hello is docelic around? looks like not apparently not ntk, did you forget? no, i was doing some reading waiting for 17:00 and accidentally went a few minutes over So what sort of policies were going to be discussed? The only one I can remember is the one-issue-per-motion suggestion. I don't think that's a real valid policy. It's too hard to define what "one issue" is. Members are free to vote against any votes they believe were proposed inappropriately. I would tend to agree with that. I do think that we could improve the procedure for voting on bylaws, but I don't think limiting it to one issue per amendment is practical or desirable there may be some merit in particular to having a period of public discussion after an amendment is proposed, whereby it can be discussed/altered before it is voted on, especially since as things stand anyone can initiate a vote at any time I like that idea. also there is an unresolved issue right now about conflicting amendments with overlapping voting periods, namely if they both pass how to resolve them I guess we didn't draw up an agenda for this meeting (and docelic didn't show), but I was more interested in discussing how things are going with moving forward with a new server, bank account, & also 501(c) things I got the hcoop debit card yesterday in the mail. I think that means I can switch Xiolink billing to the bank account now/ great. so in terms of the bank account, you have everything except checks, yes? I think that's accurate. I also have a Wells Fargo guy leaving phone messages about setting up credit card billing. and the paypal link is still pending, yes? what's the address you are using for paypal? If that's cheap enough, it could be useful. PayPal is all set up. And the address has always been payment at hcoop dot net. Great. So perhaps we should discuss if we want to set new payment policies and how to start collecting those negative balances What kind of policies would those be? By the way, for informational purposes, I am going to remain in Philadelphia (although soon at a different address) this summer until around August, when I will be moving to Queens in NYC, where I shall remain. well for instance, do we want to move to fixed base payments rather than computing them based on exact expenses every month, and also a set policy for people who owe the coop money and also if and when and how much we are going to require in the amount of refundable deposits, per the bylaws The payment amounts depend on how much we pay for a server. (and hosting) and if nothing else, we should let users know about the new bank account and start requiring those negative balances to be paid I think one or two months' worth should be fine for a deposit. Are we still planning on having the dues be semi-dependent on bandwidth usage? well, yes. there is a question of how we are going to finance this new server It's only another way of saying "don't let your balance get dangerously low," as I understand it. mwolson, I don't think so. mwolson: at the very minimum any excess expenses incurred by a user should still be charged. but under a new hosting plan it is likely that we will not be going over our allocated bandwidth so perhaps then we won't need to charge extra for bandwidth `hogs' until it becomes an issue That makes sense. *** mwolson (mike@hltp-b-155.resnet.purdue.edu) has quit: "Last final exam of the semester" I propose not calling this an official meeting. I guess we can't without docelic, anyway. I see the nonrefundable deposit acting as a sort of loan. if we required a deposit of say 30 dollars per user, that could finance our first new hosting arrangement right now, if everyone paid. the only other ways i see to accrue money is to charge an excess per month (which is a good idea, but takes time to save it up), or to make large "once-off" charges to users Actually, if I recall the bylaws properly it only takes two of us to hold a meeting, but I'm fine with not actually setting any policy today. I do think we should at least resolve to start collecting on the negative balances I'm sending an e-mail now to Xiolink about changing contract ownership & billing. It might make sense to wait until that is switched over, if only to prevent working on too much stuff at once. you mean about collecting on the balances? I think it would be a good idea to start early, we already have the paypal in place and it will probably take some time and reminders to get everyone to actually pay up. we'll need all the cash we can get for the new server/hosting I have the new web portal system ready for beta usage. That will organize a lot of what is going on, and for some ill-defined reason I think it's helpful to have that going before proceeding much further. Ok. I think I will revise ActionItems now with some new stuff. As far as the server itself, I think all you have to do is have in writing that you are giving that to the coop for it to be legal. I suspect Abulafia won't be very critical to us for much longer, so it might not even be worth switching it legally. the hosting? perhaps not. but at least giving the server to the coop doesn't involve any outside entities. I do think that getting the new server/hosting and unfreezing membership should be our top priority now, above even the 501(c) business. But how is that application coming? Well, I've been drafting some stuff on my machine, I will upload it after the meeting. I think we should be able to send that in within a couple weeks we already have incorporated, officers, bylaws, EIN. it's just a matter of finishing the application paperwork but in terms of achieving new hosting, aren't the two main things in our way right now just 1. raising enough cash and 2. deciding on a provider and acquiring those services? Raising enough cash is not an issue. I can pay for everything myself in the worst case. speaking of which, I was going to ask for a partial refund due to my tight finances, but if I can only hold out until August or September I'll have some big loans coming through, so I think I can hold off on that so in that case, we really just need to figure out where we want our hosting or collocation, and possible also building our server. It's pretty easy for me to PayPal you the money, since nothing has gone into the bank account yet. well, I'll see how things go in the next month, when I have to pay new rent deposits and such Can you take a gander at http://users.hcoop.net/abu/ActionItems ? (The web portal shouldn't work yet for anyone but me.) ok Oh yeah, and the member contract is also in the way of accepting new members. Ok, that was my other question I added a question to LegalQuestions for a lawyer, namely whether we actually need "contracts" for our members. contracts imply some sort of future quid-pro-quo, so my question was if we are requiring users to pay in advance could we just have a membership agreement? either way we'd want to have it reviewed or drafted by a lawyer at some point. however I wonder if it is premature to require a lawyer to do so before we reopen membership I'm not up on these legal terms. "Contract" and "agreement" look the same to me. ...but I'm not trying to argue the point. I'm quite content to leave that sort of issue up to you. ;) Let's see if we can agree on the dependency graph among our current action items, then. a contract requires a quid-pro-quo. i do this, you do that. i.e. the member agrees to pay a certain amount every month for a year and the coop provides certain services, with remedies if either party reneges. i see an agreement as basically just consenting to certain terms (i.e. just a Terms of Service). I want to square things with Xiolink before getting a new server. Sound reasonable? like when you sign up for a landline or dialup service, you don't usually sign a contract the way you do with renting a house for a year or getting an annual wireless plan yes that sounds reasonable Probably do everything under "Switch to group finances" first, actually. yes, definitely "Tweak bylaws" only seems to be in the critical path for 501(c) application. Agree? the only thing I thought was helpful for 501(c) in the bylaws was the "dissolution" clause, and that already passed. speaking of which I need to update those documents I want to have the web portal running smoothly at the start of using the new server, but that's not a big deal. I think that's ready now. ok I think that gives us "finances" and "contract" as dependencies for "new server." I consider finding the right server & hosting to be included in that item. Ok, the only thing I would dispute is whether getting a lawyer to draft a contract or terms is truly necessary for us to start with new hosting because that is a considerable expense and could be a big time-bottleneck as well. I think we need to consider whether the benefits outweight postponing the new server and opening up membership at this time I'm pretty big on the benefits of avoiding liability (even as a corporation) for others' criminal acts! True. Now that HCOOP is incorporated, members should be shielded from any individual liability (where they are not at fault). a lawyer would help minimize the coop's liability as well, however are we at the point where that is critical yet? we are still a small fish, I have no idea. I know next to nothing about the law, which is why I am cautious. I just know that even bloody web forums about My Little Pony have terms of service you have to agree to to sign in! even if we had watertight papers, a lawsuit could sink us easily enough anyway. I don't think it's too likely, and I think the nature of our agreement is liable to change and require review again once we've got the new server and grown a few times over anyway that's true, but Hasbro has their own lawyers and they are a multinational (or whoever makes those ponies) I'm talking about small non-corporate bulletin boards. One or more popular software packages have these things built in. i dunno, i think a lot of times those agreements get copied wholesale from one website to another. to listen to lawyers (which apparently I will be one in another three years), you need to have an agreement individually crafted by a lawyer and have it reviewed by a lawyer anytime the document or the situation changes in the slightest. but, in practice I don't think this is possible. It's not just the terms of the agreement that matter. I think that is relatively minor. I want good reason to believe that online "signatures" are enough for legal purposes. If not, any agreement we present that way is useless. not being a lawyer myself, I think an agreement whereby "use of this service implies agreement" is generally considered binding. I want to hear a lawyer say that. ;) ok I just don't want us to be lawyered out of existence before we've even had time to grow :-) On a related subject, why are you working on the 501(c) application somewhere other than on the wiki page? i had just begun typing them offline before, no particular reason. it's not a whole lot more OK. I believe we are set, then, with the first four action items ready to go. I'm working on the financial stuff and the web portal. I will send out an e-mail soon about rolling out the web portal. We can use that to vote on additional bylaws amendments. Ok Michael has that member contract thing in hand, but I think he's waiting now for more decisions. (from others) So we should probably look at that and decide what to do. Are we counting on Michael to meet with the lawyer himself? I don't know. I think he's willing. We need to make sure that the lawyer is familiar with our situation and what we need, so we don't end up paying a lawyer $2K to do something unhelpful I guess Michael has access to all the coop's documentation OK; that is a detail. Does my outline of current status sound complete? Yes wait, which outline? The last few lines of this conversation. that's what I thought, yes, it does so what else do we need to talk about? Nothing ok shall we set another meeting or do you want to talk to docelic about that? I don't want to set anything now ok *** Smerdyakov (~adam@Smerdyakov.active.supporter.pdpc) has left channel #hcoop-meeting: "Client exiting"