[Noisebridge-discuss] Re: Draft Finance Policy

[Shannon Clark]

been following the discussions with interest, I'll try to stop by tonight
though i have to go to another event earlier this evening (may be able to
drop off some spare cleaning supplies on my way - anything in particular
that would be useful?)

Anyway as I was reading this it struck me that some, though not all, of
these issues are very similar to the ones faced by people opening up
"coworking" spaces (including many here in San Francisco) - are people
familiar with coworking? See http://coworking.pbwiki.com/

In many coworking spaces there are usually one or two people who are the
legal signers of the lease - deal with the landlord, usually collect
money/pay out bills. Then often there are a number of people (limited only
by the space) who pay on a regular basis, usually receiving in exchange both
a permanent workspace (i.e. desk) and perhaps equally important storage
space.

For Noisebridge I might suggest that some form of storage space be obtained
(old lockers etc) and people who pay for it get to use those spaces to store
unfinished projects. Nothing too fancy - but this would also have the
valuable side benefit of helping to keep the space neat and help clearly
identify what people are working on vs stuff available to be used in future
hacks.

As someone who likely will drop in from time to time until I figure out what
I want to hack on, I wouldn't have any problem with people who are there
more often having space to store stuff, and as a drop in having to either
bring my stuff with me - or use a bit smaller space.

I wouldn't expect that these are "secure" - except via the security of a
common community expectation.

Which is my second point.

Generally speaking people adhere to the expectations set out in front of
them.

i.e. if everything is charged for, "protected" etc then people will react to
it in part as a challenge, as a way to game the system, to get as much for
as little as possible etc.

but if instead people are expected to contribute what they can - to chip in
as they can, to leave money for the soda (or food or parts), to clean up, to
keep the space organized, to bring in more stuff to be hacked upon than they
used up etc - people generally will. Without being "forced" to - but rather
by having decided to join the community expecting themselves to do so.

This is how great barcamp/open space type events function and work well -
and how many self-organizing activities end up happening. The role of who
ever nominally "organizes" (well starts the ball rolling) is really to set
up the expectations of people such that they then build upon that and do
what needs to be done.

A simple suggestion - I would suggest that costs & financial goals be made
visible along with progress towards them.

i.e. have some simple display that might show "rent needed this month" or as
per Meredith's suggestion (hi Meredith!) "cost to replace if broken" - i.e.
keep costs, where they exist, visible and then make it easy for someone to
contribute if they so choose (and from a matter of pure safety assign
someone responsible to make deposits on a frequent basis of any cash that
comes in vs paypal etc)

When non-profit status is completed one bit of tricky but important
accounting to decide upon is what "value" people get for contributions -
i.e. a magazine subscription run by a non-profit has some (low) value
assigned it, the excess amount being the donation, a ticket to a dinner
fundraiser etc. Just being a non-profit doesn't mean that some things can't
generate profits - and I'd suggest some thinking about whether there are
simple things that might be done to generate revenues to help offset
memberships.

Anyway I'll try to stop by this evening if I can, if not will try to stop by
later in the week and help with cleaning etc.

Shannon
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