Just highlighting this for the ones not on the list. Elmo
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- From: Koen Martens <gmc@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: Hackerspaces General Discussion List <discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2010 15:13:22 +0100
On Fri, Jan 08, 2010 at 10:38:55AM +0100, Koen Martens wrote: > Anyway, the whole idea has been tossed around Dutch hackerspaces for a > while now, although we still are not sure about the details. We came up > with a slightly larger membership fee. The additional fee would go into > some national hackerspace fund somehow, and participating hackerspaces > would then accept these 'members+' to their facilities and use their > equipment. I've been putting some of the thoughts, comments and ideas in a document for discussion by the community, thought i'd share it here as well! Gr, Koen (gmc) REQUEST FOR COMMENTS ==================== Author: Koen Martens (gmc) <gmc@xxxxxxxxxxx> Version: 0.1 Status: proposal This document proposes a form of special membership of the Dutch hackerspaces. Please join the discussion at the hackerspaces.nl discussion list: https://lists.hackerspaces.nl/wws/info/discussion The goal is not to set rules, but merely to provide a framework to accommodate the desires felt within the community. This document should be read as such. 1. Roaming membership --------------------- Several people have expressed a wish to support hackerspaces and become member, but not of a specific hackerspace. An example is the case where the prospective member is not living close to any of the existing hackerspaces. In this case none of the hackerspaces can effectively be this members' '3rd room'. With a roaming membership, this person can visit any participating hackerspace, and enjoy certain benefits set out by each of the participating hackerspaces. 1.1. Roaming benefits For example, at Revelation Space, non-members pay a small fee for participation in certain workshops. For roaming members, this fee might be waived (as it is for actual members of the space). Roaming members typically do not get a key to any of the spaces, although this is up for decision by each of the individual spaces. Each hackerspace decides on the specific benefits roaming members get at their space. 1.2. Roaming fee collection Roaming members pay their dues to the Hxx foundation, who collects the money and puts it in a special fund. The fund will be spend at the discretion of the participating hackerspaces. To keep things simple, the money from the fund may be spend only if all of the hackerspaces (by way of their governing body) agree to the expenditure. 2. Membership plus ------------------ Another kind of global membership pertains to those members of hackerspaces that do get around and might want to visit other hackerspaces from time to time. The basic premis is that the member pays a slightly higher fee at their hackerspace, to get additional benefits at the participating hackerspaces. 2.1. Membership plus benefits The same applies as stated under 1.1. The benefits for membership plus might be different from the benefits of a roaming membership. 2.2. Membership plus fee collection The additional fee (which will be set to the same amount across all spaces to keep things fair) will be collected by the individual hackerspaces. Members of space X will pay the extra fee to space X. The extra fee will not be put into a central collection agency, but remain in the funds of the individual hackerspace. The rationale is to keep things simple. Spending of the extra funds is entirely at the discretion of the collecting hackerspace. 3. Identification ----------------- When a roaming member or member+ first visits one of the hackerspaces there might be a problem of identification. "Is this person really a roaming hackerspaces member?". It is up to each of the hackerspaces to find a way to deal with this. As a common guideline, in case of membership plus, the hackerspace could contact representatives of the space the member claims to be with. Ties between hackerspaces are considered to be close enough to make this kind of verification possible. As for the roaming members, some sort of token may be issued. This provides a weak protection against fraud of course. The form and properties of such a card should be decided by the participating hackerspaces. People in possesion of such a card may call themselves 'card carrying hackers'. Another form of validation that could be applied is to just take the persons claim at face value. This provides the weakest form of validation. 4. Enrollment ------------- Hackerspaces can enroll in this program by stating their intention to participate, and compliance to the conditions outlined below. 4.1. Conditions for enrollment The conditions are: a.) the hackerspace does have an actual physical space that is understood by common sense to be a hackerspace; b.) membership of the hackerspace is, in principle, open to any natural person that expresses the wish to become a member. 4.2. Status of agreement The whole deal is understood to be on the basis of an understanding between the participating hackerspaces, and has no legal basis or otherwise binding contractual form. At any time could a hackerspace retract from the understanding. There are no obligations to participate. 4.3. Miminal reciprocity It might be felt that a given hackerspaces does not provide enough reciprocity in the sense of paragraphs 1.1 and 2.1. of this document, while still making a claim to the funds. In this case, the hackerspace might be unanimously excluded from this program by the remaining hackerspaces. EOF _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list Discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://lists.hackerspaces.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
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