[Noisebridge-discuss] Noisebridge-discuss Digest, Vol 32, Issue 10

Nick Mooney gnewt at gnewt.at
Fri Jun 11 04:43:49 UTC 2010


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I'd love to offer a guest-perspective of Noisebridge. A few weeks ago
I flew down to San Francisco for Maker Faire. On my offtime I hung out
at Noisebridge, which was quite a bit. I've been on the list/IRC for a
while and have noticed the same "squabbling" you (the OP) notice, but
in reality it's quite a welcoming place. I took the BART to
Noisebridge straight off the plane and was greeted with many "hellos"
and "are you new here? would you like a tour?" type things. It was a
really welcoming environment and I found it easy to both sit down and
chill out on my laptop, or have discussions with others, or build
thing, etc etc. I ended up going out for crepes the first night I was
there with some awesome people I had met.

While Noisebridge sometimes strays from its "be excellent to one
another" policy on the mailing list etc, it really shines through at
the space itself. Don't form an opinion before you've dropped by.
You're free to leave at any time of course, but it's important that
you see how the space "really is" before you make a judgement about it.

On 6/10/10 9:26 PM, Christie Dudley wrote:
> Hm.  Interesting perspective.  As one who's been directly involved
> in these squabbles (having offered the "CPA advice" and voiced
> criticism over the Elixir event) I do wish to extend apologies for
> what seems to be a lot of squabbles.
>
> I think what appears to be an uncomfortable situation stems from a
> few sources.  First, we're all pretty familiar with each other and
> tend to dispense with a lot of the niceties that you might expect
> from more formal communications.  And yes, this means occasionally
> we squabble like siblings.
>
> Also, there are a lot of idealists amongst us.  We Believe in
> things, and don't always think about the them the way we're told
> to. It's admirable to be amongst people who have dedicated their
> lives to noble causes, but there are sometimes philosophical
> discussions on things associated with non-mainstream convictions
> that seem like criticism from left field.
>
> We recognize lately that the mailing list has become
> less-than-pleasant and we're all thinking of ways we could improve
> that.  That said, for the environment we all support where we
> encourage greater freedoms, the cost is a lot of messiness in
> terms of what is actually done.  People will be people and continue
> to be emotional beings and sometimes allow things to get away from
> them. I like to think it's because we care about what and how
> things work and emotions get tight when they worry about them.
>
>
> So yes, if you'd like to spend some time hanging out in a space
> where people are connected, yet open, and genuinely care about
> what's going on in the space and world around them, please come
> stop by Noisebridge.  We turn no one away and welcome everyone
> equally. If you want an environment a bit more... sanitized, then
> maybe you'd prefer a place with more rules and less chaos.  But I,
> like everyone else here, do strongly encourage you to pop in and
> check it out before judging us too harshly.
>
> Sincerely, Christie
>
>
> _______ "Great spirits have always found violent opposition from
> mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not
> thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and
> courageously uses his intelligence." -- Albert Einstein
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 8:35 PM, Jack Perkins
> <jackaperkins at gmail.com <mailto:jackaperkins at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> Jim,
>
> I hear your concerns. I see the squabbles and argumentative
> chit-chat on this list too, and I'm not the kind of person who
> enjoys such things.
>
> However, I am also someone who has actually been to the space. I
> think if you drop by, say on a Monday night, you might find a very
> different noisebridge than the one you like to imagine.
>
> If you come by on a Monday and find me, I'll be happy to give you a
> tour and introduce you to some incredible people.
>
> -Jack
>
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 8:12 PM, - <noisebridge at splattercast.com
> <mailto:noisebridge at splattercast.com>> wrote:
>
> Hi.  You don't know me, and at the risk of making enemies of people
> i've never met, I wanted to say something about this recent
> thread.
>
> I moved to SF in January and have been looking for a good place to
> hang out, learn more tech skills, and work on "stuff". I checked
> out the Hacker Dojo down in Mountain View - and found it to be
> really cool in its own disorganized ad hoc busy-busy-busy way. I
> would be glad to pay $100/mo to be able to plop onto a couch with
> my laptop and work there, go to the informal classes, meet people.
> I need to meet people. Good lord, do i need to meet people. But its
> way too far away. Parisoma and the other places like it are much
> too expensive for my casual needs.
>
> Noisebridge sounded a lot like Hacker Dojo, and that was exciting,
> especially because other places "like" Hacker Dojo, here in SF,
> seem to have fallen apart and gone away.
>
> And so i write this note only cuz I loves ya, even if i doesn't
> knows ya:
>
> What i've seen on this list is tons of squabbles, people correcting
> one another in public and not in a happy way, someone accusing
> someone else of "illegally" offering accounting advice while not
> being a CPA (that's not illegal unless you charge for it and/or
> advertise that you're a CPA) and now someone is in trouble for
> trying to raise money for an organization that, in my limited
> experience, is about to face a cash crunch. I have a sense of who's
> senior and who isn't, and frankly, senior persons, take it from
> someone who has been "senior" in many roles - the most gracious way
> to be a senior person anywhere is to do it in a way that is not
> noticeable by anyone.
>
> All this grumpiness makes me sad.
>
> I've been involved with a number of nonprofits (formal and
> otherwise) over the years, from grunt to board member to president,
> with budgets from $-infinity to $millions. Some worked better than
> others. Some really were not very great at all.
>
> Anyway, I hope you guys can get back to having fun, because what I
> see (only through this list) is kind of off-putting and a little
> bit intimidating. If I was afraid of saying the wrong thing before,
> and not sure I'd ever want to enter the space. But i hoped that
> maybe an outsider's perspective might be useful. This is all I'm
> going to say about it.  My hunch is that someone who sees this will
> want to respond with a curt "goodbye" and ejection from the mailing
> list. I can't do anything about that. I just hope that there is
> some hope for a chill gathering place in bicycle range of SF, not
> just for my own sake, but for all the people like me, and this town
> is full of such people...
>
> Best - jim
>
>
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>
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>
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- -- 
Gnewt
http://www.gnewt.at
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