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Comment by linkmotif | Hacker News Reader

I really wanted WeWork to work for me. But it did not.

During my time there, it became apparent that their entire focus was on growth. WeWork was never interested in catering to their core market: people who want to work. They failed to create a productive work environment. They alienated people like me, who were willing to pay top dollar for a decent place to work. Instead they created distraction-filled, tacky places that fostered little except beer drinking.

I'm looking forward to seeing it crumble, or at least for reality to catch up.

PS. If anyone knows a co-working space in NY that actually provides a nice, quiet place to work, please let me know. I will pay good money for such a place. I am thinking like https://misantrope.com/?lang=en

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What's really strange to me is that WeWork has the ability to offer wildly different work environments to different types of people, but they don't do it. Instead, they try to offer the same space to everyone, pureeing everything together.

How about a location that's dark and brooding and enforces "library" noise rules? How about a location that fosters the hot-house environment of sales teams? How about a location that's free of alcohol? It doesn't matter what each one is, but make them different, and give people the option of choosing one that fits their mood that day.

That being said, maybe I just don't like the centralization of WeWork. Let a hundred different people make their own spaces with their own characters and the market will work it out.

Aren't "co-working" and "nice, quiet place to work" sort of mutually exclusive? It's like nice quiet open office plan. I suppose it's possible in theory but doesn't seem to be the norm. Certainly there are lots of places that rent private offices.

> Aren't "co-working" and "nice, quiet place to work" sort of mutually exclusive?

I don't think this has to be true. Why can't people co-work together, quietly? This used to be the case in libraries, before libraries became places where governments administer social services.

It's nice to work around other people, just as long as they are not on phone calls or taking meetings. These people belong in call centers or meeting rooms, so that people who aren’t talking can continue thinking and working.

> Certainly there are lots of places that rent private offices.

After giving up on the open office hot desk, I switched to a private office in WeWork. You could hear the music from the hallway. Furthermore, this particular WeWork was situated on top of a beer garden. Every weekend my "private office" most literally started shaking and vibrating as the beer garden turned into a club. I am not exaggerating. It was a joke.

In my experience, most of the spaces in libraries where I work are still pretty quiet. But there's a pretty strong cultural expectation that you don't talk on the phone or have more than short low volume exchanges with others--even aside from any specific rules.

I agree music seems more than a bit much but a workplace is somewhere many people have conversations and have to make and take calls. I don't think I'd be very inclined to spend money on a space where I had to try to find a room every time I was on a phone call or wanted to talk with someone.

I'm willing to restrict talking if I'm hanging out for free in a library. Not so much if I'm paying for a desk. One should of course have consideration for others but, for many, a big part of their job is talking on the phone.

> I don't think I'd be very inclined to spend money on a space where I had to try to find a room every time I was on a phone call or wanted to talk with someone.

But what makes more sense: you stepping out or getting a private office, or making the open office non-viable for everyone else who has to focus? What a conceit that everyone else should adapt to you when you could simply adapt to everyone else.

It's a matter of expectations. For most people, an office isn't a library reading room. It's a place they work which often means talking. Someone's welcome to do a silent co-working space startup but I don't think they'll have much success.

> It's a matter of expectations. For most people, an office isn't a library reading room. It's a place they work which often means talking.

Can't argue that. Only issue is WeWork doesn't sell it that way. They sell the open office space as a quiet place, and then play good cop/bad cop and everything in between.

WeWork is a new low. It's not even necessarily the demographics or the chatty beer/coffee scene; their standard fitout couldn't echo more, or block less noise, if they tried.

Source: spent over a year in a WeWork, with a desk, using meeting rooms etc. I've spent 14 years working in various open offices and WeWork was the worst.

Just go to a library and bring headphones?

Coworking spaces for the most part don't seem interested in catering to you. It's easier to find people who don't mind an active noisy environment than it is to please people who demand a quiet workplace.

Brooklyn Creative League

Thanks for the recommendation. Not seeing anything on there suggesting they provide quiet places to work.

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