Hackerspace Weekly Digest: Nov 12th - Meeting to discuss new locations, and CamBam Workshop!

[Christopher Hoffman]

Hey Hackers!

Important topics in the digest this week. Lets get to it!

Downtown Location Update:

Last Wednesday I sent an email explaining now the new management of the Sun Center is trying to increase our rent, so we have been looking around for possible new locations. (You can see that email here). After talking this week with Vicki Todd, the manager of the Sun Center, she has made it clear they are not interested in working with us to compromise on an amount in which we are able to afford as an organization. Even if we had no other expenses, with our currently membership numbers and dues, we would not be able to afford the new rent they are looking for. 

However, there is some good news! We have had a feeling this might happen after the sale of the Sun Center, and have been looking for the past few months for possible new locations. And after my last email, we have had a number of other members reach out with leads, and have spent the last week following up on them. I want to thank everyone that has helped out, the Gainesville Hackerspace would not be able to survive without all of you.

We will be having a formal meeting on Tuesday (Nov 14th), at 7pm (the beginning of Open House), to discuss the possible new locations. We want all members input, so please be there at 7pm. There are 3 places which might work for us, so Daniel will be presenting on the possible locations, and hopefully all of us can come up with an action plan. Hopefully we'll have a new home soon, and then comes the fun part :D

Again, I will be sure to keep everyone updated, and if you have any other leads on vacant locations which would be a perfect for the Gainesville Hackerspace, please let the board know! (bo...@gainesvillehackerspace.org)

Calendar:

• Tuesday (11/14/2017) 
• 6pm: Strategy Meeting - City Commissioner Adrian Hayes-Santos will be joining us to discuss the Hackerspace and see if he can offer suggestions for locations.
• 7pm: Meeting on possible new locations. All members please come out and voice your opinions. We want all members input on our new home, so please attend. It is also our Weekly Open House! Everyone is welcome to join us at the Downtown Location, meet our members, check out our space, and bring a project if you want!
• Voting Members: We have one application to vote on as well, see the email for the usual details. We'll vote after the meeting about locations.
• Thursday (11/16/2017)
• 7pm: Kamin Miller will be hosting "Introduction to CamBam for CNC and Laser Cutters", a workshop teaching the basics of CamBam, and how to use it to design a coaster to be cut on CNC router, and how to design a keychain to be cut on our laser cutter.
• Open to the public and free to attend!
• https://www.facebook.com/events/1786549621638113/
  

Misc:

• The "How to Design for 3D Printing" workshop was a great success! We had about 26 people attend, and had lots of great conversations afterwards. Thank you to everyone who came out! For those unable to make it, I'll have the video on our youtube channel shortly.
• We have a new Slack Chatroom! Slack is awesome, think of it as a modern-day IRC room. Its a great way to chat just between members. We'd had a good number of members join, if you are an active member and didn't receive an invite, let me know! You can also sign up if you have an @gainesvillehackerspace.org email address. 
• https://gvillehackerspace.slack.com/

If you have fun projects you've worked on recently, email me at secretary@gainesvillehackerspace.org, and I'll add them to the next digest! And I hope to see everyone on Tuesday at 7pm for the meeting on a new home for the Gainesville Hackerspace.

Christopher Hoffman

Secretary, Gainesville Hackerspace.