- SparkFun’s January 8 “Free Day” promotion—$100 of parts to the first 1,000 claimants—was flagged as a chance for the community to pool orders and acquire RFID readers/chips for a hackerspace entry system.  
- The group compared open-source CNC platforms (MechMate, Joe’s CNC) against proprietary turnkey machines (ShopBot) and agreed SKDB should host open-hardware designs rather than endorse closed machines.  
- A $60 k hackerspace/retail-fixture equipment budget was outlined, with consensus that any CNC machine will work but open-hardware designs are preferred for SKDB inclusion.  
- LinuxCNC supports up to 9 axes, yet hobby-level 5-axis CAM software is scarce, creating a chicken-and-egg problem with affordable 5-axis hardware; a Chinese vendor is exploring <$800 45 W laser retrofits and a $1 k open-source 5-axis articulated arm.  
- 80/20 T-slot extrusion was highlighted as a modular structural system for machines, with tips on buying discounted “refurb” stock via eBay.  
- STL vs. STEP file formats were debated: KrisC dislikes STEP’s ISO baggage and worries about material metadata in STLs; kanzure asked for specific objections to improve SKDB geometry handling.  
- kanzure proposed Mechanical Turk at $1/page to transcribe PDF datasheets or writing supplier-specific Python parsers to auto-extract specs for SKDB parts libraries.  
- A Roland VersaUV/LEC300 UV printer workshop was arranged at a local sign-materials supplier to demonstrate textured-surface deposition for membrane-panel prototyping.  
- Warehouse space in Brisbane (~US $1 k/month) and rural farm properties were discussed as low-cost, low-restriction fabrication sites for future hardware builds.  
- QuantumG shared speculative physics papers on sonoluminescence as quantum-vacuum radiation and magneto-electric “quantum wheels,” asking whether combining a magneto-electric gas with sonoluminescence could yield new phenomena.