Computer Show, Election results
 And the Christmas Party!
 by Mike Taphorn / GCC President
 

COMPUTER SHOW

Evidently, the computer show in St. Charles was a dud. Chuck did find out that we are having one in Collinsville in the Spring. Not sure where he saw it, but, we can get the details from him at the Christmas / Holiday Party. If you went to the show, make sure you let us know how it was...

ELECTION RESULTS

We elected our officers last month. It wasn’t near as close as the presidential elections and it didn’t take as long either. Here are the winners

Position             Winner (If you want to call us that.)                     

President:       Mike Taphorn
Vice:                Jim Tomlinson
Secretary:      Carlos Mariles
Treasurer:      Charles Wallace
Webmaster:   Steven Gilroy
Librarian;        Jason Whitener
Editor:             Dennis McMurtrey
M.A.L:              Jerry Casteel
M.A.L:             Chuck Hill
M.A.L:             Bob Havlin (also corporate sponsor)            

Thanks to all the voters and participants and the board and I hope to have a great year serving as your Leaders.

HOLIDAY PARTY

Come one, Come all….. To our Holiday Party.

Everyone knows that a Holiday party is a time to come together and share a little time with your family and your friends. Our party is no different…

The Board Members and I would like to invite you to our favorite meeting of the year. We’re going to start a little early (6:00 PM) so we can all enjoy the meal before the gift giving begins. We have a lot of good food every year and I’m sure this year will be great as well. Please bring your family and any friends that want to get in on the free food and prizes.

Every dues paying member will get a special prize and the raffle prizes are going to include the best stuff we have had all year. Make sure you bring the kids. We’re going to have a special prize just for them. I hope you can make it and remember that we start early this month. Be there by 6:00 PM or you might miss out on some of the goodies…

PROGRESSIVE RAFFLE

Our progressive raffle is up to $300 and we are going to keep drawing tickets until somebody draws the Joker out of the deck we make them our big winner. Unlike our normal months, one member of each family is going to be given a ticket for the raffle this month (One ticket per family or membership). If you choose to purchase more tickets to increase your odds, you'll have a better chance at going home a winner. I bought about $500 bucks worth of stuff to give away over the next year at the meetings off of Computer Geeks and Surplus Computers and I'm going to bring a lot of the good stuff to the Holiday Party to give away. Make sure you come to the meeting, see what we have, buy a few tickets and join in the fun...

HOLIDAY PARTY PRIZES

The Members-Only Prizes have arrived (most of them) and the board members got a sneak peek at (some of) them at the last board meeting. We think you’ll like them and I hope they come in handy for everyone. Every member or family will receive a couple prizes just for attending. One per family or membership.

Don’t miss this meeting or you’ll miss out on great food , great friends, and, the great prizes…

See you at the meeting,
Mike

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 GCC Nov. 2005 Minutes 
 GCC Minutes
 by  Carlos Mariles/ GCC Secretary

 

GCC Nov. 2005 Minutes

President Mike Taphorn opened the meeting by welcoming the general membership, new members and guests. For the benefit of the new members and guests Mike explained how the door prizes work and what were they. The next topic on his agenda was the nomination, vote and installation of the new officers for the GCC club. At this point the names of those running for present office were mentioned. Those office positions that were still open were also made available to the membership in general. Some were nominated while others volunteered for the open positions. The nomination for all the positions, once they were filled was closed and the voting started. The voting count was taken and the following officers were selected and installed:

President:       Mike Taphorn
Vice:                Jim Tomlinson
Secretary:      Carlos Mariles
Treasurer:      Charles Wallace
Webmaster:   Steven Gilroy
Librarian;        Jason Whitener
Editor:             Dennis McMurtrey
M.A.L:              Jerry Casteel
M.A.L:             Chuck Hill
M.A.L:             Bob Havlin (also corporate sponsor)            

After the formal installation of the officers the meeting continued with an invitation to some of the members to attend the Blue Star Computer Show held in St Charles. Next on the agenda was the Club’s X-mas party which will be held during the next general membership meeting. Mike asked the membership to bring side dishes and that the club will buy the sandwiches from Quiznos. President Taphorn announce in a more serious note that one of our past members, Mr Everet Trutman, had passed away quietly in his house. Following was the Q&A sessions which normally last for thirty minutes. And finally Mr. Shawn Traveres from Microsoft Co., St. Louis, Mo. based, gave a presentation on the Tips and Tricks to use on your Windows XP. Mr. Traveres raffled three new Microsoft books among the membership. compliments of Microsoft Co,

The next membership (party) meeting will be held at the usual location on Dec. 21, 2005 at 6:00 pm.

Till then, your Sec.
Carlos B. Mariles

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 Alternative to Windows
 by Mitch Graves / Mitch's Corner

There is a new very easy alternative to Windows out.
It is a new version of Linux called UBUNTU.
Most versions of Linux have been for real geeks.
Guys who like to find and fix bugs in thier systems.
Up till now those of us that "just want it to work", had
little time or use for linux.
What makes this one different is that the guys releasing it do so with;
1)  A large selection of software (16 thousand!!!). (some screen shots)
2)  They made sure all the software actually works with it as is (unlike other Linux distros).

You can boot to the CD and actually run it from the CD without installing on your computer..
You can have access to all you windows files through the UBUNTU software.

You can download it free or they will actually ship you a factory CD for FREE!
(NOTE:  I have already ordered 40 for the GCC club so you needn't bother.)
And: Here is what they say about their OS.

• Ubuntu will always be free of charge, and there is no extra fee for the "enterprise edition", we make our very best work available to everyone on the same Free terms.
• Ubuntu comes with full commercial support from hundreds of companies around the world. Ubuntu is released regularly and predictably; a new release is made every six months. Each release is supported with free security updates and fixes for at least 18 months.
• Ubuntu will include the very best in translations and accessibility infrastructure that the Free Software community has to offer, to make Ubuntu usable by as many people as possible. We collaborate as widely as possible on bug fixing and code sharing.
• Ubuntu is entirely committed to the principles of free software development; we encourage people to use free and open source software, improve it and pass it on.

Ubuntu is suitable for both desktop and server use. The current Ubuntu release supports PC (Intel x86), 64-bit PC (AMD64) and PowerPC (Apple iBook and Powerbook, G4 and G5) architectures.

Ubuntu includes more than 16,000 pieces of software, but the core desktop installation fits on a single CD. Ubuntu covers every standard desktop application from word processing and spreadsheet applications to internet access applications, web server software, email software, programming languages and tools and of course several games.

For those of you that think Windows prices are a rip off  remember the laws of supply and demand.
The more we support and promote this stuff the more reasonable MS has to get (or go out of biz).

I've always wanted an adventure so I'm gonna try it out!
Later, Mitch

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 Merry Christmas: 
 And Have A Not So Politically Correct New year!
 by Dennis McMurtrey / GCC Newsletter Editor

My You and your families have a blessed Christmas and New Year! Yeah, Yeah I know this isn't computer related. But it is the season and the reason we are having a Christmas Party. So hope you and your families all can come and join us for a good time of free food and gifts. - Dennis

 Jackpot: $300.00
 Only 13 cards left in the deck
 Get your jackpot tickets 1 for 1.00 / 10 for 5.00

We'll give away ALL the $300.00 cash! Drawing till there IS a winner!

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