The HackLab concept has started to take off throughout Europe as a way of sharing knowledge and experimentation with media and technologies. As Free Software has become an organised movement, HackMeetings - gatherings of digital communities and countercultures - have happened with increasing regularity. This year's meeting in Pula, Croatia, will be another important opportunity for people to share ideas about technology, politics, free software and related ways of thinking.

Now London too has its own Lab, situated in the Brick Lane area of the East End, based at the Freedom Press bookshop and social centre. The HackLab will be an open access computer lab with internet access, but also a political space used for alternative media, the use and development of free software and other emancipatory technologies, skill sharing, collective learning, community projects and anything else we can organise. 'The projects that happen there will be limited only by the commitment of those involved,' explain the co-ordinators. 'HackLabs are autonomous technology zones, spaces for learning, self-made media, and for the sharing and development of free and not-for-commercial-use technologies and software, for battling surveillance and alienation, for ongoing projects and for using new forms of communication in direct action.' They seek to continue this legacy providing resources like free internet and computer access, a video/audio editing suite, a Free Software 'free shop', and a wireless internet project. There is also a workshop programme covering areas like basic computer use, GNU/Linux freeware, graphic/web design, filming, video and sound editing, and computer recycling.

'Geeks challenge the notion that creation, advance and development can only happen within the capitalist paradigm of profit,' say the HackLab's creators. 'They're driven by the love of the new, inspired by sharing new ideas and information, the challenge of creating. We regard hacking as an attitude that isn't confined to information technology. Our way of being hackers is apparent in day-to-day life, even when we're not using computers. It reveals itself when we fight to change the things we don't like, such as force-fed misinformation, the use of expensive technologies that are not available to everyone, and having to accept information dispensed without any interactivity.' They see critical need for a HackLab that can raise people's knowledge of computing above that merely required to be a good consumer. 'We can use technology to break alienation, communicate with each other directly and challenge the notion of ideas as private property. We aim to cross boundaries and borders by means of open communication networks, to freely share and exchange information and ideas.'

The project co-ordinators see the London HackLab for the sharing and development of free technologies and software, 'battling surveillance and alienation' and founding ongoing projects and using new forms of communication in direct action. They see inspirational campaigns as the Woomera 2002 'No Borders' camp border hack technology, which explored ways of breaking down the borders between those inside and outside Woomera detention centre, using methods ranging from noise actions to Phone Indymedia Patch technology (PIMP) through which detainees could make a phone call that was automatically transferred into an MP3 file for upload onto the Desert Indymedia website. They also see projects like Rome's Telestreets project, with its provision of local, community-run pirate TV stations, as paradigmatic.

London's Media HackLab is in the process of being set up every Wednesday afternoon from 2pm-7pm at Freedom, Angel Alley, off Whitechapel High St, London E1. Everyone is welcome to get involved, 'whether or not they have computer experience.'