Membership fees/incentives for startup capital

[CeramicHaloes]

I think it is a good idea to discuss some options for incentives for those who propose to donate their own money to the start-up capital that the hackerspace needs. There is no reason to punish those who put their own money in before they get anything in return. Is it fair to someone who was here at the beginning of the space to put in money now knowing that someone who joins after the space is up and running doesn't have to put in "extra money" for nothing? These monetary donations should be separated from fundraisers and sponsorships.

I have a suggestion to kick the discussion off.

Make a monthly fee reduction appropriate to how much was donated. For example, if Bob donated 100 dollars, he might be allowed to pay 35 instead of 40 dollars for 20 months or something like that. This would be promised to begin sometime after the space is up and running and self-sufficient with membership income (or some sort of stable income). Although this is a promise, it has to be a redeemable somehow such that if you donate money for the start up capital and the space doesn't get going (lets plan for the worst, hope for the best) that you are going to see that money again. Maybe the return isn't 1:1, but if its not, maybe an additional incentive might be "necessary". A concern with this incentive is a drop in monthly income from those who would partake in this incentive. However, as with any new organization and as seen in other hackerspaces, membership will grow when people see that this place is up and running and stable and that the people and the space meets their needs. Not a lot of people are willing to gamble on creating a space like this, I am excited to see so many people gathered and interested at this point, but it is just the beginning of the space. I do not know how many more people will join per year after the space is completed, maybe there are some statistics like this from other hackerspaces or nonprofit organizations with membership fees that we could extrapolate to our situation. "If you build it, they will come" is only part of the issue. Just because the space would be up and running, it still needs a lot of work to "get the word out" and be active in the community, of which I have heard of many ideas that these things are a very possible part of the hackerspace's future. As you can tell by now, this incentive is shaky at best, as so much depends on how well the space does and how quickly it does it. If this enthusiasm stays as high as it is now, I don't see this being a problem, but every new thing tends to lose luster after a while and so do peoples enthusiasm towards getting projects like this started.

I suppose it is a possibility that all of the 10K start up could be corporate donations and fundraisers. This would eliminate the need for incentives. This would also leave a need to figure out how many people are dedicated to long term membership. I suppose even now with pre-space membership wouldn't necessarily be a great indicator of long term membership either.

Also, sorry for the rambling, I would like to echo a point raised earlier tonight about how many people would fit comfortably in a space, and how many that would lead to being able to work on different days. I could foresee a scheduling problem if everyone wants to work on saturday, 60 people will not fit comfortably with all the equipment and storage that we've been talking about. Does this mean that we make people sign up for times they will be working? Who get's precedence? How many can sign up? Finally, what is the minimum sustainable fee that would have to be charged to each person? Knowing all this could help create incentives that are both feasible and worth it, for lack of a better term at the moment. All these are considerations partially determined by the size and price of the place we pick.

[DigitalOSH]

I really like your idea of spreading the cost reduction over a number of months. That would make it more rewarding for the members and more managable for the space. I'd love to see where this idea goes.

[Bergo]

I would be supportive of a "sign up sheet" to spread the utilization of the space over as many days as possible. I think a sign up sheet which we change up quarterly would be advantageous. If we are paying to lease a space that is only utilized on friday nights and saturday afternoons it would be an aweful waste.
I would propose that we have a mon-friday sign up sheet, and general meetings on Saturdays, or something similar to that. General meeting times could be more of a project showcase and a meet/greet.
While the sign up sheet would indicate when you are allotted time in the sapce, I'm sure it would by no means be disalowed to visit on another night etc, just a suggestion to try to plan around your schedule.

While it would be great to have 5000sqft and have 100 people in there working, it would be far more economical to have 1000sqft with 15-20 concurrent users (from an OPex standpoint)

[rsilk]

I just looked into Kickstarter. It's not going to work for us, as they only support US projects. Tax reasons, etc.