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Alex Hillman

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the value of a community, online and off

1 minute read
by Alex Hillman

Roz made really great post on the urban family, and afterwards followed up with me offline about the format that etsy (an awesome crafty/boutique community) has run that really feels like a direction that IndyHall is headed.

Etsy has another “entity” called EtsyLabs, which allowed them to extend their successful community of people selling their things online into a resource to teach OTHER people how to experience that same success from doing something that they love.

Roz is spot on, part of the fuel for me wanting to start organizing Independents Hall was self-serving: I’d already built a successful business that was based around sharing of talents between friends and established talent partners. Since it worked so well for me, I not only needed a place to find more partners (thats the self-serving part), but also I wanted to show others the value of collaboration, and make it easier for them to be awesome at what they do.

Along the way, many of us have become friends, and encourage each other to succeed and be happy with what we do, even outside of the realm of “work”. The fact of the matter is, Independents Hall has allowed us to build the foundation of an “urban family” that’s much larger than just our circle of friends, acquaintances, and business partners. By taking an online community offline, and doing things face to face and not just for the purpose of business but for the purpose of improving the quality of our lives, we make huge strides to unify an otherwise segmented community that we live in.

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Alex Hillman I am always thinking about the intersection of people, relationships, trust and business. I founded Indy Hall in 2006, making us one of oldest fully independent coworking communities in the world. This site is packed with the lessons and examples I’ve learned along the way. You can find me on Twitter, too! 🐦 Say hi.