Spring 2020 Executive Meeting

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General

The Spring 2020 Executive meeting was held on March 14.

Announcements

Department Updates

Community Outreach

Nothing on the agenda

Events and Conferences

Anni 2020 and the global pandemic

Anniversary party will not be celebrated in the spring due to the world wide pandemic, it might get postponed to the Fall, which means Fall Ball will be cancelled, which makes sense especially as Disney is currently closed and plans cannot really be made.

The question for the Shatayan remains if people who can’t come later in the year get refunded or will they be allowed to transfer the ticket money to a future event? Since transferring the money is better, as paying back is a painful process, it was decided that the default is to use funds for Fall Anni, but there can be refunds on a case by case basis.

Rhed, outgoing Amyrlin, is ready to transfer all functions to the new Amyrlin, but can have an official ceremony in the Fall, it will be announced now so that she can retire into her chosen Ajah. It was suggested that there could be some sort of online event so that people still get to see a ceremony.

Other Events

JordanCon

Evaluating, it will most likely be cancelled, the conversation on Tower representation is paused until there is more information.

There is a new conference coordinator who will be announced shortly.

EuroParty

EuroParty 2020 is set to open registration in a week, the hotel needs numbers by May 15. Still hoping to go ahead with Aug 21-23 target date. The Tower can wait on payment and don’t have to worry so much about refunds. We can aim to accept payment at the end of April, maybe May – we can regroup then and make firm plans.

No bids for Euro 2021. Prague was suggested as TV show is filmed there – the idea is to tour filming locations.

Anni 2021

Proposals have been sent to 2 hotels, one is out of price range, the Marriot is within our range. Eleyan has access to planning forum.

One person put in a bid for banners – we did want more and are still on it.

Fall Ball

Disney closed, we are moving Anni to fall, we can keep Disney for another year, maybe spring 22

Marketing

The Keeper has suggested that the Department of Marketing should work together with other departments, since Marketing has a lot of cross over. Due to this, it will be reevaluated which forums Directors have access to (the same for Shatayan and Archivist) and it might be decided that Directors should see all other department’s forums.

Real Life Marketing

Style guides – it is good to update for 2021. There is a volunteer to take this on. Keeper can share Jordan Con style guide for ideas. Previous style guide attempt fell apart.

Ads for different philanthropy projects were discussed.

Shop

Hoping to switch to zazzle from café press. Zazzle is easier to use – can add one design and put it on everything and members have also said Zazzle is better quality.

There could be an issue with the word “Aes Sedai” – zazzle said it is possibly copyrighted, but people have bought it in the past. There is no guidance from Sony or Amazon on Wheel of time terms.

The logo is the property of TarValon.Net, The Aes Sedai symbol is probably not copyrightable, but Aes sedai and Ajah might be something they can claim. However the community does have a 20 year history of being able to use the terms (and have even been recommended in the actual books).

Other

There are other plans to engage JM more. A mentor/mentee game is being considered.

Membership

The reasons for doing a Membership Clean up were discussed and the Amyrlin would like to discontinue the clean up threads.

The boards currently have a function that says when someone last posted or visited, so if needed that information can be used.

Other

The SM test was moved to a google form test.

Raisings which were approved to be done during a RL event will not be held. A question if JM would like a RL raising was included in the MoNR/MoAS offices.

The idea of a video live raising was entertained. Some people really like the idea of a live raising and would be willing to wait for the RL events to start again, but others just want it over and to be raised as soon as possible.

Activity in Facebook

Director of Marketing is always looking for more engagement, have gained around 1000 likes in the past year, but TarValon.Net Members group is largely dead. It might be that people engage with their community group’s page rather than the general one.

City Forums

Welcoming committee project and planning separate. Intends to hire more greeters. Will change WC to be more TV related and maybe split to subforums, will help keep it consistent and ask for name suggestions.

Raising Requirements

The current raising requirements state that for a person to be raised to the Accepted, they need to have read all 14 books, which is a long and slow process for some people. New members who have begun reading will need to take a long time before being eligible for raising. It was discussed that in the future it could be possible that knowledge from the TV show be incorporated instead.

There is also consideration of information about the community that must be known to be eligible for raising. A document is to be created and the Membership Manual is already in the process of being updated.

Different paths

A third path for Senior Membership was discussed, but the idea of making Resident Citizens into an additional SM group was rejected.

A third path will be considered but not at this point. Changing the raising requirements may negate the demand for this – some citizens have stayed where they are because they don’t want to read the books.

Gender

Non binary people have said they don’t feel comfortable in either the Parlour or Clubhouse SM forums, so it was requested that a third, non binary forum, be added.

Technology

The Technology Director would like to set up the Dev Server and implement the ticketing system. Needs to sync time with Director of Mods for Discord, there might be need for a Discord Admin.

Spam

There was a big spike in spam accounts, due to a setting being turned off in the back end. The Gatekeepers will be given the task to approve newly made accounts, so that spam accounts do not become active.

Research and Records

Plans to implement the TV show information into our current Wiki structure may need to wait until a new Director of Research and Records is identified.