[dundee] Newsletter - Just when you thought it safe to return.......

[Arron 'Finux' Finnon]

NEWSLETTER

Hi Guys,

Firstly I'd like to say we hope you had a fantastic Christmas and a
happy new year (or should I say GNU/Year).

I have plenty of news for you, firstly there has been some massive
changes at the Linux Society (the name for starters) and some changes
around in some of the officers.

During the AGM/EGM it was decided that it maybe appropriate to consider
a name change for the society, it has been a long time since we were a
Linux only sort of group and we have always been more into open
technologies one than specific type of software one. So I'm proud to
announce the Linux Society has changed its name to "The Open Society" or
The O.S for short.

I was also nominated and elected for the position of President of the
society, with Nick Walker and Werner Nel staying on as officers, Nick
Walker is Treasurer and Werner Nel Secretary. There is no Vice-President
this year. I would like to take the time to thank all the other
ex-officers for their time, and we do hope to see you at the next meetings.

There was many things discussed during the AGM and EGM and thanks to
everyone that came along and had their say.

Some of the main issues raised;

Too many hacking talks.

TayLUG being formalized.

Lack of Prior notice to meetings.

Lack of community members not participating in the form of talks.

Location of the meetings, (Union Vs University)

Officer attendance

Website (www.thelinuxsociety.org.uk)

More integration with other Societies and Groups in Dundee

As you can see we have areas of concern raised by our members and input
from everyone will be required to ratify them.

To this end I have agreed to swap talks with the hacking society, so
co-president of the ethical hacking society will be coming to us soon to
talk about net-neutrality in return from me speaking to them on
tunneling out of restrictive/captive portals/firewalls.

We had great success last year with Dr Tony Cox's historical tour of
Dundee and am in the process of arranging a date with him.

The meeting also saw a resolution passed that requires all officers to
have been to at least 4 meetings per academic year.

Kris Findlay remains in charge of the society's web site, however a new
site will be deployed, and the old one is to be archived.

During the meeting a large TayLUG membership where present and of that
section a large majority wished to see TayLUG formalized with a
constitution and officers. Due to Gordon Dunlop not being at the last
meetings, Robert Ladyman agreed to start writing a draft constitution
and have that posted to you guys for your thoughts and additions over
the next couple of months.

As for meetings,

13^th January 2011 -- Arron Finnon -- Welcome to the Open Society

27^th January 2011 -- Tom Paynter -- TBC

10^th February 2011 -- Dr Tony Cox -- Historical Tour of Dundee - TBC

24^th February 2011 -- Rorie Hood -- Net-neutrality -- TBC

10^th March 2011 -- Flash Talk Night

Our membership also decided that the society's meetings should return
back to the Hannah Maclure Centre at the Union Campus, Nick Walker is
looking into it however I am unable to confirm that this will be sorted
by the 13^th .so I think it wise to keep the next meeting at the
university campus

As always if you have a talk you would like to give at the society, or
have one that you would like to hear then drop me a line or speak to me
in person. If you think of a guest speaker you would like then drop me a
line with their details and I would be more than happy to contact them
for you.

As usual our society meetings are open to everyone, regardless of any
Student/Academic relationship, so if you have a buddy, partner, enemy or
virtual pet that you would like to bring along to the meeting then
please do so.

I hope to see you all on the 13^th of this month

Yours

Arron "finux" Finnon

The Open Society

Cat Herder Supreme


-- 
Arron "finux" Finnon

Finux.co.uk - Twitter.com/f1nux - facebook.com/finux

PGP: http://finux.co.uk/finux.asc

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