

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

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?<p>I envision this topic as something that can potentially help out a lot of HNers as well.
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kineticac
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 :)

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derekc
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.

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

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kineticac
They are selective, and it's not actually free. Prices vary depending on what
you need. There are some "scholarship" desks from what I know, which are truly
free, but that's yet another program. Get in touch with Ryan Spoon / Polaris
for info =) They also have Dogpatch Labs in NY and Boston.

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retube
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)

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stretchwithme
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

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alex1
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.

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el_chapitan
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).

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bgnm2000
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!

