Minutes Montreal 2009.08.31

= Agenda =

Non-profit Corporation
Let's get this done with.

University Promo
Alex and Rob spoke about a university promotional campaign, let's flesh this out a little more.

Artists
Let's plan a way to get more artists on board. Despite Montreal being a hot-spot for the culture scene, we are still mainly just a group of computer geeks. That should be changed.

Meeting Location
While Café Chaos is awesome, we should probably start holding meetings in a more professional location. Warren mentioned using a classroom or something at McGill.

Camera
Someone please bring a camera so that we can get some pictures. I (Rob.s.brit) will try to remember mine, but it's possible that like last time I will forget.

Get-Involved Page
On our website there is a "Get Involved" page, however it doesn't really tell you much on how to get involved. We should put in there something saying how to handle tasks, what needs to be done, etc. Maybe a link to the contact form. Perhaps we should set up a volunteer@pirateparty.ca?

Domain Redirecting
If I go to www.piratepartyofcanada.com, I do not get redirected to to www.pirateparty.ca. Let's set up some permanent redirects or something.

= Minutes =

''Here are some ad-hoc minutes from the meeting on Aug 31st at Cafe Chaos. Those who attended the meeting are encouraged to add minutes that I've forgotten or clarify where I have botched an issue.'' - Ryan


 * 1) The meeting started with introductions of the 15ish people present.  In addition to the Pirate Partisans there was a journalist from Université du Québec who recorded observed the whole meeting, and an inventor/musician who was curious about what we are up to.
 * 2) The non-profit corporation was discussed.  The Paperwork is prepared, Rob just needs to collect the other two signatures so we expect to see the NPC set up by the next meeting.  There are some funds from registration donations(no longer fees)sitting in our paypal account which will become accessible once the NPC is established.
 * 3) Collecting signatures for registration as a federal party were discussed.  Many signed pages are reportedly in the mail.  We hope that the establishment of the University clubs will lead to a huge surge in signatures.
 * 4) The establishment of the University Clubs was discussed.  Ryan and Warren will have the McGill club formally running in time for the September 14th clubs night (where students are introduced to all the clubs on campus).  Rob will start working towards getting a similar club rolling at Concordia, but would love for some other Concordia Students to share that responsibility.
 * 5) The urgency of getting the French translation of the webpage up was agreed upon.  All bilingual Pirate Partisans are encouraged to start translating or creating French content on the wiki in the next few days.  Stephan has committed himself to ensuring that there will be French content on the site by the end of seven days, but he ominously warns that it will be entirely his opinions expressed unless others get involved on the wiki.
 * 6) Other issues with the website were discussed.  Some were technical issues about PiratePartyofCanada.com redirecting to PiratePartyofCanada.ca or the number of hits we have been receiving after recent appearances in the press.  There was a general lament about the insufficient quantity content on the sight at present.
 * 7) Liaisons were discussed.  At the moment, Max has accepted responsibility for keeping in touch with what is coming out of the PPoC in Vancouver.  Future liaisons between the PPoC groups sprouting up and with groups outside the pirate party movement will be considered as things continue to expand.
 * 8) Several fundamental questions were raised by an inventor/musician who would probably not classify himself as a member of the pirate movement. What is the problem our group is trying to solve? what approach(s) do we intend to take?  How will we communicate these ideas clearly?  His concern reminds us that we still do not have sufficient answers to these challenges, much less a clear and elegant expression of those answers.
 * 9) We broke off into a general discussion about PPoC plans, problems, slogans, etc.
 * There was agreement that we are fundamentally concerned with these four issues:
 * Copyright Reform
 * Patent Reform
 * Net Neutrality
 * Privacy
 * There was considerable discussion about the inclusion of "government transparency" into that list.
 * As could be expected, defining what exactly those terms means proved challenging.
 * There was a effort to search for a one sentence expression of the problem the PPoC seeks to solve. The discussion here is hard to summarize and will hopefully continue to develop on the forum/wiki.
 * Marcus has committed himself to ensuring that the four basic points above are expressed in some clear and idiot-proof manner before the next meeting.