Editing Meeting Minutes/2020-05-18 Regular Meeting

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= Trustroots Meeting =

* Date: 2020-05-18
* Facilitator: Mikael
* Present: Mikael, Julien, Ludo, Philipp, Nick, Gary, Dario, Noah, Gabriel, Mauro, Martin, Marco

== Agenda ==

* New members and volunteers (welcome! 👋)
* Look into stats:
** https://grafana.trustroots.org/
** signups up to level pre-covid19
** we’ll need to check in few weeks how’s the impact otherwise
* CS switches to paywall
** Do we do something? What. Not this please: https://trustroots.slack.com/files/U08SEHYCC/F013TMNFLKC/screenshot_20200518-105848_facebook.jpg
*** already knew they were going to do this on 22nd april, were just deciding the price
*** a lot of people are complaining in groups on facebook
*** could be useful to just mention trustroots there instead of trying to rush new features
*** also reddit is a place where these discussions happen
*** new people should understand that trustroots is not just the same as CS
*** idea: a blog post to explain this perspective (e.g. we don’t have references, but it’s coming, etc…)
** CS importer? https://github.com/Trustroots/trustroots/issues/1080
** CS had a much more international community than we have until now (very EU-centric). Any ideas on how to keep the first wave of immigrants in scarcely filled countries like the US active, so that the community can grow there in the future?
** announcement of Edvard: Preparing a workshop on organizatinal development for the next weeks
** Make a blog post for people to point to. [Julien]
** Blog post about references. [Mikael]
*** How to use features as they are now to fullfill needs for references? -&gt; put to blog post
*** Focus ahead by making post more about Trustroots and future, rather than about Couchsurfing and about past.
*** People are seeking for answers; we also noticed that CS did what they did. Our project can be answer to them, invite to participate if they want. Elaborate on our values.
** Consolidate little more where we are with references, see next steps to get it out.
** Idea for newsletter? people who have joined trustroots recently since CS change, people to articulate positive vision
* People want to give us money
** Should we even?
** Liberapay
** bountysource (fee: 10%)
** opencollective (fee is dependent on which “fiscal host” you are part of)
** there are expenses for servers etc, but they are currently covered by people who are on the board and are not that big compared to the effort of setting up financial infrastructure and bookkeeping
** did imagine trustroots would accept donations at some point and distribute as salary somehow, it’s a big and interesting topic to consider how to distribute it and maybe we can start that conversation soon
** big question is how to use it, not the technical bit of how it gets to bank account
** salaries could be for people that don’t have financial security to contribute at the moment
** actual numbers on the existing finances and tax admin burden, financial burden in a thousands/year, finance admin costs more like hundreds/year, idea was that approx half a salary amount of money makes the difference, but spreading money across more people is another direction
** collecting thousands/year would be around the threshold where it might make sense to setup the infrastructure for this (admin, fundraising, etc…)
** bewelcome collects ~3000-4000/year, they have a treasurer to handled expenses/bookkeeping
** requires some switch to be start asking for donations
** basic important principle of transparency and authenticity
* FYI: sent iOS app for review to Apple again, waiting to hear back.
** We’ll need an email to be sent to 870 people who asked to be informed when it’s out. Any volunteers? :-)
*** [Noah] already sent out 40k msg for the hackweek and can do that again ;)
**** Julien helps to write email
*** [Nick] where are the email addresses? [on ideas.trustroots.org/wp-admin -&gt; feedback -&gt; export CSV]
* Gary would like to help with communications &lt;3
** Julien and Mikael
* Weekly call: Are there other time slots that would work for most people?
** Dario won’t be able to join at Monday 17 UTC+2 for the next 2 months

== Action points and outcomes ==

* Blog post [Mikael to start draft]
** Talk about money. How little we need, how it’s not a problem (and who currently pays it?). Maybe point donations to the orgs listed in the thread below.
** Talk about community
** Talk about transparency, organization, empowerment.
* Somebody to write email to iOS users [Somewhere between Noah, Julien, and Gary!]
* Import iOS app people from wordpress into mailtrain [Nick]
* Start a thread on Slack about collecting ideas on orgs to forward generosity to. [Julien]
* Organise a conversation about Money. [Who? otherwise I, Nick, would just suggest we just make a #money channel in slack and start mulling over higher level thoughts…]
** Yes yes yes!
* Create a doodle poll to find a new time for weekly meeting that more people can join [Dario]

== Next meeting ==

* Next Date: 2020-05-25 17:00 UTC+2/CEST (unless we pick a new time before then… so check again!)
* Next Facilitator: Julien again unless anyone else volunteers