NEWSLETTER : TRINITY 1999
[See below for previous issues]
NEWSLETTER : TRINITY 1999
The ashes of the past have fallen, and, like a phoenix, a new committee has risen. She who was both President and Secretary (de facto if not de jure) is now merely the President. The term of office of Treasurer has hopefully returned to a single year, unless there be fools in power. New positions exist, though have yet to be ratified. The results of the elections are here presented.
The AGM was not entirely conclusive. Owing to the lack of work from the SCCC +, no new constitution was created last term ++, so all amendments from the AGM were to be drafted into the new constitution and presented with it at an Extraordinary General Meeting to be held this term.
The SCCC consists of Rod O'Iron, Tom Anderson and Zac Appleton. Of course, Tom and Zac may not as yet realise this....
NEWSLETTER : SPECIAL EVENTS
This term sees three special events. Primarily, there is the Punt Party Panto author-fest. This occurs on Friday, 7th Week, and probably lasts all night. This involves writing the Punt Party Panto to be performed the next day. This is a demanding task, and tradition favours the use of velociraptors. For previous examples of these things to prove absolutely no talent is required to assist, follow the links from the OUSFG web-page at http://users.ox.ac.uk/~ousfg/. The only problem is, if everyone turns up to write, the whole affair will be madness. So, I'll leave it up to the society at large to decide how to go about it. If necessary, the committee will have to decide who will be involved. Of course, you might not all be mad enough to want to stay up all night crafting a piece of rubbish, so the problem may not occur.
Following the author-fest, there is the Punt Party itself. This invoves punting to Parson's Pleasure (providing the weather is acceptable to everyone except Tanaqui) and eating, drinking and performing the Panto. Everyone should take some part, even if it be a lowly velociraptor in the chorus.
Following the author-fest, there is the Punt Party itself. This invoves punting to Parson's Pleasure (providing the weather is acceptable to everyone except Tanaqui) and eating, drinking and performing the Panto. Everyone should take some part, even if it be a lowly velociraptor in the chorus.
Sunday, 6th Week sees the EGM, with the presentation of the new, improved Constitution. Vote it in, or I'll have to kill you all.
NEWSLETTER : NEWSGROUP
You may all by now realise that there exists our very own newsgroup,
ox.clubs.ousfg but you may well not know that there also now
exists a web-based archive of the aforementioned newsgroup. Needless
to say, this is linked to from the OUSFG webpage, but you can instead
go straight to the archive at
http://munchkin.magd.ox.ac.uk/ox.archive/ox.clubs.ousfg/
if that is your desire. Note, however, that OUSFG is not responsible for the
maintenance of this page, so if it dies, then the Ghost in the Machine
can't do anything about it directly.
NEWSLETTER : ARTICLE APPEAL!
Right, if you've read through the whole newsletter already, you'll realise the truth of this; I need articles submitted! There's only so much crap I can fill this thing with myself. Given that I'd prefer to release two newsletters per term (as is currently constitutionally demanded) I really need submissions. I am supposed to be Newsletter Editor, not Author so if I had a surfeit of articles, I could pick and choose, and store others for times of article drought. I know there is enough authorial talent out there, so write things for me. It doesn't matter what they're about (although some relation to speculative fiction might be nice...) as long as they're not too long, and not too short. Anything from about the length of this paragraph to a couple of sides of the newsletter is acceptable.
NEWSLETTER : CONSTITUTION
Right, to fill this little bit of the newsletter, I'm going to give a brief rundown of the changes to the current constitution that should be implemented at the EGM.
NEWSLETTER : QUIZ!
As I don't know with what to fill the middle of the newsletter, I've decided to run a quiz. There will be a prize awarded, so submit your answers to me, in person, via email or even through pigeon post to Ian Snell, Oriel College. Only members of OUSFG may enter.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Given that there is a possibility of a draw, I should probably set a tie-breaking challenge thing, but I can't think of a good one, so I'll set one if it becomes necessary.
I haven't yet decided what the prize will be, but I shall partially leave that responsibility to the winner. I shall be taking suggestions from anyone with a potentially winning score.
The final entry date is Saturday, 4th week, so you can give the answers to me at the Bonus Video Meeting, or email them to me before it, or pigeon post them to me in plenty of time. Any entries received later than this will be ignored.
NEWSLETTER : AUTHORS
We have two authors this term, which you'll know if you've skipped straight to the back to check the termcard. One of these is Juliet McKenna, an old OUSFG member who has just released her first novel, and having read her book myself, I'd like to say that it is very fine indeed. Of course, I'm probably a little biased because I tend to like a lot of fantasy novels, but this is a good example of well-characterised writing. Too much fantasy has an over-powering setup, and too many all-powerful figures swanning around, showing off. You might take Gor novels as an example, or you might prefer not to. However, in The Thief's Gamble, the characters aren't super-human, and have interesting personalities. The story takes a few twists, some of which seem inadequately explained, but the world in which it takes place appears surprisingly well thought-out. I'm looking forward to the sequel.
Juliet McKenna doesn't live too far away from us, and it's entirely possible she could turn up to other meetings if she likes us well enough. I, for one, think this would be a good thing, so I encourage you to treat her well, and not abuse her too much +. Luckily, Tanaqui likes the book too, and as she is the person most likely to moan too much about things, everything should go well.
Our other author is John Clute. He is probably most well-known for his editorship of the Multimedia Encyclopedia ++ of Science Fiction and Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopedia ++ and his co-editorship of the Encyclopedia ++ of Science Fiction and the Encyclopedia ++ of Fantasy, the last three of which have all won Hugos. So, he should certainly have an encyclopædic knowledge of the genre, and should be able to answer most reasonable questions. I trust OUSFG to come up with plenty of unreasonable ones.
NEWSLETTER : LOCATIONS
Here is a brief summary of our locations this term. If you need to know more, please contact a member of the committee.
NEWSLETTER : BONUS VIDEO MEETINGS
Ensure you remember the odd times and places for these. We have a lot of Mysterious Cities of Gold, and we may not be able to view it all even though we are starting early. We have seven episodes of Reboot, so if we dither our usual amount before starting, we'll seamlessly end up in the EGM. Food might be necessary, however, so it might be worth starting the videos on time.
NEWSLETTER : TERMCARD