In 1996, it wasn’t hard to dub your event ‘the largest collaborative Internet event ever,’ but even by today’s standards, 24 Hours in Cyberspace was an impressive undertaking.
I’ve been a bass player in a few Seattle bands over the years, and back in the day I used to have band practice in the dank basement below the world famous Rendezvous bar in Belltown.
Jack Straw Productions launches one of the first streaming radio stations, Sonarchy. 20 years later, this popular music show is now featured regularly on KEXP.
As Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood begins to be revitalized, Speakeasy’s backroom theater is one of a new style of performance spaces.
I worked regular shifts in the cafe for some time, which I enjoyed in the extreme. I also got to trip out on coffee. I love making coffee. I love coffee!
Roderick and Anisa Romero of Sky Cries Mary hold the first live-streamed art gallery opening, displayed at the cafe.
The day my girlfriend left for school back east, a friend took me out to cheer me up. He brought me to the Speakeasy Cafe to show me ‘The Internet.’
After months of wielding jackhammers, running cable, wrangling 2 x 4’s into actual furniture and eating far too many PB & J sandwiches, it was finally time to open the cafe.
One day, just days before our scheduled opening, our electrical inspector was doing the final inspection and asks, ‘where are the UL listing numbers for all the ethernet cables that connect all the computers?’
One day, I was walking from the Pike Place Market to our apartment in Belltown. On the way, there was a sign on a door of a building at 2nd and Bell about a Speakeasy, and there were activities and construction inside.