Ask HN: What do you think of co-working spaces?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1366655

by derekc • 16 years ago

7 10 16 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

A friend of mine is looking to rent out a co-working space in the area. He believes it'll be conducive to greater productivity and some networking. Is it worth the money? How's the rep. of the co-working spaces in your area?

I envision this topic as something that can potentially help out a lot of HNers as well.

stretchwithme• 16 years ago

Hacker Dojo!

Figure out the total dollar cost of coffee at a coffee shop, struggling to connect, traveling between the library and coffee shop or time lost distracted at home. Its most likely a good deal to get your own small space somewhere.

Hacker Dojo is just $100/mo, which is less than spending $5 a day. If your time is worth $50 an hour, you only need to save 6 minutes a day to spend that $100 every month.

If you only make $25/hour and the rent is $200 per person, you just need to get 24 minutes of extra productivity per day. seems like a deal to me

alex1• 16 years ago

I know of one in my area (Los Angeles) and that's CoLoft in Santa Monica. I was there for a mixer last week and I must say I would really enjoy working there. It's a very open space with 2-3 meeting rooms, a kitchen, tons of desks, chalk boards, dry erase boards, etc. It's very "startup" friendly. Great place to collaborate with other like-minded people.

As for the price, it's probably going to cost you much less than getting your own office space -- at least here in LA. CoLoft costs $345/month fulltime and $495/month fulltime with 24/7 access.

kineticac3• 16 years ago

Me and my cofounders are residents at Dogpatch Labs in San Francisco. The experience is awesome. The community feel and support is there, and it's so motivating to be around other startups. The coffee, meeting rooms, Internet, and awesome location on a pier in SF is awesome.

I think these environments are great!

I work there 2 or 3 times a week, otherwise i work out of my home office the whole day banging out code. But there are times you just need human interaction and meeting rooms. It's slightly embarrassing asking people to meet with you at home. Being at dogpatchlabs is much more professional :)

kineticac3• 16 years ago

http://Dogpatchlabs.com

derekc• 16 years ago

How much is it per month? The website doesn't really state the prices and I'm also assuming it's selective in which startup/project it lets in.

rradu• 16 years ago

It's a bit selective. But it's free. Up to 6 months I believe.

retube• 16 years ago

I spent 6 months renting a desk in a large studio in Dalston, London. Wasn't IT/start-up focused, just lots of young small companies - graphic designers, artists, web developers, fashion designers. Quite boho. Was very cheap, amazing internet connection and generally good value. However it got freezing cold in the winter (it was a badly insulated warehouse) and being near the kitchen area was a pain cos people were always in there gossiping and making a lot of noise.

(Edit: plus the location was slightly dodgy. During my spell 2 shootings and 1 stabbing just yards from the entrance)

bgnm2000• 16 years ago

I worked out of the CIC (cambridge innovation center - outside of boston) for close to a year. Great co-working space, gave me resources I never would have had on my own (conference rooms etc.). Would certainly recommend to others!

el_chapitan• 16 years ago

I worked in Affinity Lab in DC for about 7-8 months, and I loved it. I ended up moving out of DC, and hence left Affinity Lab.

Working there was great. There were lots of people there working on all sorts of creative projects. The creative energy was a great motivating factor, and often times there were people that could help you through whatever business or technical problems you were facing (well, technical problems required someone to know what you were working on).

Ask HN: What do you think of co-working spaces?

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