Nat 1 Publishing Board of Directors Meeting
Present: Brandan Roberts, Michaela Butler, Dahlia Thomas, Jennifer Weigel, Jason Willard, Kathleen Locke, Cal Tripp
Absent: n/a
Others Present: n/a
Prior Meeting’s Minutes: Accepted as written.
Old Business
Nat 1 Publishing has been approved by the Federal government to be a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation under section 509(a)(2) as a public charity. While most corporations are required to file a beneficial ownership information to FinCEN under the 2024 Corporate Transparency Act, we are not required to because of our status as a nonprofit organization (and thus are supposed to be transparent, anyway), meaning the process of transitioning from an LLC to 501(c)(3) is complete.
All authors affected by our transition and schedule change have been notified, and we have received responses from all of them; except for two authors who opted to have their contracts dissolved, all agreed to extend their publishing agreements one year to fit the new schedule.
The Write, Wrong or Otherwise short story challenge was a success. The discord gained roughly eighty members, and there have been 31 stories submitted by non-board members. Once the submission windows are completely closed, Roberts will order the gifts (posters, stickers, and bookmarks) to send to the participants, then order the physical anthologies as soon as editing is finished. The second WWoO is slated for August 10-23, 2025.
New Business
Motion by Roberts: After going through logistics and pricing, Roberts recommends changing the language for Gaslamp Pulp Zine so that it isn’t a “magazine” but rather a “biannual anthology.” By doing this, I will be able to be published on Amazon as books rather than on MagCloud as a magazine. The primary reason for this is that MagCloud will end up being about $35 per issue (print) compared to Amazon, which would be less than $10. Typically, the criteria for “magazines” are they are heavily financed by advertisements (which it won’t be), and they are frequently published—usually weekly or monthly—and Gaslamp will be twice a year. He also noted the name of the publication is Gaslamp Pulp Zine, but Zine is shorthand for magazine. While it may not be an issue, Roberts opened the door for discussion. don’t think it will be an issue, especially if it’s clearly labeled as an anthology, but if anybody has any suggestions to tweak it, now would be the opportune moment. Weigel suggested we drop the term Zine altogether as Gaslamp Pulp feels complete on its own. Both the initial motion and the suggestion to eliminate the word Zine from the title passed without dissent.
Motion by Willard: To improve Amazon visibility, Willard suggests creating a form of “Review Squad” to help books read a threshold of required ratings and reviews to be more consistently shown by Amazon’s algorithms. After discussion, the initial idea was rejected because of Amazon policies, however, there was a unanimous vote to find ways to advertise the need for ratings, including campaigns and monthly free booka to download to help entice downloads and possibly get them.
Meeting Adjourned: The next Board meeting is scheduled for the week of August 17-23.
Minutes Submitted by Brandan Roberts, 8/25/2024.