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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
December 19, 2012
4:30PM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 4:30PM by Joyce Bettencourt

 

AvaCon Business

  • Staff Positions:  Chris will create developer accounts for new hire and schedule our first meeting, ideally after Christmas but before the New Year.  One of our previous staff appointments has confirmed continued interest, Chris will circle back around to the other staff member.
  • General Liability Insurance:  Chris will complete the form to get the quote, to start the insurance in 2013.
  • Metaverse Future Society:  Membership levels, costs, and benefits were discussed and approved.  Next step is to work with the developer to discuss creation of the new site, and to begin focus group discussions.  Chris will work on draft presentation and survey items.
  • AvaCon Conference Center:  Chris completed the build for the AvaCon Conference Center on FleepGrid.  Joyce gave feedback and all changes were made.  Kathey still needs to review.  Starting in January, the conference center will be hosted on Kitely for public meetings, but we will continue to use FleepGrid as the home base and development area.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  Invoice from accountant was received and Kathey cut a check to pay them.
  • 2012 Taxes – Preparation:  Chris hasn’t yet started preparing 2012 spreadsheet, but has all the information and materials.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed, and itemized report of monthly charges.  Discussed end of the year expenses, reimbursements and staff stipends, Kathey finalized all expected expenses for the rest of the year.

 

Activities and Events

  • Metaverse Cultural Series: Announcement was posted and received promotion on Twitter and in several news stories and blog posts.  We’ve already received several proposals and questions/clarifications, some from high profile community members and for multiple platforms, which is encouraging.  Chris is responding to requests and questions as they come in.
  • Opensim Users Conference:  Chris will ping Overte Foundation to follow up and get the ball rolling, perhaps to schedule the first meeting.



Meeting adjourned at 7:30PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
December 13, 2012
6:30PM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins – Absent: Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 6:30PM by Joyce Bettencourt

 

AvaCon Business

  • Staff Positions:  Chris emailed the web developer and she completed the application.  All in favor of hiring her for the position.  Discussed levels of access and accounts that need to be created for her.  We also need to circle back with previous staff appointments and begin to schedule regular staff meetings in the new year.
  • General Liability Insurance:  Agenda item tabled until next meeting.
  • Metaverse Future Society:  Draft name of the membership organization voted upon, all in favor and MOTION passed.  Registered domain names and began a brainstorming document to determine levels of membership, benefits, website ideas, and other future goals for the group.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  Taxes were filed and we received confirmation from the IRS and MA.  Now waiting on invoice from accountant.
  • 2012 Taxes – Preparation:  Chris hasn’t yet started preparing 2012 spreadsheet, but has all the information and materials.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed, and itemized report of monthly charges.

 

Activities and Events

  • Metaverse Cultural Series: Chris created the presentation and venue proposal forms.  Joyce created graphic for the blog site.  All forms and post were reviewed and then posted.  Agreed to push promotion of the event till Monday.
  • Opensim Users Conference:  No update, tabled until after the new year.



Meeting adjourned at 7:00PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
November 7, 2012
6:00PM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 6:00PM by Joyce Bettencourt

 

AvaCon Business

  • Staff Positions:  Chris will contact the developer discussed at previous meeting and encourage them to apply.
  • General Liability Insurance:  Agenda item tabled until next meeting.
  • Proposed Restructuring of AvaCon Bylaws:  Discovered there is no need to restructure by-laws, can create community site as a new service offered by AvaCon with membership levels and benefits.  Discussed ways to help facilitate the community of interest surrounding the metaverse, virtual worlds, and related technologies, and to broaden access to planning for events and activities.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  Chris sent taxes to the accountant and answered some follow up questions from the accountant.  Should be ready to file.
  • 2012 Taxes – Preparation:  Chris downloaded all 2012 statements and will begin preparing spreadsheet.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed, and itemized report of monthly charges.  Joyce submitted receipt for correspondence to IRS.  Discussed other reimbursements for staff expenses.

 

Activities and Events

  • Metaverse Cultural Series: Kathey and Joyce still working on graphics/logos/branding for the event.
  • Opensim Users Conference:  No update, tabled until after the new year.
  • Meta Meets:  Discussed upcoming Meta Meets conference in Europe and discussed how we might partner with or support their work, perhaps some kind of reciprocal promotional/sponsorship support.



Meeting adjourned at 7:00PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
October 14, 2012
6:00PM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 5:00PM by Joyce Bettencourt

 

AvaCon Business

  • Staff Positions:  Joyce has spoken to someone interested in the Web Developer position who has extensive programming experience.  Chris will contact the developer and encourage them to apply.
  • Annual Conflict of Interest Statements:  All officers reviewed the Conflict of Interest policy and completed the annual statement.  No financial conflicts of interest were noted for any officer.
  • General Liability Insurance:  Agenda item tabled until next meeting.
  • Proposed Restructuring of AvaCon Bylaws:  Per our earlier discussions, Chris is working on a draft modification of the bylaws to permit a multi-level membership model rather than the relatively flat organizational structure AvaCon currently has.  Our goal is to broaden the base of community support for our mission and to facilitate a wider range of activities, interests, and events that a larger membership could support.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  The expenses ledger has been completed, Chris to finish reconciling all charges and double check the forms and spreadsheet, to send to Kathey in the next couple days.  Kathey will submit to accountant.
  • 2012 Taxes – Preparation:  Chris will update the 2012 ledger and take over monthly reconciling of bank statements temporarily until the Bookeeper position is filled.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed, Joyce submitted receipt for renewal of our PO Box through 2013.

 

Activities and Events

  • Metaverse Cultural Series:  Chris presented an initial draft description and Call for Proposals for the Metaverse Cultural Series, to launch in 2013.  All reviewed the draft and discussed.  Kathey and Joyce will work on graphics/logos/branding for the event.  Chris will continue to flesh out the draft based on feedback from the meeting.
  • Opensim Users Conference:  Justin Clark-Casey of the Overte Foundation (which manages contributions for the OpenSimulator code base) raised the idea of holding an Opensim Users Conference in 2013 to take place in-world (likely in OSGrid).  Chris proposed that AvaCon offer our support and/or services as event partners, possibly helping with organization, registration, or production etc.  All were unanimously in favor.  Chris will follow-up with Justin to continue the discussion to see how we may be able to help with the event.
  • Monthly How-To Workshops:  Joyce raised the idea of offering how-to workshops with guest speakers who have expertise in content creation and other topics of interest.  After discussing, this idea was tabled as a possible benefit of membership once the bylaw restructuring is completed.



Meeting adjourned at 7:00PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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ANNUAL MEETING OF THE CORPORATION
Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
August 21, 2012

7:00PM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 7:00PM by Joyce Bettencourt

AvaCon Business

  • Annual Voting for Officers:  In accordance with the corporate bylaws, officers were nominated for the next year.  Upon motion duly made, seconded, and unanimously carried, it was resolved that all officers would continue in their current positions for the next term, which expires August 31, 2013.Joyce Bettencourt – President
    Chris Collins – Vice President
    Kathey Fatica – Treasurer
    Chris Collins – Interim Clerk
  • Staff Positions:  Kathey was contacted by someone interested in the Web Developer position who has extensive programming experience.  Item tabled until next meeting.
  • Proposed Restructuring of AvaCon Bylaws:  Chris proposed a restructuring of the AvaCon Bylaws to broaden the base of community support for our mission and to facilitate a wider range of activities, interests, and events that a larger membership could support.  Following the discussion, it was agreed that Chris would work on a preliminary draft.
  • Web Hosting:  Chris reported that she has lowered the memory resources allocated to our VPS, which should lower our costs.  In addition, she renewed the monthly fee payment schedule for our private wikis.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  Kathey reported that the accountant filed another extension for the completion of our 2011 taxes.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed, Chris reported that the charge for our webhosting agreement will decrease in the following months since we have lowered our memory resources on the VPS.

 

Activities and Events

  • Second Life Community Convention:  A discussion was held regarding the announcement that AvaCon would not be organizing an SLCC this year.
  • Metaverse Community Convention:  A discussion was held regarding the possibility of AvaCon organizing a broader based Metaverse Community Convention.  It was agreed that we should pursue some of the smaller events on our ideas list for the next year and discuss again when we have filled some of our open positions.



Meeting adjourned at 9:00PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
February 25, 2012
11:00AM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 11:00 AM by Joyce Bettencourt

AvaCon Business

  • Board Meeting Hiatus:  Due to changes in life circumstances for several board members, it was proposed to put our regular meeting schedule on hold with periodic updates to the group via Skype.  Kathey’s work schedule has changed considerably in the new year, Chris’ grandmother is gravely ill and needs extensive care, and Joyce is preparing for a summer internship that will take her out of town until August.  All agreed to use email and Skype as primary communication methods until such point when we can meet regularly again.
  • Staff Positions:  Chris proposed postponing filling open staff positions during our hiatus period, all agreed.
  • General Liability Insurance:  Joyce proposed investigating General Liability Insurance for the corporation, all agreed this is something to look into at future meetings.
  • Web Hosting:  Chris reported that we’ve receiving warning notices from our VPS, but that these could be safely ignored as the memory spikes are infrequent and in general we are at the correct hosting level for our usage at this point.

 

Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes – Extension:  Kathey reported that the accountant will file an extension for the completion of our 2011 taxes due to our extenuating personal circumstances.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed.
  • Renewing Contract with Accountant:  Joyce made a MOTION to approve the proposal from Smith Sullivan to continue their accounting services for the corporation.  Chris seconded the motion, the motion passed unanimously.

 

Activities and Events

  • Second Life Community Convention:  A discussion was held regarding the contract offered by Linden Lab for the next SLCC.  It was felt that the contract terms were untenable, however, some members were not quite ready to give up on the idea of holding some kind of an event even if we couldn’t call it the “Second Life” Community Convention.  Agreed to table the discussion for a future meeting.
  • Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education:  A representative from VWBPE made a request to use the SLCC regions as a venue for their conference, however, since the expiration of our contract with Linden Lab, we no longer have any legal rights to the region.  We regretfully had to decline the request.
  • SXSW:  Joyce will be attending SXSW and reported that she would look for opportunities to discuss and represent AvaCon at the conference.



Meeting adjourned at 1:00PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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Executive Board Meeting Minutes

AvaCon, Inc.
January 28, 2012
11:00AM EST ~ Online Meeting

Board Members
Present: Joyce Bettencourt, Chris Collins, Kathey Fatica
Quorum Present: Yes

Proceedings
Meeting called to order at 11:00 AM by Joyce Bettencourt

AvaCon Business

  • Open Board Position:  Donna Meyer has resigned as Clerk.  Joyce made a MOTION to appoint Chris as interim Clerk until the position is filled.  Kathey seconded the motion, the motion passed unanimously.
  • Web Hosting:  Dreamhost suffered a security breach that affected FTP accounts.  Chris reported that she would be changing all FTP passwords for AvaCon websites.



Financial Report

  • 2011 Taxes :  All final expenses for 2011 have been wrapped up and Chris and Kathey will begin reviewing documents to prepare for submitting our taxes to the accountant.
  • Expenses:  Bank balance reviewed.

 

Activities and Events

  • Second Life Community Convention:  Follow-up items from SLCC 2011 were discussed.  We are awaiting a contract offer from Linden Lab based on our earlier discussions.

Meeting adjourned at 12:15PM
Minutes submitted by Interim Clerk, Chris Collins.

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