Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2004 01:58:55 -0500
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
From: Elspeth Kovar <ekovar at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Re: The End of Austerity?
Cc: lubell at bigfoot.com, jekindell at aol.com, macbuccfo at email.msn.com
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

At 09:40 PM 1/13/04, Eric Jablow wrote:

>On Jan 13, 2004, at 9:27 PM, Keith F. Lynch wrote:
>
> > If nobody has any objections, at Friday's meeting I plan to propose
> > that the Austerity Committee be disbanded, and that WSFA finance the
> > $25 per month cost of our website hosting directly rather than asking
> > for sponsors each month.
> >
> > This is due to the excellent financial news which our treasurer
> > reported at the last meeting.

>I am not so sure about this.  Conversations at the last meeting reminded
>me of the bad days of Enron, WorldCom, and Parmalat. I have no objection
>to funding the WSFA web site from WSFA's funds. I have profound
>objections
>to spending $10,000 of our money on the projects proposed at the last
>meeting.

I'm not going to be able to attend the meeting this coming Friday so I'll
make some comments now.  They are free to be quoted at the meeting -- just
so long as they're quoted, not paraphrased.

I think that once the WFC money is moved over from the Bucconeer credit
card account, where it's been for processing, and from the WFC account
where some of the money has also been, it is worth considering using some
of it for the website.

At that point there are some other things that might be considered.  We've
had problems with the website where it is and it doesn't support the WSFA
mailing list.  We're using this host because at one time they gave us
certain considerations.  Now that they don't and now that WSFA has a bit
more money what other options do we have?  Or could we find another host
willing to support WSFA?

At the same time, the need to have WSFA members support the website out of
their own pockets may -- or may not -- have gotten people paying more
attention to the website.  This is our first contact with much of the rest
of the world and I wish that more people be involved in it.

>I would prefer that WSFA act austere for a while longer. I want the
>Committee
>to remain until we can be sure WSFA will act responsibly with its
>bounty.
>Frankly, I believe some of the Bucconeer crowd is taking their pirate
>stylings
>too seriously.  At the very least, I want a large proportion of the new
>money to
>be kept in reserve at least until the next Capclave.

Any pirate stylings aside, WSFA has suddenly gone from having too little
money to having almost too much.  Were it only enough to keep us going I
wouldn't be concerned but this looks to be so much that we should take care
to not go from being very careful about money to being too casual.  After
all, because the WFC committee made a point of keeping WSFA involved and
gave the profits to WSFA we have money to burn.  While I agree that using
some of it to cover the cost of the website makes sense I wouldn't agree to
even that proposal at this point.

To my mind deciding to spend _any_ of the WFC money at this point, beyond
what was needed to cover Capclave 2003, isn't the wise thing to do.  I may
be overly cautious but spending any of the money now will only make it
easier to vote to spend more of it in the same fashion, without looking at
the overall picture.

Instead I think that we should evaluate our needs and our desires and hold
the money in abeyance until we've reached some conclusions.  In the
meantime it may be that we should be more, rather than less, careful about
budget matters.  In the past we've all known that every cent spent could be
the one that broke the bank.  Now while no one is going to think, "Oh, we
can do that; we have the money" the psychological factor is there.  Making
accurate budgets to figure out or show how much is spent on things will
help us avoid that.  That may just be my perspective, since I'm abysmal
when it comes to numbers so want things that I can look at and study, but
it also makes financial and psychological sense.

As for evaluating our needs and desires, I think that the starting place is
that we have a website; insurance payments if we want to continue to hold
conventions; WSFA meetings; and Capclave, a new and still unformed
convention.  The way that the money might be spent on the first three is
fairly clear and the amount doesn't vary.  Beyond that investing a chunk of
it so that it's there if we need it seems like a very good idea.

But the above leads to another question, which I hope that people will
answer under a different subject heading.  I'll suggest "Where to go with
Capclave?" in hopes of not starting too many threads.

We may want to spend some building up Capclave as the 'premier convention
of it's kind' in the area but that will mean deciding what 'it's kind'
means.  Balticon is already doing the big tent thing, with literary,
consumers, gaming, anime, et al.  Do we want to compete with them or do we
want to specialize?  That's a far different discussion than what to do with
the WFC money.

In any event all of this is going to require a lot of talking over.  We
have plenty of time: the money isn't going anywhere.  We're not going to
get it all done during the formal part of WSFA meetings and in truth
they're not set up for this sort of thing.  So let's all take a step back
and talk things over.

Usually I'd have said this during a meeting but, as mentioned, I'm not
going to be able to be there on Friday and this is likely to come up
then.  I am sending this to Judy and Bob since I know that Judy isn't
currently subscribed to the WSFA list and I can't tell from Keith's reports
if Bob is.  Sam, if you want something for the Journal let me know and I'll
try to turn it into an article but it's probably enough if someone prints
it and reads any parts that might turn out to be appropriate during the
meeting.  Count yourselves lucky that I won't be able to add any of my
usual side comments!

My laptop is doing a good imitation of a doorstop right now so I'll only
have a chance to check my email about once a day after this, but I'll try
to keep up with the conversation.

Elspeth