VANCOUVER REGIONAL FREENET ASSOCIATION BOARD OF DIRECTORS MINUTES OF MEETINGS May 30, 1995. 411 Dunsmuir Meeting Room Present: Brian Campbell, Sharon Zaluski, Stephen Gauer, Eric Teachman, Vic Vaivads, Margaret Coates, Eric Yung, Ross Penner, George Lindholm, Neil K. Guy Absent: Larry Kuehn, Tom Hansen, Penny Goldsmith. Guests: Lorne Gray, Howard Hunchak 1.0 Agenda Motion: (Ross/Vic) That the agenda distributed be approved. PASSED. 2.0 Minutes of April 18th and May 9th. * minutes to be dealt with next meeting. * Eric Y. was away for the May 9th meeting and still requires minutes text from Tom. 2.1 Ted's Resignation: 2.2 Claire's Resignation: * we combined a motion to accept two resignations we received. Motion: (Ross/Margaret) To accept the resignations of Ted Heatherington as Fundraising Chair, and Claire Toynbee as User Support Chair. PASSED 2.3 Sharon's Resignation: * Sharon has offered her resignation due to time complications as a result of her pregnancy. * She has offered the position of Volunteer Coordinator to Lorne and he's accepted. Motion: (Margaret/Ross) To accept Sharon Zaluski's resignation as Volunteer Coordinator. PASSED. Motion: (Vic/Margaret) To accept Lorne Gray as our new Volunteer Coordinator. PASSED. 3.0 Policy Issues: 3.1 alt.groups: * George brought up the issue that with the new HDs we have the HD space for a full newsfeed, but we have no active policy on censorship, and he wants direction before turning "on" the feed for the alt.hierarchy * rather lengthy discussion ensued about censorship, and liability. * disucssion broke down to the following points: - 1) philosophy and what we want to offer - 2) impact on the FreeNet - 3) potential legal obligations Motion: (Margaret/Vic) That we allow the full alt.hierarchy to the public while continuing to search for information on our legal positions etc., and we will consult the membership at the Annual General Meeting. Vote was 5 in favour, 3 against, the motion was carried. * request by Ross for some of the multi-cultural newsgroups as well. 3.2 FTP * in the past, we had removed file transfer access due to restricted HD considerations. Vic is asking for direction on this issue. * additional limitations of the 56k line to our modem bank at 411 Dunsmuir was also discussed. Motion: (Eric Y./Margaret) That no binary FTP abilities be allowed due technical limitations, and we will revise at a future date when technology allows. PASSED. 3.3 BC Information Highway Counsel: * Brian advised us that BC is forming a BC policy on the info highway * a meeting is scheduled for Victoria on Jun 21st. * Our position on this was discussed, and chiefly reiterated our mandate and constitution - chief points are free, total public access, and support for FreeNets and the libraries. * policy discussion meetings next Tuesday/Thursday. 4.0 Treasurer's Report: Tom absent, no report * Ross asked for clarification of the $5500 item for Information Providers * Ross was directed to send proposals for spending the money to the Operations Committee. 5.0 Committee Reports: 5.1 Operations Report: * Our 2 Section 25 people have been extended for 6 weeks, in lieu of another Section 25 person being hired. * staff meetings indicate that the staff is integrating well. * Eric T.'s proposal for membership drive is to go to the Operation's Committee ASAP. * next Board meetings - we should review our goals, our staff and priorities. 5.2 Hardware/Software: * the new HDs were installed and are now running * some optimization of disk layout and some tuning of the system has been carried out. * suggest that we purchase a commercial copy of zmodem (a binary transfer protocol) - some discussion centredaround a binary license vs. a source license. * Eric Y. raised the question of a purchase of this when we're not currently allowing FTP transfers. Motion: (Vic/George) That the Board authorize the purchase of a source license for zmodem, not to exceed $500 US. PASSED. * questions from HW/SW about purchase of new machine - George is to investigate technical specs, and the issue is to be revisited at the next Board meeting. 4.2 System Design: * tabled discussion on machine siting and location to next Board meeting. * Alex is working on the Human Resource Development job bank stuff. 5.4 Fundraising: * Ted has resigned, and a new chair is needed ASAP. At the moment, volunteers are to be centred around Kathy. * Kathy has several initiatives working * talk to Carleton about software to do a "PBS" style drive - delegated as a task to Kathy and Alex. 5.5 Public Relations: * display board and case is finished, and displayed to the Board. * signs for public access terminals were also displayed * Neil was given approval for both items and commended for the jobs. * Childnet stuff is proceeding with 4 people under Neil * Operations Committee was asked to investigate using the lit sign in the window of our 411 office space. 5.6 Community Content - report distributed * discussion centred around mail server software, and offering it to our IPs * clarification - Ross is already authorized to create new newgroups and SIGS by passing the request to the system administrators. Motion: (Ross/Lorne) That Hardware/Software and Systems Design examine the feasibility and cost of implementing mailserver software to enhance the value of the FreeNet to Information Providers. Vote was 7 for, 2 against, the motion was carried. 6.0 User Training Coordinator's Report: * There will be a Saturday training session * we now have a used laptop, but still looking for a LCD screen * suggestion that we register Telix - matter to be discussed with Kathy * 2 new members, for a total of 9 trainers. * next training sessions are June 10th and 17th from 10am to noon and there is still a limit of about 20 people. 7.0 User Support Coordinator's Report: * there is currently no chair of this committee to replace Claire * Gerry Leminsky is filling in in this role. 8.0 Public Access Liaison's report: Penny absent * publicity of Public Access sites - needs support and user training for these sites - the issue was given to the Equal Access Committee for more work. 9.0 Vice-President's report: Covered under the Operations Report 10.0 Membership Coordinator's Report: * discussion about the initiative to call-out by Board members - we do need a mechanism of reporting back our results. * we may want to re-examine the registration process due to some feedback we've gotten. * possible thank-you letter after registration? * we have 5905 users, 2025 are members and roughly 1700 are paid until the end of July. 11.0 Volunteer Coordinator's report: * Lorne is now the Coordinator, and they have had a volunteer meeting. 12.0 Labour Liaison's report: Larry absent, no report.