121–130 of 162 posts
I was on the board of directors for a local Linux Users Group and can echo the difficulties in finding a venue. In a city full of empty office spaces on a weekday night it was virtually impossible to find a stable meeting location. Without a stable meeting location you are much less likely to establish a core group since people do not like to have to learn how to get to different venues. Mozilla hosted us at one poin…
I was on the board of directors for a local Linux Users Group and can echo the difficulties in finding a venue. In a city full of empty office spaces on a weekday night it was virtually impossible to find a stable meeting location. Without a stable meeting location you are much less likely to establish a core group since people do not like to have to learn how to get to different venues. Mozilla hosted us at one poin…
Even when a company offers meeting space, they can be overbearing about it. I was involved a tiny bit in reviving a local interest group of high-powered programmers. Another person, who did all the actual hard work, of meeting organizing, got meeting space at a Big Tech company... Unfortunately, as a Big Tech (and in the surveillance capialism space), it was complete with signing in with security in the lobby, gettin…
This doesn't sound unreasonable to me if you were using a private companies space. The company providing the floor space and security.
Sure there may be easier venues but I wouldn't expect less than this if I was going to be using a company's boardroom for my meeting space.
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> I do believe that it should be a mandate for the municipality to provide meeting space for local non-profit and special interest groups. Japan has these. There’s local community centers basically everywhere which can be used as a meeting space for a token fee (I think it was like $5/hour last I checked). My local center in the middle of Tokyo is just three floors of rooms that people can use for whatever they need.
In 2024 Japan you could also just buy a house for 10k USD and call it your club house :p
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In my experience $20-$70 an hour is too much. We were offered $50/hour meeting space at a local incubator, but the numbers never added up. It is hard enough to get people to show up if it is free, requiring people to pay to attend a casual meetup would not work in our situation. Who is going to foot the multi thousand dollar per year bill for meeting space? This is why municipalities need to provide this space for fr…
Why should my tax dollars pay for your special interest group to have free meetups? How would we distribute access to this newly created resource equitably? I don't disagree with the concept, but it gets hairy in the particulars. The problem is that of course we rarely ever get to vote on issues such as "should we build a community meeting space?" so we never really get to understand how the electorate truly feels.
The rule is simple: you running a non-commercial event? You can use the space for free. Commercial component? Pay an hourly rate that comes out to ~$5 per person or so. There are some restrictions on events based on space but it's an obviously good thing in the same way a public park or water fountains are.
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Even when a company offers meeting space, they can be overbearing about it. I was involved a tiny bit in reviving a local interest group of high-powered programmers. Another person, who did all the actual hard work, of meeting organizing, got meeting space at a Big Tech company... Unfortunately, as a Big Tech (and in the surveillance capialism space), it was complete with signing in with security in the lobby, gettin…
> it was complete with signing in with security in the lobby, getting a guest badge for the visit This doesn't sound unreasonable to me if you were using a private companies space. The company providing the floor space and security. Sure there may be easier venues but I wouldn't expect less than this if I was going to be using a company's boardroom for my meeting space.
I was on the board of directors for a local Linux Users Group and can echo the difficulties in finding a venue. In a city full of empty office spaces on a weekday night it was virtually impossible to find a stable meeting location. Without a stable meeting location you are much less likely to establish a core group since people do not like to have to learn how to get to different venues. Mozilla hosted us at one poin…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even when a company offers meeting space, they can be overbearing about it. I was involved a tiny bit in reviving a local interest group of high-powered programmers. Another person, who did all the actual hard work, of meeting organizing, got meeting space at a Big Tech company... Unfortunately, as a Big Tech (and in the surveillance capialism space), it was complete with signing in with security in the lobby, gettin…
> it was complete with signing in with security in the lobby, getting a guest badge for the visit This doesn't sound unreasonable to me if you were using a private companies space. The company providing the floor space and security. Sure there may be easier venues but I wouldn't expect less than this if I was going to be using a company's boardroom for my meeting space.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, great article. Really struck a chord with me. I help run the Boulder Ruby meetup ( https://boulder-ruby.org/ ). We survived covid, having to move venues multiple times, and the declining sexiness of Ruby. Thanks so much to our sponsors Mojotech (for space and drinks) and Github (for zoom). We're still looking for other sponsors for pizza support--if you are in the Boulder area and are interested, please reach ou…
> the declining sexiness of Ruby What is replacing it?
And I should be clear, it is really the declining sexiness of Ruby on Rails. Lots and lots of systems folks still use ruby. I personally think that Rails is one of the best languages for delivering a web based MVP, but if you look at the number of participants in the Boulder Ruby meetup, it is much lower than it was 10 years ago.
We still have a number of folks (like me) who like ruby so much that even though they are not using it in their day job, they show up for the meetup.
Who's up for one in Boston? I'll organize if I can find some speakers.
Our meetups have been very casual, just hanging out with some laptops, sometimes with pizza and beer. We tend to just talk about projects we think are cool, and things we're working on or learning.
https://lowellmakes.spaces.nexudus.com/events/1415349776/lin...
Also I am the "Robby" on the "contact..." line, so if you have questions feel free to direct them at me :D
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> I do believe that it should be a mandate for the municipality to provide meeting space for local non-profit and special interest groups. Japan has these. There’s local community centers basically everywhere which can be used as a meeting space for a token fee (I think it was like $5/hour last I checked). My local center in the middle of Tokyo is just three floors of rooms that people can use for whatever they need.
I'm interested and I need this. Do you have some additional info for me maybe? Thank you!!!
A friend also organises painting classes in his local one.