Following the 2600 meetings, Tetalab is born in 2009 at Toulouse on Gapz, Alex, PG and Sad Eden initiative with original goal to meet more often and have a place to setup projects.
Quickly with word mouth help, passionate people from various bacgrounds eventually gathered.
At first Tetalab concentrate on 3 points befor spreading in multiple directions:
* A place, [Mix'Art-Myrys](https://www.mixart-myrys.org) to meet people (safely)
* A light installation, the LED WALL around which efforts and skills of a handfull of members were gathered to achieve this project that needed electronical understanding and know-how, software engineering and hardware manipulations.
* And early, a festival, the [THSF](../thsf) to touch a larger zone than Toulouse area.
#### Tetalab & hackerspaces
Far from the bad people described by mass-medias, we are proud to (re)present the hacking culture from an honnest perspective and consistent with its true egalitarian philosophy: Reappropriation of tools and technology, DIY, free software and hardware, knowledge sharing and spreading.
We are a group of people who loves to divert tools and device of their meanings. Like many, we contribute to free software, free hardware and alternative medias projects .
Tetalab is a place where people with a common interest to technology, art and freedom philosophy can meet and collaborate together.
Each member has his own skills and we are always pleased to help someone stuck in a project. The addition of the community and tools makes the Tetalab like it is.
Tetalab principle is share and self-investment. So Tetalab does not initiate any project but its members develop them in it. One comes with an idea, a project and others graft to it if they're interested.
The lab is open 24/7 allowing access to ressources and experimentation at will for members. A weekly public meeting takes place on wednesdays nights from 9PM. This a moment for sharing, meeting, duscussing/presenting about projects in a warm informal athmosphere (Bring your 6 pack, bro').
#### The lab/container/DD2
The Tetlab is establsihed in a shop made from 2 welded 40' marine containers (aka Double Dragon 2) situated within the self-governing artists group Mix'art-Myrys'hangar.
It was built by its members and people from Mix'Art-Myrys.
Link between Tetalab and Mix'art-Myrys is strong and promote collaboration between hackers and artists like [VSRK](https://vsrk.net/), [Annlor Codina](https://annlorcodina.com/works/stochastic/), [Darkimey](https://darkimey.tumblr.com/), [Guillaume Bautista](https://www.guillaumebautista.com/)…
Each year since 2010, the THSF (Toulouse Hacker Space Factory is organized by Tetalab in collaboration with Mix'Art-Myrys. This event is articulated around conferences, workshops and artistical propositions. The topic is new technologies and again watchword is knowledge sharing.
This is a fundamental principle of hackerspaces.
#### It looks awesome, how can I join ?
Have a look to the ["join"](../adherer) section. :)
#### But I don't know much about all of this :'(
So you'll get pleasure to learn ! Don't worry, here, you skill level is not important. If you are self motivated you will be warmly welcome !
#### RTFM
The Tetalab members [guide (aka RTFM)](./rtfm) answers all your questions about our hackerspace rules.
Missing something in the guide ? Feel free to send an [email to the list](mailto:tetalab@lists.tetalab.org) :)
