Archive:2005-05-22

FC.o conference call for 22 May 2005.

Can we just incorporate already?

 * We're gonna do it unless you say otherwise
 * Reasons not to: Possibility of Florida having crappy annual filing practices; possibility of being better to incorporate in another state
 * Annual filing doesn't look bad
 * If we're 501(c)3, we'll have to do a ton of paperwork
 * If we should have incoporated somewhere else, the worst that happens is that we're out $80 (donated)
 * We won't likely have an actual office somewhere for a long time, so we'd be waiting a while

UK groups
We should set up a meeting with the UK and US people and discuss how we can work together across the Atlantic.

Free Culture Phase 2 report
Gavin and Nelson will report in about the weekend's events.

Details of incorporation

 * Who should be on the board of directors?
 * What sort of people?
 * Academics, alumni? What ratios/percentages?  Should we have a student majority?  A majority of people who have been involved with FC.o as students at some point in time?
 * Who specifically should be on the board at the moment?
 * How big should the board ultimately be?
 * Do we want an advisory board?
 * Officers: what are the roles/titles? What do we need?  Who are they?

The Future(tm)

 * What should FC.o be focusing on?
 * What should the structure be, what should the organization look like?
 * Funding: what do we need it for? Where do we get it?
 * Office / staff: Should we have a paid staff member? What sort of person should the staff member be?  Where should our office be?

Minutes
Attendance: Nelson, Nick, Andy, Gavin (and Eldo a little towards the end)

Connections to Free Culture

 * Make magazine: Hobbyists, geek-oriented magazine that covers political issues such as the broadcast flag and is definitely in favor of open source/free culture issues
 * How can we get involved? Write articles? Promotion?
 * Community wireless
 * Push for taking down regulations that prevent municipal wireless from becoming a reality
 * We won't be taking the lead, but following the push to get students behind it

Can we just incorporate already?
Three of three Free Culture members say yes.

UK groups
We want to meet at a time that would be convenient for folks living in the UK (GMT), so we're shooting for 11 EST AM on Saturday, May 28.

Free Culture Phase 2 report

 * Our grant is ~$3,000.
 * How do we want to use it and what do we hope to accomplish?
 * $1,000 for transportation subsidies to get members
 * $800 Initial investment for merchandise, for fund-raising
 * $800 Propaganda/Promotional Materials: banners, posters, fliers, etc.
 * What's left: e.g. $100 Buying domain names, other expenses.
 * What are our long-term expenses, e.g. does incorporation cost us annually?
 * Barring catastrophic events, things like our hosting from Downhill Battle should be fine.
 * Nelson will post a draft of what we expect to use the money on and develop it from there
 * The Ford Foundation funds student groups, and works though fiduciary agents


 * Creative Commons's gift is still in limbo, but it should be coming in the next few weeks


 * Other cool stuff at the conference:
 * Speed Geeking: people demonstrate technology for 5 minutes to other people at the conference
 * Volunteer module for Civic Space: it's cool, but do we need it?
 * Prometheus radio
 * Scribe Video: Gretchen in Philly, Nick will try to network with them and see if we can work together
 * Open-Source Beer: sell microbrewery beer as a fund raiser


 * Work on a white paper about making money from Free stuff: Open Source, Creative Commons, etc.
 * Convincing the Swarthmore school board on using Creative Commons licenses
 * Maybe start with the professors to help build "success stories"
 * Getting scholarly papers/thesis in a central database, digitized and in different formats, and under free licenses is a massive undertaking, but a possible result of more academic support of copyleft

Details of incorporation

 * Who should be on the board of directors?
 * Nelson, Gavin, and Nick...
 * Other members are still a point of discusison, including what type of people we want.
 * What sort of people?
 * Alumni of FC.org groups to start
 * Current discussion is 3 students and 2 "other" people...
 * How big should the board ultimately be?
 * It should be an odd number...
 * Three inital board member

The Future(tm)
Questions that we want to ask the public on our blog to help develop the future of Free Culture.
 * Problems
 * What if people get offended when we don't take their specific suggestion?
 * How shoudl we reconcisle difference of opinion in who should be on the board?
 * Explaning our rationale behind our decisions should help diffues conflicts


 * Questions about our organizational structure are related to our board decisions, and should be posted to the blog together (narrowing the questiosn under "Details of Incoporation" on the agenda above)

Next Week

 * Post to the Core list about our questions and discuss what we can answer/refine the questions we can answer into what we need to solicit from the public
 * We need to discuss these questions before we can decide if Reed Hundt should be a candidate
 * So, we need to contact Lessig let him know that we're not prepared to make a decision yet