SoylentNews

This is a summary report from the Friday, Aug. 4th 2023 20:30UTC (1:30pm PDT, 4:30pm EDT) meeting of the SoylentNews governance committee.

There is an IRC log available of the meeting itself from the #governance channel of SoylentNews IRC. For technical reasons (handling of the # sign), the link -- https://logs.sylnt.us/%23governance/2023-08-04.html -- can't be entered here directly, but here is a link provided by a URL shortener (which does work): https://t.ly/VG4N5. Within the IRC log, the meeting begins at 20:28:47 according to the timestamp.

This was the committee's first meeting.

Draft Minutes:

• Meeting called to order at 20:28 UTC. Members present are fnord666, janrinok, deucalion, requerdanos, kolie constituting a majority of committee members and therefore a quorum. During the meeting, arrived mechanicjay (20:45), bytram (21:16), and audioguy (21:35). Absent: cmn32480.
• The group sought volunteers, at kolie's prompting, for who was to be secretary, responsible for keeping meeting minutes and other agenda records. requerdanos volunteered. With requerdanos as secretary, it was decided that minutes would be published on the public wiki.¹
• The group sought, at kolie's prompting, to clarify its objective. After some discussion, requerdanos asked "Do members present agree that the objective of the committee is to form a new entity (for which the PBC should pay), as opposed to rehabilitating the PBC itself?" kolie put this forward as a motion, seconded by janrinok. Motion passed unanimously.
• Discussion: There was discussion before the previous motion of contacting matt_ to see whether he wants to remain involved with SoylentNews. deucalion and kolie will contact matt_ to ask.²
• After requerdanos requested that notice of meetings be handled more formally, and brief discussion, janrinok made a motion "That future meetings be promulgated with at least 4 days notice via a meta and the agenda published at least 24 hours before the meeting is scheduled to begin." Motion passed. Look for the meta post(s) in the future for meeting announcements.
• Discussion: The group discussed what type of entity would be sought to be formed, generally trending toward a not for profit corporation. Kolie agreed to reach out to separatrix who prevously had published a template of NFP bylaws. Also it was suggested to ask in the next meta posting about the upcoming meeting if the community has any experts willing to advise the committee on the topic: If you're an expert in this area, then please contact a committee member and/or attend our next meeting (see below for date and time).
• Discussion: A possible goal is to get back to having our management group and team leaders structure for day to day operations. janrinok agreed to prepare a rough draft of the existing material for review and consideration going forward toward that end.
• Discussion: audioguy initiated discussion about the objective of the committee, raising the ideas of having the board simply hand over control of the existing PBC rather than creating a new entity, or creating a new entity but not within the framework specified by the board. Specific concerns audioguy put forth were as follows:
  1. Setting up a NFP is more complex because of tax reasons
  2. There should be no need for lawyers if people are negotiating in good faith
  3. It looks like a delaying tactic
  4. The board is not engaging us in discussion
  5. It's not clear why they are so determined to keep control of the PBC -- we could start a new organization and they could just decide not to do what they said they would do
  6. It feels like something is being hidden from us

  It was agreed that the group would further discuss audioguy's concerns before the next meeting.

• There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 22:11UTC.

¹ These minutes are journaled but not initially posted on the wiki because the wiki login link appears broken at the time of writing.

² deucalion reported at the completion of the meeting that he had contacted matt_ by email as discussed.

The next meeting is tentatively scheduled for Friday, August 11th, 2023 at 20:30UTC (1:30pm PDT, 4:30pm EDT).

The work of the governance committee takes place in the #governance channel of SoylentNews IRC. The community is invited to observe and participate. Thank you.