I'm getting in on this conversation very late. I accidentally wiped out my desktop several days ago and have been busy trying to put things back together again; so I didn't pay attention to what you were all talking about.
But I find that I am very interested from the point of view of a non-techie. I would love to have somewhere to drop in and talk about what's happening with my setup. And I suspect there are at least a few others like me around. Money--that's the problem. I have an idea that may be worth exploring. I'm a old guy. Let's start with that fact. And I am familiar with three senior centers--the Champlain Senior Center, where I have helped get their computer room in order; Senior Net, at the Pines, just off Dorset Street, where they have a very good setup and teach a lot of computing, and where I have taught word processing several times (though not lately; not enough registration); and the Charlotte Senior Center, where they have a set of two or three computers and some classes. (And then there's the Heineberg Center (spelling?), where I've never been.) The Champlain Center's computer room has six old clunkers that run XP, and I haven't seen many users. The room is not very large--a line-up of six computers, room for a long table behind them and a walk space in between, a wall of large shelves at one end that hold quite a bit of stuff. Would it make sense to look into sharing that space, or one of the others? I would be willing to contribute financially. There may be others willing to do so. And I suspect that costs in such a center would be significantly less than just renting a room somewhere. Warner White 12 Harbor Watch Road Burlington VT 05401 H: 802-863-0182 C: 802-318-0956 www.warnerwhite.org ________________________________ From: Jim Carroll <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Thursday, April 9, 2009 9:31:57 AM Subject: Re: VT Hackers Meetup On Thu, Apr 9, 2009 at 6:29 AM, Marc Farnum Rendino <[email protected]> wrote: > I'm from Hinesburg too, so I'd like to see something there as well. :) Me three! > Suggestion: Let's think of this as a meta-incubator with the express > purpose of creating several local groups. The local groups may indeed > come and go as interest/projects change, and that too may be part of > the way this is built; the more dynamic the better, especially if > there's a stable core. I don't actually think the economics of a dedicated hacker-space would work... a friend of mine seriously looked at putting together something like this in Montpelier, and he would have to have at least 6 regular 'tenants' at their desks and paying a small fee (couple hundred a month) before it would start to be worth the rent. Once you have a core like this though... all sorts of casual meetings could happen. Would I would love to see is a monthly get-together / pot luck at someone's house for a few hours on a weekend... Maybe automate their vegetable garden weeding with some arduino-powered robots. Or put some temperature, flood water, and wine-level sensors in a wine cellar! ;) A little more expensive than the arduino but wireless is Synapse: http://dkc1.digikey.com/us/en/ph/Synapse/EK2100.html The creators program it with 100% python, and gave a fantastic talk at PyCon: http://us.pycon.org/2009/conference/schedule/event/73/ In my mind, what we need is some good planning so when we get together on a weekend, we have all the plans and parts and people together to do some cool stuff. -Jim
