ITEMS:
1. Resignation of our President.
2. Appointment of new member to Board of Directors
3. Cabinet Shuffle
4. Change to L.I instead of LSI
5. Changes to membership dues.
6. New website under development
1) A short time ago, Kim Bohnet (aka Varjeal) announced to us that the current commitments of his life were making it difficult for him to participate in the operations of the club, and asked that he be replaced on the Board of Directors. Kim has been with the club since its inception and has been invaluable in getting us off the ground. He has always been a level headed and strong leader for the club, and so it was with regret but understanding that we accepted his resignation. Kim will continue to be active in local club meetings and will always be welcome to participate in any capacity he can. On behalf of Locksport International, I extend my deepest thanks to Kim for his efforts in helping to get started a really great club!
Thanks Kim!
2) We are very excited to announce the appointment of Nick Fisher (Lucky1406) to the Locksport International Board of Directors. Nick's official title/roll are being hashed out at the moment, but I am confident that he will be a great addition to the team. Nick is currently building the College Station chapter in Texas. He is enthusiastic, energetic, and totally hooked on locksport.
Welcome to the team Nick!
3) With the departure of Kim from the board of directors, there has been the need to make a bit of a cabinet shuffle. The board met last week to discuss changes and the changes are as follows:
I have been appointed to the roll of President.
Doug Farre has been appointed to the roll of Administrative Director.
Devon (frostbyte) will continue to act as treasurer, and Matt Fiddler remains Board Member at Large (until we find a title for Matt.. and he doesn't seem to mind either way.
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4) Going forward, Locksport International will no longer use the acronym "LSI" to abbreviate its name. It has come to our attention that the Lockmasters Security Institute holds legal claim to the LSI tag in the capacity of locksmith training. Though we feel that what our club does/offers is in no way connected to locksmith training, we do not wish to create bad blood or have to fight over the LSI brand, so we decided to willingly drop the LSI tag.
Locksport International will now be referred to as L.I (That's L dot I). We have made the appropriate changes to our logo, and to the guide.
It seems that the LSI Guide to Lock Picking was the item that Lockmasters' lawyers had the biggest problem with. I have updated the guide, changing the name to The L.I Guide to Lock Picking and the new version will be hitting the locksport.com site shortly. I would ask that if you are currently hosting the guide, you download and host the NEW version.
Changes to the Charter and Members Rules of Conduct will follow shortly to reflect both the new moniker and the changes to the board of directors.
Going forward, I would ask that everyone refer to the club as L.I, or use the full name Locksport International. Though we do not agree with the position Lockmasters has taken, we can at least empathize and felt that changing from the LSI acronym was a small enough concession that we could comfortably accommodate them.
5) The structure of membership dues has been changed. Previously, dues have been $20 USD / year. Going forward, the dues will be split into local and international portions. The organizing body of L.I will take a $10 due / year, and local chapter presidents will be able to charge whatever they need to in order to make the club viable. We are, of course, recommending that chapter presidents set the local component to $10, but in instances where chapter presidents wish to include things such as pick sets, or where costs of meeting space are higher, they may wish to charge a bit more than that. Of course, the interest is always in making L.I both fun and affordable. Some chapters (such as my own) have opted to waive local fees altogether (since we meet at my house, and thus, have very little in the way of costs) making membership in the club even more affordable.
There have, along the way, been those who wished to join L.I just to support the club, despite the fact that they do not have a local chapter. They will still be welcome to do so, but the rate will now be $10 USD. However, we will be adding an option to make donations for those who wish to on the new website.
6) Currently in development is the new locksport.com website. We are HUGELY excited about what this site will bring to L.I. We are fortunate to have among our ranks Sean Ali of Alico Web Design. Sean is a close friend of mine, a great web developer, and a really good guy. He has graciously agreed to donate his time to the creation of the new site. There are *countless* hours going into this site, so I could not be more pleased and thankful to Sean for all his hard work.
The new site will offer some VERY cool features to the club. You'll have to wait to see the whole package, but here's one I'm pretty hyped about: There will be a competitions area in the site where chapter presidents can define their own contest and plug in the results from their meetings. Then, other chapters will be able to conduct the same competition, following the same guidelines and standards, and plug their own members' stats into the database. This will allow chapters to create and manage competitions and compete against other chapters. I think this will be WAY cool!
So, that's all the big news. Feel free to comment. In closing, I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone that continues to support and promote the club. We are seeing big things happening in the college-based clubs (Austin is up to something like 80+ members!!!) and I am quite excited to see what 2007 bring L.I.
We continue to gear up for Defcon 15, and I hope to see many of you there! It's going to be a blast - you can count on it!
Cheers,
Josh Nekrep
President, Locksport International
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