Hello All,

Here we are in February and it's really too late to wish everyone a Happy New Year. But I'll do so anyhow. Hope it's shaping up well for you so far.

I will try to keep this down to 3 subjects, all big ones, this time.

Just occasionally in this life we fall into it and come up smelling of violets. Just as we were getting into what could have been a major argument (possibly legal) with the landlord of the Belconnen Centre, we were contacted by the Department of Urban Services on Monday of this week. Were we interested in some community space at the Grant Cameron Centre in Holder? The old Holder High School in Mulley Street, just off the Cotter road.
Interested? Yes indeed. I arranged an inspection that afternoon and Mike Dinn also came along. Outcome is that the premises look ideal for us at 1/3 of the rent of the current Centre without the training room. Mike took some photo's and I wrote a description which are posted on Mike's web site at http://www.pcug.org.au/~mdinn/pcugholder/ We arranged another visit this Friday AM for the rest of the committee and some of the people who have helped us in the search for premises over the last few months. I hope that we can approve on the spot, and possibly complete a move by the end of March.
Of course with all major moves and changes there are Pros and Cons. Some are detailed on the web page noted above. But I'll cover a couple here.
Pros: Huge reduction in Rent for the long term. We will finally have some premises which recognise that we are a non-profit community based organisation, and we can join the hundreds of similar organisations that have been enjoying low rents for many years. After we have paid off some of the moving costs we should be solidly 'in the black' and we can start returning the benefits back to the membership, quite probably in the form of reduced fees and charges, and certainly more bang for your hard earned bucks. More announcements later.....
Cons: Although access is very good (see the web address) and the venue is quite central, some of our hard working volunteer staffers and others may not want to travel further than they are at the moment. If they decide that, we will understand, but hope they will think it over carefully. Parking is superb and free at least!
Moving, fit-out and make-good is going to cost a lot. But can probably be recouped in saved rental in less than 12 months.
STOP PRESS!!!!!
Members of the committee visited the Grant Cameron centre today and unanimously agreed that the PCUG Centre should move to Holder. We hope to move by the end of March...... More pictures at http://tinyurl.com/5qc9p

Almost as momentous is the fact that TIP was 10 Years old on the first of this month! All the TIP administrators who have given their time freely (some for more than 10 years) deserve a huge vote of thanks! They could certainly charge a minimum of $100 per hour for the services they perform out in the 'real world', but thank goodness they believe in the 'Users helping Users' motto.... I have asked them what sort of Party, drinks, certificates, etc. etc. they would like, but so far they have been too busy to answer! Perhaps Pizza would be acceptable? I always was a cheap date.
Hopefully some of the good things we are planning for TIP will be implemented soon. These include free 'proper' Email for all PCUG members, extra 'real' Email boxes, and even better Internet deals. Specially if the current 'further doubling' trial is a success. We did confirm earlier that the first doubling trial is now permanent, and our current rates and charges are detailed at http://www.pcug.org.au/member_info/services.htm The new doubling trials effectively double all those allowances again! And includes things like 100MB Web space allowance, and virtually unlimited dial-up access.
As TIP was one of the first ISPs in Canberra - it is a tribute to the Administrators that we are still in business and the reliability has been absolutely outstanding.
Some of us are visited TransACT yesterday and met the General Manager to discus new and better deals. I hope we will have some good things to announce next week.

Finally I would like to mention that we have joined the ASCCA (The Australian Seniors Computing Clubs Association). See http://www.seniorcomputing.org/ for a whole lot more details. This is not just that many of us (a majority?) members are getting quite long in the tooth, but there will be many benefits to both organisations. From our viewpoint they will refer members to us and provide us with a voice to Government and other organisations. But also (and Microsoft haters can stop reading), we have become an 'Unlimited Potential' organisation. The 'Unlimited Potential' project was announced by Bill Gates when he last interviewed our Prime Minister - many millions of dollars worth of free software to eligible organisations. We are eligible for up to (I think) $17,000 of free software for training systems and other purposes like door prizes etc. I am told that there is a 10 Kg box waiting for us to inspect at the centre and it contains training course materials, CDs and similar goodies. It will be quite an incentive to get the training systems up and running again as soon as possible.

I could rattle on about the last MMM (Main Monthly Meeting) which was simply superb, and the next which will also focus on the path of Open Source Software, but that will be posted elsewhere - so I'll get out of your hair now.

Have a good month - John Saxon..... 11 Feb 2005

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