XCOM Meeting 27 October 2008
From TMUG - The Triangle Macintosh Users Group
Contents |
meeting called to order
7:08pm, present & accounted
- Stefan, president
- Smythe, 1st VP
- Chips, secretary
- Fred, treasurer
- Allen, immediate past president
[template]
- some of the following info is incomplete &/or carried over from the Aug mtg notes. It is in place as a template prior to the Sept 29 mtg
TMUG server
- Smythe suggested MacHighway as an alternative host for TMUG.org to RTMX & our G4 server, in case we need to replace the server Mac. The price is much less. Stefan has written them asking about what is involved to moving tmug.org to their hosting service, but has gotten no response as of 9.28.
- Stefan has talked with MacHighway. He will fill in some details here.
Future Meeting Programs
November Meeting:
- James Lyons' recent discussion about his stolen iMac has prompted having a meeting on security. Topics suggestions include: how to secure your Mac's data (Charles Mangin); using Mobile Me / .Mac's Back to my Mac; Lo Jack & xxx (Stefan). Other details to be ironed out.
- ComicLife, tentatively, by Stefan
- Q & A – Bob Chandler (Stefan will double check?)
-
- Smythe has talked w/ Trish Huffman about doing a chat room for Q&A & the meeting. She has a standing meeting on our meeting day, so would have to teach someone else to manage this. Allen live blogged the Aug & Sept meetings' Q&A. Hopefully he will continue this.
- We will give time to Tim McBrayer to report on his ISP survey results, if he responds positively to Smythe. Tim responded that he doesn't have time to do this now, but maybe in Oct or Nov.
December Meeting:
- Smythe has talked with a Targus rep, who has sent us a box-o-goodies to give away. There are ~6 items in the box. The requirement is that we review the items. The reviewer gets to keep the item he reviews.
- We will have a "raffle extravaganza" with several items. Possible items may be Airport Extreme, iPod Touch, iPod Shuffle, iPod Nano, 500 GB Time Capsule, Airport Express.
- ???
January Meeting:
- Apple preso by Frances Shepherd - Apple update and future directions (podcasting, pro apps, Apple TV / iTunes, MobileMe). Our Jan 12 meeting is the week after Macworld.
- He agreed to this in early October and has it scheduled.
February Meeting:
- Remote Presentations?
- Remote access?
- Back To My Mac, GoToMeeting, WebEx, Glance
future meeting suggestions:
- no contact yet Mark Williams, founder of Modality
- EyeTV
Treasury & Membership Reports
- Members in good standing:, with renewals due & in grace.
- There were in attendance at the October meeting – members & 2 guests; renewed. other has renewed & have joined by mail this month, for a total of memberships.
- There are now entries in the TiGA, including renewals & new memberships since June 1.
- Cash in bank: $6065.52
- Chips suggested that since we have not paid rent for our meeting location since we moved to the Community Church in April, that we make a donation. Smythe suggested $500.
- [reported by Chips & Fred, as of 10.27.08]
New Business
- There has been an increase in spam posts to TMUG-list over the past month (~10 - 15 / day). Chips has been discarding (deleting) these posts individually. He suggests we undertake more robust anti-spam measures for TMUG's Mailman lists & @tmug.org addys.
- A few weeks back we signed up to be an affiliate for MacUpdate's daily promo. A link to this is on the tmug.org main page. Do we want to be affiliates for other sites? Smythe, Allen, & Chips say yes. We don't need the money, but it's a good way to provide a service. But we should be tasteful & unobtrusive about how we present affiliates to the members & public; i.e. create an affiliate page linked from the main page. We should look into adding Amazon, iTunes, MobileMe, MacZOT, & others.
- Chips reports some interesting data. As of 9.24, there were 254 subscribing addys to the tmug-list. (There are several subscribers sub'ed with 2 or more addys, & 18 subs are disabled for one reason or another.) There were 104 TMUG members (including 11 in grace or due to renew). 40 members were not sub'ed to the list (or at least with their membership addys). They were sent an invitation, extolling the benefits of the list. Since then, 6 have subscribed. Of course, we can't force a member to subscribe to the list, & one is certainly missing out by not.
- At the past 3 meetings, there have been 4 people who have not signed the iMac give away book for a total of 5 times. We remind people at the meeting to sign in. But, again, we can't force them. Chips' opinion is that if they ask after the fact, he will add them. But if they do not, it's their loss. We've spoken of this before, but this note is to put it "on the record".
- Fred brought forth a discussion about "the membership" - Should we try to grow it? Is the average age higher than we would like? Should we try to aquire more younger members? Should we redirect the group's focus?
Old Business
- Smythe has identified a Karaoki PA from Best Buy for ~$80. The Durham Best Buy did not have it in stock on 8.25.08, so Chips bought an alternate model w/ an iPod™ dock for $91. We will evaluate it at the September 8 meeting.
- Update - The consensus is that this karaoke system is inadequate for our needs, as it was more of a toy. It was returned to Best Buy.
- Smythe will look into a compact, integrated PA amp / speaker system in the $300 price range & will report back to XCom.
meeting adjourned
at 8:58 pm by Stefan.
