you want to start something?

I’m feeling frustration over the current state of play with CoWorking in Belfast.

Things move slowly as you begin to involve people, organisations and bureaucracy. And the difficulties of navigating the various personalities leaves me wanting to just the whole thing into the “TOO HARD” basket this week.

Dealing with estate agents and landlords is a struggle – they’d rather have empty space than a client with reduced rent.

I think this week I’ve got a little too much on my plate. I want to focus on the things that excite me (iPhone Dev Days) and less on the things that don’t (wrangling a lease for a place I’ll likely never get to actually work in).

Tags: Annoyances, CoWorking by mj
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Today I posted a quick note about a workshop being held in the OhYeah building (with special thanks to OhYeah and NoMoreArt for helping pull it together). The event itself was conceived during an OpenCoffeeMorning conversation between myself and Marty Neill of NoMoreArt – as he puts it, democracy without bureaucracy.

The workshop is designed to help those in the “creative industries” find the time to fill in the forms for the Creative Industries Innovation Fund. I’ve spoken to a lot of people about this Fund and extolled it’s virtues and I hear a lot of the same story – it’s something they’ll get around to.

Well, time is up. The closing date for this first call is Thursday the 5th of February and if you miss this one it’s months until the next. And the best reason in the world to hold a workshop is to help people focus the mind. Ideally we’re aiming for a largish group of people all focussed on filling in their forms and getting the paperwork out of the way.

There will be two sessions: one from 11 am to 1 pm and the second from 4:30 pm to 6 pm. The content for both is the same and it straddles part of lunch and just after work so that people from all walks of life can make some time to come in and at least get the forms.

The workshop itself is not about guidance – it’s not about trying to ensure success - it’s about getting the forms in on time, because if they’re not in then you’ve got no chance. I have invited representatives from the Arts Council (who are managing the fund), NIMIC and NIScreen (who are especially relevant to the digital content industry) and the Digital Circle Steering Group – hopefully an individual might be able to talk to these representatives and maybe get some guidance or inspiration from people who have experience with this sort of thing.

It’s meant to be collaborative, it’s meant to be a learning experience and it’s meant to be a shared social experience. At the most basic level it’s a heap of forms and pens and desks and chairs. What’s more is that it’ll be a collection of people who all have something creative inside them which they feel is deserving of public funding in order to have it realised.

There’s a form for registry – just to help us get an idea of how many people will turn up so I’d appreciate it if people could register beforehand. The format will be informal and it will be about completing forms.

Tags: CoWorking, Commentary, Cool, DigitalCircle, Do Something Now, Social, Startup by mj
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One of the opportunities for 38minutes and the whole ‘ning-based’ network is the shortening of these distances – isn’t that what the internet is all about (apparently it’s not just about porn and advertising).

When I look at a map, I like to draw a line circle from where I am to around 75 miles…

and I find myself wondering what is across the Irish Sea, what new counties and towns exist over here and is it simply the cost of the ferry which stops us working together more? I’m looking to look and learn, eastwards over towards Glasgow – what are my cousins over there doing?

Over the last twelve months I have been in Scotland twice – both times passing through – past the towns which, to me are simply legends of my heritage (apparently my family is from Annan) and having no real concept of the life and people who toil and live there. Even Glasgow, not much further from me than Dublin, is seemingly distant due to the tyranny of around 26 miles of sea.

So where should I ask? Here? What’s going on in Lochaber and Skye, in the Western Isles, Ayrshire, Dumfries and Galloway?

Tags: CoWorking, DigitalCircle, Do Something Now, Social, Startup by mj
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I was very happy to see Andy post this on Twitter just a few minutes ago as we’d been sitting on it for so long, working out numbers and trying to figure out how to pay for things.

The Good: The rent and rates are affordable and the room itself is great for the purposes. The café below is also not bad and the food seems pretty healthy. The room itself is very nice, has heaps of natural light and is in a popular part of the city. I think the atmosphere in the room will be very enjoyable for dynamic, ‘agile’ companies. It’s not going to suit everyone – and that’s fine – CoWorking isn’t meant for everyone.

The Bad: We’re realistic. This is a temporary home – it’s going to take us a couple of years to build to the point where we have enough people and momentum to take CWB to the ‘next level’. The vision for CoWorkingBelfast has always been ‘an entire building’ so we’ll start here and see where we go. There’s no parking though – which is a pain and an expense but that’s going to bite you anywhere in the city. You should be using public transport anyway.

The Ugly: We’ve still got a heap of paperwork to do and we could do with a reasonable solicitor to help us through some of the muddle. Nightmare. Anyone got much experience with non-profits and want me to owe them a favour?

Tags: Bedouin, CoWorking by mj
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Ian Graham of TheCodeFactory.ca writes about whether we CREATE or FACILITATE communities:

Create is in fact a very strong word and implies that you make something from nothing. If you read the bible you will recall the story of creation. In seven days God created the earth, man and all of the wild beasts. Pretty powerful stuff. Most mere humans lack the capability to create something.
Facilitate is different and more of a catalyst in nature. When you facilitate you act as an agent on existing elements helping to bring them together. Communities waiting to happen exist everywhere. These communities can often be made more vibrant and dynamic with a bit of facilitation or the act of bringing elements together.

I tend to the side of FACILITATE.

The first community I worked with was the Northern Ireland Mac User Group. I created the mailing list, web site and the forum which allowed the community to manifest. The community was already in existence throug word of mouth and shared emails.

Some groups don’t tend to naturally congregate and therefore it’s hard to quantify the community as whole – though the internet provides a method of easily managing this side of community engagement.

My day job, as the Facilitator for the Digital Circle really means creating a focus to allow the digital media creation ‘community’ which then permits the “Steering Group” to focus the direction of those members of the community who want to collaborate towards the given goal. Yes, at times it’s a little like herding cats and everyone can joke about managing a committee towards a decision.

If we, as facilitators, focus our energies on creating an ‘oasis’ where communities can engage with each other, and then work through the process removing baggage where necessary, we can better achieve the stated aims of the ‘oasis’ (which, again, may not be core to the community aims).

Tags: Bedouin, CoWorking, Commentary, DigitalCircle by mj
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