-- Start log: Wednesday, March 14, 2001 9:36:10 pm ASI Meeting Server time-- 

TimCadell says, "I hope I picked a good name." Greg says, "Ah, the tape is
now running." TimCadell says, "Can you repeat all of that, Greg?" Greg
says, "OK."
Greg says, "I know what I wish the Moon Society were: a large organization
with lots of local chapters and conferences and publications. Activities
would include star parties, lunar science, brainstorming ideas for stories,
lots of social events, selling lunar kickshaw, and especially recruiting
new members. The new members would get sucked into the Artemis Society and
start participating in ASI activities; and some of them would become
Artemis Project program participants. I'd also like to have the Moon
Society able to fund and conduct some major research projects, including
participating in (but not controlling) Project Leto." Greg says, "Ta da."
irs says, "Nicely put. Now we have to get to that." Scottyg says, "Ok,
now...Can we reduce that to some short-term goals?" Greg says, "I can't,
no."
Scottyg says, "Just two or three at most." Greg says, "Every time I think
of short-term goals, I think of the action items required to accomplish
them; and the goals vaporize." TimCadell says, "Do we have a mailing list
for chapter leaders?" Scottyg says, "Where I'm going with this is...If we
can identify a small number of short-term goals, then I think we can get
Margo to help find staffing for them." Greg says, "Now that we have a basic
business infrastructure created, I'd say the next most important thing is
to write a local chapter manual. That manual needs to include sections on
the rules, how to form a local chapter, lots of ideas and helps for chapter
activities, recruting brochures, templates for meeting announcements,
templates for agendas, templates for chapter newsletters (including web
pages)." TimCadell says, "Sounds like I should take that action item."
TimCadell says, "But I'll be asking for input. Maybe from Simon, he seems
to have more experience than I do at that." Greg says, "Another key
short-term goal is to clean up the Moon Society web site. Change it so that
it can be maintained with WSD. Move everythig into WSD, and kill anybody
who telnets in to change the site. (Or at least revoke that person's access
to the server.)" Greg says, "Simon Rowland?"
TimCadell says, "Have we had problems with files changing under WSD?"
TimCadell says, "Yeah, remember he gave that talk at last July's LDC
meeting about setting up meetings." Greg says, "No problems that I know of;
it's just that the current web site is a confusing mess." Greg says, "PHP3
is cute, but very difficult to maintain without a guide map." TimCadell
says, "I was going to say that I have used telnet to edit the Bay Area
chapter's files." Scottyg says, "Yeah, theres a doc sitting in WSD
(what-you-can-do.html) that I can't figure out where to put with the
current site layout." Greg says, "I haven't been too enthusiastic about
doing anything there myself, but I find it even more debilitating that Jim
Burk hasn't done a damned thing since he first set up the site." Greg says,
"Yup. I fear we need to start over with a complete redesign. I just haven't
been up to it lately." Greg says, "More than anything else these days,
people will judge us by our web site." Scottyg says, "Speaking of web site,
one of my pet projects reached fruition today. My company's new web site
went live this morning." TimCadell says, "What's the URL, Scotty?" Greg
says, "Tim, to the best of my knowledge, Simon does not have any experience
with setting up meetings or running organizations. So there's great risk
that anything you get from him would be theoretical rather than based on
actual experience. On the other hand, if he will draft stuff, at least we'd
have a starting point. " Scottyg says, "http://www.stalkerradar.com" irs
says, "Two points:"
Greg says, "The important thing is that you should never publish Simon's
work without first reviewing it very carefully." Scottyg says, "Yeah, Simon
has a lot of energy and gets things done." irs says, "One: the Moon Society
web site is pretty, but we have to kill the "last update date" (or whatever
it says) and the "upcoming events" headers. Sure, it may not be updated
very often, but we shouldn't rub the viewer's nose in it." Greg says, "The
phrase "Stalker Radar" has some interesting connotations." Greg says,
"Point well-taken, Ian."
irs says, "Two: As much as we want to build from the ground up right, might
it be a little easier to NOT set up the whole chapter infrastructure right
now, but instead let them grow organically, and then, at some
not-too-distant point in the future, put together a few of the local group
folk to design that infrastructure for their successors?" Greg says, "Nice
web site, Scotty!"
TimCadell says, ""Nice fron tpage, Scotty." Greg says, "I'd recommend
leaving out the dba reference, though. That information might appear in an
about-the-company page if it needs to be on the web at all." Scottyg says,
"Yeah, there was a LOT of debate about that trade name." Greg says, "I love
this illo that says "Speed Limit 20. Your speed 65." Heh." TimCadell says,
"Greg, Simon gave a talk on "Promoting a chapter". Looking at his synopsis
that he gave me, it looks okay, but I'll keep that in mind." Scottyg says,
"LOL. I had one other goal tonight...Work related...Wanted to tralk to
Randall about WSD Lite to use to maintain it." Greg says, "OK, I've ordered
14 radars guns. Now I wonder what I'll do with them?" TimCadell says,
"Greg, jburk@moonsociety.org owns the chapters-council mailing list. Is
that the one I would use to start coordinating the different chapters?"
Greg says, "Tim, yes."
Greg says, "Let's do what's required to change it so that you're the owner
of that mailing list." TimCadell says, "Okay, I can do that."
Greg says, "Jim doesn't even read his email these days." Greg says, "(Not
that I can talk.)"
TimCadell grins.
TimCadell says, "Okay, that's changed and I'll check it now." Greg says,
"Wow! This is really clean HTML here, Scotty. You must not be using one of
those Microsoft authoring things." TimCadell says, "By the way, we're using
HTMLKit to edit web pages. Very nice interface, though at times a bit
buggy. Includes ability to edit files directly over FTP. Loads them, you
edit them, then it saves them back." Greg says, "We seem to have a serious
CyberTeams shortage tonight." Greg says, "Tim, it's 6:55"
TimCadell says, "Also has built-in HTMLTidy and lots of other features. And
it's free." TimCadell says, "Yup, time for me to go. See you guys!" Greg
says, "See ya!"
Greg says, "(I was afraid we'd make Tim miss his bus.)" TimCadell has
disconnected.
Scottyg says, "We used a contractor to create the actual pages. I'm not
sure what he uses, but its not Microsoft junk." irs says, "bye Tim."
Greg says, "Darn, look at this employment solicitation. Makes me wish I had
used the past 2 years to learn 3D CAD instead of doing what my boss told me
to do." Greg says, "Well, does anybody have any other moon business that I
need to do tonight?" Greg says, "I still need to spend some time cuddled up
with spacejobs.com before I retire." The housekeeper arrives to cart
TimCadell off to bed. irs says, "Nothing pressing at this end. Day job and
magazine are pretty much swmaping me." Scottyg says, "BTW Greg..."
Scottyg says, "Jennifer Day and I took the email welcome letter you did and
edited it slightly to make a renewal letter." Scottyg says, "We also put
both of them on a Moon Society letterhead to make a printed version."
Scottyg says, "If you want to do something to replace any of those, please
do. Meanwhile, we have something useable." Greg says, "Great! Duh ... I had
completely forgotten about that." Greg says, "Yeah, now that the pressure
is off, I'll probably think up something really creative. :)" Greg says,
"Reminds me of the time I scored 100-4X in the NRA winter pistol match; in
the last round, when no matter what I scored, it wouldn't matter." Scottyg
says, "The email version of the renewal letter is installed in the
templates on both Moon Society and ASI." Greg says, "Are we using different
templates for the Moon Soiety and ASI?" Greg says, "Moon Society, too."
Greg says, "Not to mention the Moon Moiety." Scottyg says, "ASI still has
its own templates, but since Moon Society renewals are being recorded on
ASI as the master copy, we needed the Moon Society templates on ASI."
Scottyg says, "ASI is not presently sending out its own welcome or renewal
letters." Scottyg says, "The Moon Society letter mentions ASI membership."
Greg says, "That's reasonable."
Scottyg says, "Which reminds me...I need to get Randall to refresh the Moon
Society database." Greg says, "Since ASI is not very active these days; it
doesn't have anything to sell members, and maintains its membership only
via the Moon Society." Scottyg says, "ASI has all the updates. Moon Society
gets updated from ASI." Greg says, "It seems like it should be the other
way around, with the Moon Society transmitting data to ASI." Scottyg says,
"It probably should, but there was the problem of LT doing the updates.
They are set up on ASI but not Moon Society, and since that was temporary,
I didn't want to rock the boat." Scottyg says, "If Randall can run the
update, we can switch over." Greg says, "Got it. No superfluous
boat-rocking required." Greg says, "This, of course, requires an increase
in the local Randall density." Greg says, "They must be having a good time
in Maryland." Scottyg says, "I don't think its a major effort. He's done it
once before." Greg says, "On the other hand, the last time I talked to
Randall he was kind of concerned about meeting payroll again. Golly."
Scottyg says, "If he were here, I could make a small contribution to that."
Greg says, "There's one thing that Bill Gates did that I like. His
philosophy was never to expand the company until you had enough capital to
meet payroll for a full year with no revenues." Greg says, "Well, there"
irs says, "Well, LRC Publications seems to be doing OK. Got a story on the
final Nebula ballot (mine arrived today), and we're going into another
mailing with DNA Publications (though the mailing I'm putting together is
on hold: the associate editor of one of the magazines I'm gonna work with
died last week)." Greg says, "Well, there's always the telephone. You can
reach Randall *anywhere*." Greg says, "I don't think he takes a bath with
his cell phone, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear that he does." Scottyg
says, "It wasn't that urgent from my side." Greg says, "Ian, when are SFWA
dues due again?" Greg says, "Now, there's something to contemplate. Is
there any advantage to having everybody's dues come due at the same time"
Greg says, "?"
Scottyg says, "Ummm. Not from MY point of view." Greg says, "That settles
that, then, Scotty." irs says, "The advantage is simplified record-keeping
and one bulk mailing. The disadvantage is one huge mailing (vs. regular
mailing)." Scottyg says, "And a whole year's worth of income entries at
once. Ugh." irs says, "Due date: I don't recall. I think it's summer." Greg
says, "Yeah; doing it as a monthly accounting thing seems to work better if
our goal is to get to the point where we have full-time paid staff." irs
says, "Yeah, right, 'cause I got all the renewal money soon after taking
office. Membership year is 1 July to 30 June." Scottyg says, "Oh, I have a
policy question...." Greg says, "OK. I was just wondering whether I would
be able to afford to renew my dues. Maybe I will by then." Greg says, "Oh
goody, a policy question." Greg says, "Policy answer: No, I don't think
President Bush should nuke Iraq." Greg says, "Yet."
Scottyg says, "If a member's credit card is declined, what should we do? I
propose to try it again in two weeks, then send him a notice if it is
declined the 2nd time." Greg says, "Sounds reasonable to me. I think that's
what I would want us to do if it hapened to me." Greg says, "or happened,
even"
Scottyg says, "If the CyberCash link-up were working, it wouldn't be an
issue since it would be declined real-time and he would be aware of that."
irs says, "Yeah, Scotty, that's pretty standard procedure. That's what I do
with declined cards." Scottyg says, "But since I process these
after-the-fact, there's no feedback to the member." Greg says, "Yeah."
Greg says, "So, anything else for tonight?" Scottyg says, "Ok, I'll handle
it that way. I have one to deal with at the moment." Greg says, "Darn, I
wish I had some vacation time. I could go to one of these job fairs in
Denver." Scottyg says, "Shall we stop the recorder?" Greg says, "Yeah."
Scottyg says, "stop moon recorder"
Greg says, "Did it work?"
Scottyg says, "nope."
Greg says, "I think Tim started it. Does that mean he has to stop it?"

-- End log: Wednesday, March 14, 2001 10:23:35 pm ASI Meeting Server time--