Double Union
 DU's logo is a Unicode symbol with two nested sets | |
 A paper workshop at Double Union | |
| Abbreviation | DU |
|---|---|
| Formation | 2013 |
| Purpose | Hacking, Feminism, DIY culture |
| Location | |
Membership | 150-200 |
Origin | San Francisco, California |
Founders | Liz Henry, Valerie Aurora, Amelia Greenhall, and others on founding committee |
| Website | Official website  |
Double Union is a San Francisco hacker/maker space.[1] Double Union was founded by women in 2013 with the explicit goal of fostering a creative safe space. The organization’s mission is to be a community workshop where women and nonbinary people can work on projects in a comfortable, welcoming environment.[1][2]
Members hold public and members-only events for activities and workshops like zine making, paper circuits and electronics, coding, sewing, 3-dimensional printing, lightning talks, print making and many others.[3] Key-carrying members are allowed to invite guests of any gender.
History
[edit]
DU was founded in 2013 by a group of about ten women including Amelia Greenhall, Valerie Aurora, Liz Henry and Ari Lacenski from their connections at other hackerspaces; at The Ada Initiative's feminist unconference, AdaCamp; and through Geekfeminism.org, collecting initial funding through an Indiegogo campaign.[4] Later that year, Lacenski left the group, claiming that two unnamed cofounders practiced a form of activism that she considered too aggressive.[5] There is a board of directors and a structure in place for voting in new members; as of 2015, there are around 150–200 members.[citation needed]
DU's logo is a bright pink Unicode character (U+22D3), from the Mathematical Operators block.
Originally located in the Mission district, Double Union relocated to the Potrero Hill neighborhood of San Francisco in Fall 2015 after their building was sold by the landlord. To fund the move and several equipment purchases, Double Union undertook an Indiegogo campaign, which finished at 106 percent of its goal.[6]
Physical space
[edit]For its first two years, the space was in a 700-square-foot room in the Mission neighborhood, at 14th and Mission in the Fog Building.[3] From 2015 to 2021, occupied a space in Potrero neighborhood in San Francisco. DU is currently located in the SOMA neighborhood.[7]
Projects
[edit]App
[edit]Several Double Union members have created an app for managing hackerspace membership applications, Arooo. Arooo is free to use and is licensed under the GNU GPL.[8]
ODD
[edit]Double Union created the Open Diversity Data project.[9] The project aggregates diversity data for a wide array of tech companies.[10]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ a b "About". Double Union. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
- ^ Cassandra, Rachel. "Meet San Francisco's All Women Hacker Space, Double Union". Bitch. Bitch Media. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
- ^ a b Greenfield, Rebecca. "Why Silicon Valley Needs The Coder Grrrls Of Double Union, The Feminist Hacker Space."
- ^ Fleishman, Glenn. BoingBoing. New Disruptors 56: Doubling Down with Amelia Greenhall.
- ^ Lacenski, Ari (12 September 2013). "Shaming, doxxing and making culture". Tumblr. Archived from the original on 12 October 2016. Retrieved 25 September 2016.
- ^ Doctorow, Cory (25 September 2015). "Double Union Woman Hackerspace Needs Help with Funding Finding a New Space". BoingBoing. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
- ^ doubleunion. "Hello, we're in the process of rebooting". Tumblr. Retrieved 24 May 2023.
- ^ "Arooo - A Room Of One's Own". 11 December 2021 – via GitHub.
- ^ Brownstone, Sydney. "Publicly Shame Companies that Won't Tell us How Un-Diverse They Are". Fast Company. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
- ^ "Open Diversity Data". Open Diversity Data. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
