Board of Publications Meeting Minutes for February 7, 2017

Call to Order/Introductions

Adoption of Agenda:

Approval of January 3 Minutes:

Motion: Paul moved and Susan seconded adoption of the January 3, 2017 Minutes. Motion passed.

Public Comment:

• Bob said concern was expressed on the ACB-L list that there are no parameters for length of term for the list moderator. He considered posting the BOP meeting notice to ACB-L to encourage list members to express their concerns directly to the BOP, but wanted to check first since the list has over 300 members.
• Deb said that BOP meetings are public, the announcements are posted to the Leadership list, are passed along to affiliates etc., and would definitely be appropriate to post on ACB-L.
• Katie commented that these communication issues often result because many ACB members do not understand the role of the BOP. She noted that her participation in BOP meetings has really helped her to get the big picture.
• Larry asked how list moderators are appointed; Bob responded that Kim appoints moderators and the BOP supervises them.
• Kim encouraged that the announcements be consistently posted to the ACB-L list. She also indicated that she is looking for additional people to serve as moderators and to strengthen the Email Management committee. Kim asked Bob to recommend list members who would be good additions to the committee and could provide appropriate leadership in his absence. Bob will make committee recommendations to Kim and will make sure the BOP meeting announcements are posted to ACB-L.

Web Update: Eric Bridges

In October, ACB contracted with Louisville Web Group to review ACB.ORG and to make structural and organizational recommendations regarding ACB’s web presence. These consultants previously updated the ACB Mini Mall so are familiar with requirements for accessibility and functionality.

The first task was a review of the mobile structure or Responsive Theme—how ACB.ORG is accessed from different devices which was completed in the first month. The current discussion relates to the overall look and feel of the web site and will ultimately result in a redesign of the site later this year with the goal of being intuitive for visitors to find the information they need. The third anticipated step will be an in depth consideration of organizational branding and marketing on the web site. ACB has an IT Strategic Planning Committee, (Ron represents the BOP), that oversees all of ACB’s technology related projects including web development.

Design issues currently under consideration include: the site map, color, and other factors. There are over 6000 pages on ACB.ORG so decisions must be made to reduce, reorganize and archive the content based on relevance and use. It is understood that content such as past ACB resolutions and past issues of the Braille Forum must remain publicly available. It is possible to archive these in better ways to reduce the load on the web site, and to increase searchability. This will result in streamlined functionality and responsiveness overall.

• Both Larry Turnbull and the Louisville Web Group have provided training to ACB staff and most staff are now able to upload content into specific areas of the site.
• Deb commented that she was excited about the web initiative and asked if consistency of document structure through a template or other means was being considered. For example, documents would be more readable in various formats in they included markup for headings, lists etc. rather than unstructured, plain text as they often are now presented. Eric said that it was early in the process to consider this but would be appropriate for Ron to bring to the IT Strategic Planning committee.
• Ron asked if there were analytic tools that could be used to prioritize the old pages. Ron also asked about storing documents in PDF rather than coding them for other structure. Larry said there are analytic tools which are being used to identify use of current content. Larry and Deb both said that to actually create fully accessible and structured PDF, it was as much or more work than creating accessible HTML and did not reduce storage but would be a viable storage method for new documents more than for older ones. 
• Ron asked if it would be helpful if the BOP were to prioritize content that should be brought forward. Eric said this would be useful particularly with regard to the publications the BOP manages. Ron said he thought the scope of publications to consider might be larger than those for which the BOP has responsibility. Eric and Ron agreed that the scope is categories of publications and criteria for determining prioritization across and among categories.
• Ron suggested that it might be useful to create a taskforce of steak holders to determine the ultimate priority process.
• Eric again stressed that all historical content that is determined to be important will be retained either on the site directly or will be accessible through archives.
• Paul expressed concern that analytics might not tell the complete story about what visitors want to access because in the past few years it has been very difficult to locate content on the site. Eric confirmed this; a node search is being conducted to identify unlabeled links and they have identified a lot of content that has been unreachable.

Alternative Approaches for Transmitting Electronic Copies of the ACB Braille Forum and the ACB E-Forum: Eric Bridges

• Ron recapped the discussion regarding whether new members added through Donor Perfect or other means should automatically be enrolled in the electronic distribution of ACB publications with an opt out option. Past practice has been to maintain a separate list for publications to which people subscribe themselves. Having both Eric and Sharon on the call provides an opportunity to fully understand the issues and challenges.
• Eric explained that the business office was hoping for centralization of databases rather than maintaining separate, potentially overlapping lists for different organizational functions. He was open to hearing any objections or concerns regarding this.
• Ron hoped it would be possible for a member to provide an email address for communication and list a separate format for the publications. He also asked if it would be possible to opt out of the electronic publications and have the change automatically take effect in the database, and asked about how to change one’s preferred format.
• Denise said that people are frustrated about the need to sign up for the electronic publications after having already indicated a preference for electronic publications at membership. She also prefers, as a state membership chair, that format changes go through her so that she knows if members are having any difficulty getting their preferred format.
• Kim pointed out that many people on the ACB listservs are not members. Do we keep a separate list for them to subscribe?
• Deb suggested that these should be sorted for duplication and then added to a category in the central database for non-member subscriptions.
• Carla said that the opportunity to subscribe to the publications should be offered as part of the footer on every page of the web site. There was discussion on how subscribers from the web site could be merged with the existing database. There was also discussion of protecting these subscriber links from access by spam bots and Ron asked Larry if he was familiar with a technique regarding reverse CATCHA (called reCATCHA) which presents a form only seen by machines. Larry will look into this; ACB currently uses text CAPCHA.
• Sharon said that merging the Braille Forum list with the Donor Perfect list was happening by hand because she could not export the listserv. There was discussion that it is possible to dump data from the listserv into a text file, and Larry said that email addresses will not have names associated with them if they were not entered on to the listserv. He offered to download the data for Sharon.
• Kim stressed the importance of moving forward with one database, recommended that the Braille Forum list be advised of the change and that members be asked to complete a form to provide information for the database.
• There was consensus that maintaining one database, automatically subscribing everyone to the Braille Forum and E-Forum with an opt out link was desirable, and that subscription links should be offered on every web page footer. Ron and Eric will discuss further how this should be implemented including coordination with other activities and timelines.

Reports:

BOP Chair: Ron Brooks

• Participated in kick-off meeting with BOP/CCLVI large Print Reader Preference Survey Task Force
• Finalized talking points for BOP Update to be provided during ACB Mid-Year Meeting
• Distributed final draft of KPI spreadsheet for completion, beginning with data for January, 2017.
• Updated BOP member volunteer hours on the ACB Volunteer Hours Tracking Spreadsheet through 1/31/17. If hours are extremely different, let Ron know.
• Participated in the ACB IT Planning Committee Meeting held on 01/08/2017.
• Participated in the Goal One Committee Meeting held on 02/06/2017.

Editor: Sharon Lovering

• Sharon says she has gone through at least two reams of paper with all of the affiliate updates. One day she received 18 notifications of members who are deceased.
• Sharon’s finger is still in a splint but she sees the doctor on the 20^th and hopes to have the splint removed. She is making preparations for Midyear and praying for good weather.
• Carla observed that 300 fewer large print issues of the Braille Forum are scheduled for March and wondered why. Sharon said large numbers of format changes occur with affiliate updates. Readers are changing to the electronic formats, there are increasing numbers of deceased recipients, and when someone does not renew membership the electronic format is the only one they can receive.
• Larry said he is adding an unsubscribe link in the footer of each ACB email list.
• Kim reported that she received a memo indicating that it is now possible to order cartridges for delivery in July. They must be ordered in increments of 400. It was decided to follow the original recommendation of purchasing 2400 cartridges plus mailers which allows the 1200 recipients to have one returning in the mail while the next one is being sent out.

January 2017 Issue type: hard copy Print Page Count: 48

• Braille Distributed: 727; Returned: 5; Return Rate: 0.7%; Received: 722
• LP Distributed: 3,011; Returned: 51; Return Rate: 1.7%; Received: 2,960
• Cassette Distributed: 1,078; Returned: 13; Return Rate: 1.2%; Received: 1,065
• CD Distributed: 156; Returned: 3; Return Rate: 1.9%; Received: 153
• Electronic Distributed: 3,089; Returned: 6; Return Rate: 0.2%; Received: 3,083
• Total Accessed (Excludes Returns): 7,983

ACB Radio: Larry Turnbull

• One broadcaster resigned from Interactive and another is preparing to broadcast.
• Sagebrush and Midyear will both be streamed as Live Events.

January Statistics

• Listener Counts for January: Mainstream 1860; Cafe 465; Treasure Trove 2170; Interactive 1023; World News and Information 620. Live Event: 45 listeners for Top Dog. Phone: 5706 calls.
• Web hits: 23,050.
• ACBRI on demand visits 8436
• Downloads: MainMenu Archives 1200; Speaking Out for the Blind 23; Inside Track 294; Handy Around the House 188; Affiliates In Action 115; ACB Braille and E Forum 1067; ACB reports 755; MileStones 93; Legendary Insights 1224; Hazelnuts 740
• New Podcast subscriptions: ACB Braille Forum and E Forum 80; ACB Reports 40; Hazelnuts 95; Main Menu 110; Legendary Insights 50; Handy Around the House 20; On the Inside Track 80
• Stream Licensing Tuning hours: Interactive 1832; Café 1831
• ACB Braille/E Forum hotline 236 calls

ACB Email List Moderator: Bob Hachey

• Major increase in Chat posts attributed to discussion of the election. ACB-L has fewer posts than before so Chat is working as intended.
• Katie asked for clarification on the purpose of the lists. ACB-L is limited to topics related to blindness, Chat is open discussion on any topic as long as it is handled appropriately.
• Carla said she thought it is important for ACB leadership to at least monitor the ACB-L list to learn what a representative cross section of members are thinking about.
• Ron noted that use of social media is probably impacting list traffic. Deb and Kim said that email lists are still the only form of social media for many of our members.

January, 2017 Stats

• ACB-L Number of Members: 305; Messages Posted: 170
• ACB-Chat Number of Members: 138; Messages Posted: 758
• Leadership number of members: 225; messages posted: 120

Social Media: Carla Ruschival

Both Facebook and Twitter have increased 100 people. Responses to posts are also increasing. Kelly is posting items at the best times of day to ensure they have good visibility. We are reaching a wide audience through our variety of media.

Facebook: 2,882 page likes

• Braille menu news spot feat. Eric Bridges: 4,514 People Reached; 39 likes; 70 shares
• What is it like to date while blind?: 4,003 people reached; 42 likes, loves and wows; 48 shares
• TV for the blind feat. Marlaina Lieberg: 2,566 people reached; 40 likes and loves; 58 shares

Twitter: 1,766 followers

•  Broadway hit Hamilton sued over services for blind theatergoers: 1,125 impressions; 73 engagements
• ACB scholarships: 952 impressions; 23 engagements
•  Braille menus spot feat. Eric Bridges: 505 impressions; 17 engagements

Public Relations: Katie Frederick

PR did not meet in January but is scheduled for February. PR will be working to coordinate distribution of the Convention previews with Janet Dickelman and with Deb Lewis for ACB Radio.

Large Print Reader preference Survey: Deb Lewis

• The subcommittee met in January. Deb is developing a matrix of the CCLVI guidelines along with APH standards (widely accepted by both consumers and professionals) and current ACB practice. The matrix will hopefully show where there is consensus or disparity between the documents, and also unique areas of concern. The next meeting is anticipated in February probably on the 20^th which is a holiday for working members.
• Leslie Spoone indicated that CCLVI will have a Board call on February 16 at which the taskforce will be discussed. Following that call, Leslie indicated she will report back.
• Ron has drafted an article for the Braille Forum but has held back on publishing it until there is a more clear picture of how the taskforce will move forward.

Work Plan Update

Ron plans to update the work plan and circulate it after each meeting.

Announcements

There were no additional announcements.

Next Meeting:

Tuesday, March 7, 2017 – 9:00 PM Eastern.

Adjourn

Deb moved adjournment. There was not a clear second. the meeting adjourned at 10:51 PM.

Respectfully Submitted,

Deb Lewis, Secretary