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Board Meeting Minutes #2 — September 3, 2025

Title: Board Meeting Minutes #2 — September 3, 2025

Date: September 3, 2025 Time: 3:00 PM ET Board Capacity: Co-op Board

Attendees

  • Austin Robey (Worker-Member)
  • Sean Adams (Worker-Member)
  • Freya Yamamoto (Label-Member)
  • Iz Ocampo (Artist-Member)
  • Haana Lee (Artist-Member)
  • Nick Austin (Supporter-Member)
  • John Garry (Observer)

Community Pulse

The board discussed how Label representatives' service should be handled if they leave their label job. Label membership is the only class tied to a job and may need additional consideration.

Austin noted that label membership is somewhat undefined and suggested that individuals who manage a label and organize a label page should qualify as label members.

Open questions:

  • What makes someone an active member? Is logging on within a year sufficient?
  • Where are the gaps in current policy documents?
  • Should label representation be tied to individuals working at a label, or to the label as an entity?
  • The definition of "active" determines who can vote.

Conclusions:

  • Comment on the Google Doc policy this month to finalize; gather suggestions.
  • Bring questions to the forum.
  • Identify a set of policy questions for the community as a next step.
  • Bylaws acceptance will be triggered when members sign up for the platform via a checkbox on account creation.

Austin's updates:

  • Zine shipping: putting out a call for help with NYC members.
  • Approving artists/labels: needs to be offboarded to someone else.
  • Support: answering emails and DMs — Subvert had its biggest week yet.
  • Product testing and updates: completing the first phase of testing.
  • CCI wants to invest $50k; Austin has been working through details (pre-board approval).

Core Agenda Items

Item 1: Board Roles

Secretary:

  • Hannah volunteered.
  • Responsibilities: taking notes and communicating them to the forum, with room for the role to expand.
  • Side discussion: New member approvals are overwhelming Austin and need to be redistributed.
  • John Garry suggested the board question what to leave to itself versus what the community should decide, citing the importance of community approval.
  • Sean suggested creating a rubric of Austin's approval process to present to the community for approval — removing 10% "vibes-based" decisions.
  • VOTE: Hannah unanimously elected Board Secretary.

Treasurer:

  • Iz volunteered.
  • Responsibilities: investment decisions, cost and loss analysis.
  • John Garry offered to assist with financial analysis.
  • Iz suggested financial controls so not everything goes through one person.
  • Austin: interfacing with accountants would be helpful.
  • VOTE: Iz unanimously elected Board Treasurer.

Chair / Vice Chair:

  • Responsibilities: coordinating meetings, scheduling, setting the agenda (with the CEO), facilitating conversation, time management, aligning perspectives in dissent.
  • Austin: Vice Chair as a collaborative role.
  • John Garry: the Chair and CEO should ideally be different people; this is part of decentralizing from the corporation to the co-op and giving more power to members.
  • VOTE: Freya unanimously elected Chair of the Board.

Side note: Board meetings will occur on the first Wednesday of every month at 3 PM ET.

Item 2: Bylaws — Next Steps

  • Review bylaws and find any gaps before the next meeting.

Item 3: Executive Compensation

  • The proposed Director salary is informed by previous employment history and Subvert's current resources.
  • Austin's goal: a co-op shouldn't have to trade off market-rate salary.
  • At the project's start, others raised concerns about Subvert attracting talent without competitive pay.
  • Sean: these salaries are below market for this kind of work.
  • Subvert lacks the equity-based incentives of traditional startups.
  • Cost of living in cultural and tech capitals (NYC, Silicon Valley) is high.
  • Subvert is a worker co-op; the workers are in charge.
  • Austin worked a full year without pay. When initial funding came in, he paid himself back ~$20K for expenses but not for labor. He proposed logging this as a debt to the co-op, repayable over 5–6 years without rigid scheduling.
  • The board agreed to discuss this further with the forum.
  • VOTE: Director's salary approved at $140k/year (5–0, Austin recused), to be revisited in June at the Annual General Meeting.

Action Items

  • Look over and finalize Subvert's bylaws.
  • Define member acceptance criteria.

Votes & Decisions

  • [Co-op Board] Hannah elected Board Secretary (unanimous).
  • [Co-op Board] Iz elected Board Treasurer (unanimous).
  • [Co-op Board] Freya elected Chair of the Board (unanimous).
  • [Co-op Board] Director's salary approved at $140k/year (5–0, Austin recused per Article IV.m of the Bylaws).