Is this the wrong blog post?
Yes it is. We planned to release the Digital Glarus Manifesto today, however, so many things have happened in the meantime, we want to give you an overview of where we are.
What happened so far ...
The project Digital Glarus (we were writing it as "Digital.Glarus" in the beginning, you might still find misspellings at some places) started in May 2015 as a crazy idea...
...what Idea?
To transform the quiet, beautiful and very green valley of Glarus into a place where computer scientist will love to go to.
Why would we want them to like Glarus?
We, ungleich, moved our headquarter to Luchsingen (a small village in Glarus, which is also in the Alps! Yes, the Alps.) about 2 years ago and guess what changed for our workflow and for our customers?
Right! Nothing!
Nothing?
Yes, we are working remotely most of the time (>90%), and as long as we are visiting our customers regulary, they do not really care where we are.
However, we care and with Glarus we found a place with an breathtaking scenery, great Internet connection and good train connection to Zürich.
Why are we interested in attracting IT companies?
The valley of Glarus (aka "Glarnerland") is a rather small district with good connections. Glarus offers affordable home and office space, with its great scenery as a backdrop. As the valley is small enough in its size, it is perfect for nesting dots of co-working space in which IT companies can benefit from each other.
What happened until today
We had over 50+ (100+?) meetings with various people - from the presidents of the three townships (Glarus Süd, Glarus, Glarus Nord), to banks (various), to IT companies and entrepreneurs in Zürich, to local restaurants and cafes, to people on the street and guess what? All of them are intrigued by the idea of using the resources of Glarus to build Digital Glarus.
Is that all?
No, to be honest, we spared the biggest news until here: we searched and found a house in Glarus, or more exact in Schwanden, that will serve as the FIRST CO-WORKING SPACE in Glarus!
Can you believe this? In only 3 months, we met so many interested parties ; coaches, teachers and IT companies! We have established contacts with them, as many of them share our enthusiasm for this project. Now we are taking this important step of starting the Co-Working Space!
What is next to come?
First we have to actually open the co-working space, at the moment we are still going through paperworks. After we clear that stage, we have to clean the actual house up, as there are tons of old stuffs left in the building - from a funky 60s fridge to (genuine) vintage furniture - it's all for our use.
After we tidy things up, we hope to open the doors in November this year.We also plan to rent out some of the rooms to students.
Of course, we probably need to invest some time and money into renovating the house, as it is well over 100 years old.
We plan to start a Kickstarter project for this purpose soon.
If you are interested in the Co-Working space or want to help us funding some part of the renovation via kickstarter, follow us on Twitter - we will keep you updated!