Session Start: Tue Jan 01 14:45:39 2008
Session Ident: #sgchat
* Karen changes topic to 'Welcome to the Business Meeting for New Year's 2008 -- Moderated'
<JL`> Meeting is called to order at 2:10 PM Mountain Standard time.
Since this isn't a very formal meeting, we don't read minutes and such --
the logs of previous meetings are posted at http://www.simegen.com/sgfandom/chats/
So let's jump right in to our Department reports since we have many department heads here.
<JL`> Sysadmin's report.
Sime~Gen System Administrator's Report
- by Patric Michael, Webmaster
First, as some will already know, we are on a new server. Doubled RAM, doubled processor speed, and doubled redundant backups,
Anyone logging into FTP will notice a dramatic decrease in connection time. Whoo!
This sets the stage (finally) to begin updating and upgrading our internal software.
Most of the routine programs have already been upgraded. Some still to go when I get a chance to sit down and do it. (Those who know me, know what a bizarre schedule I routinely keep so I don't have a set period for that yet. However, in the coming months, watch for a new global page system, new design (been promising that for ages now, I know) and a much higher reliance on emerging and existant multimedia capabilities.
We will soon be able to offer our advertisers interactive flash banners, additional advertisers package elements, and as much as I might hate it personally, a larger capacity for ad space on our pages.
That last is hugely important while we transition to additional revenue generating capabilities since it is a consistent source of income to keep this domain running.
Also in the near future, we will be transitioning to a more database driven delivery system, now possible with our faster server. Most of that will be largely transparent to the end user, but will eventually facilitate volunteers without FTP capabilities to manage their respective sections.
Someday, I hope to have a "control panel" type system set up to keep us competitive with outer hosting services. The database bit is a prelude to that end which is why its so important to work out the bugs now. Whether that happens this year is a bit vague yet, but all your continued support, there is a good possibility our next new years chat will see all of these changes and more. :) On that note, thanks, and I am done. :D
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<JL`> Thank you Patric. Next we have the Reviews Department report
by our new head of the Reviews Department Midge.
Sime~Gen Reviews Department Report
- by Midge Baker, Reviews Department Manager
It's been a lively year for the Reviews Department.
First, we've had changes in staff. At last year's Chat, Laurraine announced her intention to retire in May of 2008.
I had become a reviewer in December of 2006, then joined the Department Staff in March of 2007,
as Laurraine's Assistant-in-Training. When circumstances forced her to retire early, I took over as Reviews Coordinator on June 18th.
Laurraine hasn't left - she still does reviews and is still Gatemaster of the Perspectives Newsletter.
As in previous years, we've had our ups and downs.
The bad news is that we lost four reviewers while gaining only one.
We have the same old problem with active participation, too.
Out of 41 reviewers, just 12 of them accounted for the 286 reviews we've added this year.
They are, in alphabetical order,
myself; Rebecca Benston; Shelly Campbell; Carol Castellanos; Jeanette Cottrell; Kara Hash;
Alice Klein; Harriet Klausner; Wanda Maynard; Laurraine Tutihasi; Karen Webb; and Kara L. Wolf.
The good news is that we've gained more authors and publishers. And while last year we lost an interviewer, this year we gained two. Alice Klein, has also added to the domain, doing interviews as Gatemaster of her own Mysteries Column. I have also been doing the occasional interview for the Author Spotlights section. Soon to come is the Reviews Department Picks page, of which the Spring 2008 Reviewers and Readers Choice Awards will be announced.
That concludes the Reviews Department Report.
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<JL`> Thank you Midge. Simecenter Report
SimeCenter Report
- by Kaíres Tévesu, Simecenter Editor
In hopes of handing this task off in the future, I've been documenting the process of producing
each issue, and also updating the templates. It gets a bit easier each time...as long as I don't
make dumb mistakes.
We got 2 new authors: Rochelle Campbell and Austin Camacho. I'm trying to get a new
artist:
Bernie Lee. I write to her every month when I'm getting ready to start the new edition, but our
timing hasn't meshed so far.
I guess the most exciting thing is the issue I just finally finished last night.
We have a story from a Holiday anthology, which was published to raise money for charity.
We did something similar in December 2005: featuring a story from a romance anthology,
produced to raise money for Heifer International. This one is a crime anthology, designed to raise money for the Toys for Tots program.
I owe special thanks to several people this year:
- Lois - donating 3 lovely stories that kept SimeCenter going these last few months
- Jean - letting me serialize Savage Empire (giving me an excuse to read it again)
- Patric - putting up with the flakiness my computer keeps foisting on me
- and especially Shelly - offering to help, donating a story, and introducing me to Austin Camacho.
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<JL`> Thank you Kaires! SimeCenter is a great undertaking.
<JL`> Interviews posted -- report by Karen
<Karen> As Midge said earlier, there have been some romance interviews posted.
She did several, and I helped get them into the Writers Spotlights section.
They included: Linnea Sinclair, Victoria Graydale and Elizabeth Moon.
<Karen> Victoria Graydale was interviewed by Midge. I also did one of Romance Author, Kate Hofman. These are the most recent within the past four months. We hope to have more.
<Karen> That should do it for most recent spotlights.
<JL`> Thank you Karen.
<Karen> Midge reminded me...Thanks....
<Midge> Karen, there's also Victoria Rosendahl interviewed by Alice.
<JL`> Yes, we hope to open more sections to interviews and hope to find people willing and skilled
enough to do them. Treasurer's Report on finances.
Sime~Gen Financial Report
- by Jean Lorrah, Treasurer
2007 was both a good and a bad year for finances.
On the good side we increased our income by approximately 40%.
On the bad side, we increased our expenses by about 60%, with more to
come.
Because we had to purchase a new server, we will have a couple of years of installment payments. And because it is a larger, faster server, we will be paying more for space and bandwidth. So in 2008 we have to make a concerted effort to increase our income. The more Patric can automate things like site building, the easier it will be to get more people to host their domains with us--one of our steadiest income streams.
Advertising is also an important income stream. Banner ads continue to be a good source of income.
<JL`> As Patric reported, we should soon be able to offer the most modern banner formats.
<jean> We have a number of advertising packages, but most people choose the simplest ones.
Plans for 2008 include putting Google Adsense on simegen.com. I've researched it, and it's not very difficult
to do. What we don't know is how much income we can generate using their plainest, least intrusive ads.
We also keep talking about creating and selling some kind of "how-to" book ourselves, but the problem
is always time to write it, and then market it. Not to mention the problem of exactly WHAT kind of how-to
book it should be!
To sum up, within the next few months we MUST increase our income or simegen.com will not be able to
continue supporting itself. We would like to increase the number of people hosting their domains with us,
one of our easiest to maintain income streams. We would like to increase the number of people advertising
with us. And we would like to create a piece of information that we can sell.
That ends the treasurer's report.
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<JL`>.Thank you Jean.
Sime~Gen President's Report
- by Jacqueline Lichtenberg, President
The year dawned full of hope and plans but we soon ran into turbulence.
Several spam-caused outages reduced our traffic again and again, without recovery afterward.
Patric fought as hard as he could, but there was no denying we were going down repeatedly from bad sectors on a
failing hard drive. Once fully analyzed, the problem revealed the necessity to replace the hardware we are
running the Unity server on, which also houses all our hosted clients.
We took some weeks to investigate options and to compare renting new/used hardware or buying it.
It was a really close judgement call, and finally we opted to buy. More weeks were lost as Patric was distracted
by other work, but finally over Thanksgiving weekend we were fully moved onto our new hardware.
With new capabilities and software upgrades, a RAID server's backup abilities, we are now working on restoring
traffic.
But our personnel roster is shifting. This summer, long time head of the Reviews Department,
Laurraine Tutihasi resigned in good order to devote herself to her husband's retirement move to Arizona.
We owe much to Laurraine's hard work on Reviews and her smooth handover is an example to all others.
Marjorie Baker stepped into Laurraine's shoes and with the help of Karen MacLeod and Patric Michael is
gradually learning the necessary skills, but seems to have a natural talent at management.
Unfortunately, due to our various outages and bad sectors on disks, the List Laurraine used to present books
to our Reviewers died in the middle of the summer. They stopped hearing from us, and drifted away. Now we have
a multitude of new books to review but of the dozens and dozens who have signed up to review for us, only 5 or 6
are currently posting reviews. Those reviews are mostly books they have found for themselves.
In December 2007, Patric restored full service to our Lists, running smoothly on the new hardware.
We still struggle against spam, though. Recruiting and rebuilding the Reviews department will be a big effort
for 2008. The Romance Department went totally dormant several years ago, and during the move to the new server,
Patric cleaned out that section and we are now rebuilding it as a major gateway. He hopes to use that department
to showcase some flash based banners and possibly book trailer videos and other newer high-tech presentations.
Once Patric has it set up, we should be able to offer to make book trailers (i.e. videos about their books)
for authors at reasonable fees.
Kaires is also looking to hand off Sime Center, but we haven't found an editor for that department.
It does require considerable html skills to manage, as well as the ability to find donated stories and worthy
causes.
Bruce Gray has been ill this year and seldom updated his /fandom/ department and Keybooks bookshelves.
My Keybooks book shelves are not up to date, though my Review column is -- all of which provide Amazon links
as does Reviews. Likewise, after futilely repairing our Webring I have been devoting time I normally devote to
page maintenance and domain business to writing. I have one completed script ready for de-bugging, and one very
rough draft of a Sime~Gen action script ready to rework, and meanwhile I'm exploring another script project.
Fall 2007, I finished the rough draft of the Tarot nonfiction book, "The Not So Minor Arcana" which is way too
long for one volume (over 200,000 words). It's aimed at Intermediate Students of Tarot, not beginners or advanced.
The last 20 weeks of 2007 I posted one Tarot chapter a week, every Tuesday, to
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/ about World Building. It's the equivalent of 2 short books in length.
So together, "Never Cross a Palm With Silver" and the "Not So Minor Arcana" is at least 4 volumes.
I have no idea if anyone (editor, publisher, or (except for a few) reader) is the least bit interested in this
topic, but it's a project I started more than 10 years ago, and I just wanted it FINISHED. I haven't even thought
about a market for it yet. It needs huge amounts of editing and fiddling with Microsoft Word formatting.
My review column is filed through June 2008 and you can see what the reviewed books will be at
http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/2008/
<JL`> I've done more writing in 2007 than 2006, but expect to do even more in 2008. However, I will
also be busy. I'm teaching at the following con in Maryland in March: http://www.ecumenicon.org/conference/details/ I used to teach at this esoteric con when I lived in New York. I expect to be at Westercon (Las Vegas) and Worldcon (Denver) this year but plans haven't been
sketched in for that yet. End President's Report
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<JL`> Floor is now open for nominations for Awards for work done in 2007.
<Midge> For Digen Award - Patric
<MTZ> second Patric for Digen
<JL`> OK, Patric has been nominated and seconded for the Digen award for 2007. All in favor?
<jean> Aye
<Karen> Aye
<Seanara> Aye
<Kaires> aye
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Lexie> aye
<JL`> Anne says AYE
<JL`> JL says AYE
<JL`> My reason is (other than the usual reasons Patric provides every year) is the hours he's spent helping Midge conquer tech problems and learn html. I see 10 plus Anne logged in here -- 9 Aye's for Patric. Patric wins the 2007 Digen award.Any further nominations?
<Midge> Nominate Laurraine
[for Digen Award] - for her help during the transition, and despite the fact that she was moving
<jean> second
<JL`> Laurraine Tutihasi has been nominated and Seconded for the 2007 Digen award. All in favor?
<Kaires> aye
<jean> aye
<Patric> Aye
<Karen> aye
<Lexie> aye
<MTZ> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Seanara> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<Nadene> Aye
<JL`> 11 of 11 vote Laurraine a Digen for efforts above and beyond the duties of a retiring Department Head. Laurraine wins the Digen.
<Midge> For Digen - Alice - for pitching in an helping with everything, as our new Assistant Coordinator.
<JL`> Second?
<Patric> Second.
<JL`> Alice has been nominated and seconded for a 2007 Digen Award for Meritorious service to the Reviews Dept and starting a Review column of her own. All in favor?
<jean> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Lexie> aye
<Seanara> Aye
<Patric> Aye
<Karen> aye
<MTZ> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<Kaires> aye
<JL`> 10 0f 10 vote Alice a Digen Award for 2007 service.> Any further nominations?
<Midge> For Digen - Wanda Maynard - for her help with approving reviews until I learned how and could relieve her;
<Patric> Nominate Midge for service above and beyond in learning, holding, and taming the reviews department.
<Karen> Second... she tries very hard at all she attempts.
<MTZ> second Midge
<JL`> Karen second which one?
<Karen> Second midge
<JL`> Midge has been nominated and seconded for the Digen Award for 2007. All in favor of Midge?
<jean> aye
<Karen> Aye
<Kaires> aye
<Lexie> aye
<MTZ> aye
<Seanara> aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Midge wins the Digen Award for 2007. Congratulations on your FIRST Digen award! (it is first isn't it?)
<Karen> For Midge, yes, I think so.
<JL`> We had a nomination for Wanda Maynard for her work in Reviews above and beyond her job description.
<Midge> Yes, and I wasn't expecting it.
<JL`> Do I hear a second?
<Karen> Seconding Wanda.
<JL`> Wanda Maynard has been nominated and seconded for the 2007 Digen Award. All in favor?
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Karen> Aye
<Lexie> aye
<Kaires> aye
<Seanara> aye
<jean> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> Wanda Maynard has won the Digen Award for 2007.
<Midge> For Tech-Ton - Patric - of course.
<jean> second
<MTZ> second, of course
<JL`> Patric has been nominated and seconded for the Tech-Ton Award for 2007. all in favor?
<Karen> With all his extra work on the new server, certainly....
<Karen> Aye
<Midge> Aye
<Lexie> AYE!
<Kaires> AYE
<MTZ> aye
<jean> aye
<Seanara> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Patric wins the 2007 Tech-Ton Award!!!! (he really deserves a big medallion for this one)
<Midge> For Nager - Ann DellaCamera - - as always, for her steadiness and help, despite computer problems and a traffic accident.
<MTZ> second
<Karen> Aye
<Midge> Aye
<JL`> Ann DellaCamera has been nominated and seconded for the Nager Award. Boy you're voting before the vote was called. Nagers will do that to you. OK, all in favor vote now.
<Seanara> Can we have a second nomination for the Nager award?
<MTZ> aye
<Kaires> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Seanara> aye
<jean> aye
<Lexie> aye
<Patric> Aye to Ann DellaCamera
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Ann DellaCammera wins the Nager Award for 2007.
<JL`> Thank you Midge for remembering her -- she does a lot of work on Reviews.
<Midge> For Nager - Karen
<Seanara> second. Second Karen for nager award, that is.
<JL`> Karen has been nominated and seconded for the Nager Award for 2007. All in favor?
<Seanara> AYE
<Lexie> aye
<Kaires> aye
<MTZ> aye
<jean> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Patric> AYE AYE AYE
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Karen wins the Nager Award for 2007. Congratulations Karen!!! (only 3 !'s) We expect such great things of Karen.
<JL`> Anne nominates Karen for The Frihill Golden Shovel Award.
Since Anne is Sectuib Frihill, she has that right.
<Midge> Second
<JL`> Sectuib Zeor seconds.
<JL`> Karen has been nominated and seconded for the Frihill Golden Shovel Award. All in favor?
<Kaires> AYE
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Seanara> Aye
<Lexie> aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> Zeor votes Aye
<JL`> Frihill votes Aye
<jean> aye
<JL`> Karen wins the First Frihill Golden Shovel Award ever awarded!
<Midge> Yay, Karen!!!!!!
<Midge> Karen Award: Alice Klein - for adding to the domain with her new Mysteries Column.
<jean> second
<JL`> Alice Klein has been nominated and seconded for a Karen Award for starting a new Review Column (complete with interviews). All in favor.
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Kaires> aye
<Seanara> Aye
<Patric> Aye
<jean> aye
<Karen> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye (laughing hysterically)
<JL`> Alice Klein wins the Karen Award for 2007 for initiative and verve with her new column.
<Midge> Moveable Feast Award: Kaires, of course, for her Hostess skills
- she provides the A#1 Original Moveable Feast
<Patric> Second
<JL`> Kaires has been nominated and seconded for the Moveable Feast Award
(I tasted that food - it was GREAT). All in favor?
<Seanara> Aye
<Midge> Aye
<Karen> Aye
<Patric> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<jean> aye
<Lexie> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Kaires wins the MOVEABLE FEAST AWARD for 2007
<jean> I'd like to nominate Lois Wickstrom for the Keon award.
<JL`> I second Lois Wickstrom for the Keon Award.
<Midge> Second
<jean> For bringing $$$ to simegen.com via her ads.
<JL`> Lois Wickstrom has been nominated and seconded for the Keon Award. All in favor?
<Kaires> AYE!!
<jean> aye
<Seanara> Aye
<Midge> Aye
<Lexie> aye
<MTZ> aye
<Karen> aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Lois Wickstrom wins the Keon Award for bringing in revenue during 2007 (she really REALLY is good!)
<JL`> Anne nominates Jean for the first Sex-Tub Award for the most erotic transfer scenes.
[[EDITORIAL NOTE on this award. The name came from this discussion in the other "social" room:]]
* Patric cant keep up with the Cutting & Pasting, so he is letting the machine read it to him...
* Patric groans at how Microsoft Sam pronounces "sectuib."
<Lexie> Er, how?
<Patric> Lexie: "sex-tub"
<Seanara> Oh, dear.
* Lexie giggles.
<Patric> Exactly....
* Seanara shakes her head, giving a resigned look.
<JL`> Oh PATRIC!!! ohhhhh.
<Patric> JL: Not MY fault!!! I've always said Microsoft was a bit off kilter... :)
<Seanara> Well, there has been that controversy in is it "seck-too-ib" or "seck-tweeb." One is Gulf, the other is Nivet pronunciation, I think.
* Seanara looks to JL and Jean for confirmation.
<jean> Sek-tu-ib" is Gulf and "sek-tweeb" is Nivet.
* Seanara smiles. "Thanks, Jean."
<Patric> Oh, good grief...
* Patric notes rather dryly that the "tub" part was actually a fortuitous type. "sex TUBE" was just a bit too over-the-top.....
* Lexie groans
[[Back to the regular meeting log]]
<Midge> Second
<jean> Hey--there weren't any in 2007.
<JL`> Jean has been nominated and seconded for the first Sex-Tub Award. All in favor?
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Lexie> aye
<Kaires> aye
<JL`> This is an ALL TIME AWARD -- you can only win it once.
<Karen> aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<Seanara> aye
<JL`> Anne says if there was a Sex-Shower Award, Jean would win it too. Jean wins the first ever Sex-Tub Award with a graceful bow to Microsoft. Karen will leave in the commentary on this one.
<Midge> Out Territory Awards: Margaret L. Carter, for her Vampire site and her Newsletter, where she directs folks to visit us.
<Kaires> second
<JL`> Margaret L. Carter has been nominated and seconded for the Out-Territory Award. All in favor?
<Lexie> aye
<MTZ> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Kaires> aye
<Karen> aye
<jean> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<Patric> Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<Seanara> aye
<JL`> Margaret L. Carter wins the Out-Territory Award for 2007.
<JL`> Any further nominations?
<Lexie> I nominate Beverly Erlebacher for the Electrum Yo-Yo Award. Because there's always another episode of Borderlands for her to copyedit.
<JL`> Second
<Midge> Second
<JL`> Bev Erlebacher has been nominated and seconded for the Electrum Yo-Yo Award (half silver; half gold -- first ever) for her editing and posting of the Cooperative Fiction section.
<Kaires> AYE
<jean> aye
<Midge> Aye
<Karen> aye
<Lexie> Aye
<Patric> Aye
<Seanara> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<MTZ> aye
<JL`> Bev Erlebacher wins the first ever Electrum Yo-Yo Award - half silver, half gold - for perpetual editing of Cooperative Fiction.
<Seanara> Nominate Ronnie Bob for the Digen award.
<Karen> Second Ronnie Bob. He does so much for us, too.
<JL`> Ronnie Bob has been nominated and seconded for the Digen Award. All in favor?
<Midge> Aye
<MTZ> aye
<Kaires> aye
<Patric> aye
<Karen> aye
<Lexie> aye
<Seanara> aye
<jean> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Ronnie Bob wins the Digen Award for Meritorious Service for 2007.
<JL`> Anne moves to close nominations for 2007 Awards.
<JL`> Second?
<Midge> Second
<JL`> All in favor of closing Nominations?
<Karen> Aye
<Midge> Aye
<Seanara> aye
<jean> aye
<Lexie> aye
<MTZ> aye
<Patric> Aye
<Kaires> aye
<JL`> JL votes Aye
<JL`> Anne votes Aye
<JL`> Nominations for 2007 Awards are closed.
<Karen> I'm going to moderate the room again, so others can't "congratulate" as awards are mentioned.
<JL`> Stock Awards for work done in 2007. Jean will present them.
Stock Awards
We can't give salaries or bonuses to the people who work so hard keeping simegen.com going.
However, what we can do is share Sime~Gen Inc. with them. Therefore each year we give shares of preferred stock
in Sime~Gen Inc. to the people who have been with us at least a year, and have worked for our success.
We've been keeping the corporation's head above water for years, so that the stock you own is worth a little more
than when we first began giving it out. But as I reported earlier, we need to find a way to earn more--and our goal
is to eventually earn ENOUGH more that not only will the stock be worth more, but we will be able to give actual
cash bonuses. Salaries? Well, that one's off in the future somewhere at the time when we have enough income to hire
a bookkeeper. Why is that? Once a company has even one employee, the paperwork is utterly incredible--it requires
time and expertise. But bonuses are a possibility, even if right at this moment they are just a goal. Meanwhile,
though, we will share the company with those who do the work via stock. Not options--this is actual stock: pieces
of the company that the recipients own. Jacqueline will now post the list of stock recipients--all of them are
people who have been with us for at least one full year.
Kaires 4
Doreen Dabinett 1
Eric Berlin 1
Karen MacLeod 4
Laurraine Tutihasi 1
Lisa Saunders 2
Lois Wickstron 4
Patric Michael 6
Ronnie Bob Whitaker 2
Wendy Fisher 1
Total 26 shares
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<jean> Thank you, Jacqueline.
<JL`> Congratulations to all who have been recognized today for their outstanding contributions.
We are essentially all about reading and writing - about imagination and creativity. Contributions to this domain may affect many other people, people from whom we may never hear anything. We can hope that we will all be part of the solution this coming year, not the problem. Thank you all for coming to this annual Chat meeting. Does anyone move to adjourn the meeting?
<Kaires> so moved
<Patric> seconded
<JL`> This annual chat meeting is adjourned.
<Karen> Seconded. I'll work on getting the logs cleaned up so they can be posted.
<JL`> LET'S PARTY DOWN!!!
<Karen> Stopping the log here.... Everyone may leave in an orderly fashion.
Session Close: Tue Jan 01 18:08:38 2008
Logs edited by Karen MacLeod
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