General Meeting from 06/03/02

<Walter>  Let's get started with the meeting.
<Walter>  This meeting of VOICE is now in session.
<Walter>  You'll find the agenda at http://www.os2voice.org/agendas/VOICE_2002-06-03.html
<Walter>  Sector, you recording the mtg as usual?
<Sector>  Affirmative
<Walter>  Item 3: Treasurer's report
<Walter>  Peter, how much is in the bank?
<Sector>  Hey, what happened to Item 2¨
<Projects>  $7168.29 CDN
<Sector>  $4,697.06 USD
<Walter>  Oops! I guess that was Item 2.
<Walter>  OK, Now the real Item 3: Old Business
<Walter>  a) Peter, can you give us an update on the MerchantAccount negotiations?
<Projects>  paste follows:
<Projects>  Hello Peter, you will not require a SSL certificate, because the last page
<Projects>  of the transaction process actually occurs on the payment gateway webserver,
<Projects>  which has it's own SSL certificate.
<Projects>  Because of this you will never have to worry about the security of your
<Projects>  customers, as you will never have to worry about credit card numbers
<Projects>  floating around anywhere in your server log files. So - having or not
<Projects>  having a SSL cert will not effect your application.
<Projects>  Let me know if you have any more questions.
<Walter>  So we don't get a break for already having paid the $200. :-(
<Walter>  OTOH it won't hurt us if we temporarily take down SSL support from VOICE1. Warpstock isn't using it either.
<Walter>  This is probably going to occur when we upgrade Apache.
<Walter>  We probably have enough information to vote on the MerchantAccount proposal now, but I hesitate to do so with
<Walter>  so few people present.
<MADecsSMP>  If VOICE can establish a shopping cart feature at some point in the future, Warpstock would be interested in using it.
<Walter>  Peter, does their site come with a shopping cart, or support one?
<MADecsSMP>  Right now Warpstock is going to use the one supplied by our bank just so we can get registration for Warpstock 2002 running.
<Walter>  MerchantAccount's I mean
<Projects>  Walter: I believe so
<Walter>  Me too.
<Walter>  That way Mark gets the info and send it to stan.
<Walter>  Mark, M-A supports all kinds of companies inside of Canada and outside, and I can't imagine them doing and so not having a shopping cart feature
<Walter>  doing so, and not having a shopping cart feature.
<Walter>  Mark, can you say roughly how much your bank fees are going to cost, just for the sake of comparison?
<MADecsSMP>  Stan is still looking into it. he did give some preliminary prices, but a lot depended on what features we went with.
<MADecsSMP>  When Stan gives me the final prices I will send them to you
<Walter>  You can see M-A's prices in the last VOICE meeting log.
<Projects>  I can paste the MA pricing here if you'd like
<Projects>  $369 - 1 time setup fee (was $497 - re: on site special promotion)
<Projects>  $39 - monthly fee
<Projects>  3.95% discount rate
<Projects>  $25 chargeback fee
<Projects>  no per transaction fees
<Projects>  no monthly minimum
<Walter>  Peter, do you know what the setup fee includes?
<MADecsSMP>  $39/month? Isn't that kind of steep? You need 2 membership fees just to pay the fee. Or is that Canadian?
<Walter>  I'm wondering if they supply or build HTML document to communicate between our site and theirs
<Walter>  Mark: All prices are Cdn.
<MADecsSMP>  Also is there a different rate if VOICE were to supply their own shopping cart?
<Projects>  for one, it includes a shopping cart
<MADecsSMP>  Walter: OK, then I think its more in line with what Stan has found at Bank of America
<MADecsSMP>  BOA is Warpstock's bank
<Projects>  er... might now include the shopping cart... that's the full e-business solution that's $99/mo
<Projects>  might not I meant to say...
<Projects>  walteritis sets in
<Walter>  Peter, according to M-A's website, they don't have a chargeback fee and make a big deal of this fact: http://www.merchant-accounts.ca/howmuch.htm
<Projects>  yup... see the chargeback thing on the page I'm on too
<Walter>  Peter, I don't think it does. On the page http://www.merchant-accounts.ca/technical.htm#howdo they mention shopping carts as not required but a good idea.
<MADecsSMP>  We will be using www.bamart.com "This one's setup fee is $250 + $99 application fee and for up to 9 products is $19.95/month. Over 9 products and it's a $100/month."
<MADecsSMP>  They have a $15 chargeback. All fees are in USD
<Projects>  walter: scroll up... I retracted my shopping cart statement :-)
<Walter>  There are several freeware or shareware compatible shopping carts. Some are compatible with OS/2 because they are Perl or CGI.
<Walter>  I know--I was agreeing with you. :-)
<MADecsSMP>  They have another option called "settle up" in which they don't supply the shopping cart, "The Setup fee for this is $175. + $99 for application fee. There would be a $19/mo fee for the service." That one doesn't appear to have an item limit.
<Walter>  Peter, do you know (yet) how our site would interface with M-A? Is it through an HTML form, or...?
<Projects>  dunno yet. We'll find that out once we get to the next step... buying it
<Walter>  OK. Could you email them first. :-)
<Projects>  will do
<Walter>  Apart from that, I personally feel good enough about it to go ahead with it.
<Walter>  However, I also think we need to send out a
<Walter>  questionnaire to the membership, especially since it means spending their $$$.
<Walter>  That means we're back to the members@ question.
<Walter>  Vaughn, we just said we want to put the e-Business proposal account out for a vote using a questionnaire on members@
<Walter>  So, what can you tell us about your progress in that area.*g*
<WarpedOS2>  Well...I started to test a new group and put the first 20 users over...it seems that after a certain number of members get emails weasel give a "400 nameserver" error
<Walter>  Oh dear.
<Walter>  Is it possible weasel has a limit in it?
<MADecsSMP>  Have you contacted Pete Moylan about it?
<WarpedOS2>  So the new member group so far seems to be working...so will continue to add users till it fails or just works..
<MADecsSMP>  We have over 800 subscribed to the News list. And that doesn't have the problem, at least not that I'm aware of
<MADecsSMP>  May be a bad email address
<WarpedOS2>  Yes...MADecs... it looks like a bad email...address at this point
<MADecsSMP>  On a couple occassions we had problems with some weird email addresses on the news list
<MADecsSMP>  One caused a loop at one point
<Projects>  WarpedOS2: sec... I might have a place for you to start looking...
<Projects>  WarpedOS2: start looking here: christian.hennecke@ruhr-uni-bochum.de ... when I subscribed him to the list, I remember some problems surfacing
<Walter>  WarpedOS2: Pardon my interruption above. I didn't realize you weren't finished. :-(
<Projects>  wonder if it's the . ? Walter had a problem with BMT 'cause of a first.last@ address...
<Walter>  I'm pretty sure it was the '.' that was causing problems, but that was Gammatech IRC. walter.os2@rogers.com hasn't caused problems elsewhere, except in the BMT secure server.
<Walter>  It does look like I may have to replace walter.os2 with walter_os2 (or something) eventually. :-(
<WarpedOS2>  So you are saying there is 800 member ids?
<WarpedOS2>  I thought someone said 250
<Projects>  but the possibility exists, and I rmember having problems with Christian's subscription
<MADecsSMP>  On the VOICE NEws list there are about 800 members
<Projects>  269 members... the news list has 800 subscribers
<Walter>  I think Mark said 800 people subscribe to the VOICE-News list.
<Walter>  Not VOICE members!
<JasonS^>  I wish!
<JasonS^>  good question. Mark and I taked about it the other day
<Walter>  The VOICE-News is a service to the OS/2 Users community as a whole.
<MADecsSMP>  As of June 1st there were 797 subscribers to the VOICE News list
<MADecsSMP>  And several News subscribers have first.last email addresses
<MADecsSMP>  Seems to be popular format with the Germans
<Walter>  Sympatico here in Canada automatically assigns users email addresses of the first.last format.
<Projects>  well, the first problem I recall was at christian's email address. There were no problems up to that point that I can remember
<Walter>  Sympatico is run by Bell and is very big here.
<JasonS^>  possibly the problem is the multiple "-" after the @. If the parser is not expecting it
<Projects>  could be that too... christian's email has it all :-)
<Walter>  Could be. Christian's email address is unusually complex.
<WarpedOS2>  tomorrow I should be able to look at it closer and see what happens
<Walter>  OK-a progress report was all we were looking for. :-)
*Projects will not add any new members to the list for the time being
<JasonS^>  I wouldn't thing anything before the @ sybol is even looked at
<WarpedOS2>  thanks for some insite, I will pay attention to the emails when I move some over to test...
<Walter>  Item 3b. Nomination/Election is on hold due to members@ problem.
<Walter>  BTW, Vaughn has accepted nomination for the new position as Mail Server Administrator.
<Walter>  Item 3c: 1st. Norman order
<Projects>  who got licences out of the first order?
<Walter>  Peter, Vaughn: do you have any idea who has paid and not paid?
<Projects>  I have a list that Vaughn sent me... is that the one? You're on it for 2, and Judy's on it
<Projects>  Xrange and Abel are on this list too
<Walter>  I should be on it for only 1.
<Walter>  One is for VOICE1. I don't really know who's name we should attach it to.
<Projects>  2. ************************************************************************
<Projects>  Hi Vaughn,
<Projects>  Please add me (walter.os2@rogers.com) and Morley Mellen
<Projects>  (m.mellen@sympatico.ca) to the upcoming NVC order.
<Projects>  Thanks for taking over this responsibility for me. :-)
<Projects>  Walter
<Projects>  There is two in this one!
<Walter>  However, I was referring to the 1st order.
<Walter>  I'll email you tomorrow and straighten it out then.
<Projects>  that's where I'm lost... I have no names for the first order. That quote was from the only list I got (and I didn't know if that was the first order or not)
<Projects>  yes, please... so confused :-)
<Walter>  OK, we'll get you fixed up. :-)
<XRange>  if needed I pay for another copy
<Walter>  Agenda Item 4: New Business
<WarpedOS2>  Ok...so the first order is filled?
<Walter>  a. Oops, I already mentioned that one.
<Projects>  XRange: I think you've been taken care of already...
<Walter>  It's filled, and you given me the download info, userid, password, etc.
<XRange>  i know i just helping out if need too
<WarpedOS2>  Ok....so then you want me to add another 5 licenses to the 5 we have?
* Projects thinks we should wait until members@ is fixed... could be a much larger order...
*Walter agrees.
<WarpedOS2>  Yes...if it is over 10 there are greater discounts...
<Walter>  Vaughn: I'll contact you tomorrow as well.
<WarpedOS2>  Ok...Walter...thanks..
<WarpedOS2>  Serenity Systems started purchasing NVC from me now...
<Walter>  4b. Judy McDermott has asked to replaced as Liaison Officer
<Projects>  FYI, Kim Cheung is a recent Voice member...
<MADecsSMP>  That will leave Peter as the last founding member on the board ;-(
<Walter>  I know: I can hardly believe Judy's leaving!
<MADecsSMP>  Sigh, I've said the same about a number of people
<WarpedOS2>  why is Judy leaving?
<Projects>  os2warp: you ever get that forms application going?
<Walter>  Mark: Do you have any suggestions for Liaison officer?
<Walter>  Other than that, I guess we've covered the agenda.
<Walter>  So I'm prepared to listen to a motion to adjourn.
<MADecsSMP>  Motion to adjourn
<Projects>  second
<Walter>  All in favour, say Aye.
<Zoltan>  Aye
<XRange>  Aye
<Walter>  Opposed?
<Walter>  Carried.
<Walter>  Meeting Adjourned,