Members in Attendance

• Rebecca Nelson, President
• Nathan Spanier, Treasurer
• Abby Sussman, Director

Minutes

Recurring Items

Call for Additions to Agenda

A call for any additions to the agenda was made. No additions to the agenda at this time.

Financial Report

Treasurer Nate S. presented the Fiscal Year 2018 financial report. The report is summarized as follows:

• Gross Income: $187.22
• Expenses: $187.22
• Net Income: $0.00

Since the previous meeting, we have had one new recurring expense, $15 per month to Digital Ocean for hosting compute resources for the circle.

Publicity & Outreach Report

A report on outreach and networking efforts was presented, with calls to the floor for any information on such efforts.

Abby S, while in Virginia, attempted to promote the circle to people in the area. She did not have very much success in generating interest, and noted that the people she tried talking to seemed to be the wrong age, and that they were software engineer industry professionals, which might have made them less likely to want to help with the project. She also attempted to generate interest within the board game club at the U of M, which was slightly more successful in that two new people joined the Discord, but there seemed to be a similar lack of interest.

Rebecca N. noted that it might be a good idea to focus on anime-oriented communities to increase potential response.

She gave a report on a group with similar interests as the circle that had contacted MSC. This group, “Waifu Chain”, is an online community that is in the process of creating a system hosted on the cryptocurrency network Ethereum that generates unique anime characters with intractability that is to be hosted on the blockchain. Their website is located at https://waifuchain.moe/. They contacted Moe Serifu Circle as part of their research efforts and to see what kind of collaboration might be possible. Rebecca joined an invite to their Discord and spent some time interacting with the community, and she believes that it would be a good idea to remain in contact and establish a good relationship with that group.

Ongoing/Informational Items

Vice President Vacancy

The vacancy in the office of Vice President was brought up. Rebecca called for any nominations or suggestions. Rebecca nominated Connor Norton for the position. No other candidates were nominated.

Rebecca motioned for a vote to elect Connor Norton to the office of Vice President, conditional on his acceptance of the position. Abby seconded the motion. Voting was as follows:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

The motion passed. Rebecca will notify Connor of the election and he will take office as Vice President immediately after he confirms and accepts the position.

Secretary Vacancy

The vacancy in the office of Secretary was brought up. Rebecca called for any nominations or suggestions. There were no nominations. Rebecca will continue performing the duties of Secretary until such time as the office is filled.

Bank Account Creation

Rebecca and Nate gave a report on the creation of the MSC bank account. On November 16th, 2018, they met with a banker at US Bank to create a checking account that gave Rebecca and Nate full access to it due to their roles within MSC. The account was created and online access was established.

In addition, the recurring cost for Digital Ocean was switched from Rebecca’s personal banking account to MSC’s bank account.

Project Management

A demonstration of the system used for tracking circle business at https://github.com/orgs/moe-serifu-circle/projects/3 was planned to be shown, but due to time constraints and there only being one person present who was unfamiliar with the system, this was stricken from the agenda, to be conducted in a one-on-one meeting. Rebecca will meet with Abby prior to the Q2 meeting to demonstrate the system.

New Items

Budget

Nate presented the budget for fiscal year 2019. A detailed budget is present in the circle Google Drive folder, and a summary of it is as follows:

• $180 for server hosting
• $30.22 for web domain renewal
• $49.00 for registered agent/legal fees.

A vote to adapt the budget was held:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

The vote passed, and the new budget went into effect immediately. Any further changes in spending must be approved by a special committee.

Publicity Committee

A new committee centered around handling publicity and outreach was presented. The committee would be responsible for generating interest in the MSC project and building the community outside of the circle, and would present a report on such efforts to the board of directors at each quarterly meeting. This committee would exist until dissolved by vote from the Board of Directors or until all of its members resign from committee membership.

Until that point, Abby had been acting as the de facto leader of these efforts, and Rebecca proposed that she be made chair of the committee.

Rebecca motioned for the creation of the Publicity Committee with Abby Sussman as chair. Nate seconded the motion. The results of the vote were as follows:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

The motion passed, and the Publicity Committee was created, effective immediately.

Fundraising

A discussion on how to raise money for the circle was brought up. Abby presented her findings on various crowdsourcing outlets in detail in the #publicity channel on the Discord server, with a summarization as follows:

Indie GoGo is one option, but Abby had concerns about the reputability of the website, though it would be very easy to get started with it.

Kickstarter seems to be more difficult to make work for the circle due to its all-or-nothing funding model, and the fact that we would have to pass an approval process with them.

Patreon was also considered, but Abby noted that due to its typical pay-per-month model, it was more suitable for activities that generate monthly content, which MSC does not do.

Discord Policy

Rebecca proposed a plan for the operation of the Discord community, and the formation of a new committee to be responsible for this plan.

The plan includes the following items: First, that age-restricted channels be opened in order to facilitate discussion of such topics within the community and to provide a place for such content that is separated from the general channels. These age-restricted channels would not only be marked as such, but circle staff would take reasonable measures to ensure that access to them is completely disallowed for any member that we know to not be of the age of majority.

Second, that efforts to become more involved in community engagement and community building within the Discord community be started. This would involve discussions on the primary channels as well as planning for any other online events.

Third, that a moderation team be established, and its structure be modified as needed.

Fourth, that a set of community guidelines that would guide in moderation be created. These guidelines will represent a type of code of conduct as well as outline moderation policy.

A new Community Moderation Committee would be created which would responsible for putting all of the points of the community policy into effect. The Chair of this committee would act as the head of the moderation team. Any voting member of the circle would be eligible to be a candidate for joining the team at such time as expansion of the moderation team becomes a goal. The Chair would be responsible for submitting reports on community efforts and notable community events at each quarterly meeting. This committee would exist until dissolved by vote from the Board of Directors or until all of its members resign from committee membership.

Rebecca motioned for the creation of the Community Moderation Committee with herself as the Chair. Nate seconded the motion. The results of the vote were as follows:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

The motion passed, and the Community Moderation Committee was created, effective immediately.

After the vote, Rebecca encouraged additional recruitment to the Discord community, noting that in her belief, community is a very important component of the circle, and members who created content for the circle were not so necessary as just getting more people to join.

Roster Management Process

A proposal on the member sign-up and roster records-keeping process was presented. A vote to adapt the process of completing the membership form as-is, and then paying dues, was proposed.

The results of the vote were as follows:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

The motion went into effect immediately.

Active Member Sign-Up

Rebecca noted that not all active members were paid circle members, and that this should be changed to match reality.

Intellectual Properties Transfer

Rebecca proposed the transfer of all Masa-Chan and Moe Serifu Circle IPs currently owned by Rebecca Nelson to the circle. A vote was held, with the following results:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

An agreement will be drafted and sent to Rebecca, assigning all current Moe Serifu Circle-related assets to the circle.

Software Contributor License Agreement

A proposed process for licensing software contributions to the organization was presented. After discussion, a vote was held, with the following results:

• Rebecca N: Aye
• Nathan S: Aye
• Abby S: Aye

All contributors will need to sign the agreement before their contributions are accepted, effective immediately.

Recurring Tasks Research

We need additional info on mandatory tasks (such as tax filings, registered agent filings, etc). Discussion and delegation of this topic will be held.

This item was stricken from the agenda due to time constraints.

Technical Report

The Engineering Committee presented a report on the state of Moe Serifu Agent

• State
  • Engineering Resources - 2 people
  • Timeline - 1 year
• Engineering Resources
  • Engineers:
    • Jordan Goetze (primary)
    • Jarod Pivovar (secondary)
    • Michael Ung (secondary)
  • Lead
    • Rebecca Nelson
• Planning
  • Cannot meet current deadline
  • Refactor of primary design causing delays
  • But new design should help to smooth things out later
• Timeline
  • 2019/01/04 - v0.1 - Minimal codebase converted to Python
  • 2019/04/5 - v0.2 - Publication to public project indexes
  • 2019/05/26 - v0.3 (ALPHA) - 2D Graphics and audio output
  • 2019/06/21 - v0.4 - Voice recognition & engineering maintenance
  • 2019/08/16 - v0.5 - 3D graphics engine
  • 2019/10/11 - v0.6 - Multiple output devices
  • 2019/12/06 - v1.0 (GA) - Address user testing issues and remaining maintenance tasks

Technical Demo

The Engineering Committee will present a demo of Moe Serifu Agent as it currently exists.

This item was stricken from the agenda due to time constraints.