[hackerspaces] Next steps -

[Sean Bonner]

My approach is always to solve the least amount of problems as possible,
because you can always lump more problems on to things and turn molehills
into mountains and whatnot. I think the talk of "foundations" caused people
to create a whole bunch of problems that actually don't exist and thusly
don't need to be solved. Given that this whole discussion is even
happening, there are at least 2 real problems that I can see, the rest of
the stuff kind of solves itself once those two are resolved.

Issue the first: There are a small number of people with all the
responsibility of what to do with the site. Those people are busy, and just
keeping the site online is a bunch of work, so not much time is spent
thinking about how to make the site better or what else it could be doing.

Problem II: Shit is opaque. There is "the admin" and "the community" and
never the twain shall meet. Which leads to confusion and suspicion and blah
blah blah blah blah.

I really think that's it.

So, coming up with a "foundation" or a "council" or a "board" or whatever
the fuck you want to call it - independent of any bullshit legal entity -
enables a resolution to those issues by creating a list of concerns
(keeping the site online, improving the site, keeping the community updated
on said improvements, etc...) and tasking a group of people with dealing
with those concerns. And some set period of time where those peoples
actions are reviewed and either they are kept in that place or they are
replaced by other people who have more time/interest/etc

To some extent that exists already. There are people with access,
permissions, and people without. So it's really just a matter of
crystalizing what the people with access should be doing.

I don't think there's any value in creating a whole bunch of problems to
solve. I think just making a few things more clear/obvious takes care of it.

I mean, FFS we're talking about a website. It's not a global governing body
nor should it be.

-s






On Sun, Apr 14, 2013 at 11:45 AM, Yves Quemener <quemener.yves at free.fr>wrote:

> > which involves admitting that none of us
> > knows the perfect answer - and come up with a solution that most think
> > will work
>
> I am not sure if this will qualify as 1. or 2. but I still don't understand
> the problem you are trying to solve. I think I read all the messages in
> this discussion, and I only identified three things that could be solved by
> a central entity :
>
> A. centralization of legal resources (for which countries?)
> B. giving a Goal, an Aim and an Inspiration to the hackerspaces of the
> world.
> C. Give a sens of unity to the movement.
>
> There has been other proposals, but all the other I have seen can be or are
> currently solved by independent projects that it makes sense to rely on.
>
> More importantly, I see no task that any hackerspace would be willing to
> give money for, except maybe the legal help, but then again, the EFF may be
> a safer bet if you are in US. IF you are targeting hackerspaces outside US,
> are you ready to cover all the legal systems out there?
>
> B. requires a charismatic leader or a strong driver in an awesome project.
> This is a pre-requisite, you have to have it first before making a
> foundation or council.
>
> C. is actually doable without funds but has been attempted before. It could
> take the shape of a charter (maybe a modular one, a la creative commons?),
> that hackerspaces agree or not to follow. Fablabs actually have this sort
> of things.
>
>
> On 14/04/13 17:12, Sean Bonner wrote:
> > The way I see it we have two choices at this point.
> >
> > 1. We decide to work together - which involves admitting that none of us
> > knows the perfect answer - and come up with a solution that most think
> will
> > work (I'm aware there is no way to ever make everyone happy) and try to
> > create a resource that is valuable to people interested in starting
> > hackerspaces as well as valuable to people already involved with them.
> >
> > ~or~
> >
> > 2. We continue being snarky and bashing/insulting each other.
> >
> >
> > I'm cool with either option. While I think there's massive potential for
> a
> > shared resource and I point people to the hackerspace patterns all the
> > time, my hackerspaces won't live or die based on anything that happens on
> > hackerspaces.org <http://hackerspaces.org>, one of the benefits of a
> > decentralized system such as this. And I have over 9000 hours of trolling
> > experience so I can just sit around laughing in everyones faces too.
> Either
> > way.
> >
> > -s
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Discuss mailing list
> > Discuss at lists.hackerspaces.org
> > http://lists.hackerspaces.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> Discuss mailing list
> Discuss at lists.hackerspaces.org
> http://lists.hackerspaces.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>



-- 
Sean Bonner
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