Greetings Directors and Corporate Secretary;
The JAN/06 Grand Council Report.
YIS;
Master Aleksandr Vasilevych Lev of Northshield
Grand Council Secretary
cc Grand Council
cc Grand Council Web Archivist
Report from the Grand Council: Jan 2006
A. COMMITTEE/MEMBER ACTIVITY
1) Migration of Grand Council List
Last Winter the Council voted and decided to move the mailing list from
an AOL service to be hosted on the SCA.ORG system where the Grand
Council would have direct control over the software configuration and
can incorporate additional services in the offering. It also gives the
Grand Council the ability to directly contact the person responsible
for the system in the event of an issue. Migration accomplished
successfully. A few problems are still being worked upon.
Concerns expressed at the time had a lot to do with a lack of a simple
web interface for accessing the archives for those who choose to not
receive messages or who wanted to review things. Also the limited
amount of space available for archives on the AOL service.
The Grand Council has already migrated our web presence from volunteer
space to
http://grandcouncil.sca.org
We also gained the ability to have as many additional lists under our
grandcouncil.sca.org domain as the Grand Council may need to use.
Note that the sca.org DNS issues in December have caused this report to
be later than anticipated. A followup will be forthcoming ASAP, perhaps
in time for the meeting, certainly in time for a conference call.
2) From the Board of Directors Meeting in Oct/05. A new Ombudsman,
Director, Tom Hughes and Three New Topics of Discussion.
- Increasing the amount of info available on the Web/Web publishing
as a way of saving costs
- Establishing an official start date/end date for the SCA (note that
we already officially say 1600 as an end date).
- Requiring membership for awards/martial activities
B. COMMITTEE STATUS AND COMMENDATIONS
A current list of Committee Officers is viewable on the committee
website
at http://grandcouncil.sca.org/gcroster.html
Changes due to Resignation/End of Term Limitations:
1) Margherita Alessia "Ghita" , Susan Earley, Middle USA, NomCom,
1999/07
Leave of Absence:
1) Dietrich von Vogelsang, Todd French, CAID USA, Kingdom, 2002/02 est
Commendations go out to Margherita Alessia "Ghita", who is leaving the
council after many years of great service. Also Commendation to
Bertrik
van Triecht, Moderator for his work on the migration and continued
work on solving the last glitches and to outgoing Ombudsman, Director,
Lis
Schraer whose patience and attention was greatly appreciated.
The Grand Council welcomes the new Ombudsman, Director, Tom Hughes.
No Additions this Quarter. Next Candidates will be added to the Grand
Council in May/06. We have a large pool of qualified candidates to
draw
from should it be necessary.
C. PUBLISHABLE SUMMARY
The committee has started work on the first of the three new topics
assigned after the October 2005 board meeting, "Increasing the amount
of info available on the Web/Web publishing as a way of saving costs".
Discussion is ongoing, but preliminary discussions reveal that the
majority of the council feel that all electronic distribution should be
an available option, but that paper distribution should remain as an
option for those who choose that method. It is also believed that
overall costs
may decline, though per copy costs for newsletters may increase if
subscriptions fall below some unknowable level.
Discussions on the other two topics assigned will take place after the
first topic has been completed.
- Establishing an official start date/end date for the SCA (note that
we already officially say 1600 as an end date).
- Requiring membership for awards/martial activities
D. REQUEST FOR THE BOARD
None.
Respectfully submitted,
John Patrick Kowal,
Secretary
SCA: Aleksandr Vasilevych Lev of Northshield
#28604 28 FEB 2007
Barony of Castel Rouge,
Northshield
Appendix A: Preliminary Report On The First Topic
The Following outline was generated and commentary is still being
collected.
Should the SCA pursue web publishing as a possible avenue for cost
savings? If so:
What should the SCA publish on the web?
What kinds (not formats) of documents?
What elements should be centrally managed?
What elements should be managed by the kingdoms / regions?
Hosting publications: central or regional?
Push or pull?
Email notification or not?
Format/s?
List allowed format(s) or list minimal formats and suggest more?
Access for members, nonmembers, your neighbor's dog? (for this
purpose, members are paid card holders of SCA, Inc. and it's affiliated
corporations, nonmembers are participants who don't hold a membership
card and neighbors dog is the other 5+ billion people in the world)
If restricted, upon what basis?
What mechanism will be used?
Will such publication affect membership numbers / types?
If so, can we anticipate a trend of directions (even if not
quantifiable in hard numbers)?
Can we predict future demand from current sales?
Will such publication affect the financial structure /cost
distribution of SCA, Inc.?
How do we know this?
What are the implications of a change in cost distribution?
What schedule should electronic versions of documents be made
available?
Different schedules for the three classes of audiences?
However in brief the Grand Council offers the below interim observance:
Financial Impact of Electronic Publication
If the Society offers the functional equivalent of kingdom newsletters
on the web, the financial impact will be felt at three levels. What
follows will examine what seems to be the most likely and practical
scenario, that no effort is made to collect a fee to view the web
content.
It is important to emphasize that it is neither essential nor
necessarily desirable for the electronic distribution of newsletter
content to mimic the format of the print product. It might take the
form of several different vehicles: one or more officer lists and a
regular e-mail reminder to visit the kingdom website for general
announcements and calendar updates.
Individual Participants
At the individual level, the effect will be almost entirely
benign. Everyone who finds the web version an acceptable substitute for
the print product will save $15. Also, the electronic version can
deliver the same information more promptly ( i.e. typical 1-2 month lag
between submission and arrival of information). Those who think the
print product is worth the additional price can continue to purchase
it. If the number of current subscribers who switch to the web product
is large, printing and mailing costs per copy will rise, and these
increased costs will probably need to be passed on to the remaining
print subscribers.
Two society rules limit the ability of individuals to take
full advantage of electronic publication. Officers are required to be
sustaining members, and one member of a household is required to hold a
sustaining or international membership to allow other members of the
household to order family memberships. If an acceptable electronic
alternative is available, these individuals are still required to order
the paper version even if they feel it offers no added value.
If a kingdom makes all newsletter content available via the web, it is
recommended that web access is an acceptable alternative to a
sustaining membership to hold office, and family memberships should be
available to the immediate family of sustaining and international
members (current policy) and associate members (new policy).
Kingdom Level
Assuming the kingdoms are responsible for hosting and delivering their
web content, there may be some additional costs they must cover. At
first approximation, the added marginal costs seem to be minimal.
Some kingdoms may be spending more to produce and deliver their
newsletters than they receive in newsletter stipend. This is presumably
less of an issue since the newsletter stipends were increased, but may
still be a factor for some kingdoms. If so, they would benefit from
increased electronic distribution. The Grand Council doesn't have
enough information to answer this question.
Corporate Level
Current subscribers who choose to drop their print subscription have
two choices.
Sustaining to Associate
Currently, the newsletter portion of a subscription seems to bring
more revenue to corporate SCA than it costs in newsletter stipends,
perhaps as much as $2.00 per subscription. This is based on a fairly
crude analysis of Society budgets, and the Board probably has a better
sense of per capita cost and revenue than the Grand Council.
Presumably, this balance will change as printing and mailing costs
increase over time.
Membership Dropped Entirely
If an acceptable alternative to our print product is offered at no
charge, some participants will choose this option. However, the
Non-Member Surcharge will still make membership attractive for most
current members. According to the member survey, 75% of the members
attend six events a year or more. At seven events a year an associate
membership pays for itself through avoided Non-Member Surcharge fees.
If a family membership can be purchased in conjunction with an
associate membership, the break even point for an adult couple is five
events a year each. If a person attends no other event than Pennsic,
that alone justifies membership on purely financial grounds.
Even if all the newsletter content is available electronically, it
is likely that a significant number of current members will still feel
value in the print product because of portability, comfort, habit or
other preference. After all, the calendar and event announcements have
long been available on most or all Kingdom sites for some time, and
this is the bulk of newsletter content, and the content of value to
the greatest number of readers.
Still, to the extent that electronic delivery is seen as an acceptable
substitute for the print product, some negative impact on membership
should be expected, either slower growth or an actual decline.
Previous discussions with the corporate office in relation to the
World Proposal indicated that a membership decline of several thousand
would not lead to a proportionate reduction in office expenses, as it
would not be enough to allow a reduction in staff and many office
expenses are
fixed. There would be modest savings in the cost of printing and
mailing membership cards and renewal notices. There would also be some
offsetting revenue, in that someone who no longer held membership would
begin paying the NMS. It would not entirely offset the lost membership
revenue, since dropping membership makes the most financial sense for
members that attend less than six or seven events a year, but the
offset could be significant.
The distinction should be made that the "push" is to make electronic
publishing *an* official format not *the* official format. For the
foreseeable future, print would also continue to be *an* official
format. However we must recognize the fact that due to not everyone
having access to the web, in either broadband or dial-up formats, that
any push to make electronic publishing the official format for the SCA
might lead to an alienation of some of our members.
For more information on the SCA, see the SCA Home Page
Last changed: 29-Nov-2007
Copyright of this site is retained by the original contributors. Contact webmaster prior to using elsewhere.