2015 LCS member's meeting minutes November 21st, 2015 (1st revision) Members present (Proxies in parenthesis) Lisa Weißbach David Salo Philip Newton *Kaleissin Jessie Sams Sai (Sentaro Mizuta) Nikita Monstersla Grayson Richardson (Leonardo Castro) Phillip Newton Tim Smith John Quijada Alex Fink Tony Harris (Lorinda Taylor, Jim Hopkins) Tim Stoffel Wm Annis (Britton Watkins) Jeff Jones Riley Martinez-Lynch Sylvia Sotomayor Jan van Steenbergen (Jan Havliš) Benjamin P Johnson (Glenn Abastillas) Patrick Niedzielski *Huchelmann Hosanna Tolman Max Dominik Weber DavidJPeterson (Kelvin Jackson, Jeffrey Brown, Sheri Wells-Jensen, Pete Bleackley) Ola Lisowska Mechthild Czapp G A Corley Christophe Grandsire-Koevoets (Michael Bacon, Bettina Beinhoff) Don Boozer Piermaria Maraziti (* Real name unknown) 31 in-person members, 13 proxies, 44 members total present. Joined later: *PAM *ScottH *Larry Amanda Furrow Billy Jaime Beltran *Tigt *AndChat The meeting was officially called to order at 2015 CET. Sai announced that Don Boozer was secretary for this meeting. Don Boozer posted te agenda of the meeting. Added to the agenda, to be discussed during the 'forum' portion: - Discussion of the Language Creation Tribune - Discussion of the LCS Jobs Board - LCC 6 feedback Officer's reports: Sylvia Sotomayor, Treasurer Finances Current balance in all accounts: $17,508.41 Balance in all accounts January 1st, 2014: $14,013.73 Balance in all accounts January 1st, 2015: $16,251.51 Income for 2014 Total: $4014.85 - From memberships: $3955 Expenses for 2014 Books, postage, fees, etc. : $1730.75 Income so far for 2015 Total: $6170.68 - From memberships: $4545 Expenses so far for 2015 (Not categorized): $4585.17 LCC6 summary Income: 1249 GBP + $200 USD Expenses: 2122.80 GBP Overall: (873.80 GBP), with offset of $200 donation by Tony Harris Other donors this year: John Clifford, Amanda Furrow Membership Currently 141 paid members 45 members were added in 2014 32 members were lost in 2014 Net change in membership: +13 49 members added so far in 2015 39 members were lost (some who may still renew) Net change in membership: +10 Of our membership: 27 are student members Members are from 27 different countries 90 members are in the USA 8 are in the UK 6 are in Germany 4 are in the Netherlands Sylvia also reports activity in the LCS lending library as small, but steady. Only about 6 members actively use the library. Further discussion on the lending library added to the forum section of the agenda. Don Boozer, Secretary Twitter statistics At the time of the last meeting in 2014: 800 Followers 3,847 Tweets As of today: 1,241 Followers (41% increase) 4,384 total Tweets Average 1.5 Tweets/day since the 2014 meeting Don was thanked for his work as secretary There was some discussion on managing the various social media accounts. It was decided to add this as an agenda item to the members' forum. David Peterson, Editor-in-Chief of Academic Publications Our only academic publication is Fiat Lingua Growth in readership has been steady. In 2012 we had 10,652 views In 2013 we had 13,068 views In 2014 we had 17,119 views In 2015 so far, we have 19,416. There have been articles for every month, but sometimes just barely. Wm Annis and Jhamie Latonero have helped out this year. There was discussion about various aspects of Fiat Lingua, and a further discussion of it was added as an agenda item to the members' forum. Christophe Grandsire-Koevoets, President Christophe reported that his first LCC as President was a big success. He thanked the following people for their help: Pete Bleackley for the local organization. Sylvia Sotomayor for all that hard work she did. Erin Peterson for her help during the conference. Jessie Sams for the LCC relay Sai and Alex Fink for technology Cristophe also thanked Jessie Sams for work on the Language Creation Tribune. George Corley, Vice President George reported briefly on the LCS Jobs Board, which will be discussed more during the forum portion of the meeting. Election results: Tony Harris announced the election results Sylvia Sotomayor re-elected as Treasurer Tim Stoffel elected as our new Secretary Nine board positions were up for election. The winners were: Christophe Grandsire-Koevoets Sai Alex Fink Tim Stoffel Jamin Johnson James Hopkins Jan van Steenbergen Jeffrey Brown Tony Harris Tony thanked Sai and Sylvia Sotomayor for their help with the election process. The discussion turned to the new voting process, which was an agenda item. The process was extensively discussed. Everyone seems to like having the elections separate from the meeting. Many people liked the gradient voting system, a few like yes/no/abstain. Some people were confused by the write-in voting process. Sai explained that this function couldn't be fixed easily in the code. There was also soe discussion of moving the elections to an earlier date and including candidates statements as part of the ballot. David Peterson motioned that voting should be done on a yes/no/abstain system, rather than a gradient system. Jan van Steenbergen seconded the motion. There was some discussion on whether this was a matter for the general membership to vote or, or board members. It was decided that it was likely a membership question. Sai will check the bylaws, but also set up the vote for the members. This vote would occur after the next agenda item. Forum items Jobs board Wm Annis discussed how he came about creating "A Buyer's Guide for Conlangs". A long discussion ensued. Major items covered included breaking out the difference between print media and other media (film, etc.), pricing out the conlanging process, the nature of the Hollywood talent solicitation process, phone calls vs email, a compendium of past work, possibly creating a 'Conlangers for Hire' board or a catalog of available-for- hire conlangers, and some possible conflicts with new EU privacy regulations. In the end, Wm Annis agreed to modify his buyer's guide to discuss the differences between print media and other media. David Peterson and Sylvia Sotomayor will work on a 'catalog of conlangers'. G A. Corley and maybe David Salo will field phone calls from potential conlang customers. The discussion turned briefly to the mechanics of the voting process for the vote proposed under the report on the election process. Language Creation Tribune David Peterson likes this publication, and singled out Cristophe, John Quijada, and Jessie Sams for their contributions to this publication. John Quijada asked how many people read the LCT. A number of people responded that they read it enthusiastically. But it was thought that the LCT could use some more promotion, especially through other language boards and social media. For social media, it was felt there should be a person responsible for posting LCS items to each of the major social media platforms. Automating this process was also extensively discussed. In the end, no action was taken on this item. LCC6 feedback A lot of good comments were made about the streaming and the videos that were produced of the conference. The discussion then turned to obtaining a better camera for covering LCC events. Rental vs purchase was discussed, as well as using 'YouTube Creative Spaces' (fixed studios in various places for general streaming to YouTube) for some events. Then, the discussion turned to future LCCs. Should they continue to alternate between Europe and the US/ Should they be every year rather than every other year? It seems that the lack of LCC proposals, as well as limited volunteer time from members was the limiting factor as to how frequently LCC's could be held. In the end, no action was taken on this item. LCS Lending Library It was thought that some testimonials from those who use the Lending library might more folks interested in using it. Some work could be dome to improve the Lending Library's website. The LCS Conlanger's library site and the Lending Library site could be better integrated. There was also a discussion on putting the Lending Library and the Conlanger's Library in their own subdomain. Sylvia Sotomayor was thanked for her work in making the Lending Library happen. G A Corley offered to set up links to direct folks to the LCS Amazon Smile program if they wish to buy a book they see in the library. Social media platforms and processes As this had been discussed in other contexts, and there was a feeling that this process needed more help or be automated, further discussion was deferred to the mailing list. Announcement of voting results Should directors be elected by yes/no/abstain? Yea: 33 votes, Nay: 7 votes, Abstain: 4 votes - carried Don Boozer had also added a question to the effect of 'When should the directors be elected? Before or during the meeting?' The results: Before the meeting: 40 votes, During the meeting: 0 votes, Abstain: 4 votes In the same vote, it was asked if Sai should have permission to write up a bylaw amendment. The results were Yea: 39 votes, Nay: 0 votes, Abstain 5 votes. - carried Volunteers/Help needed John Quijada suggested that Christophe write up something about help being needed and include it in the next LCT. Christophe agreed. Floor motions/discussions (No items) Amanda Furrow announced that the annual Conlang Card Exchange was open for this year. This activity will be open for all conlangers, not just LCS members. There was then a consensus among several members that the business of the meeting had been accomplished, and that the meeting should be adjourned. Christophe adjourned the meeting without a vote at 23:03.