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MVPCUG Meeting Minutes

MVPCUG General Meeting

Minutes, Meeting of Tuesday, April 2, 2002

The MVPCUG general meeting was held in the cafeteria of Whitesboro High School. President Joe Madeira called the meeting to order at 6:03 p.m.

Business Meeting

Minutes of Last Meeting - The March 2002 minutes were approved. Joe reminded everyone that the minutes are available on our web site.

Treasurer's Report - Bill Gorrell reported that Dan Reed conducted an audit of the books for last year. A discrepancy of $0.03 was reported. Audit reports are available from Bill and Marsha Thayer. The March Treasurer's report shows total inflows of $479.64 and total outflows of $370.88 for a net gain of $108.76. The final March balance was $6,039.56.

Special Interest Groups (SIGs) - Joe presented a summary of the club's SIG activities.

Q&A SIG (Tim Clinehens) - Tim will answer all questions presented during the SIG.
Basic Training SIG (Lisa Britt) - Lisa presents introductory material for people just getting acquainted with computers or for anyone wanting basic computer information.
Internet SIG (Jerry Finkelstein) - Jerry presents places of fun and interest on the Internet and answers questions regarding, downloading, surfing the net, etc.
Genealogy SIG (Judy Boniface) - This SIG is available to club members and others in the community.
Quicken SIG (Bo Wozniak) - Bo gave a brief introduction to the Quicken SIG. He has a good working knowledge of some features of Quicken and is willing to research areas where there are questions.

Jerry Finkelstein made an announcement regarding encrypted music CDs. Apparently several music companies are beginning to encrypt CDs so that they will not play in computer CD and DVD drives. Apparently the encrypted CDs do not always play on CD players. Jerry reported that Circuit City has a policy of same-product exchanges and no refunds on CDs that have been opened.


Presentation

At 6:25 p.m. Joe introduced John Stroiney from Microsoft who spoke to us on "The Digital Photography Experience". John reported that in this day of expanding need for digital photographic images, Microsoft has responded with operating system enhancements, a suite of tools in the Picture It! product line and even a hardware / software TV viewing system.

Microsoft's XP operating system contains the following aids to digital picture management:

  1. Folder icons show pictorial summary of first few pictures contained within.
  2. The e-mail wizard will reduce photo file sizes by about 10 for e-mail attachments.
  3. Directories in which photos are stored have slide show capability.
  4. A print wizard allows orientation of pictures and multiple copies of one photo or multiple photos in one layout for printing.
  5. An add-on product called XP Plus Pack manages screen savers.
  6. There is capability to show pictures while listening to mus

Microsoft's Picture It! product line is composed of 5 software packages and one hardware / software item. The Picture It! product line is supported on Windows 98 and higher.

  1. Greetings 2002 - This package provides greeting card type capability. Price is $24.99 (now offering a $10 rebate).
  2. Picture It! Photo 2002 - This is photo editing software. Price is $34.96 (now offering a $10 rebate).
  3. Picture It! Photo Premier 2002 - This provided advanced photo editing. Price is $54.95 (now offering a $16 rebate).
  4. Picture It! Publishing 2002 - This is photo publishing software. Price is $34.95 (now offering a $10 rebate).
  5. Picture It! Publishing Platinum 2002 - This is advanced photo publishing software. Price is $54.95 (now offering $16 rebate).
  6. TV Photoviewer - This hardware / software system enables viewing of photos on a TV screen. Software that runs on a PC lets you compress photos and write them to a floppy for input to the viewer device that attaches to the TV. The price is $79.00.

Following our break, John continued his presentation with a demonstration of the Picture It! Publishing Platinum product. Demonstrated features included changing the background of a picture, combining pictures and changing effects.

John's final presentation was the game Zoo Tycoon which is a fun, challenging game of interactive zoo management.

Door Prize Drawing Winners

Picture It! Publishing Platinum* Mike O'Toole
Streets & Trips 2000* George Purpura
Windows XP Training Manual & CD* Tim Spoon
Microsoft Encarta* Howard Netzband
Newpoint Power Control Center Joe Madeira
Keyboard Don Jennings
Pooh's Print Studio Dave Askew
Family Origins Don Pianka
Who Wants to Be A Millionaire Sue Bowley
Home Improvement Software Mary Tollerton
CD Carrying Case Jim Schmandt
Microsoft Tote Bag Tim Clinehens
* Provided by Microsoft

The meeting was adjourned at 7:55 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,
Marsha Thayer, Secretary

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© MVPCUG 2002
This page was last updated on:
February 2003