Yes, September 1 opening is what we're hearing as of last week. I'm joining HUB Bay Area <http://bayarea.the-hub.net/> as a Founding member; my wife and business partner Betsy Morris is planning to become a Charter member, and work there some of the time, as part of The Brower Center<http://www.browercenter.org/>in downtown Berkeley. I was originally personally skeptical about the viability and * coworkingishness* of "metered" hourly access vs. anchors-as-desk-renters-by-the-month "traditional" (pioneer) coworking community cooperative models, but my perspective changed as I:
- got to know the people involved, their vision, and previous projects/experience - got hands-on experience with the challenges of space and people/business relations management in our little "proto-coworking" community in downtown Berkeley for the last year. While it's nice not to have to pay hourly rent for our existing classroom space, we believe that if we're relying on hosting non-core-business outside events that gross less than $100 for a night's work to offset our rent, we're doing it wrong. And we didn't get a voice in selecting the tenants who joined after us, and had incompatible growth and use patterns. - saw the engaged communities growing around *Outside The Cube* (*aka Cubes and Crayons*), *New Work City* and *Sandbox Suites*, centrally managed/hourly metered access spaces - got more details on the benefits of membership and pricing/spaces for events; rather than paying equal shares of all the space and initial capital investment, paying for just what we use reduces our upfront and ongoing costs. Because the building incorporates multiple levels of sharing, it can get maximal value for spaces and resources. - clarified our own business vision and plans, mapping out partnerships, sorting out priorities - where can we add the greatest value? Where do we want to be spending our time? Where do we get leverage through cooperation? - realized the true power of coworking: instead of putting all our eggs in one basket (*leasing a single space*), we could be a member here (*which includes use of the SF space once it opens, and many across Europe, where **The HUB network* <http://www.the-hub.net/>* started*), and focus on building our community connections and business relationships so we can partner on events elsewhere as necessary. Plus, it's a 5-minute nearly-flat bike ride from my house, a block from the subway, across the street from the University of California campus, and surrounded by an incredible variety of dining options, including one friends are co-creating right in the building <http://terrainrestaurant.com/> that I may invest in. In a building with showers and bike parking (*including secure attended "valet" bike parking a block away*). And many event spaces, from conference rooms to a theater. And in a new ultra-green building, full of potential partners and clients <http://www.browercenter.org/tenants> in related businesses, and another coworking-style space, the Sustainable Enterprise Cluster, a *green business incubator* run by Dominican University of California's (*formerly Dominican College, not related to the University of California*) Green MBA <http://www.GreenMBA.com/> program, which includes a branch of another longtime coworking-esque venture, the NextNow Collaboratory <http://www.nextnow.org/>. Our current office has a bunch of private storage space, which we'll miss (*it was a big relief getting our work materials out of the house - fortunately, some alternatives have emerged*), and big bookshelves built in. But we really don't need that in the same place that we work together with folks in and hold meetings. Raines Cohen, Coworking Coach <http://www.CoworkingCoach.com/> *Planning for Sustainable Communities* (*Berkeley, California*) On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 2:41 AM, David J. Kordsmeier <[email protected]>wrote: > http://www.bayarea.the-hub.net/public/ > > Anyone have any scoop on when it will be operational? > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
