I'm pretty sure the talk about electricity is just to make sure that all the eyes are crossed and teas dotted, when we make sure we're not supporting something businessy.

We get a laser cutter at the space, Adam gets enough to offset wear, and it's all good.

It shouldn't matter to us if the envelope that money gets tucked into is labeled Electricity, Wear, Lunch Money, or For Services Rendered.

It might matter to the tax people.

Yeah, I don't read anything here as saying we'd be charging for electricity. Adam himself is the one that wants to collect money for laser use, to pay for replacing the laser when it burns out.

Last night, metis was asking about electricity use of the machine. We ran some quick numbers and it looks something less under a penny an hour while its on.

I don't quite remember, but that seems negligable to me. Laser tube replacement (at a very quick, back of the envelope calculation) looks to be around 50 cents an hour, but I need a bit better data to lock that in. Even at $1 an hour, I'm not sure if I want to track real usage. I honestly think making a "laser club" fee might be easier for everyone involved. If I have to spend a month of free time building a control board for it, that's another month you guys go without lazzors.

What do folks think? Would you rather pay per hour, or pay a few bucks to be in the laser club (which would last until the tube needs replacement, at which point we'd make laser club 2)?

I am good with either, club idea may make it easier to track who has been checked out on it's use..

ork and mc nailed it.

in a gross oversimplification:
we as a non-profit can't directly support a business. we can compensate a business for services they provide. since this tool would be owned by a business and used for commercial purposes, we can't support that. we can however contribute to wear and tear on it that our membership would cause.

after electricity and tube wear it comes out to ~.6c per minute for a tcm member to use, and business use would be maybe a dollar or so of electrical use per month per initial estimations. while that seems kinda negligible, we're assuming that our membership would use the tool more than adam's business would, so a tiny fee for our use is appropriate since we will cause more wear and tear on the expensive tube than he will.

if he wanted a buck a minute, or something where it was clearly a business profit making thing to provide us the service, rather than him being awesome and wanting to not get taken for a ride, it'd be a different story.

gah, got stuck on the phone with lawyer while adam posted. i'm pretty sure he was going to set up a user login method to make sure only approved folks are using it, but it may also be something that he can simply track member vs business use, and if it's gonna be a small amount the board may approve it as something the organization will cover.

figure intense 18 hr per week use, (3hrs a day 6 days a week, which is insane) we'd be looking at ~40$ a month

at $40 a month, I reckon the space could eat that.

I'm willing to pay to be in the lazzor club.

Simple solution to the who's-paying-for-what thing: Adam rents the lazzor to us. We are then paying for a service. Problem solved.

My god!

It's just simple, sensible, and logical enough to work!

Well played, Sir, well played, and good Day!

A coin operated laser would be Rad.

Just wanted to let you know what we do with the laser at DMS. This information can be found at http://dallasmakerspace.org/wiki/Laser.

The laser we have at the space doesn't belong to the space, but to one of our members. We have an exhaust vent for it because it gets pretty stinky. Also, things tend to readily catch on fire while being lasered so we have a CO2 tank (from a paintball gun???) to squelch the fires.

1) Members must take a laser class before using the laser
2) Members must pay $5/hr (or partial hour) to use the laser
3) The computer that is hooked up to has a username/password that is only given to people that have taken the class.

Some talk has gone on to further restrict usage by RFID tag, but is pending on a local LDAP server. All our members get access to the premises via assigned RFID tag so we all have one already.