Meeting notes/Meeting Notes 2025 09 09

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These are the notes from the The 830th Meeting of Noisebridge.

Date	2025 09 09
Note-takers	zoda	Mark	Andrew	Moderators	Mark

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Meeting Summary

FILL OUT AT END OF MEETING AND SEND TO MAILING LIST/SLACK/DISCORD Include: TLDR what happened at the meeting:

• Announcements:
• Consensus Items:
• Discussion Items:

Introductions

Mark - Moderator, I like Games Yon - Makes punk music Michael - Interested in electronics and networks Yarick - I like bikes and shit Elle/Ellen - I like to sew and hack organizations. I like bureaucracy and fundraising. I've seen seahorses in the wild! Loren - Talk to me about treasury stuff! Come to software infrastructure meetup on mondays Dexter - new, wanted to check out the meeting Santi - w/ Dexter, interesting in all kinds of makings, particularly robotics Andrew - Hosting a workshop about hacking AI in October Zoda - software engineer, like laser cutting, woodworking, and cncing. Recently cleaned the electronics room + hope it can stay clean. JonathanL - new to the space! trying to figure out whats going on. used to design scenery for theater, now into electronics.

Short announcements and events

Zoda- I am starting to build a website that will show our funds from all kinds of different sources. A dashboard of sorts. We want to see how our fundraising efforts are paying off in "real-time". There is a thread in #projects-forum. I'd like to know what kinds of features people want in it!

Elle -3 Sewing events! Sept. 25th - Crocheting class! Knitting class, date TBA - intro to knitting. Will do-hand knitting in preparation to learn for future machine knitting. Sewing 101(a) - hand sewing! Date TBA. Also: silent auction is going to be bumped by a month (more in the fundraising section)

Mark - starting work on the coffee table in gamebridge. Trying to make it as awesome as possible for makerfaire. Speaking of, Makerfaire is in 3.5 weeks and NB has a table for it! More info on bayarea.makerfaire.com.

Michael - Would like to be a member

Andrew - brought up being an associate member at last meeting. Based on recent discussions maybe not pushing for that as hard now.

Elle - Folsom Street fair. Sept 28th. More to come later in the meeting. Discussion item.

Also: There will be a fundraising meeting this Sunday. 6 or 7 maybe? Check #fundraising channel in Discord.

Excellence

What does that mean? Please see our page on excellence https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Excellence!

• Micheal - Each individual forms a moral intuition about what is good and what is virtuous. And excellence means acting in according to one's instinct of good.
• Mark - Adding to that, individuals helping each other with calibration of what those intuitions mean.
• Ellen - Accountability to ones self, for one self. Taking responsibility?
• Zoda - Taking responsiblity for the spaces you occupy. making new friends in the space, welcoming people, discussing things with NB folks. Important to hear everyone out

Brief Kudos

Recent examples of excellent participation, say 3, unless the passion moves you.

• To Yon - for recording content and helping with social media. And Andrew and Brian B for joining the effort.
• Zoda for helping kickstarting effort for social media?.
• Elle @ everyone who shows up to fundraising efforts and meetings. Zoda for helping to draft up email with her and Loren, Loren for sending it out. More on that in fundraising
• To Jonathan and Yon for helping start a plan for Folsom street fair.
• To Ken for continuing work on woodshop! (It's not QUITE open yet)
• To Julian, Ken Mohammed and Loren for making Dexter and Santi feel super welcome here!
• To the Writing Group for moving ppl out of the walkway as soon as we asked this evening!

Zoning & Permitting Standing Item

Status this week? Helpful broad asks to the community? NB city bureaucracy WG -- JD & Alice, among others.

Short shower last night for half an hour, maybe some leakage through the holes that are currently cut for ventilation. Ken, Elan, and Loren sealed it up then. Coming through cuts that are not yet sealed. Sealing is scheduled for Friday.

Ken and JD have been on calls with the roofer, who is saying there is new graffiti? But all we see is the old stuff. Maybe he doesn't remember? He is insisting there's new paint up there?

New issue with ventilation fan downstairs. Need a replacement fan. Handling internally.

HVAC should be done by the 19th to avoid potential city fees if all goes swimmingly.

Big C Consensus Items

Nobody likes 3 hour meetings, only explain if new people are present. https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Current_Consensus_Items

None

Consensus Items

Only for talking about Big C consensus items, small c consensus items should be discussed with people at the space at the time of the change/new item or can be reserved for the discussion section of the meeting.

None

Financial Update

News from Loren:

• Compared to just last month, we have a bunch of expenses on going. Filtering through that, Liz transfered $35,000 from Venmo. We spedn 6k last month and 4k this month.
• 17k in [savings] and 20.6k in [checking]? @loren to fix
• typically 12k out a month ($10k for rent, 2k for utility)
• 20k for woodshop this month?

All of these are shared on discord, with more detailed charts, in the finance-working-group chanel and threads.

Andrew asks about legal assistance + coinbase saga; Ellen - have an update about the legal aspect, tax document in progress loren has it. Big thing we are missing is the board members names and employers. Reasonable ask, but has been difficult to grab from our members. This is for pro-bono help from the Bar Association, seems like the best fit for us.

Loren is trying to open a new account somehwere else that will have better organizational paths for raising concerns or something, as compared to Coinbase. Looking to transwer funds from coinbase maybe? Coinbase Representative reassured that tax benefits may not be an issue for past treasurer but we are holding off until we can figure out some tax issues.

Discussion Items

Discussion Item 1

From/Raised by: Yon Seeking: Discussion + outcome/action item On topic: Doing a table for Valencia Live street fair Yon: pricing is different, table is free for us. Requirement: we need to have $150 in giveaways or activity or events for the space. we need an event to be promoted. potential for 500 grant for hosting some event that has to overlap with the valencia live hours.

$75 fee for selling items or services.

Zoda: Could do an resident electronic music night. Might overlap with the event and be a good candidate for that grant. Elle: the fee to sell it being only 75 is very attractive. Mark: when is it? Yon: Every second thursday 5 to 10 pm N: What exactly qualifies for the 500 grant? Mission based brick and mortart, slightly outside of valencia live, but also during the time. Elle: what about knitting class? perhaps that event could be relevant. Or a simplified version of the "stuffed animals" class.

Zoda: Now you have support from the community, people seem down for it. Now its time to recruit volunteer help to do it with you! Let's put it on the wiki and social media to promote. There's no heirarchy or official stamp of approval. But yeah youre encouraged to keep it going and push the ball forward!

N: Something about using the grant to reinvest in materials/supplies for the space. Its not a straight cash grant

Yon: happy with the discussion + understands next steps!

Discussion Item 2

From/Raised by: Elle Seeking: Approval On topic: Silent Auction Pushing it to Next Month Silent auction pushing to next month instead of this upcoming mean. Interested businessmen said next month was better. Designing an invitation, was needed but pausing that if postponing is approved Donations given:

   * Jonathan donated a personal 4 Mahjong lesson
   * Noah created fart machine 
   * Art work, including award winning childrens book illustrator writer
   * Outfit donated from the fashion show, worn by grace ling (sic?). 

Loren & Elle: Looking for volunteers who can reach out to businesses. Have a spreadsheet. Can anyone reach out on behalf of NB to solicit donations? Loren: We want ppl to coordinate through this list. (What list? -Mark)

Mark: can we consolidate all the lists of business we have and pin this new master list in the fundraising channel?

Decision made: fine to move it.

Discussion Item 3.1

From/Raised by: Elle Seeking: All the things, discussion, outcome On topic: Folsom Street Fair/ Fundraising

Big event, on the 28th. Could use it to promote the Silent Auction and solicit donations of items potentially for it

Table would be $450. If we wanted selling of members' items, it would be $650

There are at least a few NBers who make things that may be of interest to fair goers.

Do we have any volunteers for the table?

Zoda: seems potentially risky. Might lose money. We have a lot of other things going on already that day/week as well.

Elle: I don't think of it as a fundraiser, but more like an awareness raiser for the fundraiser. We'd be approaching a big community outside of our own. The goal isn't entirely fundraising. Its more about PR.

So an investment in increasing awareness of NB and in the silent auction.

Zoda: not personally in favor of $450 investment at this moment for raising awareness. We can raising awareness for free with social media + making posters.

Andrew: I also think $450 might be a bit too high of an investment

Elle: I'd like to propose spending the next 7 days checking in with folks and seeing what kind of buy-in there might be from people in our community who do make leather stuff.

Someone else (micheal?) +1 and said would be cool if they did it on their own and would be willing to cover it themselves.

Discussion Item 4

From/Raised by: Elle Seeking: advice/discussion/action items On topic: Progress with fundraising regarding email

Elle: Just wanted to point out, we should be forwarding it. We should check to see what eails all got it? Did everyone from our Luma group get it? (IDK) Meetup.com? (Yes) Should we prepare to send another different one out soon?

Maybe next email can include some of those cool social media videos? Other novel re-interpretations of the core message?

Zoda: Do we have metrics? Clickthru rates? I have done newsletter campaigns before. Will try to bring that knowledge into the fray. Elle: Not me. Maybe Loren! Andrew: I have experience doing this kind of stuff, I can help sustain marketting campaign. Metrics are good. Measurement framework / dashboard discussion to be continued.

Mark: I dont think we need to do it here and suggested moving on Elle: It's actually more than just about fundraising. sub-topic: Membership drive

Reminder: there are threads in "community and culture forum" in Discord about Membership and levels of engagement.

There is also an effort to resurrect the announcements mailing list ongoing. https://discord.com/channels/720514857094348840/1410107580658876477

Discussion Item 5

From/Raised by: Zoda Seeking: opinions/feedback On topic: Fundraising Dashboard plans Zoda: Money coming in from a lot of places, wouldn't it be cool if it was centralized in one place? Have a place to see the amount go up. Nonprofits have to publish this data publicly anyway Thread on Discord (https://discord.com/channels/720514857094348840/1414845837401653279) going on about this (web people seeking input) Views: Bar charts by month, colors for funding sources, list of expenses (fully integrated and sanitized) People can download data One page about how cool NB is and another page will have [something] Time, amount, source, notes Only going to be one account (maybe more than one but wants accountability, bottleneck but important for trust/credibility) Prob not going to get a chance to work on it until there's critical mass in interest

Mark: added a link to the thread

Do you have any blockages on access/credentials?

There will be one account with a user/pass tied to the treasurer email.

Robots.txt, other spam protections, firewall

Mark: plan to host this somewhere? Some people have been working on a platform

Zoda: would like to self-host on the pi rack, but open to using a service

(Andrew expresses support for the whole idea in general). Can eventually expand into other marketing/fundraising efforts (email marketing, Wiki traffic, social media engagement metrics) or side projects that are more for internal NB members (NB network traffic, financial forecasts, etc.).

Mark: Have you synced up with Loren in regards to plaintext accounting? Zoda: No but great idea!

Y: Is there a problem with the books? Mark: Not really, were just building out something else.

Question/thought: Exposing API, wouldn't someone hack on it? Zoda: keeping this in mind! def not opening this to the public.

End of Meeting