I’d like to suggest that we start some ‘show and tell’ sessions to give people the opportunity to talk about things they’re working on in or around the Hackspace if they like. Here’s some ideas about the format - I’m very much open to suggestions:
About an hour long in total, with projects ideally less than 20 minutes long (if you only want to talk about your project for 3 minutes, that’s fine!)
Alternating in-space meets and online - some projects work better in person and some might be outside the space or purely software-based which might work better in an online talk
I’ll try and request talks before the sessions, and cancel if we don’t have anything to talk about on a given session, so we don’t waste people’s time. If we have talks and time left over, anyone can talk about what they’re doing.
Completely optional, of course - nobody has to talk about what they’re working on in the space, and we won’t schedule any official hackspace business so you won’t miss important updates if you can’t make it
For a first attempt, I’m going to suggest an online meeting on Saturday 23rd October at 4pm. If you have something you’d like to show off, let me know in the replies. I can’t host in-person meetings unfortunately - does anyone else feel like hosting one of those?
The idea of shortish lightning talks appeal to me the most as it keeps things concise and interesting. Maybe time for questions as part of the 20 mins?
Yes, I think at least initially a hard limit of 20 minutes with questions, but if someone has a demo they want to do that takes a little longer, we could negotiate that a bit.
Sounds good to me! Can I let you know closer to the time if I want to show something? Hoping the plantspace watering system will be operational by then but still no idea!
Since there are no takers for this Saturday, I’m cancelling the upcoming meeting (23rd October). If you have anything you’d like to present at a future session, let me know in this thread.
It may be that Saturday afternoons aren’t good for people, but that’s pretty much the only time I can host them - if anyone else wants to host, please suggest a time!
Jim, would you be open to incorporating the idea into the monthly monday members’ meetings? I know they haven’t had great participation since we reopened, but maybe one member a month could volunteer to do a 5 minute show and tell in that? Combine promotion of both events under one banner?
Since I’ve started to get more active in the space, I’ve realised how easy it is for things like this to get lost.
I think meetings should be about specific things and as short as possible, so I’m not keen on that personally. I can’t attend Monday meetings anyway since I’m almost always at work. If someone else wants to try it out in that slot, feel free!
I’m very happy to talk about my mechanical computers but it seems a bit immodest to set up an event and talk about my own work on the first one! If the show and tell idea proves popular I’ll talk about it a few talks down the road.