Six months ago, along with some crazy friends we started discussing the idea of creating a hackerspace in my hometown, Thessaloniki.
After a lot of planning where more people joined, we managed to build from SCRATCH, the Tech Ministry – Thessaloniki’s Hackerspace. “The how” I am going to describe it with details in another post.
Since day 1, a lot of people were mocking us because we were dedicating a lot of money and effort in transforming an empty basement into a hackerspace. These people believed that we should – somehow – get our money back instead of “wasting” them for an empty space. Today – after 2 months and after a lot of effort, the space is almost complete and fully equipped so I would like to share with you how I am planning to get the earnings of my investment.
Today I had the opportunity to spend more than 14 hours in the space with some brilliant people working on a variety of projects.
- We worked and managed to transform our outdoor into an RFID featured door (had to hack the door’s metal case in order to install the electric strike).
- Brainstormed on techniques for transforming solar energy into electric energy and aquaponics.
- Brainstormed on upcoming events and planned 2 new ones.
- Had a short docker hands-on session.
- Learned more about apache’s configuration.
- Worked on installing, configuring and using owncloud’s API.
It’s 1:55am (woke up at 7:30am) and after this exhausting day I am still FULL of energy, writing this blogpost and ready to continue working on my favorite projects!
Can you now understand why I am so passionate and thrilled about this place? Because anyone can do amazing things without any previous experience, by simply spending his time with some brilliant people. This is the earning of my investment, gaining experience on doing amazing stuff with amazing people!
Have I also told you that a hackerspace is not only a space but it is actually a community? Yes! More on part 2. 😉
So what’s your excuse for not joining a hackerspace or starting one?
Christos Bacharakis 
One response to “You should start a hackerspace, TODAY! – part 1”
Bravo my friend! I have seen closely some of the evolution of the hackerspace of Thessaloniki, and i would like to say it’s quite impressive! I exhort everyone who lives in Thessaloniki to take a look in this place, there are many talented people doing great work in there.