Congratulations to Adam McCombs on winning the Turnstone Uno Chair for participating in our blood drive!

Twenty-three of Cospace’s members donated blood on Tuesday, August 23rd. Turnstone generously donated a blood red Uno chair to be raffled off among the members of the coworking space with the most blood donors.

Thank you to everyone who participated! We are looking forward to our next blood drive Wednesday, December 14.

Cospace staff and members recently joined 31 coworking members/former members and 17 other coworking space founders/reps from across the coworking universe to share our stories and perspectives on coworking in Working in The UnOffice: A Guide to Coworking, a new ebook from Night Owl Press.

Night Owl Press interviewed coworkers PJ Christie and Kyle de Haas along with founder Kirtus Dixon and operations manager Sarah Cox to get our thoughts on coworking from both a coworker and management perpective. The book is a raucous chorus of insights and experiences– a mix of raves, confessions, and straight talk about getting out of the home/coffee shop/overpriced suite/corporate cube– and into a collaborative workspace.

Check it out at CoworkingGuide.com or read it on the Cospace/Turnstone iPad.

Photo credit: Dan Lien

Over the weekend, about 30 coders and designers gathered at Cospace for Friday Night Hacks, an all-night programming/socializing/networking/idea-sharing event put together by Damon Clinkscales. Together, they worked on several projects, including designing, developing and launching www.fridaynighthacks.com. Check out Friday Night Hacks for info on other projects, a full photo gallery, and to sign up for the next one!

Our friends across Burnet Road, Link Coworking, have challenged Cospace and other Austin coworking spaces to a blood drive competition.

Donor Appointment Instructions

(If you have any problems, I should be able to register you.)

Thanks to everyone who came out for our Happy Hour on Friday! We had a good time and hope you did too.

Thanks to Cospace member Dan Lien for photos and party prep help!

Meet Paul O’Brien, Early Stage Marketing Executive and Cospace member.

Why do you cowork?

I’ve been in Austin only 6 months.  I picked up and moved the family out of a need for a better life and we have certainly found it. At home in Austin, I wanted to find a way to quickly connect with people in similar straits. People working for themselves from whom I can learn a few things, we can potentially work together, and with whom we can make some great new friends.

In the first few months that I was in town, I spent time with all the major coworking spaces and Cospace is the most diverse, comfortable, supportive of the community at large.  Every coworking space has its role, and the folks responsible for developing and managing these spots for the rest of us are doing a tremendous service, worth more than the business being built with their sweat; they are helping others succeed and building our economy in the process.  Cospace may not be the right fit for you but for me, for many, it’s home… Did I just call my office “home”?!

What are you working on?

I love this question because for me, the answer changes every six months, a year, or so.  It took me years to get used to this work style I have; I like doing a vast variety of things and usually find myself launching startups. That’s the easiest way to put it. I don’t create my own, I help entrepreneurs find the right trajectory. I take Seed or Series A companies and give them runway; with a marketing organization, analytics, monetization… everything but development.

I’m working with this fantastic company called Fliptop which gives a business unparalleled insight to the social profiles of their audience.

Out of Denver comes perhaps the most significant and little known innovator in the payments space since PayPal; IPCommerce enables software companies and developers to create amazing payment apps and services. Conceive of anything you ever wanted to do with payments and they make it possible.

Finally, I’m a big fan of crowd-sourcing models so I’ve been working with FoxTranslate who is doing for document translation what oDesk did for programmers.

Oh, and of course a few of my own projects.  A few weeks ago I launched SteinerRanchPost.com to bring an online community to an offline community.  I call Steiner Ranch home and I want to create a world-class online experience for small communities.

If the Internet died tomorrow, what would you do?

I’m going to take the liberty of bundling that question with some others you prompted, “What gets you up in the morning?” and “What keeps you up at night?”  There are moments when I consider ways to take down the internet just so I can retire and spend more time with my kids.  Then I remember it’s those same kids who crawl in bed at 4 in the morning.