Last Month….

Our annual Digital Photo competition has become a permanent fixture in our annual calendar and this year’s evening was another excellent success with some absolutely stunning photographs on display. It is a testament to all the entrants when Arthur Payne, our resident judge, comments that the standard increases every year. So, well done to all of you.
As usual there were six subject areas and all were well represented. After much deliberation Arthur offered praise and constructive feedback on each photograph before naming the winning entries and then choosing the overall winner for 2009.

1. Recreation
Snow Scene - Peter Simpson

2. People
Melton Victorian Market - Steve Orrell

3. Landscape/Seascape
Melton Country Park - Sid Freeman

4. Street Life
Balloons - Steve Orrell

5. Melton Buildings
Anne of Cleves - Peter Simpson

6. Flora & Fauna
Poppies - Geoff Walsh

The overall winner for 2009 is Balloons entered by Steve Orrell.

So congratulations to Steve for his winning entry and well done also, to everybody who entered. Arthur expressed his admiration for the standard and the difficulty in choosing the winners. Our thanks to Arthur for again giving up his time and coming along to be our judge.

Finally, our thanks to Geoff Walsh for kindly donating the prizes once again.

Dave Robb

Melton Computer Club
Minutes of Annual General Meeting 7th January 2009

Meeting started at 7.50pm.

Apologies received from Derek Kerr, Keith Allen, Wendy & David Arkell, Graham Rock, Peter Main, Larry Larsen, Diane Cave & Chris Fox-Mapletoft.

Minutes of 16th January 2008 were approved as a true record of the meeting.

Matters Arising
No Matters arising from the above minutes.

Chair’s Report
Apologies for Absence

Secretary’s Report
Once again we tried to offer a varied programme in 2008 and hopefully there was a good range of subjects to get our teeth into. Our Problem Solving Evening was well attended and appears to be a favourite with the members. We will hopefully have another in the first half of 2009. Other subjects covered included Music and MP3 Conversion, The Ultimate Boot CD, Video Editing, Virtual Machines and another foray into the world of Vista. Alan Danbury’s evening on Tuning Your PC had everyone rushing to clear out all that unwanted accumulated data that eventually grinds the computer to a halt. My thanks to all those who contributed to make the evenings such a success. We finished off the year with our annual Photo Competition which as usual attracted a wide variety of excellent photographs from the members. The standard again was a credit to all who entered. Well done to Geoff Walsh for his overall winning entry. Our thanks also go to Geoff for donating the wine for the prizes. A suggestion was made that we exhibit the entries before the Christmas Dinner for the wives and friends to see. We will look into the feasibility of borrowing the room for half an hour before the meal. Harry McKnight put on record his thanks to Derek Taylor for his help in sorting out numerous computing problems in the last year. Once again I would like to record our thanks to Ben for organising another excellent night. Ben kindly offered to organise this year’s dinner. New ideas for the programme are always welcome and we will always do our best to accommodate. We also welcome any member who wants to share their knowledge with the rest of us. Please contact the committee members with your ideas and suggestions for future meetings.

Treasurer’s Report

The finance statement shows a loss of £41.49 on the previous year. Derek explained that this was due to room hire for one extra meeting and re- registering the club’s domain name for the next three years. Without these extra costs, the club would have shown a small profit similar to last year. However the cost of postage is scheduled to rise in April and the club will need to absorb this. A brief comment was made regarding the merits of posting the newsletter. Again there was a range of different opinions among those present as to the best way of distribution. Some work had been carried out to see what the best format would be, but no firm decision had been made. It was agreed that we needed a format that encouraged people to open and read the newsletter. The committee agreed that they would again look at the issue. Derek explained that although the ethos of the club was to be non profit making, we were vulnerable to a large expense such as a projector bulb replacement. Club fees have been static at £12.00 per annum full membership and £1.00 for associates. It was suggested that fees be increased to £15.00 for full membership and £5.00 for associates. It was agreed that this still offered excellent value for money over a course of the year. As the meeting was not quorate, it was agreed that a motion be put at the February meeting.

8. Elections

The following members were elected:

Treasurer – Derek Taylor
Proposed: Geoff Walsh
Seconded: Harry McKnight

Cttee Members –
Geoff Walsh
Re-elected unanimously
Steve Orrell Proposed: Peter Simpson
Seconded: Geoff Walsh
Barry Gilchrist Proposed: Derek Taylor Seconded: Geoff Walsh

Thanks were recorded to both Mike Taylor and Derek Kerr who had both decided to step down from the committee this year.

9. Newsletter & Club Website
The club website continues to be a medium for the Electronic Newsletter. Articles are sparse and usually originate from the Newsletter. Ideas to improve its content would be readily welcome.

The newsletter continues to be well received. The discussion regarding its medium was covered fairly extensively in the Treasurer’s Report. Members felt that it was informative and a handy referral to previous presentations and a good reminder for the next meeting. Most of the work creating it is carried out by a minority of people and they could do with some support with more articles. So please come forward to help us out.

10. Feedback from 2008 topics and ideas for future topics

2008 had been well received by members present and they felt that the presentations went well.
Topics for 2008 included
Music & MP3 Conversion
Problem Solving
Ultimate Boot CD
PC Tuning
Vista
Video Editing
Virtual Machines
Backup & Recovery of Files

Ideas for 2009 include
Desktop Publishing
Sony E Reader
Wireless networking
Backup & Recovery of Files part 2
Apple Iphone
Problem Solving
Programming XL
Food Database

The onsite broadband connection has really helped expand our presentational horizons.

11. Any Other Business
It is the club’s 25th anniversary on the 14th March. The membership was asked to consider how they would like to celebrate. It is pretty unique for a computer club to have run unbroken for so long, so we should be rightly proud of the achievement. Ideas at the February meeting or to any committee member would be appreciated

12. Meeting closed at 9.00 pm.

Melton Computer Club

AGM Agenda January 6th 2010

Meeting commences at 7:30 pm

1. Apologies For Absence

2. Minutes Of Previous Meeting (January 2009)

3. Matters Arising

4. Chair’s Report

5. Secretary’s Report

6. Treasurer’s Report

Elections Of Committee Members

Chair (Larry Larsen)
Secretary (Dave Robb)
Committee Members (Alan Danbury)
(Peter Simpson)

8. Newsletter & Club Website

9. Feedback On the Previous Year’s Meetings And Future Topics

10. Any Other Business