From PPI
- Agenda PPI BOARD MEETING
- --- 10.3.2021 13:00 UTC/14:00 CEST ---
- Big Blue Button Room: https://bbb.piratensommer.de/b/gre-cnw-a9v
- Audio recording: PiratesOnAir Streaming, recording
- Video: https://bbb.piratensommer.de/b/gre-cnw-a9v
Record of the meeting
1 - ATTENDEES
1.1 - Members of the PPI board
- participating: Mike, Manuel, Bastian, Keith,
- excused: Bailey, Gregory, Dario
- unexcused: Carlos, Dan
- Quorum: 4 out of 9 present. There is some confusion about whether there is a quorum. A prior decision was vacated on the rules of the board, rule 5, point 3, but this rule was not replaced. Aa result, we decided to open the meeting but not to make any binding voted decisions. At the next meeting or by correspondence we will have the
1.2 - Others
- Alternate Board Members
- participating: Svein arrived at 13:20 UTC
- excused:
- unexcused: Thomas, Ji Yong
- Guests:
- participating:
- PiratesOnAir
2 - PROCEEDINGS
- Meeting opened at 13:15 UTC by Keith
- Meeting chaired by Keith
- Secretary for this meeting is Everyone
- Quorum established with (5 out of 9) board members present, including Svein.
- Streaming started: started https://piratesonair.net/live-stream/
- Recording started: 13:15 UTC
- https://owncloud.ag-technik.de/s/WZ4rHoF4H9yD4Lt
- Postal votes: none
- Notes on meeting process: none
3 - APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES
| Motion | |
|---|---|
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| * Minutes of the last meeting: https://wiki.pp-international.net/wiki/index.php?title=PPI_Minutes_2021-02-17 | |
 Yes : Bastian, Keith, Mike, Manuel,
| |
 No :
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 Abstain :
| |
|
4 - REPORTS
4.1 - Short reports of the board members 1)
Board
- Keith: Our elections are in 2 weeks. We just made tv and radio ads that are being broadcast as we speak. I wanted to translate everything for you all before the election, but I may end up missing.
- Dario: not present
- Bastian:
- All the financial information I have is in the PPI wiki. But I need access to the bank account as soon as possible. #Groundhog
- I have been taking care of the PPI technique as I do every day. All systems are running fine. The spam problem is solved ufn. ;-)
- Manuel: All my work has been slowed due to my educational responsibilities.
- Discussion about rules of proceedure and CoA and other petitions... my report on the issues with fingerprinting and other contraversies. I have been able to develop an app, a simple app that displays my website as a student delegate for anyone to see without opening the browser. I am planning to add rss capabilities to display modifications. If everything goes well I can present to the board and committees, so it can be used as a tool for us or PPEU or anyone.
- Mike: Situation in PPCZ: still on our way to possibly win; still polling on the top, electoral reform pending. Some of the regions, the size of the region differs widely. (Speaking about the voting threshhold...) Due to this the small party issue was problematic in these regions. Issue was favoring the one man parties. We will see what happens. The election might be postponed, but I hope that that will not happen.
- Gregory: not present
- Dan: not present
- Carlos: not present
- Bailey: not present
Alternates:
- Svein: Most of my work regarding PPNO. We are preparing our lists. We need to have them finished by the end of March, but it is looking good. That is what we are working on everyday. We are one of the lucky parties, because we got enough votes the last time so we don't need to get signatures. We have also started preparing for the big stage for the campaigning which is in my town. We just now today received a stand. We got next to all the bigger parties. They often try to hide us, but this year we got a good spot.
- Ji Yong: not present
- Thomas: not present
5.1 - Proposals
- Mike did not get through to this yet, but he will do it before the next meeting.
Issue: Letter to our members (on fees and multiple GAs)
Submitted by: Mike
Justification: At the last board meeting, I was tasked with drafting an e-mail. I only got to it recently, so we might as well discuss it here.
Motion: none
Text (subject to change):
Dear members of the PPI, First of all, hello and welcome to 2021; let’s hope it’s going to be a little bit better than 2020. Second of all, we have two topics we would like to run past you and get your response to both of them: 1) We would like to move ahead with collection of the last year’s membership fees, which are due this year. But as you know, since Munich 2018 General Assembly, setting of the fees for each member party has been simplified on one hand, but also made a bit less exact and more up to the parties than before. Thus now we need your best estimate as to in which tier of the four-tier system passed in Munich do you see yourselves. We have our own estimates, but it’s definitely you who has the most current information. The tiers are as follows, along with their descriptions: --here’s gonna be the list once Wiki will be back up and I'll have somewhere to copy it from-- We would therefore liked to ask you to get back to us with the best estimate to which of the tiers do you consider your party to currently be. 2) The second thing: We would like to pick your brain on how we should plan this year. There’s certainly going to be a General Assembly at the end of the year, as it always is, with elections and such. But just like last year, especially since the pandemic is still raging, we are thinking about one or two more General Assemblies to better keep in touch amongst ourselves. Please, do let us know what would you think about that, if any additional GA’s are needed, how many and anything else you might think of. Your input is very important to us and we do not want to plan anything our members wouldn’t then like to participate in. Thank you in advance for your reply and your time. Have a great day! Bailey Lamon, PPI Chair on behalf of the PPI Board
- Issue: Google Ads Grant
- Submitted by: Gregory
- Justification: We now have the opportunity to do google search ads for 10,000 USD per month with maximum bid of 2 USD per keyword. (there are many more fineprint involved, most grantees do not manage to spend the whole 10,000 USD every month) the ads have to have an effect - meaning a certain click through rate and also conversion rate on the site. I like to start playing with it and direct people to the Freedom to Share ECI widget on our site, so that we can collect signatures and email addresses for our newsletter. https://pp-international.net/freedom-to-share-eci/ - this is a page that have a call to action and can do any "conversions" - so a good playground.
- Motion: Approve of uses for our Google Ads Grant.
- Gregory mentioned that the Freedom to Share would be targeted to EU residents.
- Manuel: As a starting point it is a good idea.
- Svein: The budget is pretty huge, 10,000. I am thinking that there are a lot of things going in Europe with elections as well. Can we use it for elections, would that be legal? It might need to be reported. It depends on the rules of the country.
- Keith: I would like to see it used for selling t-shirts and crowdfunding, plus gaining individual members to PPI, and to help us create a public mailing list.
- Bastian: There is a mess with the GDPR. We should be cautious if we use this grant, because it will be complicated for our current compliance.
- Manuel: I agree with Bastian that we should postpone the vote, so Gregory can help us get to a clear conclusion.
- No one is opposed to postponing the vote for now.
Issue: Mailing List to The Public
Submitted by: Keith
Justification: Mailing list and current EU sign up info. "So we need to create a mailing list. For a newsletter and this info, this would be a good project. Not all of our mails need to be to leaders. We need a sign up, and one that is not just for Europeans."
Motion: Create a public mailing list, such as announcements@pp-international. Use this list to send newsletter and information about events.
- Manuel: I think we should make this list.
- Mike: I think that as well.
- Svein: Agreed.
5.2 - Working Groups Update
- There were no working groups.
5.3 Economic Update
- Bastian: No news on Bitcoin nor anything else.
5.4 ECOSOC/UN
- Keith: In three months (June) our quadrennial report is due.
- Mike: Do we know what's supposed to be in it?
- Keith: We already have some first draft. I'll find it.
5.5 PPI HQ update
- Mike: Nothing new to report.
6 AOB - Any other business
Issue: AOB (Pirate Blockchain R&D)
Submitted by: Keith
Justification: We discuss often our support for blockchain tech for decentralization, but we have done very little other than accept a couple membership fee collections in crypto to support the movement. There are energy and lack of transparency concerns with some crypto firms, such as Bitcoin and the Pirate coin (ARRR). There are new technologies, such as Cardano and Chia, that seem more ecofriendly and transparent. What is our take and how can we use/support/development blockchain, either by developing our own currency, investing in an existing one, or using it to preserve information?
Motion: This is just a point for discussion, unless someone wants to take the initiative of starting the project.
- Manuel: If we find a way to use the coin in a sustainable or meaningful way, there will be justification for this.
- Svein: There's discussion on this as well. A lot of mining centers get tax-payer subsidised electricity to mine Bitcoin. We need to come up with a solution to this. I can see a lot of users in insurance perhaps, to follow transactions. We'll see what will happen.
- Keith: I've been trying to get in with Chia netwoork. It would be good for us to be on top of this technology.
- Manuel: As a law student I would be interested in legal side of the NFT.
- The PPEU Board would like to do a joint meeting again, as soon as possible.
- They are expecting our answer.
- When should the meeting be? It should not be on the date of their regular board meeting, which is on Wednesday. It is normally at 7 pm. We could make it on a Saturday, to accomodate the time zones.
- There was a mention of March 17, but that time has been reconsidered.
- Perhaps Saturday afternoon.
- Perhaps we can create a Doodle. Restrain the hour to make it possible for Europe.
Sat 20th is okay for us present here; Mike will get about that in touch with PPEU and we'll decide on time.
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- Next meeting will be with PPEU: time will be announced.
- Next PPI scheduled board meeting: 31.03.2021, 13:00 UTC/14:00 CET/08:00 EST
- Meeting Closed: 14:35 UTC
