Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Aaron Cruikshank]

We found that the upload speed was an important consideration if you have a
lot of people in your space doing video conferencing via Skype, Google
Hangouts, etc...
At the HiVE, we were on a coax cable internet plan and the upload speed was
1 MB/s. It used to brown out the internet for everyone if more than two
people tried to do video calling at the same time. When we switched to
fibre, we were then getting 100 MB/s up and the brownout problem went away.

Aaron Cruikshank
Principal, CRUIKSHANK
phone: 778.908.4560
e-mail: aa...@cruikshank.me
web: cruikshank.me 
twitter: @cruikshank 
book a meeting: doodle.com/cruikshank 
linkedin: in/cruikshank 




On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 11:28 AM, Jacob Sayles 
wrote:

> Also on the DHCP front we switched to using a netmask of 23 instead of 24
> to get twice the number of addresses.
>
> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 11:04 AM, Stuart Lambert 
> wrote:
>
>> Yeah, dropped it down to a day from 7 and our helped.
>>
>> (Secretly looking for an excuse to buy better kit anyway! )
>> On 2 Apr 2015 18:29, "Glen Ferguson"  wrote:
>>
>>> If you shorten the DHCP lease time to 2, 4, or even 8 hours, that should
>>> address the problem of running  out of leases.
>>>
>>>*Glen Ferguson*
>>>  Phone: 301-732-5165
>>> Email: g...@coworkfrederick.com 
>>> Website: http://coworkfrederick.com
>>> Address: 122 E Patrick St, Frederick, MD 21701
>>>
>>> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Alex Hillman <
>>> dangerouslyawes...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
 Oh yeah my experience matches Stuart's, the dual band is *much*
 better.

 I thought we could get away with the single band $99-per-unit versions
 when we expanded our initial cover and...yeah, they're just not as good.

 Definitely spring for the Pro units - this 3 pack:
 http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-System-UAP-PRO-3/dp/B00DJERLFG


 Or this single unit:
 http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Enterprise-System-AP-Pro-UAP-PRO/dp/B00HXT8T5O/ref=pd_sim_pc_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=1SYSFCBY9V4T4H5TW0P1

 -Alex


 --
 *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
 Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
 Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast

 On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:16 PM, Stuart Lambert 
 wrote:

> +1 to the Unifi recommendation.
>
> We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot
> of users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so
> we have the 5Ghz band to ourself...
>
> Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool
> on our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no
> matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being 
> unable
> to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them.
> We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us
> with better throughput from our network to the internet -
> http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094
>
>
> On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>
>> I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way -
>> even within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky
>> data to acquire!
>>
>> But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how
>> bandwidth is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had
>> hundreds of people piping through a shared connection every day:
>>
>> 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without
>> getting super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network
>> responds, which is different from how fast files download.
>>
>> MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or
>> using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game
>> developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work
>> are relatively small.
>>
>> But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to
>> load a page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels 
>> like
>> it has a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb
>> down/10mb up almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people
>> working hard every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.
>>
>> Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen
>> in our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our
>> internet provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the
>> network is uploading a huge file (offsite b

Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Jacob Sayles]

Also on the DHCP front we switched to using a netmask of 23 instead of 24
to get twice the number of addresses.

On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 11:04 AM, Stuart Lambert  wrote:

> Yeah, dropped it down to a day from 7 and our helped.
>
> (Secretly looking for an excuse to buy better kit anyway! )
> On 2 Apr 2015 18:29, "Glen Ferguson"  wrote:
>
>> If you shorten the DHCP lease time to 2, 4, or even 8 hours, that should
>> address the problem of running  out of leases.
>>
>>*Glen Ferguson*
>>  Phone: 301-732-5165
>> Email: g...@coworkfrederick.com 
>> Website: http://coworkfrederick.com
>> Address: 122 E Patrick St, Frederick, MD 21701
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Alex Hillman <
>> dangerouslyawes...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Oh yeah my experience matches Stuart's, the dual band is *much* better.
>>>
>>> I thought we could get away with the single band $99-per-unit versions
>>> when we expanded our initial cover and...yeah, they're just not as good.
>>>
>>> Definitely spring for the Pro units - this 3 pack:
>>> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-System-UAP-PRO-3/dp/B00DJERLFG
>>>
>>>
>>> Or this single unit:
>>> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Enterprise-System-AP-Pro-UAP-PRO/dp/B00HXT8T5O/ref=pd_sim_pc_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=1SYSFCBY9V4T4H5TW0P1
>>>
>>> -Alex
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>>> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
>>> Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
>>>
>>> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:16 PM, Stuart Lambert 
>>> wrote:
>>>
 +1 to the Unifi recommendation.

 We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot of
 users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so we
 have the 5Ghz band to ourself...

 Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool
 on our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no
 matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being unable
 to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them.
 We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us
 with better throughput from our network to the internet -
 http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094


 On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:
>
> I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way -
> even within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky
> data to acquire!
>
> But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how
> bandwidth is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had
> hundreds of people piping through a shared connection every day:
>
> 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without
> getting super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network
> responds, which is different from how fast files download.
>
> MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or
> using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game
> developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work
> are relatively small.
>
> But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to
> load a page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels 
> like
> it has a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb
> down/10mb up almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people
> working hard every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.
>
> Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen
> in our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our
> internet provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the
> network is uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or
> uploading a video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency
> because it thinks something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!
>
> Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular
> site like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice
> things slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling.
> Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just
> take a few extra moments before they start.
>
> It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if
> it's latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more
> speed without an improvement in latency is important.
>
> 2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection.
> There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network 
> design
> and what ha

Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Stuart Lambert]

Yeah, dropped it down to a day from 7 and our helped.

(Secretly looking for an excuse to buy better kit anyway! )
On 2 Apr 2015 18:29, "Glen Ferguson"  wrote:

> If you shorten the DHCP lease time to 2, 4, or even 8 hours, that should
> address the problem of running  out of leases.
>
>*Glen Ferguson*
>  Phone: 301-732-5165
> Email: g...@coworkfrederick.com 
> Website: http://coworkfrederick.com
> Address: 122 E Patrick St, Frederick, MD 21701
>
> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Alex Hillman <
> dangerouslyawes...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Oh yeah my experience matches Stuart's, the dual band is *much* better.
>>
>> I thought we could get away with the single band $99-per-unit versions
>> when we expanded our initial cover and...yeah, they're just not as good.
>>
>> Definitely spring for the Pro units - this 3 pack:
>> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-System-UAP-PRO-3/dp/B00DJERLFG
>>
>>
>> Or this single unit:
>> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Enterprise-System-AP-Pro-UAP-PRO/dp/B00HXT8T5O/ref=pd_sim_pc_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=1SYSFCBY9V4T4H5TW0P1
>>
>> -Alex
>>
>>
>> --
>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
>> Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:16 PM, Stuart Lambert 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> +1 to the Unifi recommendation.
>>>
>>> We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot of
>>> users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so we
>>> have the 5Ghz band to ourself...
>>>
>>> Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool on
>>> our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no
>>> matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being unable
>>> to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them.
>>> We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us
>>> with better throughput from our network to the internet -
>>> http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:

 I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way -
 even within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky
 data to acquire!

 But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how
 bandwidth is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had
 hundreds of people piping through a shared connection every day:

 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without
 getting super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network
 responds, which is different from how fast files download.

 MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or
 using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game
 developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work
 are relatively small.

 But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to
 load a page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels like
 it has a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb
 down/10mb up almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people
 working hard every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.

 Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen in
 our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our internet
 provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the network is
 uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or uploading a
 video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency because it thinks
 something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!

 Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular site
 like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice things
 slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling.
 Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just
 take a few extra moments before they start.

 It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if
 it's latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more
 speed without an improvement in latency is important.

 2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection.
 There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network design
 and what hardware to get before, but Jon Markwell's post sums up the
 majority of the best of it: http://jonathanmarkwell.
 com/2014/11/22/best-coworking-wifi/

 We upgraded to the Unifi system that he mentions in this post and it's
 been a MASSIVE improvement over everything e

Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Glen Ferguson]

If you shorten the DHCP lease time to 2, 4, or even 8 hours, that should
address the problem of running  out of leases.

   *Glen Ferguson*
 Phone: 301-732-5165
Email: g...@coworkfrederick.com 
Website: http://coworkfrederick.com
Address: 122 E Patrick St, Frederick, MD 21701

On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Alex Hillman 
wrote:

> Oh yeah my experience matches Stuart's, the dual band is *much* better.
>
> I thought we could get away with the single band $99-per-unit versions
> when we expanded our initial cover and...yeah, they're just not as good.
>
> Definitely spring for the Pro units - this 3 pack:
> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-System-UAP-PRO-3/dp/B00DJERLFG
>
>
> Or this single unit:
> http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Enterprise-System-AP-Pro-UAP-PRO/dp/B00HXT8T5O/ref=pd_sim_pc_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=1SYSFCBY9V4T4H5TW0P1
>
> -Alex
>
>
> --
> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
> Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
>
> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:16 PM, Stuart Lambert 
> wrote:
>
>> +1 to the Unifi recommendation.
>>
>> We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot of
>> users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so we
>> have the 5Ghz band to ourself...
>>
>> Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool on
>> our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no
>> matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being unable
>> to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them.
>> We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us
>> with better throughput from our network to the internet -
>> http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094
>>
>>
>> On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>>
>>> I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way -
>>> even within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky
>>> data to acquire!
>>>
>>> But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how
>>> bandwidth is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had
>>> hundreds of people piping through a shared connection every day:
>>>
>>> 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without
>>> getting super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network
>>> responds, which is different from how fast files download.
>>>
>>> MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or
>>> using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game
>>> developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work
>>> are relatively small.
>>>
>>> But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to load
>>> a page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels like it
>>> has a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb
>>> down/10mb up almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people
>>> working hard every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.
>>>
>>> Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen in
>>> our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our internet
>>> provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the network is
>>> uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or uploading a
>>> video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency because it thinks
>>> something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!
>>>
>>> Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular site
>>> like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice things
>>> slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling.
>>> Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just
>>> take a few extra moments before they start.
>>>
>>> It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if
>>> it's latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more
>>> speed without an improvement in latency is important.
>>>
>>> 2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection.
>>> There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network design
>>> and what hardware to get before, but Jon Markwell's post sums up the
>>> majority of the best of it: http://jonathanmarkwell.
>>> com/2014/11/22/best-coworking-wifi/
>>>
>>> We upgraded to the Unifi system that he mentions in this post and it's
>>> been a MASSIVE improvement over everything else we tried. I
>>> heartily endorse this recommendation now from first hand experience!
>>>
>>> -Alex
>>>
>>> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy 
>>> wrote:
>>>
 Hi everyone!

 do you recommend any websites or databases for researching average data
 consumption by industry and/or company size?

 or do you have a

Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Alex Hillman]

Oh yeah my experience matches Stuart's, the dual band is *much* better.

I thought we could get away with the single band $99-per-unit versions when
we expanded our initial cover and...yeah, they're just not as good.

Definitely spring for the Pro units - this 3 pack:
http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-System-UAP-PRO-3/dp/B00DJERLFG


Or this single unit:
http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Enterprise-System-AP-Pro-UAP-PRO/dp/B00HXT8T5O/ref=pd_sim_pc_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=1SYSFCBY9V4T4H5TW0P1

-Alex


--
*The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast

On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:16 PM, Stuart Lambert  wrote:

> +1 to the Unifi recommendation.
>
> We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot of
> users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so we
> have the 5Ghz band to ourself...
>
> Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool on
> our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no
> matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being unable
> to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them.
> We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us
> with better throughput from our network to the internet -
> http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094
>
>
> On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>
>> I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way - even
>> within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky data
>> to acquire!
>>
>> But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how
>> bandwidth is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had hundreds
>> of people piping through a shared connection every day:
>>
>> 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without getting
>> super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network responds,
>> which is different from how fast files download.
>>
>> MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or
>> using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game
>> developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work
>> are relatively small.
>>
>> But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to load
>> a page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels like it
>> has a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb
>> down/10mb up almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people
>> working hard every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.
>>
>> Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen in
>> our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our internet
>> provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the network is
>> uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or uploading a
>> video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency because it thinks
>> something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!
>>
>> Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular site
>> like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice things
>> slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling.
>> Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just
>> take a few extra moments before they start.
>>
>> It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if it's
>> latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more speed
>> without an improvement in latency is important.
>>
>> 2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection.
>> There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network design
>> and what hardware to get before, but Jon Markwell's post sums up the
>> majority of the best of it: http://jonathanmarkwell.
>> com/2014/11/22/best-coworking-wifi/
>>
>> We upgraded to the Unifi system that he mentions in this post and it's
>> been a MASSIVE improvement over everything else we tried. I
>> heartily endorse this recommendation now from first hand experience!
>>
>> -Alex
>>
>> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi everyone!
>>>
>>> do you recommend any websites or databases for researching average data
>>> consumption by industry and/or company size?
>>>
>>> or do you have any insights to share regarding how your ventures provide
>>> internet services?
>>>
>>> thanks :)
>>>
>>> Cassidy
>>>
>>> --
>>> Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
>>> ---
>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
>>> Groups "Coworking" group.
>>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
>>> an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
>>> For more option

Re: [Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Stuart Lambert]

+1 to the Unifi recommendation.

We found that the dual band versions work far better. It seems a lot of 
users in the building our space shares are using 2.4Ghz only routers so we 
have the 5Ghz band to ourself...

Something we've bumped into very recently is exhausting the DHCP pool on 
our router (a Draytek) which only supports 254 DHCP total address, no 
matter what size subnet you configure. The symptoms are people being unable 
to connect to the network because there is no spare DHCP address for them. 
We have one of these on order which will fix this issue, and provide us 
with better throughput from our network to the internet 
- 
http://linitx.com/product/linitx-apu-1d-3nicusbrtc-pfsense-embed-firewall-kit-red/14094


On Thursday, 2 April 2015 14:02:24 UTC+1, Alex Hillman wrote:
>
> I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way - even 
> within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky data 
> to acquire! 
>
> But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how bandwidth 
> is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had hundreds of people 
> piping through a shared connection every day:
>
> 1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without getting 
> super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network responds, 
> which is different from how fast files download. 
>
> MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or 
> using internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game 
> developers and video editors, the files we move around in our daily work 
> are relatively small. 
>
> But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to load a 
> page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels like it has 
> a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb down/10mb up 
> almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people working hard 
> every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc. 
>
> Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen in 
> our network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our internet 
> provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the network is 
> uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or uploading a 
> video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency because it thinks 
> something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!
>
> Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular site 
> like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice things 
> slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling. 
> Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just 
> take a few extra moments before they start. 
>
> It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if it's 
> latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more speed 
> without an improvement in latency is important. 
>
> 2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection. 
> There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network design 
> and what hardware to get before, but Jon Markwell's post sums up the 
> majority of the best of it: 
> http://jonathanmarkwell.com/2014/11/22/best-coworking-wifi/
>
> We upgraded to the Unifi system that he mentions in this post and it's 
> been a MASSIVE improvement over everything else we tried. I 
> heartily endorse this recommendation now from first hand experience!
>
> -Alex
>
> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy  
> wrote:
>
>> Hi everyone!
>>
>> do you recommend any websites or databases for researching average data 
>> consumption by industry and/or company size?
>>
>> or do you have any insights to share regarding how your ventures provide 
>> internet services?
>>
>> thanks :) 
>>
>> Cassidy
>>
>> -- 
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Re: [Coworking] What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work well for a coworking space?

[Alex Hillman]

Yeah, big +1 to that.

We have done some research into the reasons people join and stay, and
location/proximity are consistently WAY lower on the top 10 list than
anybody expects.

That data (and more) can be found in this synthesis:
http://www.slideshare.net/mobile/alexknowshtml/quantifying-community-how-we-measure-success-in-a-coworking-space

I also had a couple of academic researchers on my podcast recently who
found that things like "proximity" are far less indicators of people
choosing coworking, since the people who choose it generally have workspace
alternatives that are closer than the one they end up joining and paying
for.

Location matters, but it matters a lot less than you might think if you're
actually solving a problem for people.

-Alex


On Thursday, April 2, 2015, Andy Soell  wrote:

> I know this isn't exactly what you're asking, but Alex's post reminded me
> of one of the most interesting and unexpected things I've found since we
> opened our space nearly 3 years ago. I expected that we would have around
> 80% of our members coming from the immediate neighborhood, but I've found
> that people are more than willing to commute if the place they're commuting
> to is a place they enjoy working. I just took a quick scan of our member
> roster and less than a quarter of our members live in what I would consider
> the neighborhood of either of our spaces. Several of those 25% are in the
> neighborhood because they've specifically moved here after joining us,
> which is even more incredible.
>
> So yeah, it's not necessarily about proximity as much as what you're
> offering and the kind of community you're cultivating.
>
> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 9:44:02 PM UTC-4, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>
>> How many people are in a radius doesn't really matter, if none of those
>> people care about or need Coworking.
>>
>> We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a
>> place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a
>> neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something
>> important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main
>> parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively
>> central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the
>> other 2/3rds of our community would've felt more disconnected.
>>
>> Bur I say relative because that's important. There is ALWAYS someone who
>> will say that you're too far away. In our case, that can be as "far away"
>> as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to.
>>
>> All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are
>> your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach...but who are
>> the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they
>> already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind
>> of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to
>> choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a
>> problem or set of problems?
>>
>> I'm a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly,
>> workatjelly.com) for a while before selecting any space because it's the
>> ideal way of seeing who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly
>> WHY. Is it because they need a place to work? Or...is it because they're
>> lonely at home and cafes are awkward to be a professional.
>>
>> And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the
>> "perfect" location (which doesn't exist, that's a fantasy) and without
>> spending a dollar, unsure if you'll ever see that dollar again.
>>
>> -Alex
>>
>> --
>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
>> Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
>>
>>
>> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
>>> Like,
>>> - at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
>>> - at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
>>> etc.
>>>
>>> Thanks!
>>>
>>> Cassidy
>>>
>>>  --
>>> Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
>>> ---
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>>> Groups "Coworking" group.
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>>> an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
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>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> --
>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
>> Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
>>
>>  --
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> email 

Re: [Coworking] What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work well for a coworking space?

[Andy Soell]

I know this isn't exactly what you're asking, but Alex's post reminded me 
of one of the most interesting and unexpected things I've found since we 
opened our space nearly 3 years ago. I expected that we would have around 
80% of our members coming from the immediate neighborhood, but I've found 
that people are more than willing to commute if the place they're commuting 
to is a place they enjoy working. I just took a quick scan of our member 
roster and less than a quarter of our members live in what I would consider 
the neighborhood of either of our spaces. Several of those 25% are in the 
neighborhood because they've specifically moved here after joining us, 
which is even more incredible.

So yeah, it's not necessarily about proximity as much as what you're 
offering and the kind of community you're cultivating.

On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 9:44:02 PM UTC-4, Alex Hillman wrote:
>
> How many people are in a radius doesn't really matter, if none of those 
> people care about or need Coworking. 
>
> We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a 
> place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a 
> neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something 
> important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main 
> parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively 
> central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the 
> other 2/3rds of our community would've felt more disconnected. 
>
> Bur I say relative because that's important. There is ALWAYS someone who 
> will say that you're too far away. In our case, that can be as "far away" 
> as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to. 
>
> All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are 
> your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach...but who are 
> the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they 
> already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind 
> of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to 
> choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a 
> problem or set of problems?
>
> I'm a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly, workatjelly.com) 
> for a while before selecting any space because it's the ideal way of seeing 
> who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly WHY. Is it because 
> they need a place to work? Or...is it because they're lonely at home and 
> cafes are awkward to be a professional. 
>
> And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the 
> "perfect" location (which doesn't exist, that's a fantasy) and without 
> spending a dollar, unsure if you'll ever see that dollar again.
>
> -Alex
>
> --
> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
> Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
>
>
> On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy  
> wrote:
>
>> What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
>> Like, 
>> - at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
>> - at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
>> etc.
>>
>> Thanks! 
>>
>> Cassidy
>>
>>  -- 
>> Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
>> --- 
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
>> "Coworking" group.
>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an 
>> email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
>>
>
>
> -- 
>
> --
> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
> Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
> Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
>
>

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[Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Alex Hillman]

I've never seen a resource that organizes bandwidth usage that way - even
within our individual respective spaces I think that would be tricky data
to acquire!

But two things that aren't obvious about Internet usage (and how bandwidth
is just a tiny part of the equation) until you've had hundreds of people
piping through a shared connection every day:

1) bandwidth is important, but latency is more important. Without getting
super duper technical, latency is the speed that the network responds,
which is different from how fast files download.

MOST people spend a lot of their day clicking around the Internet, or using
internet connected apps. With some rare exceptions like game developers and
video editors, the files we move around in our daily work are relatively
small.

But when the latency is bad - everyone feels it because clicking to load a
page, or refresh email, or live typing on Google docs etc feels like it has
a lag. Our network (internal wireless + gigabit) plus our 50mb down/10mb up
almost always has more than enough bandwidth for 120+ people working hard
every day. And that includes streaming videos, music, etc.

Where things go haywire is when latency ratchets up. This can happen in our
network because wifi coverage is interrupted, or because our internet
provider is having issues, or most often because someone on the network is
uploading a huge file (offsite backup like a Dropbox sync or uploading a
video to YouTube) and our ISP starts to throttle latency because it thinks
something is wrong. This tool is FOREVER to figure out!

Our normal network latency is 20-30ms response time from a popular site
like google.com when it goes above 100ms, you start to notice things
slowing down. 200ms and the network feels like it's crawling.
Interestingly, though, you can still download big files quickly they just
take a few extra moments before they start.

It's a rough experience to explain to people, and they don't care if it's
latency or speed they just want to work. So understanding that more speed
without an improvement in latency is important.

2) the network itself is just as important as the Internet connection.
There's been a bunch of great discussions on this list about network design
and what hardware to get before, but Jon Markwell's post sums up the
majority of the best of it:
http://jonathanmarkwell.com/2014/11/22/best-coworking-wifi/

We upgraded to the Unifi system that he mentions in this post and it's been
a MASSIVE improvement over everything else we tried. I heartily endorse
this recommendation now from first hand experience!

-Alex

On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy > wrote:

> Hi everyone!
>
> do you recommend any websites or databases for researching average data
> consumption by industry and/or company size?
>
> or do you have any insights to share regarding how your ventures provide
> internet services?
>
> thanks :)
>
> Cassidy
>
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[Coworking] Bandwidth questions for new coworking venture

[Ramon Suarez]

>From home connections to gigabit, everything goes. Make sure that you can 
>upgrade easily

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