MINUTES OF THE NATIONAL CAPITAL FREENET BOARD MEETING 21 November 1995 held in the Honeywell Room, RMOC Headquarters The following Board members were in attendance: Julie Chahal, 2nd Vice President, ab161 Jessica Cohen, aa724 Brett Delmage, aa693 Rosaleen Dickson, ac174 Yvonne Dionne, ao594 Chris Hawley, ah654 Rebecca Last, as006 David Loan, aa112 Andrew Patrick, 1st Vice President, aa118 Dave Sutherland, President, aa001 Richard Taylor, Secretary, aa333 Absent: David Blackwood, aa332 Scott Catterill, aa355 Richard Mount, aa009 Stephen Toy, aa102 NCF Staff Present: Lisa Donnelly, Executive Director; Ian D. Allen, System Administrator; Gordon Pearson, Director of Development; Sheila Currie-Alder, Administrative Coordinator. NCF committee/task force/project members and regular members present: Andrew Allan ct246, Jeff Bossert - Treasurer xx025, Matthew Darwin xx673, Jim Elder xx456, Miranda Gray xx717, Mike Jankulak am821, Dave Jones aa457, Andrea Kujala aq880, David Libert ah170, Mike Mason an956, John Stewart xx104. Dave Sutherland called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. 1. INTRODUCTIONS 2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF 17 OCTOBER 1995 Moved by D. Loan, seconded by R. Last carried. 3. REVIEW OF THE AGENDA Additional item: 6f Bell Rate Hike 4. OLD BUSINESS 4a. POLICY UPDATES - Richard Taylor announced that draft policy statements on (1) Freedom of Expression, (2) Privacy and (3) Binary Files have now been posted online. He requested board members to read these and continue the discussion online in ncf.board-discussion-unmoderated. The intent is to come to a consensus on these policies by the January 1996 Board meeting. 4b. REPORT OF EXPORTING NEWSGROUPS TASK FORCE The Task Force Report, which was available online, contained three possible motions: 1. Be it resolved that the NCF Board export *some* NCF newsgroups. 2. Be it resolved that the NCF export *all* NCF newsgroups. 3. Be it resolved that the NCF place restrictions on the export of the newsgroups. There was considerable discussion on the fact that motions 1 and 2 were contradictory. Jessica Cohen and Miranda Gray, speaking on behalf of the Task Force, acknowledged that this was true but the lack of clear position statements from the Board is making it difficult for the Task Force to come up with proposals. It was noted that this issue cuts to the overall policy issues of NCF. Should these decisions go to the AGM? It was also pointed out that there are two types of restrictions to be discussed: (1) restrictions on which groups to export (2) restrictions on which sites to export to. Changing technology may make the entire discussion irrelevant. MOTION TO EXPORT NCF NEWSGROUPS Moved by Jessica Cohen, seconded by Rebecca Last, with amendment suggested by Richard Taylor and accepted by Jessica and Rebecca as friendly (although redundant) to add "but not all": Be it resolved that the NCF export some, but not all, NCF newsgroups. The motion carried. There was a lengthy discussion on the desirability of placing restrictions on which sites to export to. Some members felt NCF should follow the Internet tradition of no restrictions while others felt that NCF should not export to any site which would not be cooperative in cancelling spams or tracking down people posting items with illegal content. It was noted that Information Providers would be given a choice of whether to export their newsgroup but would not have a choice of which sites to export to. MOTION ON SITE RESTRICTIONS OF EXPORTED NEWSGROUPS Moved by Jessica Cohen, seconded by Dave Loan: Be it resolved that the NCF place site restrictions on the export of its newsgroups. The motion carried. 5. 1996 ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING PLANS Andrew Patrick announced that motions from members for the AGM would be brought to the February Board meeting. Two proposed motions have been received to date. There could be a problem if a member brings a motion which the Board does not wish to bring to the AGM. It was also noted that last year few Board members spoke to the topics under discussion in the AGM. Candidates for the Board may need to be shown how to use the election menus. Matthew Darwin and Miranda Gray have suggested some menu design changes. The discussion is already posted in the AGM area (go agm-com). Garth Graham has been appointed the returning officer but there has been no final decision regarding a nominating committee. Lisa Donnelly is preparing terms of reference. The nominating committee formally established to fill an empty Board position may be reconvened with the exception of members who are running for a position. 6. REPORTS 6a. Operations Update - Lisa Donnelly noted that there are no action or decision items requiring attention. She will post a report shortly. 6b. Executive Committee - Dave Sutherland reported that Miranda Gray has resigned as Chair of the Hardware/Software Committee. Richard Mount has missed the number of Board meetings that results in his seat being declared vacant. However, since it is so close to the AGM election the Committee recommends taking no action to fill the vacancy at this time. 6c. Fundraising Update - Gordon Pearson distributed his report. The question of fundraising e-mails to regular members was raised. All members were e-mailed at the time of the Challenge Fund campaign. The Development Committee will discuss this. 6d. Financial Report - Jeff Bossert announced that the financial report is available online. Question: Are we financially healthy? Answer: Yes. 6e. Francophone Committee - Rosaleen Dickson reported that she and Yvonne Dionne attended the Francophone Committee meeting of November 2. Rosaleen's report of the meeting is posted online. MOTION TO APPROVE FORTIN AS CHAIR OF FRANCOPHONE COMMITTEE Moved by Rosaleen Dickson, seconded by Yvonne Dionne: That Mr. Jean Yves Fortin (ai772) be approved as chair of the Francophone Committee. The motion was carried unanimously. It was noted that Jean Yves Fortin has worked diligently on this committee for the last couple of years and that he has been selected by the members of the committee to serve as chair. 6f. Bell Rate Hike - Dave Loan suggested that there is public goodwill towards NCF and we should be in a position to obtain an exemption from the announced rate hike. Dave Sutherland and Lisa Donnelly will be attending the Internet Service Providers meeting and Telecommunities Canada is also approaching the CRTC to seek exemptions for community networks. "This is a $100,000 fundraising campaign" since it may cost us that much more to pay for phone lines after a rate hike. MOTION ON BELL RATE HIKES ACTION Moved by Richard Taylor, seconded by Rebecca Last: THAT NCF Board of Directors supports the campaign to keep members informed about Bell's initiative to raise its rates, and coordinate activities to address this issue. The motion carried. 7. PLANS AND BUDGET FOR 1996 Jeff Bossert distributed copies of the draft budget and gave a presentation using an overhead projector. At the end of the presentation the following points were made in the discussion: grants from either the region or the city are unlikely in the coming year; budget does not provide for additional public access terminals; there is no provision for additional telephone lines or modems; $2000 for WWW server software is based on a quote (seemed low) - needed for VISA donations; GUI design is being expensed while WWW implementation design work is being capitalized; it should be possible to get a homepage design donated in exchange for giving credit to the designer; projected revenues from PIDs expected to decrease after the first four months; planning committee should work on public access; libraries want to get connected - a grant fund for libraries to solve the access problems themselves may be the answer. Note that this budget allows FreeNet to remain free in 1996. 8. NEXT MEETING - TUESDAY 19 DECEMBER 1995 Will be primarily devoted to a discussion of strategy and directions for NCF in 1996. 9. ADJOURNMENT - moved by Dave Loan, seconded by Richard Taylor at 10:30, as notice was received that the building was closing for the night.