Exec Present:
- Jack Holden (Chair)
- James Bulman (Minutes)
- Katie Stevenson
- Henry Potts
- Joshua Brown
- Noah Valpy-White
Meeting Start 19:02
Online Term 1 Events:
James stated that he wants the approval of the exec before confirming events. He states that the socials discussed at the previous meeting will be organised.
James listed the events: Jackbox, Skribblio, Among Us. And further goes on to recap the previous Jackbox event and GMod event.
James stated the Jackbox Stream went very well, stating that it would have gone better with more exec present.
James stated that he doesn’t always know what should be allowed to be said in these events.
Jack iterates that it is simply common sense.
James states that he still struggles with knowing. And would still appreciate the help of other exec members.
Jack suggests making it family-friendly.
Jack thinks James is doing a good job at filtering bad content.
James moves on by explaining the way that the Jackbox Stream would be streamed to Facebook for 3 hours, then after that, rules on what can be said get relaxed as it is only streamed to Discord.
Noah says it sounds fine as long as it doesn’t upset anyone present.
Katie agrees and suggests reminding the members.
James states that anyone joining the Discord stream should be suitable for this content anyway.
James states that members can ask for recorded Facebook streams to be taken down if they feel uncomfortable with what they have said.
Katie states that if anyone is uncomfortable, then they can say.
James asks about GMod TTT. As well as reminding exec members that they can host semi-official events whenever they wish.
Jack states it went badly. As members were having troubles with downloading the large mod pack.
James suggested posting a guide on how to make it work in the gmod-antics channel. Then asks if we want to try GMod TTT again.
Jack said yes but give it time first.
James asks for any other suggestions for events during Term 1
Jack asks for Among Us as everyone enjoys it.
James asks if its best to keep it as a semi-official event or having more official events.
Katie states that she ran a Skribblio semi-official event in freshers week that did very well.
James suggests that Katie run more events like these and see how they go.
James recalls Minecraft Hunger Games, and suggests it being run every 3 weeks.
James asks if having just Minecraft Sandbox would be worth it.
Jack states its not a good idea.
James states it is complicated to moderate.
James suggests instead, having more kinds of games like Hunger Games.
Jack states this will be easy to do.
James asks to get this sorted sooner rather than later.
Katie suggests doing a poll asking people what they want on Minecraft.
Jack suggests doing what we did with the GMod Freshers Pick, which was a reaction poll.
Katie recalls that the members who played the previous TTT event preferred to have fewer mods.
James recalls the most popular GMod game modes to be Prop Hunt, TTT, and Deathrun.
Jack states that Deathrun is incredibly challenging to set up, but Prop Hunt can easily be done again.
James suggests doing another GMod poll to see what everyone wants to play in a GMod event.
James also suggests preventing the members from using any reactions that are not part of the poll.
Katie likes this idea, as it will make it easier to statistically analyse the results.
James asks the others to suggest Minecraft game modes.
Josh states that Minecraft Pictionary is too similar to Skribblio.
Jack suggests Race for the Wool.
Jack states that we ask members for suggestions first using the game request channel.
James recalls the Animal Crossing social to be very impractical due to the inefficiency of eduroam.
Jack agrees, casual players wouldn’t want to go through all the fuss of VPNs.
Jack suggests to schedule Among Us as well as keeping the Semi-Official Events too.
James asks on what frequency should Among Us be hosted.
James states that Jackbox Social has replaced the County Social.
James suggests the Among Us events behave similarly to the Smash Weeklies. For now, Among Us Weeklies would replace Smash Weeklies.
Jack approves.
Noah suggests possibly bringing back Fighting Game Weeklies. But then thinks it might be better as a Semi-Official event.
James suggests that Noah host Semi-Official events if he thinks they would work.
James asks if anyone can run Minecraft Hunger Games on the following Friday.
Nobody is certain.
James states he will sort things out closer to the time.
Possible tweaking of punishments
Jack recalls the harassment that has gone on previously with other members, and that just a strike really isn’t suitable for this kind of behaviour.
Jack suggests that any extreme behaviour will result in a permanent ban (commonly referred to as a yeet)
James asks about appeals.
Jack states that if anyone banned this way appeals, there is very little chance they will get back in if they have harassed anyone.
Jack states that it is difficult to word these harassment rules, as it should be more so down to common sense, making sure that members don’t get upset.
Katie recalls previous events, stating that some of the behaviour witnessed could have potentially hurt some other members.
Jack says this should not necessarily be set rules, but if questionable behaviour gets brought up and the exec deems it to be extreme, then said permanent ban should be issued.
James reminds that it still needs to be written in rules.
Josh suggests “All severe events can jump strike levels”.
James adds “If an exec member deems behaviour to be extreme then a permanent ban will be issued”.
Jack asks everyone to speak their opinions on this.
General Consensus for agreement.
Katie states that if anyone is unsure, then another exec can be asked.
James asks that exec should reply quickly to these matters as we do not want this to escalate.
James encourages more engagement in the exec chat.
Jack will modify the rules to include this harassment zero-tolerance policy.
Exec Introductions
Jack asks if everyone has an exec intro done.
Josh says yes.
Jack states he will send his exec intro after the meeting.
Henry asks if an introduction event will be done as suggested before.
James thinks its too late for that.
Jack agrees.
James states that everyone took too long to arrange their intros, so an event wouldn’t be suitable.
Katie agrees, most people already know us from the freshers events. Especially herself, James, Jack and Noah.
Katie still thinks the intros are still a good idea, but an event would be pointless.
Henry states that it is only Week 2. He thinks it would be good for people to ask questions about the committee, talking about what events members want to see potentially a Q&A event. He personally prefers voice chat to text chat.
Henry wants people to ask questions over voice more.
Katie suggests this should just be a Semi-Official event if an exec member wants to gather interest about what members want to see, so they can ask questions.
James wants to encourage all exec members to run Semi-Official events of games that they enjoy to attract members and make exec look more friendly.
James suggests gauging peoples interests, asking if they like “example game” and inviting them to play if enough interest is given.
James asks how popular the Switch Stream was.
Henry explains it went well, a lot of his friends showed up.
Noah confirms also saying that a good amount of people also showed up.
James suggests doing a switch stream again if it was this good.
Noah would want more engagement from the audience if this event was to be done again. As it gets a bit boring, just 2 people fighting on Smash.
Henry asks what to put in his exec introduction.
James suggests putting in anything that Henry would be happy to talk about with other members. Then points out that you don’t really need to mention games (as shown by Josh’s intro).
James states that once the exec intros are in, you may edit them however you want if you want to improve them.
Hoodies
Jack asks where we are on hoodies.
James states that no progress has been made yet.
James states this should have been ordered slightly differently to ask about the bank stuff first.
Bank Stuff (early)
Katie states that we have the forms, and states that herself and James both need to sign forms and hand them in.
Josh gives a brief explanation of how to do it.
James asks if he needs to meet up with Katie to do this.
Josh states again how James needs to bring in a form to confirm it is him, Katie needs to do the same, then these forms get sent in.
A long winding conversation of merely reiterating the same things over and over again takes place until James finally understands what to do (kinda).
James states that he will understand once he sees the forms.
Hoodies 2: Electric Boogaloo
James states that he will send an email about hoodies to the supplier.
Jack states that at the moment, we will only get exec hoodies as a trial run.
James asks if we should place the order before or after the GM. Because we could potentially gain more exec members.
Josh states he will not buy a hoodie.
James asks who else will not be buying a hoodie.
Noah won’t.
General Meeting Election Discussion (early)
Katie questions on whether to get new exec members at the next GM. Because of the way things are structured at the moment, we don’t know much about the potential candidates as we have never met them.
James asks Josh about how esports is being handled.
Josh doesn’t care if he gets more help or not.
Josh states that we might as well just fill the positions, as there is no harm in doing so.
Katie reiterates that it might be a bit strange having new members not knowing much about the society due to little experience. Katie thinks the election should be put off until Covid restrictions are lifted.
James disagrees, as the exec term will only last until the end of Lent term, which isn’t a long time.
James states we need to hold a GM anyway to sort out issues.
Katie states that freshers have only been at uni for a few weeks, so they would be inexperienced to take on a role.
James recalls past exec members (including himself) who became exec after only a few weeks experience at LUGES.
Katie states that those occasions were in person, and as such were easier to learn about.
Jack agrees, as the way exec works in person is very different to how it works now.
James states that if any of these freshers get an exec role, they may resign at any time if they feel uncomfortable or not suitable.
James believes these exec roles need to be filled as soon as possible.
Josh states this is not the case as the vacant exec roles are not core (President, Secretary, Treasurer).
Katie wants any freshers who would want to join the exec to familiarise themselves with the society for longer before joining.
Katie wants to wait until 2 months in before allowing freshers to join the exec, to familiarise themselves with the society.
James reiterates that we need a GM soon so we can get things done.
Jack realises that calling a GM is the next item on the agenda.
Calling for a GM
Jack asks when we want to do it.
Josh iterates that we need 2 weeks notice if there is an election, if not then only 1 weeks notice is needed.
Jack agrees with Katie that elections should be held later on.
Katie thinks 2 months is a good amount of time to wait.
Josh disagrees as that would allow them to be exec for one term, and would therefore not be useful.
Katie states that they can reapply if they did a good role in that short time.
Josh states that we usually have the AGM on week 15, so they will essentially only have 5 weeks of being exec.
James states that he would appreciate the extra help with socials. He mainly focuses on Social Secretary but agrees that Equipment Officer is not needed at the moment.
James wants the election to be done soon.
Katie and Jack want to wait for a few weeks.
Noah wants to get the Social Sec and Esports Coord done sooner rather than later.
Henry is somewhat neutral, stating pros and cons on both sides.
Henry is happy to help with Social Sec work.
Henry finalises by saying it would be nice to give people the option to run sooner.
James states that we are not forcing anyone to apply for exec roles and that if nobody applies at the next GM, then we can wait longer.
James states that having elections would not be a waste of time as we need a GM anyway.
Henry asks to get a GM called.
Katie and Jack suggest giving 2 weeks notice either way.
Jack states that we will be opening up the nominations.
The GM date is confirmed for 1st November @ 3PM.
James states that at that point, freshers could potentially have over a months experience at LUGES.
Jack moves onto the GM agenda.
James states that alongside the elections, we will need constitution changes, including clarifying the Honorary Member situation.
Introducing Console Specific Channels
Jack doesn’t like this idea.
James reads out what Member A has asked for.
Jack states that the #igns channel should be used for that.
James agrees.
James and Jack don’t think enough people are going to use them.
Jack states that we have too many channels already and he doesn’t think many people play on console anymore.
Katie thinks that the games channels would be more suitable for this.
Henry can see where Member A is coming from. He thinks it could be a good idea, such as talking about console exclusives. He thinks we should make these channels, but if they become dead, then we delete them.
Josh has no opinion.
James recalls the Console Rep being a previous exec role, and how it became a pointless role.
Henry states that it was a long time ago, and maybe things have changed now.
Jack thinks consoles have gone downhill as most people own PCs.
Henry and Noah disagree.
James states that Discord is a PC platform anyway.
James is really uncertain about what to do here.
Jack says we should just make these channels and see where they go.
James thinks this is a good idea, as they can just be killed if they fail.
James suggests an Xbox, Playstation and a Nintendo chat.
General Agreement with this.
Casting/Streaming for the League Team
Katie recalls on whether the League Friendlies should be streamed, and then people watching can request to commentate.
Katie states that members have asked about this.
Jack agrees about trying it out. Thinking it would be good to give esports what they want.
Jack assumes we just stream and let people commentate over it.
James recalls that working with LA1TV didn’t go anywhere.
James says that we should only do it if we find the casters and streamers to do it.
Jack agrees.
Katie states that none of the members asking have experience in commentating. Suggesting that the subs in the team provide commentating as they know about the teams and should know how they play.
Katie states for casual games, this would be good practice.
Josh states that if League players want to cast, then they can cast. They can do it themselves.
Katie recalls previous players wanting to cast.
Josh reiterates his previous point.
Jack supports this, providing they don’t break ToS.
Jack says this can be sorted.
Katie will have a look at how to do it.
Josh asks what the point is here as if players want to cast then they can. They need to know how to stream anyway if they are to cast.
Josh states that this knowledge is important.
Katie states that they need to be taught how to stream. Katie is merely relaying what members have asked.
Jack suggests talking to a previous esports coordinator with experience in streaming.
Josh states there is nothing we can do for them, all we can do is provide a token to allow them to stream on our twitch.
Josh instead suggests we host their individual channels on our twitch channel, which would provide them with the correct experience.
Josh states that esports peeps want to cast big games, not small friendly ones.
James asks if we would need to monitor the stream.
Josh replies with no, as they should be responsible enough anyway.
AoB
Jack asks about the complaint about politics being banned in the Discord.
Josh says there isn’t anything wrong with the ban.
Jack doesn’t want to unban politics.
James didn’t understand what was being said.
Jack and James think that political discussion has no place on the Discord Server.
Henry wants to do more Switch streams, it will help grow the Switch side of the society.
James states that this was somewhat covered in a previous agenda item.
Henry states that he needs the society laptop and capture card, meaning it will need to be a scheduled official event.
Jack and James say this isn’t the case.
James states that because both Noah and Henry will be present at this event, then it can still be considered a Semi-Official event.
James encouraged this event, as long as the exec gets notified, so that attendance of the laptop and capture card is logged.
Josh previously sent Henry a Halo Esports link.
Josh is uncertain of what it is and thought it would be of interest to Henry.
Henry asks if we could do Halo Esports. He is unsure of what is meant by the link Josh sent him.
James requests Josh send this link to all the exec.
Josh states that if we do this, then we do it for PC not console.
James suggests asking if anyone is interested through reaction polls in future announcements.
Henry asks about making Jackbox streams purely on Discord.
James clarifies that we do it to both.
James says that we stream it to Facebook to increase our reach, letting more people know about it, and encouraging more people to join.
Henry suggests deleting Facebook streams after they are finished. As that would make it more relaxed and casual.
James agrees that this could be an issue.
James stated that if anyone requests for a stream to be taken down, then we will take it down.
Katie states that during the Jackbox Streams, James continually repeated that the event would be streamed to Facebook and to say if that bothered anyone.
Katie further explained that some people might not be able to attend but might still want to watch it. And it is only partially streamed on Facebook as it is limited to only Discord after a certain amount of time.
James asks if Katie thinks streams should be deleted after finishing.
Henry asked what if people want to join early, but don’t wanna be streamed to Facebook.
Henry asked if the streams should be kept up for a few days and then deleted.
Jack thinks that this isn’t really an issue and doesn’t need to be addressed.
Henry recalls that he personally doesn’t like there being a permanent record of himself on streams.
James reiterates that anyone can request a stream to be taken down if they were in it, and we can delete it straight away.
Henry states this makes it harder for shy people to do this.
James states that if they are that shy, then they likely won’t be talking in the Discord. And that they could simply say that they don’t have a microphone if asked about it.
Katie states that the majority of stuff we do doesn’t get streamed. So this event caters to those who want to see events but for whatever reason can’t take part. But still, the majority of our events don’t get streamed.
Henry disagrees, but suggests we can bring it up another time.
Meeting End 20:27