Meetings/Planning30-10-2012

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What should we talk about?

  • Donation policies
  • Health and Safety & writing risk assessments for upcoming activities (painting?)
  • review of Founder Membership agreement
  • Community Rules
  • All members night - quite soon! "all comers" - at least 2 weeks notice


Notes


Donation policy

At the moment we don't want too many things (eg computers) and we've been lucky with some things

But we'll have to pay for disposal of stuff :)

Review of donations page from wiki - at this meeting?

Giving vs lending vs people who want some benefit (such as people giving something and wanting reduced/free member fees in exchange)

We also have the case where if we were buying something, we'd want more than just the capital cost, to cover maintenance and bits... for low value items (eg a chair) that's fine, but for bigger things we need to think.

If people want to donate kit, they don't get reduced membership fees, that's not the same as membership fees because membership fees aren't for capital purchases. Donation or lending has to be totally different!

If you want to sell something to makespace and use that money to buy your membership that's ok.

How can we value second hand goods? A committee might determine fair market value of an item, not just what someone says it is worth. If people want to do that maybe we encourage them to sell on ebay and use the money to pay for membership. (We/Makespace can always bid for the ebay items!)

We also imagine a future where we might trade up or replace kit which is here/free today. Later maybe we buy everything!

Some things might be on loan and when we replace them or trade up, the loaner takes them back... we'd need to track this in the equipment database.

Kit brings (regardless of whether it's a loan or donation):

  • contents insurance
  • risk assessment
  • buy safety kit
  • requirements for certification / testing

Loan conditions:

  • has to be unconditional, except that you might get it back
  • but we can't guarantee that it won't break!
  • you have to take it back, or we'll bin it. For big kit maybe a disposal bond? (to pay for removal if you don't take it back) Or at least a commitment that you'll take it back

We want a doc which describes on what terms we would take a loan... but do we want to capture these as rules or an understanding? It's more important at the start - donations are more exciting to us now

Motivations of the lender and makespace must be aligned!


Conclusion: Big items (physically big, high value, high material risk): then the committee has to decide.

Alternative: we don't accept donations, but here's the list of things we want! If it's on the list, then let us know. If lots of people offer something we might want to pick the best (not first).

We could share the costs of disposal across MS in the future - the only worry here is that we aren't sure about future cashflow. But obviously people getting value from kit is good.

Don't want people donating kit to feel unwelcome though...

Donations should be Guidelines rather than Rules.

But we don't want people to dump junk they ought to dispose of sensibly! We could end up with an enormous pile of junk....

Guidelines:

  • don't dump stuff here
  • if it's on the list of stuff we want that's great
  • if it's big / complex/ costly then talk to committee about it
  • if it's a loan be prepared to take it back or lose it
  • thanks!
  • we don't buy stuff from individuals - if you have something to sell, put it on ebay and we might buy it (guarantees market rate)


Note: we have some boxes which aren't transparent - red and blue - we could use these to mean things like "you can salvage parts from here" or "this is working; use but don't disassemble"

What about kit that people bring for their own personal use? OK if it's a hammer. But if it's a huge 3D printer, it's another conversation :)


Painting and health and safety

  • risk assessments
  • painting main workshop - at height. This means we need to think about it. A small tower would be safest - would need it to be signed off (as correctly constructed and destructed) by competent person. Brian would be able to do that sign-off. Individuals working on the tower wouldn't need to be competent to *use* it. Would want it on wheels - can be moved by a non-competent person.

Likely to want to reach tall things in main workshop more often - so we might want something we could own. Might be up to £1000 for a good industrial ladder.

  • HSS hire - 4m scaffold tower £150 for a week.
  • add "good step ladder with podium" to wishlist for donations!
  • we might want to look at the nature of the roof in the classroom if we have a platform in the space :) (although current ceiling, though ugly, gives good sound and heat insulation...) Maybe get some more clear tiles....
  • still need to write RA for painting itself.
  • washing rollers and hands. Buy a lot of rollers and chuck them out afterwards? Get buckets/plastic washing up bowl to use near tap (secure workshop)
  • check that ventilation is good!
  • heating for drying paint - heating is on for the winter, not under our direct control.
  • Do we have a date for painting? need to check mailing list ... original plan November 6th, 8th, possibly Saturday 10th. (talk to John Sturdy for info!)
  • interest in big logo - possibly painted by art student? Look up contacts at Reworks and piano people.
  • future agenda item - Artist in Residence :)
  • No blutak policy? Or special non-blu-tak-staining-paint. Or sheets of (sort of single use) whiteboard sheet (like ideaspace)... what will we stick to the walls anyway? Whiteboards all over the walls - expensive? But nice... We can repaint easily, although less so at height, and the high up paint might get dirty over time... Cork boards or felt pinboards - might help sound insulation - could be in makespace colours! We want wall space to write on, wall space for displays, wall space for attaching things... A flexible rail with accessories would be really nice! Hang whiteboards, cork boards, kit racks...
  • Matt paint.
  • we should get a big roll of brown paper - as a general resource :)

Membership agreement

[[1]]

A few typos were spotted. (will be corrected!)

Lockers: the agreement refers to lockers.

What about some temporary lockers, so people could put their stuff securely? But it makes it a bit less like a commmunal space, more municipal, wrong feel?

For normal opening, we have trust in other members. For public events, people will be guarding their kit... so maybe we don't need lockers.

Workshop manager - we do expect to have one - could be one of "us" or a contractor. Need to make sure they are a good fit for makespace culture. Part time expected.

Full members - you don't have to be a basic member first, you can do it all at once.

Students and unwaged: offer "bursary" rather than reduced fees. Defining means testing is a big hassle! We want to make sponsors take this on rather than us.

First aid came up again - having a group of trained people would ensure good availability

Agreement includes clause where we can block access: we don't expect to do this. But it's nice not to be held to a service provision model - because what's service? what if a 3d printer broke? we can't offer service provision standards...

Makespace will provide safety equipment.

Fair use for visitors: if a member always brings the same friend as their guest, we need to encourage the friend to be a member soon! No rule but part of guidelines.

Company block memberships: we need to induct so there's an extra cost. Also, if we gave a bunch of access cards to a company, even if we trust the individuals to get inducted, how do we feel about that in a trusted members-only space? So we'll talk about companies and how we work with them but we don't see non-personally-identified memberships.

Similarly for clubs and societies.

Rule: no "running business from makespace" - ie no registered offices here. One or two people working from makespace - fine. But no (1) hogging a machine for your production lines (covered by fair use sharing guidelines) or (2) 20-person companies operating full time from makespace!

Need to ensure we write down that guidelines work and that there's an escalation. Guideline - that we try to ensure fair use happens!

Wiki: currently specify CC-BY. It can be tricky to attribute wiki content. On the other hand it's nice to be upfront. We could change to plain old CC. (Will take to mailing list) Depends a bit on what the wiki gets used for later.

We do ban upload of content you don't own to the wiki

What about making weapons in the space? We specify no illegal activity.

Maybe separate wiki content out from the Membership Agreement.

Public open event

Tuesday 20th November.

If this was a making event we can have people making things. "Bring a soldering iron" Bring all your kit. We'll have risk assessments done in advance or on the fly. Maker Night!

Then later: December, a public show and tell. Bring the thing you made!