How Doing Real Work Can Still Fail the Community
Elle genuinely contributed significant work to Noisebridge — she ran sewing classes, helped individuals with projects, organized fundraising meetings, and maintained equipment. The community thanked her repeatedly and publicly.
And yet, when she stepped down in December 2025, she left behind gaps, not capacity.
This is the Bottleneck Pattern: doing real work while simultaneously preventing others from being able to do it.
This is not a case of someone who just talked. Elle actually did things:
"thank you so much Elle for the great sewing class" — lil phacelia
"Thanks for the class today. It was great" — Brennan
"Big thanks to Elle and the whole team!!!" — j.d. (27 reactions)
"Kudos to Ellen and team!" (wind tunnel) — OkZack
"thanks Elle for the help with the design" (leather bag) — Blue
Elle documented 2,276 messages (top 11 by volume). The work was not imaginary. The thanks were sincere.
"Please advise from Elle over me" — Jet
"Elle would know" — Mike
Every question routed through one person. Every certification request. Every access issue. This is a bottleneck.
From the Discord analysis:
"We got a grant!"
"We have 2 new machines coming in!"
"Membership drive going strong!"
Who wrote the grant? Who acquired the machines? Who organized the drive? Unknown.
This creates an implicit association between Elle and all accomplishments, even when others did the work. See: Credit-Taking Analysis for quantitative breakdown.
Pattern from the sewing channel:
"would love to help out a bit... Should I come at ~1pm?" — asked of Elle
"would you still be around tomorrow to show how to use the industrial machine?" — asked of Elle
"do you know if we have a walking foot for the juki?" — asked of Elle
No documentation. No training pipeline. No distributed knowledge.
See: Credit-Taking Analysis for full quantitative analysis.
| Metric | Elle | zoda (contrast) |
|---|---|---|
| "I did" rate | 1.05% | 0.39% |
| Credit balance | -286 | -27 |
| Per 1000 msgs | -125.7 | -21.2 |
Elle took credit 2.7x more often than zoda per message.
"Sad to hear you're leaving Elle... you are a gem" — Christine
Sadness, not confidence.
No one saying "don't worry, we've got trained people."
Because there aren't any.
The bottleneck pattern didn't just affect the sewing room. It extended to conflict mediation, where it burned out one of the community's best facilitators.
"I found mediation for Elle and Cloud extremely difficult for reasons hard to explain. I'm forfeiting mediation responsibilities... Hope to never talk to her again... Remind me to never do conflict mediation again." — zoda
Cost: The community lost one of its best facilitators (zoda) partly due to Elle's behavior during mediation.
See: Mediator Burnout
Instead of becoming the sewing room, Elle could have:
| What Elle Did | What Guild Building Looks Like |
|---|---|
| Ran all the classes herself | "I'm certifying 3 people to run Sewing 101 this month" |
| "We got 2 new machines!" | "Thanks to @X who acquired these machines and @Y who set them up" |
| All questions routed to Elle | "For industrial machines, ask @A or @B who I trained" |
| "Sad to hear you're leaving" | "I'm stepping back; here are the 5 people who can handle things" |
zoda's approach demonstrates the contrast:
zoda's credit balance: -27 (vs Elle's -286). zoda built capacity; Elle created dependency.
You must also build capacity in others. A guild that can't function without you has failed.
Without it, helpers feel invisible and leave. See: Credit-Taking Analysis
The goal is to make yourself replaceable. If you can't step away, something is wrong.
252 "We got/have/did" messages with 0 attributions = all credit flows to the announcer
Technical correctness doesn't excuse interpersonal friction. "Not technically wrong" but "tanking the Vibe" is still a problem.
The zoda incident cost the community dearly. One person's pattern can drive away experienced mediators.
If "no one comes to meetings," ask why — don't just complain. The problem may be you.
| Red Flag | What It Looks Like |
|---|---|
| All questions route through you | "Ask @You" is the default answer to everything |
| No co-leads emerged | After 6+ months, you're still the only one who can do X |
| High announcement rate, low attribution | "We did X!" but no names of who actually did it |
| People thank you but don't join | Gratitude without replication — they appreciate it but won't help |
| Low meeting attendance | "No one comes" — but have you asked why? |
| Stepping down creates panic | "Who will do it now?" instead of "here's the team" |