[fellowniusmonk]

It's not hard to start a community but it does take a certain minimal amount of capital, physical space and sufficient population density.

I've done it on a shoe string in the past, but I don't have the space to do it currently. Getting off the ground is the hardest part. Considerably harder than software unless certain resources align.

[arjie]

What did you start? If you happen to already have it written down somewhere, I'd be eager to read.

[fellowniusmonk]

An insolvent co-working space my company took over after the founders offered it to us as we were the only reliable paying members, we turned into to a ethos driven local community social club and co-working space, I come from multi generational missionary family though I myself am no longer theistic.

Most people don't have the experience of seeing one person turn into 200+ in a geographically co-located place.

My family has probably planted more churches than any living group, they range from <100 people to >10,000.

There are transitional stages at every growth milestone, the hardest part is the first 15 people and you need capitalization to get over early humps, that's why missionary organizations exist.

Eventually you can hit break even or even being able to start a rainy day fund, but people aren't willing to capitalize communities the way they capitalize companies even though in the end they have way more socio-political power.

As a fellow SWE engineers and tech people really underestimate the writing, training and empiricism for polity and growth that non-coercion community building entails.

Even people who are vaguely exposed to missionary work are typically exposed to force-coercion oriented groups.

[arjie]

Thank you for sharing that. Yeah, I was curious if someone has put in the work to talk about the mechanistic aspects to making a successful community space. It's an evolving thing, but I'm sure there are many details that one can just get right. Would be a cool book to read.