From merope@Radix.Net Mon Oct 8 09:11:48 2001 Date: Mon, 8 Oct 2001 09:11:48 -0400 (EDT) From: merope Reply-To: merope To: Daily Board Show Subject: Daily Board Show, 10/8/2001 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: O X-Status: Do you want to know a secret?...its Your Daily Board Show! *warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk! Sunday 7 October 2001: Jana Black thanks Holly "Tim" Timm for reposting the old Board-Exec rules and asks for clarification on some items: "One question, is the Exec-L considered to be USGW Executive Session? If so, are there protocols we need to use before we take discussion to Board-Exec?...if Board-Exec does not equate with Executive Session, I gather the discussion there can include subjects the Board members choose to discuss among themselves for either sensitivity or confidentiality reasons, but those discussions still are protected with confidentiality, correct? Before such discussion can go to Board-L, you will be the one to introduce it, correct?" Holly forwards a message from Linda Haas Davenport notifying us who the EC has chosen to fill the vacant EC volunteer slots. The winners are Joy Fisher, Lorraine Sonnenberg Newsome and Barbara Yancey-Dore. These names are submitted to the Board for approval. [Egads, no _wonder_ Linda didn't want Holly and I in on the discussions. Can you imagine Babs "Ferret" Dore having access to YOUR voting records? And she and Keith Giddeon are abnormally tight; those two together are reminiscent of a pack of pitbulls that has spotted an unattended child innocently playing on the sidewalk. Once those two have free reign in the EC, I foresee even more vacant slots opening up in the near future.] Vicki Shafer forwards a message to the Board from former Archives representative Joe Zsedeny. He essentially supports Pam Reid's comments regarding the Special Projects, toots his own horn a bit, and makes the following observations: "I conclude that many of the comments I have read so far concerning the Archives taking data away from the CCs is bunk. I happen to be a CC and instead of crying about the data going up by someone else I collected it from 1400 miles away and I have hardly scratched the surface. There is still plenty to go around. It is just that most of the Archives managers are go getters. But I am sure that they have also offered to share the data the same as I do for ND." Jana Black forwards a set of emails from project members, this time in support of retaining the Special Projects and their seats on the Board. She notes "I also read Pam's comments and want to clarify that I am *not* in any hurry to do anything except understand all the ramifications of the position(s) of SPs within the USGW Project. I certainly agree that this is a time for "thought and careful consideration." For me, this is not about eliminating SPs, it is about doing a better job of defining how we all work together in the Project as well as what the primary function of the USGW Project is. Perhaps one Board seat for all SPs is the solution, and I agree that the Archives are in a different category." [Hmmm...wonder which way the wind will be blowing tomorrow?] Teresa Lindquist notes that the current discussion regarding revising the bylaws to remove the SPs and/or their Board seats is "little more than a delaying tactic to avoid having to deal with the two census projects and the vacant Census Project seat on this Board." Her opinion about the Special Projects is "that they are just as deserving of representation as any other member of this project. Those people volunteer their time no less than I do (and many of them probably far more) on behalf of improving USGenWeb for our visitors. Removing their voices on this Board just because we don't want to address a difficult issue is hardly fair to those folks who devote their time to USGenWeb as a Special Project volunteer rather than as a county volunteer." --- In Executive Session: --no activity === "As a rule, what is out of sight disturbs men's minds more seriously than what they see." ---Julius Caesar This has been your Daily Board Show. -Teresa Lindquist merope@radix.net ------- Daily Board Show, (c) 2001 by Teresa Lindquist, all rights reserved. From merope@Radix.Net Tue Oct 9 19:41:59 2001 Date: Tue, 9 Oct 2001 19:41:58 -0400 (EDT) From: merope Reply-To: merope To: Daily Board Show Subject: Daily Board Show, 10/9/2001 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: O X-Status: Going around in circles...its Your Daily Board Show! *warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk! Monday 8 October 2001: Phyllis Rippee asks if the Board has a panel of mediators and notes "we have to handle the everyday business of the Project that comes under our "job description" as separate from that which is to be handled by the NC." [yes, I guess one can fairly describe grievances as an everyday occurrence in USGW ] Teresa Lindquist notes that the Board needs to select new mediators as only one of the original five is still on the Board. Regarding the ongoing Special Projects discussion, Phyllis notes that in the beginning the discussion was focused on getting rid of the SPs and bylaws revision entered the picture when she pointed out that in order to do that revision of the bylaws was necessary. But, she points out "The fact also exists that the bylaws need to be revised. This is true whether or not an amendment is adopted that will do away with the SPs. This is true whether or not an amendment is adopted that will set up a recall, or impeachment, procedure. This is true whether or not an amendment is adopted that will cover any other ideas presented to the bylaws committee for inclusion." She does not think discussion of bylaws revision should involve only the topic of removal of the SPs and suggests "if 100% fairness is to be accomplished, each individual Article would have to be approved by the general membership. Instead, of an all or none, approach. Although, it would have to be all of an Article and not voting on each individual section thereof." Tuesday 9 October 2001: Teresa moves "that National Coordinator Holly Timm direct the Advisory Board members to immediately begin electing new mediation panel members to fill the four vacant slots, as per the instructions contained in Section B.1 of the Mediation Process Information and Procedure document located at http://www.usgenweb.org/mediation/mediation.html" Holly asks Teresa to withdraw the motion so that the Board can address the vacant EC slots. Richard Howland moves "I move that the Board approve the following new members for the Elections Committee: Joy Fisher to the open seat in the NW Region. Lorraine Sonnenberg Newsome to the open seat in the NE Region Barbara Yancey-Dore to the open seat in the SE Regional." Vicki Shafer and Kathy Heidel both second the motion. Tim Stowell asks Phyllis to elaborate on her comments regarding voting on bylaws revisions. Tim suggests that Teresa's Mediation Panel motion is redundant, asking "Wouldn't asking the NC be a better solution rather than wasting time with this rigamarole?" He suggests first finding out who on the original committee is still on the Board and if they are still willing to serve on the panel and whether there are any Board members who will decline to serve. He notes "After those questions are answered, it would make it easier to select the members who wish to serve." -- In Executive Session: --no activity === Clarification Corner: Many of you have seen Linda Haas Davenport's response to yesterday's DBS, in which I commented on the potential appointment of Babs Dore to the Election Committee. In that column, I said "Can you imagine Babs "Ferret" Dore having access to YOUR voting records?" This was an _extremely_ poor choice of words on my part, as it was mistakenly taken to mean that EC members have access to actual votes. Of course they do not, to my knowledge at least, have such access. My meaning, which was utterly unclear, was that Babs would have access to individual voter information: names, email, counties, special projects, that sort of thing. [Most of us have seen what she can do with a very little bit of personal information once she puts her mind to it]. Anyways, as Linda pointed out: "Any of you who read my posts before, during and after the election, know that NO member of the EC has access to ANY voting record. The only person who has access to how YOU voted is Larry Stephens and unless YOU asked him to specifically look at YOUR personal vote he probably hasn't seen it either. The voting software compiles a report of vote totals and this is the report that Larry sent to the EC who in turn sent it to the Project. What the members of the EC do have access to is your voter registration information: Your name, e-mail address, the job you do (CC, SC, whatever)and the county(s), state(s) you volunteer in. Hardly the same as "Access to YOUR voting record"." She is absolutely right, and I apologize for the misunderstanding. === "It is madness beyond compare To try to reform the world." ---Moliere, The Misanthrope This has been your Daily Board Show. -Teresa Lindquist merope@radix.net ------- Daily Board Show, (c) 2001 by Teresa Lindquist, all rights reserved. From merope@Radix.Net Wed Oct 10 12:19:31 2001 Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 12:19:31 -0400 (EDT) From: merope Reply-To: merope To: Daily Board Show Subject: Daily Board Show, 10/10/2001 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: O X-Status: A poke in the eye with a sharp stick...its Your Daily Board Show! *warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk! Tuesday 9 October 2001: Sundee Maynez sends a test message to Board-L Wednesday 10 October 2001: Tim Stowell asks if the Board can address the suggested replacement EC volunteers on individual ballots rather than as a group. Teresa Lindquist points out that the EC guidelines are murky on this subject: "According to the EC guidelines, replacement members chosen to fill slots vacant due to the expiration of terms have to be approved as a group, but the guidelines are not clear what is to happen when replacements are required for other reasons." She notes that had the EC filled the slots when they became vacant, the Board would have voted on them one at a time, and asks "Are we now required to vote on them as a slate because the EC decided to fill them all at once?" Holly Timm says "the EC Report as accepted states that slates of volunteers submitted for approval are an all or none." [My, this interpretation does give the EC wide latitude as to how it chooses to fill its vacancies and submit them to the Board.] Phyllis notes "This means that if we are opposed to one, or two, of them, we have to vote based on whether we see the glass as partially empty, or partially full." She asks "if we vote against all three in order to vote against one (or two), does that mean that the EC cannot place any of the three in a new package for us to vote on?" Tim's understanding of the [EC] guidelines is that the EC would then have to submit a new slate for approval. [Or, they could just submit the names one at a time.] -- In Executive Session: --no activity === "We do not err because truth is difficult to see. It is visible at a glance. We err because this is more comfortable." ---Alexander Solzhenitsyn This has been your Daily Board Show. -Teresa Lindquist merope@radix.net ------- Daily Board Show, (c) 2001 by Teresa Lindquist, all rights reserved. From merope@Radix.Net Thu Oct 11 12:39:35 2001 Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2001 12:39:35 -0400 (EDT) From: merope Reply-To: merope To: Daily Board Show Subject: Daily Board Show, 10/11/2001 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: O X-Status: Its always darkest before the dawn...its Your Daily Board Show! *warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk! Wednesday 10 October 2001: Richard Harrison has no problem with the proposed slate of replacement EC members and doesn't think the majority of Board members does either. He notes " the procedures were set up to reduce the influence of the Board over who would serve on the EC in order to prevent the appearance of stacking. Obviously, there will be some candidates who are more appealing and some who are less appealing to any particular Board member." He suggests that if Board members are not happy with this interpretation of the guidelines they draft a motion to revise them. Tim Stowell notes that "Other parts of the EC report as accepted have been ignored by the EC or changed as THEY saw fit, without Board approval. The Board was, in some cases, informed after the fact - if at all." [I have no idea what he is referencing here. As far as I know the EC has followed the guidelines pretty closely.] He thinks that it is the Board's perogative to change the guidelines to suit its wishes. Richard supplies a link to the motion in which the EC's standing procedures were adopted. [I think what Tim was really getting after was Motion 01-05, in which the Board voted to approve the EC's choice to replace a resigned member. This was the first and only time the Board has done that, so far.] Pam Reid notes that she took the EC procedures down when the EC put up its own webpage, but that she probably shouldn't have done that. She hopes the page is still available. Pam later notes that the EC procedures are now back up on the national webpage. Richard thinks that "Someone else's error (real or imagined) is not justification for the Board to ignore whatever rules it has set up for the operation of the EC." He suggests that if a Board member thinks there was a problem in the past they "should address it directly and specifically to the Board so that steps can be taken to prevent its happening again." Holly Timm notifies the Board that she has received mailing lists for the publicity, guidelines, and bylaws commmittees and has subbed those Board members who expressed an interest in any of the committees. Tim says there are no "standing procedures" for this circumstance, since the Board never replaced anyone on the EC to his knowledge [he never did pay real good attention to his surroundings.] He then notes "Hmm, perhaps there was one but I believe that that was an alternate person that was put in place." Pam tells Holly that she forgot to sign up for the committees and asks Holly to sub her to whichever group that needs members. -- In Executive Session: --no activity Bylaws "starter" Committee --the group discusses committee size and regional representation Guidelines "starter" Committee --no activity === You Saw That Coming Corner: From today's New Zoo Review: "Ancestry.com and RootsWeb have combined their public family tree databases to create the largest family-tree offering available online...The combined database will include more than 150 million names once the integration is complete...Although the value of this database will continue to grow as more trees are added, Ancestry.com and RootsWeb are still committed to provide free access to this valuable collection...data submitted to WorldConnect will never be sold on CD-ROM...The combined offering will have all of the functionality RootsWeb users currently enjoy on WorldConnect, which includes a number of reports that have not been available in the past on Ancestry.com. The new database includes all active files in the Ancestry World Tree and WorldConnect." Heh. Look likes Ancestry/Root$web is the current winner of the "who has the most names online" game. Of course, since everyone I know who submitted their work to Root$web also submitted it to Ancestry, lots of them are duplicates. We are sure that all of you who once freely gave of your hard-earned GEDCOMs to Root$web will be pleased to learn that it is now, or soon will be, safely ensconced on Ancestry.com, where they are "still" committed to free access. We wonder how long that will last. === "I believe in getting into hot water; it keeps you clean." ---G.K. Chesterton This has been your Daily Board Show. -Teresa Lindquist merope@radix.net ------- Daily Board Show, (c) 2001 by Teresa Lindquist, all rights reserved. From merope@Radix.Net Sun Oct 14 19:17:50 2001 Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 19:17:49 -0400 (EDT) From: merope To: Daily Board Show Subject: Daily Board Show, abridged edition Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: O X-Status: When your mail program eats your homework...its your Daily Board Show! *warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk! 12 October 2001-14 October 2001: [Due to circumstances beyond my control, namely a mail program that is the spawn of Satan, today's incredibly detailed and unbelievably witty DBS, which covered the last three days of Board activity, has been irretrievably lost. I am too lazy to re-write it so here's the Reader's Digest version] Motion 01-32 [replacement EC members] passed with 10 yes votes and 5 no votes. The motion regarding the mediation panel was declared dead for lack of a second. The Board has briefly [and I mean briefly] discussed the domain name issue currently under hot debate on the -ALL list. From the one or two Board members who responded and the general lack of response from the group, it seems that we aren't interested in dealing with it. There has been no activity on the Bylaws or Guidelines "starter" committees, and other than a message posted by Tim Stowell, no activity in Executive Session. === "Aaaaarrgghhhhhhh!" -me, when my email fried :) This has been an abridged version of your Daily Board Show. -Teresa Lindquist merope@radix.net ------- Daily Board Show, (c) 2001 by Teresa Lindquist, all rights reserved.