Free Geek Research Project and Volunteering

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Margaret Young

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Mar 31, 2015, 11:38:43 PM3/31/15
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Dear Free Geek,

Hello! My name is Meg Young. I have been to Free Geek a few times in March and maybe late February, exploring if folks would be OK with me working with you for a research project.

I found out about Free Geek through Lee and TA3M. I think what you guys are doing is awesome.

I was only able to make it to FG a few times to date to introduce myself, but now that my project is booting up I am wondering if I could talk to the group about how they feel about the project. I am on a team (a small group spread between UW, Cornell and Lancaster University) interested in tech repair. We are working with all different sites of tech repair, from tool libraries and computer repair in Seattle, to post-consumer repair in Bangladesh and West Africa. To do the work, I would come to every meeting and class and pitch in to work, and do some interviews.

If you guys are open to it, there are actually 3 other people who would like to be on the Free Geek team with me. We all want to dig in and work doing the same stuff volunteers would do. We have not set our research questions yet, because we are hoping to do work that starts with observing before we start to hone our focus.
The work outputs would be academic papers in the summer sometime, which I would absolutely share with you. I am really excited about FG, and am hoping to be able to volunteer and work for you into the medium term after the project. I also want to generate the kind of outputs which might be useful to FG, if there is something that seems good to you.

This is not an informed consent email, but just to open this idea up to the group and get some sense of your reaction. I have talked to Jon, Lee, Andrew and Dan by attending Saturday workshops before.

I know that FG core team is busy at the moment. My hope would be to come to FG as often as you meet (or have a class for youth), and if there is a week that you don't meet, to be able to interview someone.

Thanks so much for your consideration. If you have any questions, reply on- or off-list or call me at 734-358-5413.

Best wishes
Meg

Lee Fisher

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Apr 1, 2015, 10:37:57 AM4/1/15
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> If you guys are open to it, there are actually 3 other people who
> would like to be on the Free Geek team with me. We all want to dig
> in and
work
> doing the same stuff volunteers would do.
...

Elcaseti/others: I believe Meg is also interested in a trip to
Portland, if anyone has input on the best way to do that, including
Portland contacts, that'd be helpful.

Free Geek Seattle is very on Workshop Leads at the moment. I presume
if you and 3 other people were to do some Leading of the workshops, I
presume you'll get additional perspective that'll help your research.

The Monthly meeting might be a good place to meet others involved with
FGSea. Unfortunately, only a few seem to have enough time to volunteer
at the Workshops.

If your research could help us find more workshop Leads/volunteers,
that'd be nice. More exposure would be helpful.

There'll be a FGSea booth at LinuxFestNW. If you and your other 3 want
to help staff the booth, you might get some perspective from newbies
interested in FGSea-type activities, in case that could help with your
research (in addition to helping us staff the booth...)

PS: Pedantically: FG is Free Geek, aka Free Geek Portland or FGPDX;
the Seattle group is called FGSea or FGSEA. Not called FGS since that
was too close to FCS (Filipino Community Center).

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Margaret Young

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Apr 1, 2015, 12:38:15 PM4/1/15
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Thanks so much Lee for your reply. Are folks going to be leading Workshops on Saturdays for the next few weeks?

Lee Fisher

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Apr 1, 2015, 1:35:50 PM4/1/15
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> Are folks going to be leading Workshops on Saturdays for the next
> few weeks?

For anyone considering attending an upcoming workshop, to check if the
workshop is happening or not:

1) Look on web site. On home page, currently on upper right of page,
there is a list of workshops with dates. If there is no page for that
deate yet, or the page has no Lead listed ("NONE YET"), odds are good
nobody has signed up, and it would be a bad idea to just show up and
assume a Lead will materialize.
https://freegeekseattle.org/wiki/Event_Schedule

2) Ask on IRC. (Sorry, search wiki to find FGSea channel URL.)

3) After workshop has started, call the lab's phone. (Sorry search
GoogeGroup archives to find phone #.) If no answer, odds are not good.

4) If still unclear from above, ask on this list.

For this Saturday (I think 2016 means 2015, or this is a Koanhead
April Fools Joke?), it appears Koanhead is *once again* Leading:

https://freegeekseattle.org/wiki/2016-04-04_FCS_Workshop#Agenda

I will attend this weekend, to drop off booth signage kit. I may have
to leave early, *IF* the Document Freedom Day Seattle event -- being
planned on the LibrePlanet-US-WA list -- gets schedule for Saturday
5:30 at Elysium in Capitol Hill. Alternatively, it may get scheduled
for Third Place Commons, adjacent to FGSea's monthly meeting, not sure
yet.

I don't know about future weeks.

I think the FGSea should be closed during the weekend of LFNW and
SeaGL. I think Koanhead said he'll be at LFNW on Saturday, so I'm not
sure who will be leading that weekend, if at all.
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Andrew Kane

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Apr 1, 2015, 4:41:25 PM4/1/15
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On 04/01/2015 10:35 AM, Lee Fisher wrote:
>> Are folks going to be leading Workshops on Saturdays for the
>> next few weeks?

I'm planning to lead Saturday workshops until LinuxFest at the end of
April, or until other leads start taking it on.

>
> 2) Ask on IRC. (Sorry, search wiki to find FGSea channel URL.)

On freenode, channel #freegeek-sea

>
> 3) After workshop has started, call the lab's phone. (Sorry search
> GoogeGroup archives to find phone #.) If no answer, odds are not
> good.

206-858-9311 is the number for the lab.

>
> For this Saturday (I think 2016 means 2015, or this is a Koanhead
> April Fools Joke?), it appears Koanhead is *once again* Leading:

That's just an 'oops' on my part. I've fixed the title so that the
page should now show up correctly:

https://freegeekseattle.org/wiki/2015-04-04_FCS_Workshop



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