding light on the problem for 1 minute at our meetings will
   go a long way towards raising awareness.
   - At our regular meetings, especially those featuring super awesome
   talks, we can take a moment to pass the hat to collect (optional) one-time
   donations.
   - The ML Group collectively could join the membership effort to "sponsor
   a day of NB" in December as a fundraising goal.  This would mean raising
   $165+ via the mailing list or from meeting attendee donations.
   - Beernation (as suggested by Sean C. on NB-disc): "walk in with a 6 pack
   of beer, start drinking one, and offer them to peeps in the space. When they
   ask if they owe you anything, I just tell them to throw $5 in the hat for
   NB, and it seems to work out"  [mmm beer]
   - Win the Kaggle Social Network Competition!

Thankful for you all and NB!
Jared-

PS:  I've posted this on the wiki as well here:
https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Machine_Learning/Fundraising
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