Time for a weekly update on the Dallas Maker Space.
Next Meeting:
When: Thursday, March 4
Where: XMAX Games, 1931 Skillman St., Dallas, TX, 75206
Presentation: Ed Paradis will demonstrate his mini-CNC
Desc: Have you ever wanted to make something, but not wanted to put up
with doing it by hand? What about a robot that can build things for
you? If you’re familiar with the RepRap or the Cupcake, you’re
familiar with the idea of “computer numerical control” or CNC. Ed is
in the process of building a cheap (under $100) CNC engraver for
making printed circuit boards, cutting vinyl, and even has plans to
turn it into a laser cutter for cutting paper stencils for printing!
He’ll be giving a short talk and a demonstration of his machine’s
current capabilities.
Website update
The new wiki is now online, feel free to check it out and create an
account. There are two levels of user accounts, one for maker space
members and another for interested non-members.
http://www.dallasmakerspace.com/
The DPRG has an low-volume IRC channel where a lot of maker space
discussions are going on. If you’d like to join us, there are direct
IRC links and web-based IRC client links on the maker space wiki.
Membership Update
Current members: 6
Member Goal: 30
If you haven’t joined yet, please do so today. We’re asking for a one-
time up front donation of $100 or more to help us reach our startup
fund goal. After that, there will be a monthly membership fee in the
$30-40 range, depending on how many members we have by the end March.
If there’s something you’d like to see happen before you plunk down
your hard earned money to join up, please let us know what is and
we’ll try to address it.
We’d like to reach 30 members by the end of March to keep our plans
for getting office/warehouse space on track. We have 65 people on the
mailing list and 35 who filled out the survey saying they wanted to
join, so this goal shouldn’t be too difficult to reach.
Startup Fund Update
DPRG contribution: $1000
Member donations: $1500
Supporter donations: $125
Total: $2625
Goal : $6000
We’re halfway to our funding goal. If we reach our membership goal of
30 members, that will generate another $2400 in one-time member
donations. But we’ll still need about $900 more in general donations.
These aren’t the best times financially for non-profits to ask for
donations but if you can squeeze out a few dollars, you’re helping to
create a group that could potentially have a big impact on Dallas and
make our city a more interesting place in which to live. Any donation
will help, however small.
Building Search Update
Donation: The DPRG has received one offer of a building donation but
it was significantly larger than we could afford to maintain and
located nearly an hour and half from Dallas, so we had to decline. We
still have high hopes that someone will be willing to donate a
suitable building but we aren’t going to let this hold up Maker Space
plans. We will lease a small building if needed until a suitable one
is donated.
Lease: Ed and others have been doing online and drive-by searches for
buildings in likely locations around town. The most likely area for a
lease building, based on mapping the zipcodes provided in the survey,
is near the intersection of 635 (LBJ) and 75 (Central). There’s a
large warehouse district north-east of the intersection near the TI
buildings with many available buildings. Ed has gotten quotes on a
couple already.
That’s all for now. See everyone at the next meeting!
