Last month, Manchester saw its first coworking community — FlyThe.Coop — move to a new location shared with the recently-launched MadLab hackspace. MadLab, also known as the Manchester Digital Laboratory, describes itself as:

“a community space for people who want to do and make interesting stuff — a place for geeks, artists, designers, illustrators, hackers, tinkerers, innovators and idle dreamers; an autonomous R&D laboratory and a release valve for Manchester’s creative communities”

Last week, I got the chance to talk to one of MadLab’s four founders, Dave Mee, about the vision for MadLab, its history, its residents, the challenges it has faced, and his advice for other coworking space founders.

Imran Ali: Tell us a little about the background of MadLab. What were the motivations of the founders?

Dave Mee: We spent a lot of time around hacker user groups and communities, and often found ourselves in pubs for the events they held. Pubs aren’t great locations for these events: Projectors wouldn’t work, DJs would show up halfway through presentations, and generally they’re not geared up for reliable Wi-Fi and soldering, particularly with alcohol around. At the same time, we saw there were no real alternatives; other presentation spaces were either too expensive, lacked facilities, or were too far out for people to get to.

At the same time, we missed some of the events we were used to from London: DorkBot, Flash user groups, MiniBar, the Takeaway festival. The was the talent, passion and eagerness for these things to start in Manchester, but without the infrastructure to support bottom-up cultural activity, they never could get off the ground and move beyond being meet-and-drink events.

We spoke with people around the city; there’s a vibrant Social Media Cafe in Machester, and this provided a great way to get involved with many of the people and institutions that supported us as we set the project up. The Manchester Digital Development Agency (MDDA) were a great ally early on, and understood the value of a cross-disciplinary space in the city, in readiness for the next cultural and technical waves we’ll be hit by.

Manchester — technically, Salford — is seeing huge investment as the BBC moves to Media City. There will be a huge growth in media and technology companies here over the next few years, and we see MadLab as a space for tomorrow’s media and cultural professionals.

Imran: Do you see much collaboration between residents? What’s the general breakdown of residents in your space — what kind of work are they involved in?

Mee: Our basic aim was to provide a free space for community and professional groups to use to explore their practices and share them with new people and groups — a kind of  ”digital salon” for the 21st century. We’re approaching this in three ways:

1. Establishing programming and events (such as our Robot Hack Day, which we arranged with the Museum of Science and Industry).
2. Providing a platform for new and established user groups to build from, and giving them some permanence and infrastructure to rely on. As organisers, we’re actively engaged with the local council, education schemes, libraries and agencies to provide us with further programming and events which we can bring to people who wouldn’t normally be aware of them — from contract law workshops to book clubs.
3. Supporting a local coworking organisation, FlyThe.Coop, who provide a bridge between people exploring digital spaces and those establishing their own businesses.

Imran: What were your greatest surprises in bootstrapping MadLab — and the largest operational challenges?

Mee: Finding out how much spaces like the MadLab are needed in modern cities has been the most surprising thing — our basic idea of open practices and collaborative space has been adopted by a huge number of communities around the area. We’ve found we’re bringing together animators with robot builders, permaculturists with screenwriters. We always hoped for a mixed group of users, but the variety of people who have embraced what’s going on has been inspiring.

It’s been hard work; we don’t want anyone thinking of starting their own that it’s an easy thing to do. As a new organization we’ve had to start everything from scratch, but enough people value the idea and the work we’ve put in that we were offered a lot of pro-bono support and assistance. This is ultimately what it’s about; building a framework around which people can get together, find each other, and support their activities.

One of the biggest challenges is securing funding. We set out with the aim of making the MadLab free or low-cost for people using the space, and that there would be a democracy of participation, rather than having room-hire or membership fees. This means there’s constant background activity in chasing applications and finding sources of funding, and building a solid network and outreach between the regional and national agencies and organizations we want to work with.

Imran: What’re your plans for the future?

Mee: We are establishing a few new strands of programming, and we’re bringing in a broader range of speakers and events on both the national and international level. We’re also working with some of the festivals and events around the region, and building a platform to provide greater exposure to our community’s work to these other audiences. On a longer-term basis, we want to build ties across the world and organize MadLab and hackspace exchanges.

Imran: What are the key pieces of advice you’d give to people thinking about establishing a coworking space?

• Don’t underestimate your running costs!
• Never, ever undervalue the strength of your community; build out and spread the word far and early.
• Local development agencies and business advice groups are there to help.

Post your thoughts and reactions to Dave’s observations in the comments below.

Pressitt says the site’s focus is on providing journalists and bloggers with a primary research tool for stories. PR types can upload releases into the system that should then be available to these journalists and bloggers.

My very first experience with the site wasn’t great. When I first went to sign up (as a PR person) I was faced with these restrictions on the registration page:

“I confirm that the content I am about to publish is not related to adult explicit, alcohol, activism, extremism, petition, prescription or other drugs, religious, ringtones, tobacco or vitamins related themes.”

As a social media consultant with a variety of clients, projects and events to publicize, I was immediately put off by the limitations, namely because the two things I wanted to create social media releases for were a wine branding company (alcohol) and a philanthropic campaign (activism, petition).

Undeterred, I filled out the rest of the registration so I could at least check out the tool’s features. Pressitt is entirely free, compared to the existing social media release tool PitchEngine which I wrote about previously. Here is an example release I created on the PressIt site.

Here’s how Pressitt stacks up as a Social Media Release (SMR) tool:

1. Ease of use. Pressitt has a very straightforward fill-in-the-blanks format. The link to create a release is prominent and obvious. Once you start one, you have the ability to choose which brand to attach to the release to.
2. Content prompting. Pressitt offers basic fields for your release headline, overview, and core facts. It does not accommodate for the main body text, but instead prompts you to build your release with overview, core facts, as well as quotes and links. Unfortunately, Pressit doesn’t prompt you to develop a Twitter-friendly blurb for your release so you can easily tweet a link to it.
3. Multimedia Integration. One of the critical aspect of SMRs is the integration of multimedia into a release. Pressit lets you upload videos and images, as well as document files (.doc, .docx, .ppt, .pptx, .xls, .pdf and a maxiumum filesize of 8MB). While uploading my release to Pressitt, I ran into a technical glitch that I couldn’t get past. First, it would not let me upload .jpg files because it was expecting .jpeg files.  The site specified it could accommodate these files: jpeg, gif, bmp, png and a maximum file size of 4MB. I changed the .jpg to .jpeg and tried again. Pressitt gave me an error message saying .jpeg files were not allowed. So I converted the images in PhotoShop to .bmp. The site then gave me an error message saying .bmp files were not allowed. I gave up, so my test release doesn’t have any extra images.
4. Social Media Options. The second critical aspect of SMRs is social media integration. I was impressed with the extensive array of 16 or so social media posting options on Pressitt, including some that are probably more popular in the UK, such as Bebo and Propeller. Pressitt doesn’t seem to have its own URL shortener. It is also a little confusing to have Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin buttons at the top of page, but instead of being able to share the content using these services, these are meant to be links to the Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts for the person sending the release.
5. Enterprise-level features. At this time, Pressitt doesn’t offer more enterprise-level features, or embedded social media newsrooms. While major companies might be using Pressitt, it is more likely for the ease of use and the fact there are fewer SMR tool options overseas than because of robust enterprise solutions.
6. Reach. It is a little too early to see if Pressitt will expand beyond being a UK- or Euro-centric tool. That isn’t a bad thing, but it just might not have the marketing muscle to make a big impact in the States.

The Verdict

If you are looking for a fast, easy solution without a lot of bells and whistles, Pressitt could work well for you. Me? I like the idea of using all the social media release resources available, particularly when I want a more global reach. I’m still disappointed, however, that some of my company’s clients will never be able to use Pressitt because of the site’s legal limitations.

Which SMR tool do you use and what do you like about it?

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Businesses have been concerned at the potential impact of these changes and, as such, Neil’s guide focuses on five tips to help employers prepare for a potential influx of flexible working applications from employees.

1. Understand the process of application
   The entire process of review and negotiation can take up to 14 weeks. Employers need to be prepared with transparent processes to tackle each case consistently.
2. Take time to understand your staff and the roles they play
   Preempt applications by identifying potential candidates early.
3. Trust your staff
   There’s a mismatch between what web workers think they can achieve and the trust employers place in them to work effectively in remote conditions. Kay-Jones suggests that presence and IM-based tools can act as useful technological measures to help create “remote trust.”
4. Understand the effects on your business
   Efficiency, morale, reduced absenteeism, retention, loyalty and competitiveness are all potential upsides to proactively encouraging flexible working patterns.
5. Security
   It’s harder to maintain the security of your data with remote workers. It’s important to take steps to ensure that your business-critical data is secure..

It’s interesting to see that remote working is practically codified in this legislation. The British government sees increased flexibility in working as a means to address social issues. I wouldn’t be surprised to see this thinking extended to environmental issues, too.

What do you think of these changes to UK law?

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I first met Linda Broughton — head of NTI Leeds, part of Leeds Met University — in May 2007, at a meeting on the use of open-source software in the public sector where I planted the seed of an idea to develop a coworking community in Leeds in Northern England.

Within a few months, Linda had launched the “met:space” coworking community at Old Broadcasting House, which has now become the hub for most of the city’s web and new media community (also see my previous interview with OBH resident, James Ward).

I spoke with Linda about the development of OBH and her thoughts on coworking.

Imran: Tell us a little about the background of OBH. What were the motivations for coworking in Leeds?

Linda: It started out as an idea space for our graduates to move on to. We recognized that many of the students’ final year projects had the potential to become commercial businesses, so we wanted to develop a space that could support them in the early days.

I think our views on supporting the graduates have changed as we now recognize that our role is to create a climate where ideas flourish. That means the space needs to attract more experienced freelancers and businesses as well as graduates. I don’t think it would work if everyone was at the same level.

Imran: Do you see much collaboration between residents?

Linda: Yes, definitely. FriiSpray, from Jam Jar Productions, is a collaboration between three members who met here at OBH. Also the Cardboard Laptop Stand is a product developed by two of our members. We are also seeing quite a number of examples of where work is sourced between members. So we see our web designers working with our programmers, and our filmmakers working with our social networking experts. Startups, in particular, need access to good freelancers to help them grow. A coworking community helps to build trust between members which makes collaboration more likely.

Imran: What were your greatest challenges and surprises in bootstrapping Old Broadcasting House – and the largest operational challenges.

Linda: We were fairly empty at first. It took time to persuade people that coworking might work for them. But what’s great is that now people love it! I am constantly surprised by how much our members really love the space. Also it was a revelation to me just how vibrant the Leeds scene is, with so many groups meeting  regularly.

The largest operational challenge is long-term sustainability. We want to keep the rates at a level which does not deter people, while still covering our costs. This is likely to mean attracting more members, and we need to manage this without detracting from the experience for members. Overall, the space just about manages itself. Personally, I really don’t like rules and regulations so everything works on a trust basis. That seems to work just fine for everyone.

Imran: What’re your plans for the future?

Linda: I’d like to grow the community, with more physical space.  I’d also like to see a pipeline of startups from the University and the city using the coworking at OBH as  a stepping stone for growth.

Imran: What’re the key pieces of advice you’d give to people thinking about coworking and people thinking about establishing a coworking space.

Linda: To potential coworkers I’d say think of it as  joining a community. Be prepared to give something to that community. Make some time to get to know other members.

If you’re thinking of establishing a space, don’t expect everyone to join at once. You need some patience to get things going. Go out and find the groups of people who are your potential members and encourage them to try out coworking (offer introductory rates or trial memberships). You need some “fans” to get the community started; they will act as your champions. I would also say be quite flexible, if you can be, on the offer.

The relationship between OBH and the local university is unique, enabling a large institution to access grassroots entrepreneurs and innovators. Coworking can help achieve social goals. We’d love to hear your comments on other community-building offshoots from coworking.

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Imran: How did you first encounter coworking as a concept and what drew you to it?

James: I heard about an event for freelancers, GoingSolo, being held at OBH in Leeds. I had started working freelance just a few months earlier but from past experience working on my own I had learned the importance of getting out and making connections with other people. Working on your own every day in the spare bedroom can get pretty lonely and soul-destroying.

For me, attending this event was one of those serendipitous moments in life that lead to changes more profound and beneficial than I could have imagined. First off, it was my introduction to a network of professional peers all talking about the same challenges and issues as I recognize: managing finances, clients, confidence. The exchange of ideas was exhilarating. I came away from the day on an absolute high…and I had also discovered coworking.

NTI Leeds, who run OBH, have given over a large part of the building to coworking, a concept I hadn’t really heard of before. I had assumed that my only option for working away from home was to rent expensive office space or spend my days working on my lap in coffee shops. But here was a place where for a very small cost I could work  at a proper desk, in a professional environment, surrounded by other freelancers. And, to top it all, the coffee is good — and free!

Imran: What have been your greatest challenges and surprises in coworking?

James: There can be tensions in this kind of environment, especially where the culture and expectations of the members are evolving and changing as the space grows, the population changes and members’ businesses needs develop. It can sometimes be quite noisy in a shared space and I think that’s something that you pretty much have to just tolerate, just as you do in any shared environment. We recently started holding a semi-formal meeting once a month to give us all an opportunity to discuss with each other and the managers of the space any issues or ideas that we have. Like any community — and it really does feel like a community — we need opportunities to communicate with each other.

What really surprised me was that I hadn’t expected the extent to which working in a space like this would improve my life. I have gained so much: friends, business contacts, skills, opportunities for work, ideas and inspiration. Joining OBH has accelerated the speed at which I have come to know and be known on the local network and has enabled me to get involved in events and activities that I simply wouldn’t have known about otherwise: Twestival, Think Visibility, Business Link Enterprise Shows, to name a few.

Imran: How would you like to see coworking evolve, globally and locally?

Locally, I would like to see the coworking community here in Leeds grow and become more flexible. OBH is extremely well-equipped — 30″ Apple displays, Mac Pros, Adobe CS3, etc. — but not everybody needs these facilities. Some people just need a place to connect to the web and sit at their laptop. I can see scope for different membership options, depending on your requirements, although I wouldn’t necessarily want hugely complicated tariffs and per-hour charges. I like the simplicity of a monthly fee.

Globally, some people have talked about a “coworking visa”‘ that would allow members to use facilities in other cities when traveling.

Imran: What are the key insights and pieces of advice you’d offer to those considering coworking as a mode of work?

James:

• Be tolerant. If you need peace and quiet to concentrate, consider getting some decent noise-canceling headphones.
• Be respectful. We all have deadlines to meet. Try to be sensitive to other people’s needs.
• Be generous. The more you share, the more you will get back

Share your coworking stories in the comments.

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Conference organizer Stephanie Booth has recently announced that she’ll be touring the conference globally, with the next event landing in the UK on 12th September in the city of Leeds.

Like the Lausanne event, Going Solo Leeds will focus on practical and theoretical sessions for freelancing professionals, independent workers, the self-employed, remote workers and those who are considering ‘going solo’.

Though there’s a bias towards internet and media professionals, most of the sessions are appropriate for traditional independent workers too. Here’s a taster of the planned programme…

• Laura Fitton: You Only Get What You Give (Marketing and taking care of one’s social capital)

• Dennis Howlett: The Joys of Tax and Finance

• Panel moderated by Suw Charman: Setting Rates and Negotiating with Clients (Martin Roell, Stowe Boyd, Dennis Howlett)

• Suw Charman: When Passion Becomes Profession (Balancing Work and Life)

• Martin Roell: Self-Organisation for Effectiveness: Tools and Methods to Get Things Done

• Panel moderated by Stephanie Booth: Solo in a Networked World (Laura Fitton, Linda Broughton)

• Stowe Boyd: From The Far Side To The Dark Side: A Crash Course In Business Realities For Soloists

The Lausanne sessions are available online at DailyMotion and registrations for Going Solo Leeds are currently about halfway through the ‘early bird’ discount phase of £150 ($300/€190) with only a few such passes now available…so hurry!

Going Solo will be taking place at Leeds’ Old Broadcasting House on Friday 12th September, so it’s a great excuse to spend the weekend exploring one of the UK’s most exciting cities as well as skilling up on best practices in freelancing.

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A couple of weeks ago, the UK’s tax authority – Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs Service – announced a number of measures that may benefit Britain’s web workers, and more broadly, any Brits working from home.

Those working from home whom have a portion of their residence setup as a dedicated work area or office can claim that portion as a tax rebate. Also, they no longer have to pay capital gains tax on the sale of their home.

As generous and farsighted as the HMRC’s change of heart might seem, some close examination of the conditions under which these rebates can be claimed underlines how little the UK government understands about the nature of web workers in particular. Notable, in the BBC’s report are the following provisos…

HMRC are content to allow a proportion of these costs to be claimed against the income of the business if certain criteria are met, such as:

• The area of the home is used exclusively for business purposes for a prescribed amount of time – say, 9am to 5pm – this means that if you sit at the kitchen table working you won’t qualify for the additional deductions. What the taxman is looking for is an area that has the appearance of an office – so it will contain a desk, chair, storage etc.
• The amount claimed is reasonable in relation to the business – so you can’t claim that you work 20 hours a day in the office or that the area used is a large proportion of the living area of your home.

Apart from these two provisos, you will be able to claim a percentage of the total cost of running the home.

Ooops – nobody asked the web workers!
To the first proviso, one of the advantages of working from home is the physical flexibility granted to the worker; personally I don’t have a dedicated office – sometimes I work in the dining room, the lounge, family room and even the conservatory. It’s difficult to understand why HMRC are insisting on dedicated work areas and offices in the home, when its the nature, time and intensity of work that’s a more important measurable factor than location.

To the second point, again flexibility is key, in that workers dip in and out of work and domestic tasks often in the same physical space – it’s one of the reasons we work from home!

Still many of the examples given by the HMRC are illustrative and useful and the mortgate rebates are pretty generous. Though web workers represent only a proportion of those who work from home and laws need to be formulated for broad groups, it’s frustrating that the views of web workers weren’t more keenly understood – even consulted as a group – before such important legislation was completed. On the other hand, where would the UK government go to elicit the views of this community?

Web Workers Unite!
What this tells me, alongside my previous thoughts on commuting and coworking, is that web workers need to represent themselves more confidently, ensuring their unqiue perspectives are heard and noted by our politicians. As a group we’re on the bleeding edge of working practices, often at the forefront of civic and social change, but we have a responsibility as citizens to bring those experiences and passions to the attention of our politicians.

As James Bond swore an oath On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, perhaps we all need to declare some principles for Her Majesty’s Web-based Workforce!

Could WebWorkerDaily – who’s brand and iconography alludes to collectivism -  be a platform to help groups organise and represent themselves to legislators and politicans more confidently and muscularly in their localities? Should we be doing more activism as a group to influence monetary, social and civic policies?

What are your thoughts?

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Larger cities such as Leeds and Manchester have reinvented themselves as financial, media and creative hubs that provide regional alternatives to the global powerhouse of London and attract the Creative Class that Richard Florida defines as the driving economic forces of post-industrial cities.

However, smaller post-industrial cities such as Bradford are still struggling to find a path to attracting information industries, caught between ambitious but incompetent government regeneration programs and projects that misfire and develop facilities for creative classes, but misread what’s actually needed; projects such as a recently announced ‘Digital Park‘.

Much of the core of the city lies dormant, with vacant buildings awaiting vision and leadership, whilst the city’s confidence diminishes along with the hopes of its residents.

However, a pair of recently published articles hints at a way forward for places such as Bradford…

Springwise’s recent article ‘Pop-up workspaces in vacant buildings‘ covered the work of Holland’s SpareSpace Foundation in transforming vacant office and retail space into what they call ‘mobile offices’ (coworking by any other name), helping entrepreneurs from creative classes find low-cost premises in neglected downtown areas. Sparespace intends for their development to be transient until more permanent uses arrive, but there’s no reason that sustainable and viable coworking communities couldn’t continue to exist.

On the other side of the world Palo Alto’s Institute for the Future recently observed The Future of Libraries as Places and the novel uses that students are making of NYU’s Bobst Library.

IFTF staffer Anthony Townsend observes that libraries are transforming from solitary, monastic learning environments into collaborative spaces for discussion and debate. As Thomas Frey of the DaVinci Institute notes, “libraries will transition from a center of information to a center of culture”. As library materials become more accessible and useful in electronic form, ironically the physical space of a library is performing more of the role of a digital discussions forum. As books are increasingly digitised, forums are being un-digitized.

At NYU Townsend pays a discounted alumni fee of $150 per year for access work areas, printing, conference rooms and research services…that sounds like coworking to me :)

So in a place such as Bradford, where the downtown area is becoming progressively vacant and the public library is utilised less and less each day, but where there’s a vibrant University, perhaps the route to nurturing a creative class lies in the reinvention of our repositories of commerce and knowledge.

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At Leeds’ The Round Foundry in the UK, entrepreneurs in the creative and digital industries can opt for traditional serviced office space or a hot-desking plan in a large shared space. Each hot-desker gets a cute lockable ‘pod’, that includes…

• Six large shelves (with file holder tabs!)
• Six power outlets.
• Two Cat-5 sockets.
• A coat/bag hook.
• A motorized, adjustable desk area.
• Um, wheels.

The pods (the model is know as a Macro-1)  are actually quite cool, designed by local company Volume Products as part of a range of modular office furniture. Though they appear to be designed for traditional office spaces, they seem to have been adapted well to the Round Foundry’s coworking area.

However is raises some interesting questions about the nature of work environments that coworkers are interested in inhabiting.

Communal environments such as San Francisco’s Citizen Space provide much of what is valuable about coworking – a sense of camaraderie, community and collaboration that remote workers lack when working from their homes. However, some privacy is desirable when conducting sensitive negotiations or discussions (though Citizen Space does have a kinda unwritten NDA between residents).

Traditional cubicled spaces are exactly the soulless prisons that most freelancers and web workers seek to avoid when they make the choice to escape cubicle farms.

Perhaps products such as Macro-1 provide a useful middle ground, enabling a semi-private environment for each worker, but portable and mobile enough to reconfigure into collaborative spaces when needed. Yes, it’s really all about those wheels :)

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• Coworking is becoming unhooked from physical places as developments such as Jelly – a monthly 24-hour workathon – enable coworking communities to spring up wherever they’re needed; indeed encouraging gracious hosts to offer their facilities for one-off coworking days.

• Messenger bag gods Timbuk2 were recently persuaded to create some coworking desks that outside workers could use, helping to stimulate the company’s creativity

• Coworkers in Manchester – lacking a dedicated physical space – have been mashing up OpenCoffee networking events with an afternoon of coworking in a borrowed space, such as local company or coffee house. Interestingly, this particular community has somewhat of an agenda in furthering the city’s role as a hub for the digital industries, thought collaborating on startup and technology ideas.

• Still in the UK – Just across the Pennine Mountains in Leeds, that city’s coworking community is running free, ‘open coworking‘ days to attract people into signing up for their plans and encouraging local university students to use the facilities to launch startups as part of a push to create more entrepreneurs in the region.

It’s interesting to see coworking snowballing as a phenomenon, but like many trends originating in dotcom culture, what’ll be most interesting is how these shifts begin to affect larger companies and more traditional employers.

As enterprises belatedly adopted social media and communication as part of their IT infrastructures, how will human resources and more rigid line management begin to accomodate coworkers in their corporate culture?

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