Newsletter/Submissions/SOC

To all of you people a hearty hello from those of us who don't exist... or something to that effect. Just a friendly reminder from Special Operations Command (SOC), we're still around, even if we don't actually exist.

Seriously, however, I wanted to write a little about what we do for any of you who might have ever wondered. SOC does a little practical jokery every once in awhile, even some impractical jokery now and then. We also on occasion collect intelligence on various subjects that MFI is interested in. For example, we have recently been given the mission to create descriptions of other fan organizations active in the world. Last, but certainly not least, we are beginning to offer more in the way of role-play activities.

Our membership roster is not public, so even some of our own members won't necessarily know who the others are. I am leaving it up to the various members about whether they wish to be public members. They don't have to be, but they don't have to be secret either - I just leave the option there. Some of you may remember the discussion on callsigns that my predecessor William Osborne started last year. Any SOC member who wishes may arrange for a callsign with SOC Command. This is how they will be addressed in "official" communications. I would rather not exercise the option of assigning callsigns, so no worries there for those of you who disagreed with that policy.

SOC membership is available to any member of MFI, including those members of other MFI Branches. There is nothing to preclude dual membership to my knowledge, at least from SOC itself. As such, the ranks can be a bit confusing - especially as we also accept civilians. In reality, while you can hold any rank recognized by your chapter or MFI, rank is not the important thing here. What matters is the position that a member holds. SOC does not control promotions of members per se. The basic position is that of "agent", also known as an "operative". SOC staff positions are the only positions that are publicly made known through the SOC website. There are three currently, SOC Director, SOC Deputy Director, and SOC Chief of Operations. Respectively, these positions are sometimes written as DIR-SOC, DEPDIR-SOC, and COO-SOC.

Now that all of you should have some idea of what SOC does and how it is organized, I invite anyone who is interested to email me privately with questions, comments, and concerns. My email may be found on the SOC page at the MFI wiki site.

That's all for now from us non-existant people in SOC.

FCPT Ferber DIR-SOC-MFI