October 10th, 2017 IRC Meeting

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Review

Decisions/Endorsements

Mass. Amazon Bid

Amazon wants to build a 2nd headquarters and is entertaining bids from different cities/states. Massachusetts is putting together a secret proposal likely with hefty tax breaks and subsidies. We gave subsidies to GE worth $175 million for 200 jobs, so imagine the price tag for Amazon's 50,000 jobs.

Propose:

  • opposing any tax breaks or subsidies to Amazon;
  • calling for opening up the terms of the proposal and holding many public hearings on the proposal.

Projects

Planning for 2018 Elections & Organizing

In 2018, towns decide when their elections are held, but most are held in the first half of the year. State & county elections are in November. What offices are up in 2018 is listed here. We have been asked to hold a town election training in Milford this year. Additionally, it would be good to have candidate trainings in Western Mass. (Holyoke?), Worcester, Boston-area.

Nomination papers for federal/state/county elections are available in mid-February. State/county candidates have until the end of May to gather all of their signatures, while federal candidates have until the end of July. The number of signatures needed vary from 150 for State Rep. to 2000 for US House of Representatives.

The electronic election for our officers went well in 2017, and we should consider doing it again. Such a change would allow us to decentralize our yearly conference and hold multiple regional conferences in different parts of the state. We could schedule monthly conferences starting in March or April. We could limit them to about 4-5 hours long, with the first half being training and the second half being discussion. If we want to go this route, we should ask our members soon and see who wants to organize their regional conference.

Fundraiser

Monthly Video Magazine

Digital Right of Repair

Details. Making calls to volunteers and members.

Other To Dos

S.1241 - Combating Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing, and Counterfeiting Act of 2017

Approved our opposition to S.1241. Need statement (Joe)

FOSS Tutorials

Worcester farm group is interested in having some FOSS tutorials. Perhaps:

  • how to do basic labels in GIMP,
  • work through a few sample spreadsheets related to seed cost and
  • similarly applicable real-world situations, depending on the needs of the group

Basically how to do graph design & product management with open source tools. Malt will put together a one paragraph description of what we need and we can mail it out to ask pirates to help.

Tech/Outreach

  • Review regular IRC meeting day. Poll sent to email list - Sent (jokeefe)
  • email Loomio invite to supporters (jokeefe)
  • set up torrents for PirateCon videos (creynolds)
  • post remaining audio for PirateCon talks (srevilak)
  • finish setup of myBB (jokeefe)
  • install mattermost as slack alternative (jokeefe)

Mayfirst is looking at setting up a Discourse instance we could use.

Upcoming Events

See: 2017 calendar

Participants

  • jokeefe: James O’Keefe, Somerville
  • Malt: Samuel Capradae, Worcester
  • Squee: Joseph Onoroski Lowell
  • admech: Matt Fealy, Boston


Observers

  • davidd
  • hvxgr
  • igel_
  • papegaai

Summary

Mass. Amazon Bid

We agreed to oppose it. Working on statement: https://piratenpad.de/p/MAPPAmazonBidStatement

We aim to finish it by Thursday.

Planning for 2018 Elections & Organizing

Possible training schedule:

  • We may have our first training on 11/5
  • early Dec: WMass
  • January: Boston
  • February: Worcester

Once we set dates for the trainings we will put up a poll asking about our 2018 conference and whether to change it into several regional conferences.

Minutes

 


[9:06pm] jokeefe: Agenda: https://masspirates.org/wiki/October_10th,_2017_IRC_Meeting
[9:06pm] papegaai: Title: October 10th, 2017 IRC Meeting - Mass Pirate Wiki (at masspirates.org)
[9:06pm] jokeefe: ids
[9:06pm] jokeefe: James O’Keefe, Somerville
[9:06pm] Malt: Samuel Capradae, Worcester
[9:06pm] Squee: Joseph Onoroski Lowell
[9:07pm] admech: Matt Fealy, Boston
[9:08pm] jokeefe: Anything to add to the agenda?
[9:08pm] Squee: Nay
[9:08pm] admech: No.
[9:09pm] jokeefe: Skipping to Decisions/Endorsements then
[9:09pm] jokeefe: Mass. Amazon Bid
[9:09pm] jokeefe: thoughts?
[9:10pm] Squee: What items does we have to put up?
[9:10pm] jokeefe: not sure what you mean
[9:10pm] admech: Agree completely with the position on the Amazon bid.
[9:11pm] Pirate_22357 left the chat room. (Quit: http://www.kiwiirc.com/ - A hand-crafted IRC client)
[9:11pm] admech: At this point, based on our experience with GE and the Olympics, I'm prepared to oppose a bid sight unseen.
[9:11pm] Malt: also agreed with the position
[9:12pm] Malt: there's so much to attack with amazon
[9:12pm] Squee: I'm opposed
[9:12pm] admech: I was just about to say that.
[9:13pm] jokeefe: Opposed to the bid or the proposal, Squee?
[9:13pm] admech: Squee: to the bid, or to our calling for transparency/public decision process?
[9:13pm] Squee: against the bid itself. Why should we pay for them to take our money?
[9:13pm] jokeefe: lol
[9:13pm] Malt: aye aye!
[9:14pm] jokeefe: can that be part of our statement?
[9:14pm] Squee: lol, you are free to do as you please
[9:15pm] Malt: they're pretty viciously anticompetitive
[9:15pm] Squee: If they want to be a part of Mass's rich business culture, then they can proceed like every other company that does business here and follow the correct paths. Asking the tax payer to foot a bill, I can't see what that is something we should give a thought to.
[9:17pm] Malt: aye!
[9:17pm] Squee: They are just another Walmart and are exceedingly close to creating a monopoly by suppressing smaller companies through underhanded practices......
[9:18pm] Malt: the walmart comparison is key
[9:18pm] Squee: >8-)
[9:18pm] jokeefe: Looks like we are in agreement.
[9:18pm] Malt: "they're walmart crossed with the sears catalog"
[9:18pm] Malt: we have to attack the myth of the web economy, basically
[9:19pm] Malt: amazon isn't special
[9:20pm] Squee: Yeah, they are basicly the first to do it but there are other platforms out there making a name, like wayfair or ebay.
[9:20pm] jokeefe: https://piratenpad.de/p/MAPPAmazonBidStatement
[9:25pm] jokeefe: please edit it
[9:26pm] Squee: Si
[9:26pm] jokeefe: thanks
[9:31pm] jokeefe: anyway, please edit it and lets get it finished by thursday
[9:32pm] Malt left the chat room. (Quit: http://www.kiwiirc.com/ - A hand-crafted IRC client)
[9:32pm] jokeefe: Moving on to Projects
[9:32pm] jokeefe: Planning for 2018 Elections & Organizing
[9:32pm] Malt joined the chat room.
[9:32pm] Malt: sorry
[9:32pm] jokeefe: no worries
[9:32pm] Malt: logged myself out somehow?
[9:33pm] Squee: Happens
[9:33pm] jokeefe: moving on to Planning for 2018 Elections & Organizing
[9:33pm] Malt: Worcester public library rooms tend to book out 3 months in advance
[9:33pm] Malt: i haven't secured space yet, this work thing has been eating my whole life lately
[9:34pm] Squee: ^
[9:34pm] jokeefe: We may have our first training on 11/5
[9:34pm] Malt: nice!
[9:34pm] jokeefe: Could do WMass in early Dec
[9:35pm] jokeefe: Boston in January
[9:35pm] jokeefe: And Worcester again in February
[9:38pm] jokeefe: Does that make sense?
[9:39pm] Squee: Yes.
[9:39pm] Malt: the event in worcester
[9:39pm] Malt: just "run for pirates" or "all progressives, run for something"?
[9:39pm] Malt: do we want to host a joint event with other fringe/progressive groups?
[9:39pm] Squee: I would think so.
[9:40pm] Malt: there's a handful of collective anarchist spaces in worcester, that's where most of the political agitation comes from
[9:40pm] Squee: Anyone whom feels that we should have a more open goverment
[9:40pm] jokeefe: We keep them open to anyone who wants to learn
[9:40pm] jokeefe: If they want to host in Worcester, that could work
[9:42pm] jokeefe: Would you ask them, Malt?
[9:43pm] Malt: oh!
[9:43pm] Malt: i was thinking for people
[9:43pm] Malt: if i can't finagle a library, would we want to host an event at city hall?
[9:43pm] Malt: there's a space there and it tends to be unoccupied, AND they know me
[9:44pm] Malt: i am looking for spaces which can hold 20ish people at least
[9:44pm] Squee: Well, if we pay then we can get much larger spaces too.
[9:44pm] jokeefe: ok, lets book the library
[9:45pm] Squee: Host our own conference and invite speakers.
[9:45pm] Squee: It would be a good way to get people paying attention to us.
[9:45pm] Squee: Though I would be very selective as to whom we invite to speak.
[9:46pm] Malt: i'll check with the library tomorrow
[9:46pm] jokeefe: thanks
[9:47pm] Squee: Sorry if I blurted that out of place.
[9:47pm] jokeefe: no worries
[9:47pm] jokeefe: Had the idea of having regional conferences starting in March. We could put a poll out like we did last year
[9:48pm] jokeefe: and get feedback
[9:49pm] admech: I liked that idea.
[9:49pm] jokeefe: poll or regional conferences?
[9:50pm] Squee: Either or both.
[9:50pm] admech: Regional conferences, but we're going to need to poll to figure out when and where we can make them happen.
[9:50pm] jokeefe: true
[9:50pm] Squee: I would like to invite key guest speakers, like local mayors and reps.
[9:51pm] Malt: if they'll associate with THE PIRATE PARTY
[9:51pm] admech: please no
[9:51pm] Squee: my example is poor.
[9:52pm] Squee: We I mean is people whom we can interview and help us make our point.
[9:52pm] jokeefe: lets think about it.  If we do regional conferences, then we should let local organizing committees decide
[9:52pm] Squee: I will debate with anyone
[9:53pm] Malt: yeah
[9:53pm] Malt: i think this event isn't for debate
[9:53pm] Malt: so much as getting folks activated
[9:53pm] admech: ^this
[9:54pm] Squee: Ah
[9:54pm] Squee: Ok.
[9:54pm] admech: and judging by the last couple PirateCons, a lot of... exchange of ideas happens outside of the scheduled talks, which is great
[9:56pm] admech: 5 minutes, everyone. Anything pressing?
[9:56pm] jokeefe: agreed, having more discussions among Pirates is what we should aim for
[9:56pm] Malt: uhhhhhhhhhh
[9:57pm] Malt: i haven't been able to put much time into the pirates these past few weeks, sorry everyone
[9:57pm] Squee: And I have been all over the place. Sorry for that.
[9:57pm] jokeefe: So: set dates for the next trainings, put up a poll, and go from there
[9:57pm] Squee: Sounds good
[9:57pm] Malt: aye!
[9:57pm] admech: Aye
[9:58pm] jokeefe: I will ask our Hoyoke contact and look for a place in Boston area
[9:58pm] jokeefe: admech motioned to adjourn, do we have a 2nd?
[9:58pm] Squee: I second
[9:58pm] jokeefe: all in favor?
[9:59pm] Squee: Aye!
[9:59pm] admech: Aye
[10:00pm] jokeefe: aye
[10:00pm] Squee: Good night everyone!
[10:00pm] admech: Goodnight.
[10:00pm] jokeefe: good night. thanks all
[10:01pm] Malt: night!
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