[Noisebridge-discuss] Pay your damn dues / Dec. 24th is jof day

Thu Nov 25 07:33:05 UTC 2010

This same topic is being discussed on the hackerspaces.org email list.  Here's a copy of the email thread, which includes some links that may (or may not) be helpful:

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Hi all, 

Here's a fun project =)  As you all know, keep track of membership and payments hasn't quite been our strongest suite, so here's an attempt to help fix that problem.

A preliminary project has been underway a while, but time and other commitments have unfortunately not allowed us to keep up and bring it to actual use. 

So here it goes on our HackerspaceSG GitHub in the hope that the community will be able to take it on and develop it into something we, and perhaps even hackerspaces elsewhere, might be able to use.

The TallyUp (I suck at naming things) Project lives here: https://github.com/hackerspacesg/TallyUp/

And this is probably a good read as well: http://help.github.com/dealing-with-lineendings/

Do let know if you want in =)

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There's also AROS:
http://archreactor.org/wiki/index.php/AROS

and a few others that I am forgetting. What were the other hackerspace membership systems?

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A hackathon to improve the state of hackerspace management systems just went out on the hackerspaces blog.  http://blog.hackerspaces.org/2010/11/22/announcing-the-opendoor-hackathon/  If you want to share your system and potentially get contributions during this hackathon you should probably contact willow at jigsawrennisance.org.

And please do, I'm going to participate and I'd love to see some good starting points.

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Here's one I was thinking of..
http://openatrium.com/

.. but it wasn't really made specifically for hackerspaces?

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Open Atrium never worked well for us, the interface is not easy to navigate. 

What does work is a private mailing list, getting email messages increases member involvement. For member profiles we use Alkivia open community (http://091labs.com/2010/11/anatomy-of-a-hackerspace-site/)

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Hackerdojo has a pretty nice one.

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OT: I hear the road to hell is paved with 1/2 finished hackerspace
management software.

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Mitch.

-------------------- 
> From: treasurer at noisebridge.net
> Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2010 14:33:38 -0800
> To: rachel at xtreme.com
> CC: aestetix at gmail.com; noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> Subject: Re: [Noisebridge-discuss] Pay your damn dues / Dec. 24th is jof day
> 
> We are currently using xero.com, and it sort of provides this service.
> It took some figuring out, and it won't be ideal. I started
> implementing this when I began my term as treasurer. I don't know if
> the auto-nag emails will be desirable for everyone. Sometimes when
> people don't pay dues it's because they genuinely can't afford it. I
> think in many cases it's preferable to have that handled by humans,
> and I think that I can implement a reasonable system for farming out
> this job to treasury minions.
> 
> As Rachel pointed out, Paypal auto-payments sometimes die for no
> apparent reason. This is probably a perfect situation for automatic
> emails. These members fully intend to pay, and want it done
> automatically, without having to check on it all the damned time. One
> of our members is currently working on a tool that will do this for
> us.
> 
> -Kelly
> 
> On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 11:03, Rachel McConnell <rachel at xtreme.com> wrote:
> > John do you know of any software that does this?  It would need to be
> > able to handle pseudonymous dues payments (members who don't want to put
> > their email address into a tracking system) and cash payments for those
> > who prefer cash.  There are other requirements but those are the hard
> > ones, off the top of my head.
> >
> > Kelly, our treasurer, is currently searching for software that meets
> > these and other needs and could use a hand with it if you've got some
> > time to evaluate various systems.  Reach her at
> > treasurer at noisebridge.net if you can help out.
> >
> > We do actually allow people to use Paypal but Paypal has this thing
> > where they often cancel people's subscriptions without notifying them,
> > so they think they're paying their dues but aren't.  If the software we
> > used could sync up with Paypal then we'd be able to notice this a lot
> > earlier so that's another important feature.
> >
> > Rachel
> >
> > John Adams wrote:
> >> While I'm not a regular member of Noisebridge (but keep meaning to
> >> drop by and check things out), it sounds like you have both a
> >> technical and a social problem here.
> >>
> >> You should have software that figures out who is and isn't late and
> >> nag them to pay, for those members that are unwilling to give a credit
> >> or debit card for membership.
> >>
> >> For those that are, recurring charges automatically placed against
> >> member credit cards or paypal accounts should be used, using the
> >> paypal subscription system. That's available on Paypal business
> >> accounts, and for the most part, it's free.
> >>
> >> Depending on people to remember to pay is costing you money in the long run.
> >>
> >> -j
> >>
> >> On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 11:54 PM, aestetix aestetix <aestetix at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>> Has everyone who is late on dues been notified? I just realized that I
> >>> probably missed the last month or so because of a debit card fiasco, and I
> >>> haven't been paying attention to paypal.... but I didn't get any
> >>> notification of timeliness. If I am indeed late (and I probably am), then
> >>> others might be who also don't realize it.
> >>>
> >>> On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 11:46 PM, Shannon Lee <shannon at scatter.com> wrote:
> >>>> I added 12/2010, since the original idea was to cover December and a bunch
> >>>> of people pledged at the meeting.
> >>>> Also, I just wanted to point out that this number is actually really close
> >>>> to a multiple of our dues: basically, it takes two "regular" members' dues
> >>>> per day to keep noisebridge open, or four "starving" hackers.
> >>>> Jof's email made it sound like the seasonal fluctuation is the reason for
> >>>> our shortfall and like we can wait it out; but we went over the numbers
> >>>> tonight, and we will not make January's rent unless we do something fairly
> >>>> drastic; this "sponsor a day" idea is only one.
> >>>> Seriously, we're on the edge of running out of money and going broke.
> >>>> So pay your dues.
> >>>> And if you're not a member, but you use the space, consider making a
> >>>> monthly donation.
> >>>> --S
> >>>>
> >>>> On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 10:25 PM, Josh Myer <josh at joshisanerd.com> wrote:
> >>>>> On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, aestetix aestetix <aestetix at gmail.com>
> >>>>> wrote:
> >>>>>> Jof,
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> This a great idea!
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> To keep in kallistic spirit, I'll cover December 8th.
> >>>>>> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discordian_calendar)
> >>>>>> Is there a list of days that have been or need to be covered?
> >>>>>>
> >>>>> I made a table for 2011; if people are really keen on sponsoring this
> >>>>> year, we can always cut and paste more table.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/SponsorADay
> >>>>> --
> >>>>> /jbm, the put-tables-on-the-wiki-yo dude.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>> aestetix
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 9:39 PM, Jonathan Lassoff <jof at thejof.com>
> >>>>>> wrote:
> >>>>>>> One of the main topics in tonight's meeting was that Noisebridge is
> >>>>>>> running pretty low on money in the bank. Based on our financial
> >>>>>>> history, apparently this happens each winter and rebounds a bit during
> >>>>>>> the summer.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> It seems like there are a number of factors that play into this, but
> >>>>>>> by and large it seems like our issue is with members that stop paying
> >>>>>>> dues on a regular basis. I've had recurring Paypal payments that have
> >>>>>>> mysteriously stopped going through, so if you're going down that
> >>>>>>> route, please check that these are still going through.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> One idea that was floated to help Noisebridge along in this season of
> >>>>>>> need was that of sponsoring a day at Noisebridge. Our rough
> >>>>>>> calculation came out to be $165/day of operating expenses.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Some attendees (myself included) decided to take a couple days to
> >>>>>>> sponsor, and I wholeheartedly recommend you do too!
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Cheers,
> >>>>>>> jof
> >>>>>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>>>>> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> >>>>>>> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> >>>>>>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>>>> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> >>>>>> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> >>>>>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> --
> >>>>> Josh Myer 650.248.3796
> >>>>>  josh at joshisanerd.com
> >>>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>>> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> >>>>> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> >>>>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Shannon Lee
> >>>> (503) 539-3700
> >>>>
> >>>> "Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> >>> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> >>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
> >>>
> >>>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> >> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> >> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss

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