WSFS Business Meeting

The World Science Fiction Society (WSFS) is the organization that licences Worldcon. It has an unusual structure - its membership is defined as the members of that year's Worldcon. So if you are a member of Renovation, you are a member of WSFS - at least for now!

WSFS is governed through the Business Meeting, which is held at Worldcon every year. The meeting generally happens in 3 sessions, which take place on the middle three days of the Worldcon.

• A Preliminary Business Meeting - which reviews business, sets the timings for the main meeting, but cannot take any material decisions.

• The first Main Business Meeting - where the main debates take place on constitutional motions.

• The second Main Business Meeting - where the main order of business is usually to announce the results of the Site Selection process. (Business not completed in the first Main Business Meeting can also be continued here).

The Renovation Business Meetings will be held in Room A02 in the RSCC, starting at 10 a.m. on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

WSFS Constitution and Standing Rules

WSFS has its own website, which you can find at www.wsfs.org.

WSFS is governed by a Constitution and Standing Rules, which ensures that the organisation continues effectively from year to year even though the WSFS membership is changing all the time.

• The WSFS Constitution (as of September 2010)
• The WSFS Standing Rules (as of September 2010)
• Resolutions of Continuing Effect (up to 2009)
• Resolutions of Continuing Effect (2010 updates only).

Aussiecon 4 Materials

The last Business Meeting was held at Aussiecon 4, the 2010 Worldcon. We have published the minutes from the Aussiecon 4 meeting below, along with Business Passed On - typically motions which were debated for the first time at Aussiecon and now need a confirming ratification vote.

Note - some of the attachments are up to 2 MB as these are scans of the submitted hard copy documents.

• Minutes of the Aussiecon 4 Business Meeting
  • Attachment 1 - Attendance Record
  • Attachment 2 - Part A - Preliminary Business Meeting Agenda
  • Attachment 2 - Parts B & C - Main Business Meeting Agenda
  • Attachment 3 - WSFS Committee Reports
  • Attachment 4 - Worldcon Financial Reports
  • Attachment 5 - Site Selection Report

• Minutes of the Mark Protection Committee Meeting, Sep 6, 2010

• Business Passed On from the Aussiecon 4 Business Meeting to the Renovation Business Meeting.

Agenda Section 1 - WSFS Committee Reports

WSFS has a number of committees which are obliged to report to the Business Meeting. Their 2011 reports will be published here as they become available.

• 1.1 - Mark Protection Committee (including Nominations for MPC)
• 1.2 - Nitpicking and Flyspecking Committee
• 1.3 - Worldcon Runners Guide Editorial Committee
• 1.4 - Hugo Eligibility Rest of the World (HEROW) Committee
• 1.5 - Formalization of Long List Entries (FOLLE) Committee
• 1.6 - Semi-Prozine Committee

Notes:

• The first five of these committees are standing committees which report back annually. The Semi-Prozine Committee was created on a one-off basis to review the Semi-Prozine Hugo Award category.

• Resolutions 4.1.3 and 4.1.4 (see below) represent the entirety of the HEROW Committee report.

Agenda Section 2 - Worldcon Financial Reports

All Worldcons are required to present annual financial reports to the Business Meeting from the time they are elected until they close their accounts. A number of Worldcons are due to present reports at Renovation; we will publish them here as they become available.

• 2.1 Past Worldcons and NASFiC
  • 2.1.1 2001 Worldcon - Millennium Philcon (added Aug 16)
  • 2.1.2 2006 Worldcon - L.A.Con IV (updated Aug 14)
  • 2.1.3 2009 Worldcon - Anticipation (added Aug 16)
  • 2.1.4 2010 Worldcon - Aussiecon 4 (added Aug 13)
  • 2.1.5 2010 NASFiC - ReConstruction, the 10th NASFiC (added Aug 16)
• 2.2 Seated Worldcons
  • 2.1.1 2011 Worldcon - Renovation
  • 2.2.2 2012 Worldcon - Chicon 7

Agenda Section 3 - Business Passed On from Aussiecon 4

The following items are included in Business Passed On from the Aussiecon 4 Business Meeting to the Renovation Business Meeting (refer to the separate linked page for the text of each motion).

• 3.1 - Short Title: Change the Membership Rate Limitations
• 3.2 - Short Title: Electronic Voting
• 3.3 - Allow Electronic Distribution of Rules
• 3.4 - Expand Hugo Nominations Eligibility
• 3.5 - Run-Off References
• 3.6 - Mark Notice Revision

Agenda Section 4 - New Business

WSFS members may submit new motions for consideration by the Business Meeting. Motions submitted prior to the convention will be published here as they become available.

Agenda Section 4.1 - Motions of Continuing Effect

• Resolution 4.1.1 - WSFS Domains
• Resolution 4.1.2 - MPC Eligibility Rules
• Resolutions 4.1.3 / 4.1.4 - This Year's Model and Another Year, Another HEROW *
• Resolution 4.1.5 - Extension of Eligibility of "Summer Wars" (added Aug 13)

In addition, the Semi-prozine committee has submitted a motion - that can be found in their report (see section 1.6 above).

* Submitted by the WSFS HEROW Committee.

Agenda Section 4.2 - Standing Rule Amendments

• Resolution 4.2.1 - All the Time in the World (added Aug 14)

Agenda Section 4.3 - Constitutional Amendments

• Resolution 4.3.1 - Keep the Fanzine Hugo Non-Professional (revised Aug 13)
• Resolution 4.3.2 - Best Fancast
• Resolution 4.3.3 - Hugo for Children's Books.
• Resolution 4.3.4 - Hugo Exclusions Constitutional Amendment Proposal (added Aug 13)