The Skiff http://blog.theskiff.org Most recent posts at The Skiff posterous.com Mon, 03 Jan 2011 06:45:00 -0800 Happy New Year http://blog.theskiff.org/happy-new-year-2 http://blog.theskiff.org/happy-new-year-2

2010 was a very busy year for us... so busy that we somehow completely failed to post single new entry to this blog. 

  • In March we enjoyed our first month of breaking even, operating for the first time without additional financial support from our founders, Inuda Community.
  • In May we spotted a new building, perfect for us to move to and sustain the growth of our booming community.
  • In June WiredSussex agreed to take on a 50% share of the Skiff, working with Inuda Community to support the move.
  • In July we moved to our lovely new space at 6 Gloucester Street through a comoving party that got everything moved 195 meters down the road in just a few short hours.
  • At the start of October we hosted BarCamp Brighton 5, welcoming 90 people from around Europe to the space for a weekend-long unconference.
  • At the end of October BuildBrighton hosted a White Night activity introducing over 50 people to electronics hacking.
  • In November we found that we had more than doubled our membership since the move.
  • In December we celebrated our second birthday with a fantastic Skiffmas Party; check out the time-lapse video below.

We're looking forward to seeing what 2011 has in store. We'll probably continue to tweet more than we blog so make sure you are following us: http://twitter.com/theSkiff - alternatively we occasionally send email announcements out on the Friends & Not-Yet-Mates of The Skiff Google Group.

If you've not tried our new space yet please do pop in next time you are passing, we're open 10am to 6pm weekdays.

 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:43:40 -0700 The Skiff and The Werks do Roaming Coworking http://blog.theskiff.org/the-skiff-and-the-werks-do-roaming-coworking http://blog.theskiff.org/the-skiff-and-the-werks-do-roaming-coworking
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Coworking in Brighton just got better... We're very happy to announce that The Skiff and The Werks have teamed up to offer you Roaming Co-working, giving you the freedom to work (and network) at either venue. Roaming Co-working is available now to existing members of The Werks (who have Regular Joe or above membership) and existing members of The Skiff (who have Roaming Mates or above membership). Roaming Mates Membership costs £40 per month and gives you all these benefits:
  • 5 days use of the The Skiff each month including co-working, meeting, project and event spaces
  • The freedom to use these days at The Werks as well as The Skiff
  • Additional days at The Skiff at just £10 per day
  • As much Skiff tea, coffee, WiFi & power as you can take
You can sign up to be for Roaming Mates Membership right now here. If you are already a Skiff Mate you can simply cancel your subscription and then use the previous link to sign up to the new Roaming Skiff Mates membership. Hope to see you out coworking sometime soon!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 11 Sep 2009 13:21:06 -0700 Weekly Meetups for Software and Hardware People http://blog.theskiff.org/weekly-meetups-for-software-and-hardware-peop http://blog.theskiff.org/weekly-meetups-for-software-and-hardware-peop There is now a time and a place every week in Brighton to talk about and collaborate on software stuff and hardware stuff.
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Tuesday's from 7pm is BrightArray at The Skiff. The aim of the evening is to create the perfect environment for people building things with software to demo their applications, share code, develop great user experiences and found startups. More infromation at http://brightarray.org
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Thursday's from 7pm is BuildBrighton at The Skiff. The aim of the evening is to create the perfect environment for people who love to build things with electronics. The group has already transformed one of our rooms in to a full-time workshop / hackerspace that members can access 24x7. More information at http://buildbrighton.com

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 10 Jul 2009 10:42:32 -0700 A Busy Week at The Skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/a-busy-week-at-the-skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/a-busy-week-at-the-skiff One of the most wonderful things about The Skiff is the variety of events and activities the space has been able to host. Most of the things we do are focused around supporting technical-creative projects but there is much more besides. Over the last six months we've hosted events and activities including: BootCycle, Brighton Agile Forum, Brighton Animators Networking Group, Brighton Drupal Workshop, Electronics Workshop, Five Pound App, FlashBrighton, IET Younger Members Meetings, LearningLunches, MobileCamp Brighton, Money Workshop, RewiredState, RobotBrighton, Show & Tuttle, Slack Space Open Space, The Beermat Entrepreneur, UX Brighton and many more adhoc gatherings, business meetings, workshops and company away days. Our busiest week: 13th July to 18th July Next week we have something on every single weekday evening. If you've never visited our space it's the perfect time to come and say hello. Why not make a day or two of it? Spend the day coworking or hacking on a project and the evening participating in one of our events. Your first three days of coworking at The Skiff are free so it won't cost you a penny! 7:30pm Monday 13th July - Many paths to the top of the (mobile) mountain This event is a dress rehearsal for the "Many Paths to the Top of the (Mobile) Mountain" workshop which Joh Hunt and Tom Hume will be presenting at Agile2009 in Chicago at the end of August. More details at: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/2770467/ 8pm Tuesday 14th July - £5app Meetup A meet-up for programmers, web developers and designers to discuss and showcase their "£5 apps" - lightweight software created by one or two people who take a simple idea and run with it. More details at: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/2770972/ 6pm Wednesday 15th July - iPhone Developers Meetup This is the meet-up for anyone with an interest in iPhone development. If you have ideas for apps, or you want to start coding for your iphone, or just want to meet other like-minded folks over beers then come along. More details at: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/3017732/ 8pm Thursday 16th July - First Hackerspace Meeting Hackerspaces (http://hackerspaces.org) are community-operated physical places, where people can meet and work on their technical-creative projects. This is the first weekly meeting for people that want to make a space like NoiseBridge (http://noisebridge.net) happen in Brighton. More details here: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/3070998/ 5pm Friday 17th July - Show & Tuttle 20 people surrounding one mac and a projector, showing each other things on the internet. no prep, no schedule, no agenda, no context. Make it fun, educational, awesome, entertaining, inspiring, etc... let's see where the conversation takes us. More at: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/3071010/ Future Events Upcoming is our preferred service for sharing events. You can find out about almost everything that's happening at The Skiff through our venue page at: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/venue/375497 Want to discuss an idea for something new? Please join our Friends of The Skiff Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/theskiff

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Wed, 15 Apr 2009 14:55:29 -0700 Are you Mates with The Skiff yet? http://blog.theskiff.org/are-you-mates-with-the-skiff-yet http://blog.theskiff.org/are-you-mates-with-the-skiff-yet Here's a cheap, easy way to use The Skiff a bit more. Over the last five months we’ve welcomed more than 200 of you through our pink doors to cowork, participate in community events and collaborate on various projects. One of the things you've asked us most is how much we charge people to use the space. We've always been clear on what it costs if you want to become a part-time member with your own key (£150+VAT per month) or a full-time member with your own desk and key (£250+VAT per month). However lots of you don't want to make that kind of commitment but do want a nice little place to work in the middle of town where you can comfortably:
  • Collaborate on projects
  • Get some work done
  • Use a reliable internet connection
  • Charge a laptop
  • Spend time with like-minded people
  • Help yourself to tea and coffee
  • Organise events
  We want to see more of you enjoying The Skiff and at the same time make sure that what we're doing brings in enough money to keep the space going. Since we opened in November we've been very happy for people like you to stop by up to once a week for some free coworking. We've been hesitant to change this but what we now ask is this: If you feel you've got some significant value out of spending time at The Skiff, or if you've spent more than around three days trying the Skiff for free, please consider either of the following:
  • Contributing £15 including VAT per day of use using this button:

  • Becoming a Mate of the Skiff for £20 including VAT per month using this button:


  As a Mate of The Skiff you'll get the following:
  • About 10 hours use of The Skiff over each month. Applies to: Coworking, meeting, project and events spaces subject to availability
  • Additional days at £5 including VAT per day using this button:
    (that adds up to around £55 per month for 2 days a week usage)
  • As much tea, coffee, WiFi & power as you can drink while you are here
  • Recognition as a long term member of our community - you and your projects will be featured on our wall of Mates both online and in the space
  Bookings If you'd like to book one of our spaces for exclusive use, maybe for a meeting, workshop or event the following charges will apply:
  • Commercial use - basement £25 + VAT per hour, meeting room £10 + VAT per hour
  • Events with an admission fee - The lower of £25 + VAT per hour or 50% of takings.
  • Mates use - basement £10 per hour, meeting room £5 per hour
  • Free Community Events - FREE
  • Crew use - FREE
  Please email bookings@theskiff.org to make a reservation. We still consider the development of The Skiff to be at an experimental stage. We'll be accepting signups at these rates until the end of May and then we'll review them to make sure they are having a positive effect on space. If you have any specific needs that don't seem to fit with what what we're offering, please let us know and we'll see if we can work something out. Updated 28th April: We've had feedback from a few of you saying that some of the above was a little confusing. We were saying that we were happy for people to drop in for free while also asking people to pay for 10 hours use a month. This wasn't very clear so we've decided to instead say that we'd like people to consider paying for use of The Skiff once they've spent three days trying it out. You being here is more important to us than you paying for it but if none of us pays for it none of us will be here.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 20 Feb 2009 18:14:23 -0800 Brighton Will Hack The Government - 7th March http://blog.theskiff.org/brighton-will-hack-the-government-7th-march http://blog.theskiff.org/brighton-will-hack-the-government-7th-march
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Government isn't very good at computers. They spend millions to produce mediocre websites, hide away really useful public information and generally get it wrong. Which is a shame. Calling all people who make things. We're going to show them how it's done. If you can make things, and think you can do better than government this is for you! Applications for attending the main London event have now closed, however, The Skiff will be hosting the Brighton Outpost and we still have space for a few more people to join in.  The plan is to start the day at 10 am on Saturday 7th March and be ready to present at 7pm. Teams at the Brighton Outpost will be in the running for the same Prizes on offer at the London event (they'll be good). This event has already caused quite a stir and the really brilliant thing is that a team from UK government are actually getting involved and supporting it!. Click here to sign up.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 20 Feb 2009 17:46:36 -0800 MobileCampBrighton http://blog.theskiff.org/mobilecampbrighton http://blog.theskiff.org/mobilecampbrighton
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Next Saturday 28th February we're running our first one day event at The Skiff.  MobileCampBrighton will be a barcamp style unconference for mobile developers and designers to meet up and share their knowledge.  There's loads of exciting things happening in mobile at the moment and this event should provide a good opportunity for people working on the various technologies to swap notes. Sessions suggested so far range from user experience techniques to monitisation. The event is being sponsored by Vodafone Betavine and Inuda. To find out more and sign up please visit: MobileCampBrighton

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 02 Jan 2009 23:11:09 -0800 FellowCreative Arrives at The Skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/fellowcreative-arrives-at-the-skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/fellowcreative-arrives-at-the-skiff
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skiff_pics, originally uploaded by fellow_creative.
Carl Jeffrey of Fellow Creative has now moved into The Skiff and he's taken these wonderful photos of the space. We've still got room for two more full-timers to take on the desks opposite Carl's, so get in touch if you'd like to join us. Remember occasional coworkers are always welcome for a day at no charge, just give us a ring on 01273 697366 to make sure we have space on the day. If you find you want to come more regularly we have a few sets of keys available for a reduced monthly fee. Our events space shown in the bottom left photo is now open for bookings. We can comfortably seat up to 30 people but it works equally well for small groups. We'll post more details soon, in the meantime if you're an organiser of workshops, talks or other activities and you like the look of it please email bookings@theskiff.org for more information.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 21 Nov 2008 08:59:52 -0800 Skiff-Warming on Friday 5th December http://blog.theskiff.org/skiff-warming-on-friday-5th-december http://blog.theskiff.org/skiff-warming-on-friday-5th-december On Friday the 5th of December we're holding a launch party to allow as many people as possible to have a nose around our new space, meet each other and drink some local beer and cider. The event is listed on Upcoming here: http://icanhaz.com/skiffwarming Although we'd love it if everyone could come, we're only a small space so we're asking that everyone who wants to get in grabs a free ticket here: http://icanhaz.com/skiffwarmingtickets Looking forward to seeing loads of you there!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Sun, 09 Nov 2008 23:42:40 -0800 Untitled http://blog.theskiff.org/24194227 http://blog.theskiff.org/24194227

The Skiff is located at 49 Cheltenham Place, Brighton, UK BN1 4AB

If you are planning on dropping by, please give us a ring on the house phone to make sure someone's available to let you in.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Sun, 09 Nov 2008 23:29:01 -0800 Making The Skiff Open http://blog.theskiff.org/making-the-skiff-open http://blog.theskiff.org/making-the-skiff-open It's time to start firming up how exactly we're going to make The Skiff open.  We've had a bit of a read up on coworking and have been particularly inspired by Citizen Space in San Francisco.  Since the great people there have been kind enough to release their content under the Creative Commons (CC) Share-Alike license, we've decided there's no need for us to reinvent the wheel.  We've updated our about page and added a pricing page using modified versions of Citizen Space's content. We're now actively looking for people to join us at The Skiff.  We should be all set up and ready for new coworkers by Monday 17th November. Please contact us or leave a comment if you have any questions.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Tue, 21 Oct 2008 08:07:48 -0700 Why The Skiff? http://blog.theskiff.org/why-the-skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/why-the-skiff A few people have been wondering why we've named our intrepid little office in the heart of Brighton "The Skiff". First let's look at the definition of the word: skiff n. A flatbottom open boat of shallow draft, having a pointed bow and a square stern and propelled by oars, sail, or motor. The 49er Skiff is a high performance, Olympic-class sailing dinghy that usually features an asymmetrical spinnaker and requires that its small team use a trapeze to help balance the boat.  Great Britain won Gold in the 49er class in 2008. We've always had a keen interest in the sea and sailing but we think this provides a good fit because:
  • The Skiff is an open office which we encourage people to pop to and co-work or attend events at.
  • The Skiff is located at 49 Cheltenham Place, Brighton.
  • The Skiff is a high performance environment tuned to help people make a significant difference with their work.
  • The Skiff has a logo that is modelled on an asymmetrical spinnaker.
  • The Skiff is a place for small teams to come together and collaborate.
  • The Skiff is an environment in which we all help balance time spent having fun and being productive.
  • The Skiff was founded in 2008.

In addition "The Skiff" is easy to say spell and remember and is new media friendly.  This means we can track mentions on the web with ease and there are very few other things being discussed on the web with a similar name (http://howsociable.com/theskiff). If you take any photos, blog any blog posts or twitter any tweets about The Skiff please tag them with 'theskiff'.   [caption id="attachment_38" align="aligncenter" width="200" caption="The Skiff's logo, modelled on an asymmetrical spinnaker"]
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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 17 Oct 2008 09:30:10 -0700 A Place for Innovation http://blog.theskiff.org/a-place-for-innovation http://blog.theskiff.org/a-place-for-innovation Before embarking on its voyage with Inuda, The Skiff was the first UK home of Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life. What's more, it's just a stone's throw away from some of the most respected technology companies in the UK (NixonMcInnes, FuturePlatforms, ClearLeft, Ribot to name a few) and a bunch of great places to eat and drink. Fuelled by this and the inspiration of spending time in Brighton and Hove's other great working environments, The Sussex Innovation Centre and The Werks, we're hoping to continue the trend of achieving great things in this wonderful coastal city.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell Fri, 17 Oct 2008 09:30:03 -0700 Introducing The Skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/introducing-the-skiff http://blog.theskiff.org/introducing-the-skiff
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The Skiff will soon be the new home of Inuda Innovations and a collection of exceptional individuals that are all searching for a place to work that is as close to paradise as a workplace can be. In the Skiff we're broadly focused on working together to make a difference with technology. We'll try and keep you up to date on what exactly that means in the coming weeks...

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/314587/jonathanmarkwellny_m.png http://posterous.com/users/f9aj97y8W Jonathan Markwell jot Jonathan Markwell