[Noisebridge-discuss] Keys

Meredith L. Patterson mlp at thesmartpolitenerd.com
Fri Jun 5 01:01:26 UTC 2009


Jacob Appelbaum wrote:
> Noisebridge doesn't take equipment loans. If you can't donate it
> outright, we don't want to take that burden on our back.
Late to the game, but I just want to endorse this as a method of
operation. I left a cabinet full of chemistry glassware at Noisebridge
when I moved to Europe. It's stuff I wouldn't mind having, but I found
it a home there and if other people want to use it, they can (if the
space it's occupying becomes more important than the glassware, then I
hope they'll find it a home where it will be used; I have some
suggestions in that case).

Other glassware I left in my apartment, because it's stuff I was less
inclined to donate. It's being packed and shipped. Problem solved: if
you want to keep it, then keep it, if you want to give it to other
people to hack with, then give it to other people to hack with.

If you bring something to Noisebridge and it breaks, someone gets to
keep both halves. (Or maybe two someones get a half apiece.) OTOH, if
you bring something broken to Noisebridge, it might get fixed.

Those are the risks. I will note, however, that there is a fuckton of
expensive equipment at Noisebridge and nobody has broken anything major
that I know of yet. (Temporarily disabled, yes. Broken, no.) I submit
that this is a side effect of the sense of ownership of the space and
its contents that people have. We know what we can hack with and what we
can't; we're polite with the stuff on other people's shelves, we try to
be excellent to each other with respect to commonly held equipment (the
drill press, the electronics gear, &c).

I've never been in another space where people catalogued ICs for other
people's benefit because they wanted something to do with their hands
during an interesting conversation, but that totally happened one night.
People who participate in a do-ocracy feel a sense of ownership toward
the space that makes them improve it for everyone else, and that's
pretty fucking awesome.

The expectations are pretty clear, and the result suggests that people
who come to the space are driven to meet or surpass those expectations.
I don't see any point in chasing imaginary free-rider problems before
they even come into existence.

Cheers,
--mlp, your friendly neighbourhood liberaltarian



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