What can a hackerspace do to help self learners?
I would like to hear suggestions people have for how to use a physical space and non-technical staff to help people taking the Stanford classes or signed up for codeyear.org be more successful. I'm a young student who was paying membership fees at a local hackerspace over the last six months. I feel like I'm almost exactly the type of person you're talking about; I went there and worked on assignments for my C.S. classes as well as solo projects. One thing I have to say is, I think it's important to encourage interaction. My primary goal of going was to make connections with people. I would go, there would be maybe ten people there, and everyone was plugged in to headphones and I think I actually spoke with people a small hand full of times. The times I did, I approached them and was treated as an intrusion. Of course, it's very possible I was an intrusion and they wanted to be left alone, or I approached them in the wrong way, who knows? Anyways, this turned in to a bit of rambling, and I'm not positive I've helped at all, but... Hopefully I did. I agree with kipsfi completely, if the connecting part of the equation was built into the experience we would see a lot of added value. I would love to see some kind of skills exchange enter the equation so everyone feels like they can contribute. Hackerbuddy.com tries to do this virtually, but I could see the physical world giving this idea plenty more oomph. Hope that's helpful.