[hackerspaces] Introduction from Western Australia

[Tilman Frosch]

Hi,

Am Donnerstag, den 01.10.2009, 14:49 +0800 schrieb David Cake:

> 	We'd love ideas from other hackerspaces, particularly for 
> fundraising, membership drives, and good ideas for rules to run the 
> actual physical space.

1) Offer talks frequently. Invite people, who do interesting stuff, to
give a talk. Surprise your visitors with quality. Workshops are great,
too, but you will have additional costs in advance, depending on what
you do. 
Let everybody use every tool, if the person knows how to and handles
your stuff with care. If somebody does not know to do $thing, show
him/her how to do it.
Just make sure people know that your hackerspace needs their (financial)
support if they want to keep what they started to enjoy (think tools,
people with similar interests etc.)
2) host meetings of local groups with similar interests (linux user
groups etc.)
3) have a 'drink for donation' scheme (and make sure people know what
they are expected to donate) or sell drinks (softdrinks; the highly
caffeinated stuff your target audience enjoys). Make sure your visitors
know that this keeps your space running.
As everybody needs to drink this is kind of a usage-based fee. People
who use the space more often will drink more and thus pay a higher fee.

This is roughly how it worked for us in the beginning. We had one talk
per week, every Tuesday, for about 1.5 years. Quality varied, of course,
but the average seemed high enough that people were surprised they could
get this for free. 


HTH

Til