Amsterdam: Squatters Linux User Group opening up their hacklab project LAG in a new stable place

From : http://slug.squat.net

Ladies and gents,

After 6 months of renovation work we are proud to invite you all for the opening. The work is not over yet and a lot is only starting. Come by to hear what are our plans with the place,  have a drink, re-unite,  listen to some music and in general have fun. We start from 17:00.

The program details will be posted soon.

If you want to find us elsewhere (some 2.0 stuff) follow (join) us on identi.ca or/and n-1

See you all  Saturday the 16th

1e schinkelstraat 14

Amsterdam

 

——————————–

LAG is a scrap-computer-shop/hackerspace project. One of our main goals is to promote free software solutions over proprietary software. We give workshops on how to install, configure and use Linux operating systems, and help solving software problems. We also wish to emphasis the importance of privacy and anonymity in and out of the virtual network, which is especially relevant, but not only, to various activist. To encourage privacy awareness we want to have several workshops on topics such as network security and cryptography. LAG initiative will not only focus on workshops and lectures. We would like to provide anyone who might be interested, with free access to equipment and the space to realize their technological fantasies, develop autonomous software or get creative around electronics by means of collaborative practice. We don’t want to be a service but a learning environment where people share and learn from each others.

LAG is more then just a ‘hacker space’, we would like to introduce the idea of computer(and electronics) give away shop, where recycled equipment can be re-used and given a second life. People looking for help and support with free software have difficulties finding where to go in Amsterdam. It is even harder to find a place where one is free to create and develop projects in a challenging environment away from authoritarian structures.

This is also the reason why we decided to get a stable place, because after years of moving around with the SLUG (squatters linux user group) we realized that critical hacking culture in this city, like in many others, can be more easily created from a solid platform and network. So, rather than keep on blaming evictions for our lack of continuity we decided to engage into a long term project. We perceive from one side a technophobic tendency from activists to distrust and reject technology, and from another side a technofetishist tendency among nerds/geeks to be politically ambiguous.

We position ourselves in the gap created by this two approaches by considering hacking a political practice and we want therefore to encourage and inspire people to challenge the present situation.