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Coworking Spaces

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29 pointschasef45 comments

If you're ever in Toronto, Canada - https://bentomiso.com is where I work out of. It's pretty open so bring some headphones.

However they only do events/presentations in the evening and have private meetings rooms available.

There is a strong indie-game developer community here and a lot of folks from various creative fields outside web development.

Toronto Canada, I work out of Gizmolabs: http://gizmolabs.ca . Small space, meeting room available, great part time packages and interesting people. Lots of web developers here.

If you're in the Seattle area, some friends and I are opening a coworking space specifically for developers and software people in December. We're still working through some basics (pricing, plans, etc) but at a minimum we'll have amazing bandwidth, professionally installed AP's and a bunch of hackers:

http://coworking.formidablelabs.com

We're also using Github issues to collect feedback on what developers want out of a coworking space. Feel free to add your thoughts, even if you're not in Seattle:

https://github.com/FormidableLabs/coworking/issues/1

I'm getting a 404 right now - HN may have killed it.

Here's Google's cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:5Z5fsU_...

Out of curiosity, do people care or take into consideration whether a co-working space is run (ideally) as a sustainable business, or if it is tax-payer funded or otherwise government subsidized?

For example, in Scottsdale there is the Eureka Network that operates out of the main public library. It's more than just under-utilized space being made available; they're spending money on assorted staff, programs, and infrastructure.

Use of the facilities is "free" to the extent that the taxpayer is picking up the tab, and it competes with private businesses (such as Co-hoots in Phoenix) trying to do the essentially the same thing.

I much prefer to see these kinds of things done as private operations; I don't see offering free work-space to private companies as an essential city service.

I love this idea. I've heard of http://coworkbuffalo.com/

Unfortunately there's nothing like this near me at the moment. I hope it catches on.

There's also http://www.coworkingrochester.com/, I don't know exactly where near you is.

Looks like another Wordpress install just bit the dust. Memory allocation errors on the front page and everything else is a 404.

These workspaces look really nice, but I'm not sure how productive I can be in such an open space unless there is a serious "no talking in the library" style of culture there. I would regularly get distracted by conversations happening across the room, unless everything was kept to a whisper.

I'd use headphones - same as for when I work in a 'regular' office. You might then question the need for being in such a space at all, but I like being around people, even if I'm not interacting with them.

I use headphones in my current open workspace, but I find that there are certain things that I work on that are really better in silence. From Peopleware [1]:

"During the 1960s, researchers at Cornell University conducted a series of tests on the effects of working with music. They polled a group of computer science students and divided the students into two groups, those who liked to have music in the background while they worked (studied) and those who did not. Then they put half of each group together in a silent room, and the other half of each group in a different room equipped with earphones and a musical selection. Participants in both rooms were given a Fortran programming problem to work out from specification. To no one's surprise, participants in the two rooms performed about the same in speed an accuracy of programming. As any kid who does his arithmetic homework with the music on knows, the part of the brain required for arithmetic and related logic is unbothered by music -- there's another brain center that listens to the music."

"The Cornless experiment, however, contained a hidden wild card. The specification required that an output data stream be formed through a series of manipulations on numbers in the input data stream... Although the specification never said it, the net effect of all the operations was that each output number was necessarily equal to its input number. Some people realized this and others did not. Of those who figured it out, the overwhelming majority came from the quiet room."

I don't think there's a problem with listening to music some of the time. My concern is that by constantly having the headphones on to mitigate audible distractions, I'll miss insights that would directly impact the quality of the work that I do.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Peopleware-Productive-Projects-Teams-E...

Some of my coworkers have bought headphones with active noise canceling. Those were a bit expensive but I as I tried them out I can see that they could make a difference. There are cheaper models as well. They don't remove all sound but a large part.

That's what drove me away from the co-working space we have. It was such an open space that every little noise echoed. They also held presentations during the day too.

No different from a coffee shop - which might also not be the ideal working environment for you.

I have never been to a coop designed for developers. But one of the most annoying things about coffee shops are all of the non-developers (or rather non-workers) who are there just enjoying life/relaxing and laughing/talking extremely loud. I have nothing against them having a good time, I just find it impossible to block out personally.

I would like to pretend the goof off level would be much less in a place designed for work and people seeking similar

I quit the co-working place I was working out of and went to work in the public library instead. It was free and their wifi was more reliable.

Note to folks thinking of using their local library: Set up some sort of VPN or other proxy in advance.

My local library has assorted filtering in place. Last I checked, though, it was just port 80, so I was able to run a Web proxy on my remote server on another port in order to get past it.

(A VPN is a good idea for any use of public Wifi in an event.)

These are 4 good reasons to Join workspaces like that :) http://www.sharedesk.net/blog/2013/06/4-reasons-to-join-coll...

I use headphones but i don't mind people talking around me, sometimes it's energizing. Obviously you have to choose the right one.

Good thing is that you can also just try them for a week (and that's what i did at the beginning)...after a while i decided to co-found ShareDesk. :P

You have to find the right one, but YES, they are definitely places where to be more productive. Try!

They are better than an open office plan inside of a company - because those people are collaborating more loudly and feel that as long as it's on topic it's okay to be loud. Generally a bunch of professionals working on different things are quieter than that. It obviously won't beat a dedicated office, though.

Has anyone used a coworking space in NYC (Manhattan or Brooklyn) and a particularly good or bad experience?

Bad experience: Joined a space in March, it closed before the end of May. Found out it was at severe risk of closing a week into my membership, without ever being told about it as I was checking the space out. They had a 30-day termination notice clause in membership contract, which had to match up to the billing cycle. So I was locked into that second month even though I knew the time there was, more or less, wasted.

In my case, I was looking for a space with people I could interact with and get to know and be comfortable and happy around ('coworkers', natch). The looming death of the space totally killed any potential for that to happen. That's why I consider the time/money a waste.

Lesson: ask how "healthy" the space is when you're "interviewing" the space.

Same experience here. Bought a year-long membership at a steep discount in March, shuttered without warning a couple of weeks ago. A mismanaged startup led to many people without a workspace: http://observer.com/2013/10/brooklyns-creative-community-3rd...

I have an office with http://workattheyard.com and am very happy there.

I worked at a place in The Yard before and really enjoyed the community. Plenty of great lunch and happy hour places in the area as well.

I love New Work City but took me several bad experiences to find it.

I work out of Projective Space on the Lower East Side and it's wonderful. Light and open, unlike wework, and tons of coffee shops, galleries, bars, and restaurants in the neighborhood.

The startup I work for works from General Assembly in Manhattan. It's very cool - great decor (loft-style), tons of light, good kitchen, conference rooms available. I'd recommend it.

Curious how most of these spaces promo photos don't have any people in them.

Along that same vein, I'm very partial to the community-focused angle that Indy Hall in Philadelphia has taken: http://www.indyhall.org/

My experience of working in very photogenic operations center type rooms is that photographers do not find the actual users as photogenic as the architecture of the room, so for picture days, we would be shoved to one side as they marched in hordes of very young, very attractive, carefully groomed, extremely well dressed professional models, 50:50 male and female and the usual very close attention to marketing-style perfect racial distribution, etc. Believe it or not they also sometimes do this for important clients touring the facility. And this is all very expensive, so they may not want to drop the dough on professional models.

That's unfortunate. Of course, the ideal is a well distributed gender ratio, but real people look...real. And it's usually pretty obvious when this sort of "whitewashing" is happening.

That's terrible. What will this to morale of people already working there? I know most folks are infatuated with appearances, but surely actual productivity and output should trump employees who "look good".

Oficio looks fantastic. Those desks facing the window are just about the ideal spot for me.

Are there any coworking spaces like these around Palo Alto or Mountain View? Hacker Dojo has a great vibe but the lack of natural light is a bummer.

If you're in or around Phoenix, there's Co-hoots in downtown. If you're in the East Valley near Phoenix check out Heatsync Lab's open-to-the public hours and their Code + Coffee times.

Not sure if this counts, but Bamboo Detroit (Detroit, MI) (http://www.bamboodetroit.com/) is one I've heard some buzz around.

If anyone is in the Jersey Shore area there is a coworking place in Asbury Park called Cowerks, http://cowerking.com/

Has anyone experienced a successful co working space in a more rural location? I'm wondering what kind of local population is required to support them.

Looks very nice, but it must be very hard to work there with all the noise, conversations and visual distractions.

There's Gangplank (http://gangplankhq.com) and Cohoots (http://cohoots.com) for people in Phoenix. Pretty cool vibe and I believe Gangplank is entirely free and Cohoots is pretty inexpensive.

Gangplank is great. I worked there for a few years up until 6 months ago when I moved to SF. I also know many people involved in Co+Hoots, and it's also a great space.

The search function doesn't seem to be working.

The site just broke.

I miss Loosecubes.

http://www.sharedesk.net is not good enough? :( Well...we're soon going to surprise you :P

Good list. ...and you can check more on http://www.sharedesk.net (maybe for your next list?)

http://www.co-merge.com/ in San Diego was a good experience for me.

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