Minutes of the National Capital Freenet Board Meeting April 21, 1998 - 7:00pm Held at the Olde Forge Community Resource Centre 2730 Carling Avenue - Ottawa, Ontario PRESENT: Jim Elder, aa456 JE Michael Mason, Secretary, an956 MM Dave Sutherland, President/Chairman, aa001 DS Natalie Munro, aa966 NM Andre Vellino, Vice President, an386 AV Jean Wilmot, aa145 JW Chris Hawley, ah654 CH Jeff Bossert, Treasurer, au025 JB Jessica Cohen, aa724 JC Miranda Gray, ak717 MG Andre Nellis, bs904 AN NCF Staff Present: Christopher Cope, Executive Director, bz787 Sheila Alder, Administrative Coordinator, xx001 Yannick Gravel, System Administrator, xx136 NCF Members Present: E. O'Driscoll, Minute Taker, af995 Brett Delmage, aa693 Andre Ouellette, bf966 Richard Bethell, cj434 Guests: Pat Gauthier Anthony Trombetta 1. INTRODUCTIONS Dave Sutherland took the chair and Michael Mason acted as secretary of the meeting. Directors being present and notice of the meeting having been duly given, the meeting was declared to be properly constituted for the conduct of business. 2. MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS MEETING The Chairman tabled the amended draft minutes of the last meeting of the Board held in March 1998, which, upon motion made by Natalie Munro, seconded by Miranda Gray, and carried, were approved. 3. REVIEW OF AGENDA FOR THIS MEETING: Miranda Gray requested that the item regarding existing policy review be moved to the last item. Jean Wilmot requested that an item regarding communication with members be added to the agenda. 4. OLD BUSINESS There was no old business items to discuss. 5. Reports a) Executive Director's Report While NCF is continuing to be under its projected numbers of new registrations, 54.1% of new registrants made donations, which is the highest ever percentage of new members donating. Previous trends of existing members making donations being down and that the average donation is down has continued. NCF's membership increased slightly this month, growing to 21,000. The member to line ration remains at 104:1. PPP usage is unchanged this month, with peak usage at 52 simultaneous connections. Usage of the Extended Access Lines continues to climb. There are approximately 5,000 weekly sessions. In public relations, Sheila will speak to a group called Webgirls on May 15 at Computer City. Chris Cope will meet with a Kiwanian group at the Hunt Club, and will also meet with the Ottawa Citizen to give information for an article which will appear on April 29th. As for the monthly top five priorities, the membership drive is at the top, followed by revenue development. System stability, revising the board manual and the Industry Canada project round off the list. A series of graphs related to system usage and statistics prepared by Ian Allen were presented to the board. Each graph was explained, with brief discussion throughout the presentation. The Member-get-a-Member campaign will be launched on Friday, May 8th at the Myers Clearance Event at the Nepean Sportsplex. All members will get a brief e-mail message informing them about the vital details of the campaign. There was brief discussion regarding the length of the message, its content, and how much would be "too much". The goal of the campaign is to get 5,000 new members. Sheila asked that if there are a lot of new members that members of the board assist in the office during that time, as the student workforce is less at this time of the year. Chris asked for board permission to attend the Net 98 conference this year. After brief discussion, it was generally agreed that Chris should be in attendence. b) Treasurer's Report Jeff Bossert presented the highlights of the report. Key indicators: Revenue is still under predicted levels in the budget. New members continue to donate more than expected, though the trend of less new members than predicted continued as well. Office expenses include invoices from Carleton for telephone services and other miscellaneous items from Carleton. Cash on hand at the end of the month is significantly below budgeted levels. It is necessary to work on increasing revenues and decreasing costs. One possibility for lowering costs would be to re-examine amounts paid for obtaining our Internet access. Various options are being evaluated and further action is expected. Terminating phone lines is another possible alternative, all the while exploring the possibility of expanding the Extended Access plan. There was brief discussion regarding that possibility, as well as discussion about service restrictions, use of the proxy server. The intention is to reduce restrictions and Chris to decide what is feasible and report at a future meeting. 6. NEW BUSINESS a) NCF-SFSC Bicycle Tour Fundraiser A handout was presented for comments and approval of the Board (Draft Agreement for joint organisation of the cycle tour betweein the NCF and Citizens for Safe Cycling). Various details regarding the tour were discussed, including the estimation that NCF's costs would amount to approximately $1,000 and revenue sources would consist of a $25 participation fee and sponsorships. Some discussion on the liability insurance issue and what other risks might be incurred. Andre Ouellette offered that NCF would get very good publicity in this event. It was asked if the decision to participate could be deferred a bit to see how NCF revenue figures roll out as June 1998 comes around. Some discussion about commitment of funds and the impact on the budget and potential rewards for the return for the time/effort. It was asked how many volunteer hours would be required. Brett Delmage responded that it is hard to predict as sometimes people leave the registration to the very last minute. Two changes to the agreement were requested: 1. The accountant will have extra work to do and will have to be paid; 2. 10 days after the event is too short a period of time another reasonable period should be negotiated. The agreed Item number 9 is changed from 10 days to 15th day of the following month in which the event is held. Motion moved by Chris Hawley and seconded by Natalie Munro to approve that NCF participate in the tour and sign the agreement as amended. The motion was approved unanimously. b) Acceptable Use Policy Review Some discussion on the handout. NCF requires rules to terminate accounts that are being used to spam. The sooner that NCF implements these new rules, the better, as NCF is currently on one known blacklist. Some discussion on Dropboxes and other spam issues. A motion was made by Miranda Gray, seconded by Jessica Cohen that the NCF Board of Directors direct the Complaints Resolution Committee to start enforcing the terms of bylaw 2 to further the objects of the organization such as drop boxes and any form of spam haven. The motion was carried unanimously. c) Communication with users regarding system changes There was discussion regarding methods used to inform members about the changes to the 520-1135 modem pool. E-mail could have been used to inform the membership, but it was not. It was generally agreed that NCF needs to do this. A tool should be made available to accomplish this. Further discussion regarding a possible monthly e-mail to communicate on a regular basis, as long as it is a short message. ISPs send e-mail to all customers on a regular basis, thus it shouldn't be a problem for NCF to speak to its members directly. d) Existing policy review After a brief discussion, it was generally agreed that existing policies will be improved/updated over time. 7. DATE OF THE NEXT MEETING The next meeting will be held on May 19, 1998 at the St. Laurent branch of the Ottawa Public Library, 515 Cote Street. 8. ADJOURNMENT The meeting adjourned at 10:03pm on a motion made by Michael Mason and seconded by Miranda Gray. Motion carried unanimously.