[hackerspaces] New Member Vetting

[Petr Baudis]

  Hi!

On Mon, Sep 17, 2012 at 06:12:56PM -0400, Ben Brown wrote:
> What process does your space use and is it working/failing horribly?

  We are trying to keep brmlab, Prague as open as possible to the
public: when the space is open, anyone is welcome to stop by and use
our equipment etc. Members pay monthly membership fees and they get
24/7 unsupervised access to the space (we register their RFID card),
plus some (very rarely used) formal voting powers and very minor perks.

  To become a member, we ask people to come to our space several times
so we get to know them; meetups are best and on each meetup we give
newcomers a chance to introduce themselves. Then, they need to send
an email with their name, cell number and year of birth (just as
a disambiguation) to the board's mailing list. We don't use any paper
forms and don't check ids.

  Finally, the board members vote on the matter (both for decisions at
meetups and in board, we use rough consensus, then simple majority).
We never rejected a member by a vote; time by time, someone schedules
board vote on a member and we never hold the vote because we decide
we want to get to know him a little better.

  We didn't have any issues so far with any misbehaving members during
the two years of our existence.

  Happy hacking,

				Petr "Pasky" Baudis