Pete Ashton's old blog » birmingham

What do you want from a coworking space?

Pete Ashton — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:14:03 +0000

Following on from the coworking crawl last week and in prep for tonight’s bloggers meetup I’ve been working through some of the ideas and thoughts that have been floating around over the last few months about setting up some kind of informal working space for us digital nomad types in Birmingham. I see there being a number of these in the future from cafes that are quiet out of peak times (Jibbering in Moseley for example) to community centers such as the Moseley Community Development Trust building which recently got a grant to develop a coworking space for creative industry types (of which there are many in Moseley) up to purpose build office spaces with formal membership and services along the lines of eOffice on Smallbrook Queensway. And there are many other similar things in the pipeline – the Custard Factory, for example, are interested in developing something along these lines and there are many smaller office/studio complexes that could move into the coworking sphere such as, off the top of my head, The Arch in Digbeth or The Fireworks in Jewellery Quarter.

So space itself isn’t going to be a problem. Initial enquiries by myself and others indicates we might even be able to get free space for an initial period just to see how it works. The important thing, I think, is what we want from that space, not just in terms of equipment and services (wifi, desks, sofas, etc) but socially and in terms of ethos.

Some ideas might be:

Somewhere that isn’t home but isn’t a full blown office
Where they are like-minded people to share ideas / resources
A place where low-level events could take place
Some sort of digital advocacy / training centre
A secure base for those who don’t need a permanent office, or already have one out of town
A real-world space that adjuncts online communities
A social club

And so on. What I’m looking to do is gather as many of these together as possible and boil them down into a list that can be presented to a landlord or similar. Like I said, the space is probably there for the taking. We just need to know what we’re going to do with it.

The comment box is yours…

How to get BrumCamps going

Pete Ashton — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 20:52:59 +0000

Talking to Joey Devilla in the Bloghaus about how to develop meetups and the like using wikis and blogs, which is something I’ve been thinking about all weekend. He mentioned a guy called David Crow who’s apparently the brains behind their many TorontoCamps covering developers, musicians, etc. I asked him how they got to a tipping point and he said they got the loudest, most enthusiastic people together and planted seeds then let them go off and do stuff. (Another connection to the Self Replicating Awesomeness notions.)

I suppose an example would the Flickrmeets I started a couple of years back, only rather than seeing that as an endgame looking at how to empower the people on there to take the basic premise to other areas. Which we kinda did a bit but not with much force. Why not monthly videomeets? Monthly music jam sessions where most of the prep happens online?

He then said something rather crazy. Apparently Birmingham UK is in the top ten cities with the most Facebook penetration. I’m trying to find the proof so if you find it let me know. It would explain why 600+ people have the Created in Birmingham Facebook app on their profiles, more than subscribe to the RSS feed, and how we got 20+ people to the last Blogmeet. If true, this would give publicizing events an incredible head start.

Where’s my brain going with this? I think it’s a mashup between the online world and the physical world, using the former to facilitate stuff in the latter. Flickrmeet saw 20-30 people who didn’t know each other at all come together and form a community and friendships (I’ve got two wedding coming up that I wouldn’t be attending without the Flickrmeets). Once you take away the photos the basic structure of Flickr – talking about stuff – isn’t unique. You just need to put the stuff first and foremost and let people talk about it. Finding the common ground. Then spin off real world events from that.

So, who are our loudmouths?

A Progressive Approach to Wifi

Pete Ashton — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 21:58:00 +0000

I’m currently sitting outside a shop called Whole Foods Market in Austin, TX. It’s kinda like the Selfridges Food Hall and I just ate a bowl of salad at £7.99 / lb. I was thinking we’d have to go back to the SXSW event over the road for Wifi but Whole Foods have not one, not two, but three wifi networks. And they’re free.

Did I mention I’m sitting outside? So this is technically municipal wifi for the city to use? And it’s free?

The only catch is when you connect and open a web page you’re shown an advert for Wholefoods. This works on the same principle as paid-for wifi networks but you don’t have to sign in. You just have to look at it and move on. So they get advertising and I get free wifi. Which I’m using to blog this.

We need this in Birmingham.

Idea: A social media cafe in Birmingham

Pete Ashton — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 16:07:13 +0000

Talking to Rebecca Caroe in the registration queue at SXSWi. She mentions the Social Media Cafe in London which is pretty much as you’d expect. Still in early days based upstairs at a pub but they have sponsorship for the rent of the space. Which got me thiking someone like The Custard Factory might be interested in providing space for this kind of thing in Birmingham giving their tenants a service and increasing the online awareness of CF. Just an idea right now, of course.

Rebecca has another blog, Creative Agency Secrets, which she’s using to track her SXSWi adventure.

I’ll be blogging ideas like this throughout SXSWi. Please do use the comments to build on them.