Podcasting Focus Fusion Society Member Meetings

[Rezwan]

Folks, it’s time to take these conversations live via podcasts. I’ve set up Focus Fusion Radio here – http://www.blogtalkradio.com/focusfusion

Derek Shannon and I tested it yesterday and it works like a charm.

I want to have a series of meetings of the Focus Fusion Society members via podcast to discuss the issues our organization faces. We can’t support LPP or Fusion, if we aren’t a well supported and developed organization ourselves. These conversations will help us clarify our understanding of who we are and what we’re supposed to be doing, and how we’re supposed to do it, and what resources we need to pull it off. And also, who’s supposed to be doing what.

After that, we can start having podcasts featuring interviews with the LPPX crew, with other physicists, other interested parties and on requested topics.

If you have original music and sound effects that we could use on the show, send that in, we’d love to use it.

Now for the Member meetings, we have the following topics to discuss:

Membership – the Focus Fusion Society is a membership organization. “Members” are those who have paid their subscription. This is a loose definition of membership, and people who are registered on the website site but not paid are not members in the legal sense. “Membership” is a legal category with responsibilities and voting rights. We need to discuss this. Most nonprofit organizations choose not to have this sort of memberhip structure for various reasons, to be discussed on the podcast. Others make it work – but it takes more people to make it work. Like we’d have to hire a membership coordinator to really do it that way.

Board – Currently, the FFS board is nominal, consisting of the minimal 3 members who have never had a meeting together, and are standins for the legal requirement that, as a 501c3, we have a board. This is unacceptable for a nonprofit. Without a board, there is really no fundraising. Even membership organizations like the Sierra Club have a strong board. Occasionally, the board and the members come into conflict, as in the Sierra Club, when the Board made a decision to sell the Sierra Club name for product endorsement. The Members put an opposing measure on the ballot and voted to change the board’s decision.

Aside from these conflicts, the Board is key to credibility as an organization. If we’re going to advance as a fusion advocacy group, we need to develop the board.

Mission statements, From “The Board Member’s Guide to Fund Raising” by Fisher Howe:

A structured strategic or long-range planning exercise is often the best approach to the preparation of a mission statement. The mission statement will be what comes out of a planning exercise, not what goes into it; it will be the core understanding around which can be built a clear, unambiguous articulation of purposes, programs, and priorities – clearly of great value to board and management. It also affords a firm basis for arriving at an estimate of the resources needed to support the organization on which a fundraising program depends.

[Rezwan]

I’d like to schedule our first meeting for Monday the 16th – a test run meeting, just to iron the bugs out. I’ve scheduled a podcast for 6 pm Eastern time. Note that 7-11 is prime time and we have to be premium members for that. Premium membership also gives us the ability to screen calls and a few other features. May be worth it.

It will be a members meeting. We’ll do it as a podcast so it’s transparent and can be archived. Anyone can listen, but we will restrict it to members to talk. After all, paid membership has its privileges.

Note that Derek mentioned something about another type of meeting technology (meetup?). We could use that instead, although I like the open “town hall” feel of podcasting the meeting, so this may be adequate to our purposes.

What do you think?

[Aeronaut]

I’ll have to check it again tomorrow. Couldn’t find a play button. How much does the premium version go for? If it gives FFS control of the advertising, it could be well worth a small in-kind investment.

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