Our nomination period is up and voting will open shortly (emails will be sent to all current members eligible to vote) and in the meantime, you can peruse your options below, consisting of the nominee name and pitch:
1. Colin Mitchell
My involvement with Farset Labs started when it was a dark glint in Bolster’s evil eye. I say ‘involvement’ – it was really just supportive conversations, but once established this quickly turned into an obligation to join, and a membership fee has been ripped bodily from my strained bank account ever since.
However, it’s not all bad…
Some of the things I love about Farset Labs:
- The slight tendency towards anarchy
- The attempts at real democracy
- The diversity of people + their abilities
- The sense of community and random connections
- The stuff all over the place
- All the code ‘n shit with the young people ‘n all
I love the sense of ‘if it ain’t broke, break it’ – (though not Robin Prices’s lighting-up ping-pong table, nor Matt Hazley’s beer-making kit, ‘cos the phrase ‘don’t break stuff that makes beer’ should need no explanation)
Currently I’m CTO/co-founder of Sixty-5 Technologies – Farset’s co-working space was where we spent a lot of last year. Bolster was instrumental in John Arrell & I getting together, David Kane helped with initial specs, Robin Price worked on our Gateway box, Mal Duffin seriously improved our UI, Art Knipe straightened up our API – all invaluable & there’s nowhere else in NI where that could happen.
As well as techie stuff I’ve done sales & marketing, management & director stuff – so I can bring wide experience with an anarchic twist.
Right now I’m doing a lot of coding (at 57, I know, God help us) – most of the Sixty-5 Android code & some of the Ruby on Rails cloud stuff is mine. Also devops stuff with servers and all that kind of thing. I love all the hands-on stuff.
So, for Farset, as well as sharing the organisational burden with the others, there are a bunch of things that interest me:
Connectivity between the diverse membership and the wider community – both social and industrial. There’s all sorts of interesting stuff that Farset members could be part of, if it interests them. Let’s find more of these things.
Learning – there are so many different ways to get engaged in tech & to learn without going through the established education routes (with their gatekeepers). Some of that Farset is already doing well. I love the idea of someone coming through Farset from no tech knowledge to paid work. Or just for fun.
Farset has a lot of potential to act as an incubator for early stage startups – there’s already a bunch of that happening right now (Sixty-5 is but one example)
Diversity – I love diversity & inclusion. We can extend what we already have.
I love people poking at projects – how can we do more of this?
I love the idea that in years to come, world-changing stuff or people might have had their roots in Farset. That would be something.
For a tiny bit more on me, visit
2. RON
ReOpen Nominations
Ron does nothing, and means we open up nominations again.
The Directors assert that this election, odd as it is, satisfy the Director Appointment Rules as set up in the Operations Manual and ratified by Town Hall Consent from March 2014.