Mike check one, two, three, Mike check one, two, three, going live right now. We are live, right on Meta Boys. I'm on vacation. You're on vacation. Yeah, look at this. Wow, that's nice. Trees are blowing. The sound of the water. Yeah, it's nice. Very calm. Yeah. Good news, everyone. Today or actually today and tomorrow, depending where you live, the new song, Trial by Fire by Judas Priest is being released. So I guess some parts of the world, it's already the 17th of November. And other parts of the world, still the 16th. And or it's gonna be becoming the 17th. Invincible Shield, The New Wild by Judas Priest is gonna be released on March 8th, 2024 on Sony Music. And this is the second single that we'll be talking about, Alan. Yeah, there we go. They follow up to Panic Attack, which was the first single. Yep, yep, yep, yep. I thought, yeah, you know, Panic Attack compared to Trial by Fire, I think deserves to be the first single. But this is a good follow up. Wait a second, hold on. You're saying Panic Attack should have been this first single. Yeah, which it was. Okay, okay, gotcha. It makes sense that it was because I think it's a stronger track than Trial by Fire, but this is a great follow up to Panic Attack. Another teaser for the album. It's all I'm gonna do, Alan, I'm just gonna break it up this song and you just interject, okay? How's that?  I took a lot of notes down, Alan. Took a lot of notes. All right, so as everybody knows, because it was a teaser, right? It was a snippet of this song and it was sort of like a little bit of a guitar harmony. Sounded a little bit like the song, the ripper, the beginning of the ripper, but maybe slowed down a bit.  Thoughts? The intro? I like the intro. Same thing with the Panic Attack.  You know, is this? And that's, I think, with our interview we had with Richie Faulkner. You know, he's trying to, Jim always wants to know what to sound like. What's the theme of the album? He said, well, we're trying to do some stuff different. But so that's it. I like the intro. We're talking about the intro. It builds slowly and then before it gets to the major groove. It sets it up. You're saying it sets it up properly. That's what you're saying. Yeah. It's just something different. Something different, that's all. All right, so then you get the verse, right? It's chugging along.  Chugging is the same word I have in my head, Jim. I agree 100%. I find, and tell me if I'm wrong about this, it seems like the bass, the guitars, and the drums are sort of like in sync together. They're kind of grooving together all at once. They're not really doing things differently. They're just kind of grooving as one's chugging along. Chugging is the word, Jim. All right, mid-paced, mid-paced, chugging along, locked in. The vocals come in. What'd you think? Halford's on the first. It's Rob Halford. You can hear the words he's saying. He's telling a story. And you know, it's, it's, it's prized. All right, so Halford, singing in his chest voice, is not doing, you know, the song Spoon for Vengeance here. No, no, you're gonna sing that to the end. That's, that's good stuff. And he jumps into the chorus. Very melodic, very catchy. Yeah, it's kind of a laid-back chorus, now that you mention it, you know? It's not the painkiller or, you know, that's good. It's kind of a laid-back chorus. This song, I don't think it would have been out of place on Angel of Retribution quite well. All right, I agree. Right? You've got that feel, you know, it's kind of, you know, for me, it's like, well, we'll continue, continue building it up. All right, I'm building it up. So we're up, we're up. We've gone, we've gone from the verse to the chorus. And like, I like that. I like how you said laid-back chorus. A very melodic laid-back chorus, right? I like that. I like that in his chest voice. It's not screaming. It's kind of like Jawbreaker or... Yeah, it's kind of, you know, it builds, it builds slow. It's kind of like when I look and back at you. Yeah. It's a laid-back. It's like, you could be on that beach right now and you could be singing the chorus. Or here on the beach relaxing. Alan, Alan. Yeah, my sunscreen on. Here it is. Yeah. Here it is, here it is. Here it is. I can't wait to do it. I'm not saying nothing. I'm not saying nothing. Hey man, I'm Geddy Lee. All right. So, the relaxed chorus, where we were, we were at the relaxed chorus. I like the chorus a lot. I find it's super melodic. It's got a nice feel to it. And he's not repeating the words. He's not like breaking the law, breaking the law, breaking the law, right? He's actually singing the chorus and there's a change of phrasing, right? Or a change of words, we'll say. All right, back to the verse again. Again, the same old chuggy-chuggy. Back to the chorus again, right? The lyrics are A-B, A-B, right? The rhyming schemes. Yes, yes, exactly. And again, like I said, I think you said it earlier. It builds slowly, telling a story, and it's building its way up to the solo, right? And it's got a little bridge. There's a little bridge as well. And the bridge is the big note, right? The raw power, you know, he comes to the bridge like you've got another thing coming and then he just blasts out that big note right at the end of the bridge, right? That's kind of what he does. So yeah, it's got a bridge and then we get into the solo. Maybe you want to say something about Richie Faulkner and the soloing. I love it, I love it. I think it's a great solo. Yeah, me too. I think it's one of the highlights of the song, actually. You know, Richie and Rob, they're killing it. Richie, he's getting into, he's really finding his way. He's really finding his sound in Judas Priest and Rob is just at his age. He's just, he puts all the other vocalists in the world to shame. That's a great job. You know, it's still at the end of the screams and that. It's not going through like that part of screaming with vengeance. Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta. You know, it's not all high like that, but it's well rounded. It's all there, all the vocal tricks that we love from Rob, they're all in the song. But just a more mellow application. This is not, we wouldn't consider this a painkiller. Anything super fast, this is a very slow grooving song. It's not a ballad, but a slow grooving song. Then we get the solo, and then after the solo, we go back to the beginning of the song, if you noticed. It's back to the intro. We hear the gong. We hear the harmonies of Rob Halford. We hear that sort of the ripper song, you know, that little, the two guitar harmonies.  All right, so that's kind of the breakdown of the song. Short and sweet, maybe what, four minutes and something seconds? Yeah, no, that's good, yeah. I like how you said storytelling, because I looked up Trawl by Fire and actually it was a movie. I'm not sure if it applies to this song. Hey, it's a Journey album too, title. Yeah, it's a lot of, it's a very popular phrase. Very popular. Yeah, yeah, but this movie was in 2018 and actually I did see this movie. It's a man being accused, going on death row, went off, well, allegedly innocent, and this lady finds it in his heart. That's the only person that's fighting for him, his innocence, and I guess he's on death row and they, that was that, right? What about the lyrics? I like the lyrics, tells a story, A-B-A-B. The bridge is interesting. Yeah. Alan, burden of guilt, branded a liar, falsely accused Trawl by Fire. Yeah, I've committed no crime in my innocence. I've got, you know, Trawl by Fire. Endured Trawl by Fire. So I mean, committed no crime, I'm innocence, in my innocence.  In my innocence, yeah. So what about the production, overall production? Okay, I know a- You're asking the wrong guy. All right. Well, I would say it's very, it's firepower part two. Okay. That is where it goes. What about the drums? The drums are the, Scott Travis does a great job. I mean, you know, they, if it's a song, it's not the Dave Holland style, it's still Scott Travis, right? But it's not the type of song where he's gonna go absolutely wacko, right? Yeah. What about, do you think KK would have fit good well in this track? Do you think he would have put something that that is missing? Do you have to ask KK? Okay, look, look, I'll tell you my overview, okay? Hey, I'm Getty Lee. Go give me a review. Go, go. You know how Martin Popov, his favorite band is Judas Priest, but they lost him at what he called, you know, the dummy years, right? The Screamy for Vengeance and the British deal and trying to get the Americans. He loved the variations that you saw on earlier albums like Sad Wings of Destiny and Sin After Sin. And I said, oh man, that makes Martin feel old because we're like Screamy for Vengeance guys, right? That album was unbelievable. Then the Defenders of the Faith tour and just that whole album, I still think it's one of their best albums personally. So now I'm feeling that way. I'm like, okay, this is the chugga chugga chugga of the Judas Priest sound.  So I respect that. But are we getting the variations that we've seen even in Defenders of the Faith? You had stuff like when the night comes down and heavy duty and eat me alive and love bites.  You had the super speed of... Fast and furious, if I, yeah, free while burning. But I'm not seeing that much variation on the recent Priest album. So it's a fine line, right? You're trying different things. And I agree that the two songs I've heard, they're trying different things, but they go into that classic chugga chugga Judas Priest sound which is okay because when we were at the concert the last time go around, there's a whole generation that are discovering them. Much younger and that's great to see. That's a brand new fan base and that'll carry them through, right? But I'm looking more for the variations and getting away from that chugga chugga. But it's a good song. Don't get me wrong. I think what you're trying to say is, and I feel the same way you do, it's not Defenders of the Faith. It's not Screaming for Vengeance. It's a new Priest. It's like a current Priest, right? And it's a different sound. I don't know, that's how I find it. I don't know if it's a different sound. I don't think it's a different sound. That's my point is it's not a different sound. Again, it's the same dilemma with legacy bands like Judas Priest, right? How do you remain Judas Priest and do something different but without the alienating people that love Judas Priest? I mean every band goes that way. They stay true to themselves. And that's why I liked Richie Faulkner what he did with Elegant Weapons, right? There's a lot more variations going on there. A lot more different guitar styles and not blocked into what we would call the Judas Priest sound. So again, it's all right. I'm not complaining. It's just, you know, looking back at the back catalog, you're listening to them for over 40 years. You're saying, okay, this is what the Priest is now. And then there's a whole generation that is loving him because that's what they've come to grow and love. Like probably a whole generation of Iron Maiden fans have grown to accept those, you know, six minutes, seven minute songs where rap, there's nothing wrong with rap child at three minutes or run to the hills at three minutes, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's just a different perspective based on the legacy of the band and the history of their catalogs. And that's all I'm saying. So to, you know, you can see moments along with Panic Attack and this song, moments of things less with this song I find than compared to Panic Attack, that, you know, you're trying to do something different but you can't get away too far from that chug a chug a chug a chug a chug a chug a Judas Priest, you know, which takes you right back to, and you've got another thing coming, right? So perhaps even before. I hear what you're saying and I agree with that. I just think that where else can they go? Staying as Judas Priest, right? Staying as Judas Priest. And I've read recently that people have gone back and saw the intelligence and the effort put into the album Nostradamus, I mean, that for me, that's their cashmere.  No, not far from it, but they went out on a limb. They tried something completely different. And I said, hey, well, there, that's the priest that we, you know, in the 70s, they were all about doing something different. So we're talking about the song Trial by Fire, but I mean, it just goes to a larger discussion is all I'm saying.   It would have been a nice change from just getting the greatest hits package each and every core. So I think Maiden's buried it up. Now we got the distant, what is it, past the future lives or future past lives. So they're trying to, you know, two albums put it together and that's why you know you're going in and what you're going to get. So, but no, I said that was a great effort. You know, did they achieve it to the extent that the public wanted or the critics wanted? Probably not, but hey, they gave it a gallon try. And that's, I'd rather listen to that than the kind of the same old same old is all I'm saying. No, you're not saying. It's bad, the priest that's coming out now. Far from it. It's just that I think there's more room for variation. So I'm anxious to hear what the rest of the album sounds like. Maybe the rest of the album is varied. We don't know. That's what we're talking about this one song and probably panic attack prior to based off of this new album. You know what's interesting? A lot of people love firepower and they believe that that's the big return to the priest. Yeah, that's right. You're one of them. Yeah, well, I mean, I am one of them. My only sort of hesitation of that firepower era, we'll call it. And I group it with Angel of Retribution. That's sort of like these three albums are going to be the same for me. I think it's time to change and get a new producer. That's what I think. Or it's time to sort of change that sound. There's this production sound I'm not digging. It sounds kind of like compressed. You know, but I think I'm going to like this album more than I liked firepower. I don't know if that makes any sense, but I agree with you that I'd like to see more variation because I like you. The few love Nostradamus and I love Nostradamus because it's challenging. You know, there's just it's a it's a challenging album from from a local perspective and, you know, a musical perspective. It's like a very heavy meal. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's not for everybody. It's not for everybody. You got to get up, walk away from the table, do a little exercise, come back, have the second course, third course, fourth course, it is a double album. But again, it's anytime I go back and listen to that I find something, discover something new. I think it's a great album. I'm really hopeful for this album. I think because it takes a while for Richie to get into the groove of the band, right? You know, he's like the new guy still. And I can see that you could see with Angel. Okay, he's the new guy.  Then you got firepower. He's he's on fire. And I think this album will prove once again that even though they are losing Glenn, Richie is picking up the ball and he's running with it. But what I'm curious is how much more how much input is Glenn having on each and every album and how much is Richie? Yeah, because it's probably going like this. I think it's more Glenn's influence that's keeping this type of sound. Okay. And if, you know, I mean, I'm sure Ripper wanted to break out and do different things and said, that's not priesthood. We don't do that. This is our sound. And I mean, that's, you know, so I again, I don't have nothing to base this on and just my feeling that the more Glenn influencer is, the more this type of classic classic or recent sound we have. Whereas if there was a more of a Richie influence, we might see more variations, but will it still be priest? I guess, and that's why that's the question, right? That's what I said earlier. If you want to be Judas Priest, you can vary too away too much away from Judas Priest, right? We have many bands have tried that and they lost their fan base and then it was pretty much over. To me, it just amazes me that Rob Halford can still kick asses of all those. Yeah, that's it.  It's just very well done. I mean, you can't, you listen to the vocals and you can't say, Ah, starting to sound like a 70 year old man. No, he's as powerful as, you know, victims screams are coming out of victims of the change. No, but that's not to be expected either. So I think Rob still got a fantastic voice and he's still one of the leading frontmen in all of heavy metal. So, yeah. I'm going to read some comments here, Alan. Okay. Sigmund says, love these two songs will become another masterpiece. Okay, there you go, see?  Mainly the Halford haters on certain reaction channels.  Mike is saying, Richie's new band, Elegant Weapons seems more metal than this Judas Priest. I don't know about that. I don't know about that. I wouldn't necessarily disagree, but is it more metal? It's different. Again, we're only talking about two songs so far, right? I know you love firepower. For me, it was like, you know, hopefully this, I just want to say, I hope this album doesn't follow the firepower. I think I hope it goes in- More varied, you're saying. More varied, something a little bit different, something new. Firepower is what you were expecting from Judas Priest and at this era, but it's nothing wrong with variation, right? All right, David's saying Richie is a guitar. God, Thomas is saying love it, seems a lot of peeps are acting like the metal haters. People who, if they release Master of Puppets tomorrow, they would bitch and moan about they are so much better in the olden days. Okay, I gotcha. Jonathan, a lot of people, I know we said that. Mike says firepower was no painkiller, but this is a question to you, Alan. Do you want painkiller too? Do you want painkiller too? No, no, no, I mean, there's no sense. I mean, not no sense. If that's the benchmark for this particular individual, that painkiller is the benchmark and everything has to match that, that's his prerogative, that's probably hard to do. I don't think any bank and, you know, that's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying, there's, you know, what's the next? You know, Judas Priest has always varied. They've always, you go back to the early albums, not one album sounded like the other until they got to maybe the mid-80s. And then so it's like, okay, what's the next step? They've always progressed, so what's the next progression? And that's what I guess I'm saying, that I'm not hearing based on the first two singles. I've heard variations and attempts, but I'm not hearing the overall, you know, and that's why I loved about Notre Dame. There was some stuff there that was really, really... But maybe that's the proggy guy in you too, right? You know, the sort of... I'm not a big prog guy. You're the prog guy. I mean, I'm the prog guy, but, you know, that's why I love it. Donald's saying, Halford sounds great. The bounce sounds great. I'd understand the sore grapes guys. Well, not from us, but from the rest of the world, maybe I like this song. Sour grapes. These are sore grapes. He wrote sore, S-O-R-E, so it's sore grapes. Guys, he meant sour grapes. He meant sour, he spells a guy do. I really tried with Nostradamus as Dave. Madam X says, I'm a few that love Nostradamus. So there's three people today that love Nostradamus right here. The Metal Block, I love the Nostradamus album. It's good when you give it a deep listen. So there's four of us now. David's saying, Firepower is awesome. Donald's saying, Halford's voice sounds amazing. He hasn't sounded this good in years. And Dave is also saying Nostradamus is horrible. Jonathan's saying it's priest and it is awesome. Yeah, that's right. No, I'm not taking anything away from that. That's true. That's very true. Yeah. All right, on that note, guys. I can't wait to hear the rest of the album. I'm excited too.  I think being the first lead-off single, I think that was the right choice. If you're comparing it to Troll by Fire, I think it's a little bit of a stronger... Makes more of a statement about the new album, I think more of an impact. And Rob is also saying Nostradamus was a great album. So I think we're at six. Six people here today think it's a great album. I think it merits another listen. And what I read recently in an article, people are going back and revisiting it and enjoying it much more than probably their first listen. Here, Phil's got the final comment. I love the fact that band is still putting out quality music. And I think that's what it comes down to. We're just being nitpicky here because the bar is set with Screaming for Vengeance and Defenders of the Faith for Us, right? That's our bar. And you know, for a band to top the bar, it's just not the easiest thing. So they're getting close, right? But it'll... No, but I enjoyed Angel Retribution. I enjoyed Notre Dame. But the bar is Screaming for Vengeance and Defenders of the Faith. I can't say it stopped at the Defenders of the Faith. I mean, I got all the... I got rammed down even. I even went to see the Turbo Tour.  Yeah, turbo lover, yeah. Which they still play to the day. I love it, I love turbo. It's a great song, turbo love. All right, on that note, over all thoughts, I think it's a pretty cool track. I think it's very melodic and I dig it. And I'm like... Cool track. I love it. I love the storytelling, it's great. Yeah, and Rob does a great job at that. All right guys, thank you for tuning in. And leave your comments, tell us what you thought of the song depending on where you live in the world. All right. Bye everyone. Can't wait for the album.


Monique, thank you so much for coming up and sharing your incredible testimony. Tell us your testimony. What happened? What was your breakthrough? Well Kelly's a little hard to follow. I was actually invited by her. I started coming to Hungry Generation a couple of times and I was I'm still a financial advisor But the position that I started in you go door-to-door to get your sales and get people in the door and I'm good at sales But having the door slimmed in your face when you're going and trying to get business is a little tough for me So I wasn't doing very well in underperforming and I came here a couple of Sundays ago for the sacrificial offering And I wasn't gonna give it first. I hate to say it But you know the word the Holy Spirit did touch me and towards the end when he started passing the basket around Something said reaching your wallet get that check. You don't have cash on you. Just write that check two days later I got a call from my job and mind you beforehand I had applied for a position that I didn't qualify for I was underperforming I wasn't making the numbers to transfer I wasn't at the position long enough to transfer and there was a lot of candidates that you know Had the qualifications that I didn't have two days later after that sacrificial offering. They told me the job was mine I work from home now And when I was talking to her I wanted her to say that she wasn't qualified that she literally meant none of the Qualifications because some people always like to say well That is a coincidence with God that is not a coincidence. That is supernatural favor right there. Amen. Give God just some A hand of applause that is God's glory right there Monique that is incredible. What would be your word of advice? I mean you you came here to service and you know, you had that prompting from Holy Spirit to write that check What would be your word of advice for those that are wanting to tithe or give a sacrificial offering but are hesitant They don't you know, they're skeptical of it or they're like, you know what that's not for me What would be your word of advice?  Yeah, that's good. Come on. Give her another hand of applause. Thank you so much Monique Thank you for watching this content. I know this was a blessing to you We would like to ask you to subscribe to our channel and click on the bell on our channel So that each time we upload something you can be notified Don't forget to share this content with your friends and family and on social media We're so thankful to you better is not good enough. The best is yet to come


So, a few words, a few opening words from me as the work stream lead for flexibility for open networks, open networks is one of the key initiatives that bringing together all the network companies across transmission, including the system operator and northern island electricity and ESP to really look at some of the key issues on the optimum based smart systems and flexibility plan and all the other work around government and regulatory policy and get a common and standard way of delivering improvements in the, in the, in the short term, but also looking at some of the long term, longer, longer term issues. So, in flexibility, we are very much focused in how we can deliver liquid flexibility markets and standardized and common processes across, across transmission distribution within the next one on the years and immediate if you like improvements, we are building if you like the future from 2020 onwards and we have, we have a steering group where often embays sits and supports the steering of the project and we also have an advisory group, which has a quite wide range of stakeholders and provides input to, to the project in regular regular intervals. And, and criticize some of the comments on proposals and, and offers, if you like, additional ideas and a lot of the work that we are doing is stakeholder lead in the sense that our project initiation document, which is the annual. Our annual plan of work, if you like, has been, has been consulted. We have the advisory group and all the key parts of work are publicly consulted. And, and this is really part of, of this process where we want to ensure that a, the proposals that we put together work for all the market participants and all the affected parties, but also to recognize that we don't have all the answers. And, you know, we don't always fully was focused on networks. We might not always fully, you know, get some of the priorities that other parts of the system have. So this is really your opportunity to, to input we do take into account all the inputs that we get and we are building into, into our program, whatever we can. And if we can't, we say, we, why, why we kind of have a dialogue. So I think for me, the key thing for today is to encourage feedback and encourage really response to this consultation. It's really at the pivotal point in terms of, in terms of hard work. So, Dan, if you could move on to the next slide. Yeah, so the flexibility works, work stream has been running now since. Essentially, last year, so about the. 18 months now. And we have dedicated to develop the dedicated body of, of work. That looks at. Transparency standardized approaches across distribution network operators. It increasingly now looks at. Yes, so called the end DSO coordination and and and stacking of services. But we also have a product that is looking. Of how we can networks can facilitate markets and platforms that might need network data to to trade, but. The DSO is not necessarily the, the, the buyer or the procurer of, of the products that are traded on those markets. So, Dan, if we go to the next slide. So the 2020. Work really, which is the main thing we're here to talk about has. Seven main main products of work and we are going to cover. Most of them today, the work around the common evaluation methodology for flexibility that Wendy's going to cover procurement processes that I'm going to cover. Lois will do active active power services. The commercial arrangement is not something that we're going to talk about today, but this is the. Getting a common contract for flexibility services. Between the DNO's and flexibility provider, so we now have a common contract, a common contract was published earlier this year. We've received the 1st. Set of of comments because it's been it's already being implemented. And essentially by November, it will be implemented by all the nose. So we're taking that feedback. We are going to, we're going to publish a 1.1 version within the next probably 4 to 6 weeks. And then we're going to publish a version 2 and Q on at the end of Q on next year, which we are, we are aiming to be a common. DNO, but also ESO for at least for certain ESO products contract that flexibility providers will see and we can use across the UK. So significant milestone of getting that over the line and actually getting it now in in production and used by by DNO's. And product 5 is new DSO services. So this is about it's a placeholder for us to make sure that we apply the same rigor in standardizing where we have new products and product 7 is Helen is going to cover, which is about base lining. And there is a piece of work that we've got it from is actually an important piece of work we've got it from 2019 and we've reworked. To incorporate the latest developments and then it's going to talk about interactions between flexible connections and flexibility services and the revenue stacking work. So we're not going to go into the presentations and then we're going to allow some time for Q and a and of course it's a further questions we can pick them up after the webinar. So let's go on Wendy on the first presentation. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is Wendy Mantle. I'm from energy networks and I'm a member of the product group looking to develop and implement a common evaluation methodology for the DNO's to use when assessing flexible the non flexible options to meet network needs. Next slide. The drivers for this product are to address a key action outlined in the July 2019 of German Bay's open letter to the DNA. Provide transparency on how pre procurement decisions are made when DNO's assess network solutions such as flexibility services, network reinforcement and they and m etc and to provide consistency to align how the DNO's make these decisions. The scope of the work which began at the beginning of this year was to analyze existing approaches to decision making adopted by DNO's and to understand the pros and cons in the areas of current practice. To develop a common decision making criteria and methodology for DNO's when choosing between options reviewing and reflecting input from stakeholders. And to develop a common flexibility valuation methodology as part of this to include gathering and assessing current practice within the UK and internationally value and flexibility. Consider and propose common valuation criteria and to develop the methodology, including tool and a user manual. Also, we would agree future governance for this methodology. The product group have been working with Bringer, they were permission to develop the methodology and tool. Slide to please and keep. The common evaluation methodology tool is built to support investment decisions when comparing flexibility products to traditional networking dimensions. The methodology and tool can be used to evaluate the defined flexibility products, namely the sustained, secure, dynamic and restore as well as options for alleviating export constraints where containment of the new board is occurring. This methodology is the initial baseline and I'll just give a brief overview to some of the key areas that it includes. The first one is the options to be considered. Here we would identify the range of options that were considered to meet the specific network need. The baseline scenario is largely considered to be one that involves the minimum level of intervention required for us to remain compliant with all relevant security standards. For each investment decision, explanations and supporting commentary relating to what assumptions have been used and which regulations the minimum level of intervention relates to, as well as any calculations that we have done external to the tool are to be included. Next is for us to define the service requirements and for this load both details to assess network needs are required. A scenario or a set of scenarios will be put into the model. It is anticipated that a best view and all the different scenarios that have been developed by the demons will be used and such scenarios will provide a view of what the annual exceedance have that particular asset across a range of potential outcomes by comparing the peak load to the current asset capacity. If the use case does not include reinforcement deferral, for example, the use of flexibility to reduce customer interruptions or customers lost risk, the network exceedance elements can be disabled with the requirements of social impact money. For flexibility requirements, specific functionality of the model allows us to be announced to input their flexibility requirements. These can either be tied to the load growth scenarios or input manual. Any over procurement will also be captured here. Service windows together with a view on the level of utilisation expected will be included and the space for commentary in order to aid transparency. For the point of view of economic assessment, the methodology is based on the option CBA to currently use for network investment decisions, thereby providing consistency as a number of inputs and values remain consistent. For example, customer interruptions, customer needs lost and weighted average cost of capital. For the time horizon, the methodology analyses the discounted cash flow for each solution over the lifetime of the asset for 45 minutes. This starts at the beginning of the deferral period and extends for 45 years from the end of the deferral period. Within the Ofgem CBA, the sharing factor from the Trotex incentive mechanism is applied to all costs. This tool follows the CBA templates and does not explicitly include the impact of the sharing factor in cash flows as it applies equally to different solution options. To allow the options to be assessed, the appropriate costs across the baseline scenario and all network intervention scenarios are used. Baseline will usually involve asset reinforcement, but other costs can be specified, for example, losses, provided they can be deferred or awarded through the use of flexibility. The tool also allows alternative intervention costs reflecting the cost to the DNA of the alternative solutions. One of the key elements is the value of deferring network reinforcement. When comparing a baseline with another solution, in many cases, the other solution involves the option to defer the decision to reinforce the network to some point in the future and use flexibility in the meantime. The tool compares the net present value of discounted cash flows of the baseline for the reinforcement scenario with the alternative flexibility solution and provides a view of potential outcomes in terms of net present value for each set of forward or forward scenarios. For demonstrating the potential future value across a range of scenarios, this methodology allows us to explore the potential option value that is created in the future by the decisions that we're making now. There is a facility within the model to explore this option further where probabilities can be applied. Finally, the methodology considers some of the wider network and societal impacts of the different networking dimensions, including the impact of network losses, emissions and potential asset condition-driven changes. Some of these inputs are considered core functionality and expected to be used each time this model is used, but in addition, and to have some future proofing, there is additional functionality that is optional at this stage, which we're referring to as sandbox functionality. It is expected that the degree of commonality will increase over time, and this will be discussed through the ongoing governance arrangements, and some of the sandbox functionality may become core and likely it may be possible to include greater standardisation input assumptions across due notes in the future. We go to slide three. The tool displays the results for us in three ways. It provides the ceiling price for the flexibility. This is for a given set of baseline costs, and the model shows the maximum cost of the flexibility solution before it becomes the complete economic and the traditional asset solution. The net benefit of the specified flexibility price, this is where from provided baseline costs of the counterfactual solution, and from specified utilisation and availability rates, the model shows the net benefit of the flexibility solution over the baseline. There is also a summary cost benefit analysis, providing the costs and benefits for the particular scenario over a specified deferral period, showing the relative impact on reinforcement costs, flexibility losses and emissions. The tool has also been developed to provide some reporting functionality within this is included a summary of statistics, where we would show, for example, the level of overall improvement that has been included in the assessments. A benefit summary showing the maximum potential benefit from a comparison or maybe option of optimal number of years as appropriate. And plus insights into the use of flex. This can be used with particular strategies, whereby probabilities may be assigned to the different scenarios. All of this information will feed into the support of the DNO's pre procurement decision making process. Next slide. As mentioned, this methodology is the initial baseline, and we would welcome your comments on the proposed methodology and we're encouraging feedback on our general approach and also any of the specifics included. And as a final to conclude the next steps for this product, I'll have the product group to obviously review and consider the feedback we receive in this consultation and then confirm a final methodology. With regards to future governance and in order to ensure the methodology involves arrangements will need to be confirmed. From earlier discussions, the product group are proposing to publish the common methodology and tool and the guide on the website and also on our individual DNO websites. Use the ENA's administration capability for the open governance office methodology and also to form a user's group under the ENA for the ongoing development of the methodology and the tool. And in relation to implementation, it is planned that DNO's will start to use the common evaluation methodology from the latest, the 1st of April 2021 and an implementation plan will be published by 31st of December 2020. Thank you. Thanks, Wendy. We'll now pass over back to Satyrus, who's going to be covering Andrew McKenna for Product 2 Procurement Processes. Yeah, so Andrew has led this work, but he's on holiday, so I'll cover for him and for the group. And the focus really of this work has been around further aligning and standardizing. First of all, the procurement timeline, which is the way and the timelines that DNO's use to go from signposting network information through to the flexibility that they actually tender to publication of the results and then on to testing of the assets and delivering. So, you know, getting that as a set of a great timelines with key milestones that all DNO's consistently use. And the other area that we've done work and we're inviting to use and comments and feedback is around kind of the procurement weightings and the procurement process. We've identified 4 stages and one of the key questions is, you know, when exactly do we undertake each of these? It's important to say that at the beginning of the year we did the work where we analyzed what each of the DNO's is doing and we use that as a basis to essentially further work around standardization. If we move to the next slide, please. Okay. So, in terms of the stages, I mentioned that the 4 stages of the assessment of the flexibility assets and the flexibility tenders. So, the 1st one is what is called stage 1 was commercial assessment. And this is all the legal stuff up front. And, you know, things like credit scoring and whether the company has a sound financial position. So it's the all the pretty standard stuff that you do. And you carry out to the organization that you were to engage to engage in the commercial in a commercial way. And that's the scoring criteria for this is pass or fail. Then we have the pre qualification technical assessment where we are basically saying does the the specific assets or specific provider meet the criteria. Of the product parameters as set out as a standard parameter. So these things are around minimum capacity, location, you know, are they in the right location, the right voltage? Do they meet the requirements around, you know, around times, metering, et cetera. So, again, that's a pass or fail assessment. We then look at the procurement and commercial score, which is the assessment of the beat against the.  At other aspects were proposed to look at the other aspects more so like a score type type approach where. It's around technical some of the technical characteristics such as the effectiveness in alleviating the constraint or conflicts. Or the type of connection and that has been a point of discussion really in the group. So that's that to be an area that would be very interested to hear. To hear feedback in terms of the commercial score versus the technical score and how, how is that as the best traction. And can we go to the next slide please Dan. So, these are the assessment criteria in terms of the proposed timelines. We've, first of all, we said that the assessment stages are carried out consistently across the. Across the network operators in terms of the procurement cycles, we propose maximum of two structure cycles per year and I'm going to run through how these are structured. And the idea behind this is that, you know, we, we come there's a steady stream of prompt communication of the network flexibility needs and the system needs. Without necessarily having excessive excessive procurement rounds. The seven stages we've identified is the first one is signed posting of requirements. So this is this is about providing a head so it's. It's nine months ahead but you know it could be could be longer given that some of that information including publications such as the long term development statement but the sign posting of requirements. And which is essentially as far as as far in advance as possible visibility of where the system needs. Then we have publication of firm requirements, which is the full requirement, you know, the type of product and the characteristics expect delivery windows, etc. The third stage is the opening of the procurement window, which is invitation for flex providers to formally begin. Then it's a close of the procurement window, which is a close to begin in particular take part. And after that, of course, you have the results and you have contract execution, which is the agreement of terms. You have us a testing and then finally delivery delivery windows. So these are the seven the seven key milestones we've identified. Let's go to the next done and in terms of in terms of the four and assessment criteria that identified with in the in the paper. We have looked at two options in terms of where the assessment takes place with regards to the stages of the of the tender. So, you know, stage one is the is the commercial pre qualification and stage two is the technical pre qualification. So, on the first option, a commercial pre qualification happens before technical prolific. Pre qualification and technical pre qualification happens before the start of the publication of the tender. So that's that's option one on option two commercial pre qualification happens as first thing as an option one. But technical pre qualification happens after the close of the tender. So the kind of the upfront assessment of, you know, where the parties are on the right location, voltage, et cetera, et cetera only happens at the end. So this is and there's a specific question where we inviting feedback on these two different approaches. These are the two different approaches that we identified when we looked how how the NOS are doing things currently. And, you know, they have pros and cons in terms of in terms of how much of the work is done upfront, but then perhaps how much of the, you know, opportunity is then carried out to the, you know, to the final, the final evaluation. So if we go to the next slide. So these are the these are the two. So these are the two tender rounds that we are proposing. So we call them the auto and the spring tender and essentially you are always signed posting the requirement as a minimum of five months ahead of publishing the requirement and the minimum of seven months ahead of publishing the tender. And as you can see, having signed posted and having given five months of publishing the requirement and seven months of publishing the tender, then it's quite a quick. I guess turn around of publishing the tender closing the tender and then you have contract execution delivery window and we propose to do one of those at the beginning of the year. And one of those essentially later. So kind of Q1 and Q3 that are about, you know, obviously to to look at this in a bit more detail, but that's the that's essentially what what we are looking to to standardize to. So that's it from product to, as I said, there are options in terms of when we're doing technical and commercial pre-qualification that we are inviting comments. We're inviting comments on the timeline and we're also inviting comments on the criteria and the waiting around the criteria in terms of the commercial and technical evaluation of the actual bits. Okay, so think of it to Ben now. Excellent. Thanks. So I'm Ben Godfrey. I'm going to go through some of the outputs of the interruptions between flexible connections and flexibility services from that paper and also the revenue stacking paper as well. Can flip to the next slide. So what we're aiming to do under this consultation is to seek some feedback out of some of the results and conclusions from this X connections, flexibility services interactions paper. So there was a significant number of actions that we're undertaking to clarify and provide more detail on some of the issues raised and also some continuing work and suggested work for the future to help improve the situation around flexible connections and flexibility services. So essentially what the paper did was set out the historical context, the systems involved and what their current level of interaction and then also looks at what the future levels of interaction may mean and what sort of systems and processes may need to be put in place to provide better coordination. What we're seeking feedback on is the scope and prioritization of some of this future activity. So if there are some good themes and preferences for additional work that wants to be taken into the future, please do let us know. Give us your thoughts on the scope and prioritization of that future activity. We also don't want to know what your thoughts are on the time and listen quality of information on network access rights, the kind of curtailment studies that have been provided by the DNOs. Are they adequate? Is the information being provided as per some of the guidelines that we've set out and has been agreed by network operators? Is there any improvement that can be made there? We want to understand any barriers that you've experienced for flexible connections and those participating in ESO or DSO services. Is this a current issue now or is it just something that we need to manage in the future? Have you experienced any barriers or confusion when trying to access and participate in some of those ESO or DSO services? Finally, we have suggested some approaches for better managing the curtailment risk. But if any of the respondents have ideas for market-based approaches for managing that curtailment risk or sort of commercial structures, they would like to see in place what information might be needed to manage that. We would be really interested in understanding those approaches and it may be something that we can take forward under future open networks and development work. Next slide. So there's a real large volume and body of work that's been undertaken at the moment in terms of providing detail around the interactions between flexible connections and flexible services. I've tried to pick out a few of the main themes here. So it's really about kind of service alignment, making sure that the same kind of units and building blocks are being used to describe those particular services. Ensuring that there's good visibility of those connections and where they might lie and also what the interaction and physical location is in terms of the flexibility services. So visibility of both the connections and the services will go some way in helping people understand and quantify the risk. A pretty solid basis. A lot of work being gone has previously gone into A&M curtailment information, hence our request to make sure that that's visible to everyone and being a service that's being received. And then we also touch on the quantification of A&M costs through the CVA tool. So a question's already been asked on this, but the CVA tool has the ability to quantify or a potential route to quantify the costs of A&M curtailment. And is that something that we should look to being used in anger when assessing, say, strategic investment or reinforcement of A&M systems? You know, should we be looking at the potential costs of A&M and any solutions to rectify that by using the CVA tool? And then finally, the last big theme there is the level playing field for both flexible services and flexible connections, ensuring that there's no preferential treatment of one for the other. So that's the mixture of the current actions that are being undertaken. There's some time scales and existing outputs signed posted within the report already. But there's also eight further proposed actions being considered, and that's really what we're seeking or feedback on the scope and prioritization of some of these. So understanding how A&M might be impacted upon by outcomes of the significant code review, a big one there. Understanding any future service overlaps and what we might need to do to manage that kind of level of interaction. Looking at D&O access to, say, pursuers, which might provide a bigger market and ability to Renumerate some of the flexibility costs that are either being market led or potentially being provided by A&M connections. Looking at future improvements to A&M curtailment information, is that something that people have ideas on and would like to feedback into? And then finally, looking at ensuring that there's transparency on those curtailment rules for when A&M is enacted. So is everyone able to clearly see when curtailment might be required and what's triggering it and enable to do their own analysis on the potential risk? The next slide looks at the type of feedback that we're seeking from the D&O flexibility services revenue stacking. So this great paper explains how DSO services are able to be sort of essentially stacked, but how multiple revenues from other markets can be operated either in adjacent time periods or in the same time period. And that kind of revenue stacking is explained and identified within that particular paper. So what we're really seeking feedback on is those identified barriers to participation and the scope and prioritization of any future activity being considered. And on the next slide, I've pulled up a few themes that are identified in the paper. So the six sections being undertaken, the major ones there in my view are the common baseline for DSR, which can feed into the flexibility services so that they're adequately renumerated. Whole system flexibility information sharing, ensuring that there is full visibility about all the potential services being operated so that they can be coordinated. Flexibility tendering timescale as alignment as we've just reviewed. That's an important one for making sure that revenue stacking is possible. And then finally this ESO and DSO service coordination framework. So that has been completed and there's a number of different methods that have been designed so that ESO and DSO can coordinate together to best ensure multiple revenue streams available to flexible services. We really want to take those forward and use those in anger to achieve better outcomes across the system. And then in terms of the proposed actions being considered, looking at whether the question of whether visibility should be available for all flexibility services. At the moment, there's a bit of a difference between the contractual availability of open information on ESO versus DSO services. We want to make sure that we've got a standardized and consistent view across the whole system on whether all data on services should be available or whether there's commercial sensitivities around those. So we're really welcome to welcome your views on that. Looking at improving the post event flexibility reporting and aligning that both across ESO and DSO. Ensuring that we've got good principles for addressing system needs and that rule set is well defined and understood so it can be applied fairly consistently and autonomously across the whole system. The potential for alignment of DSO non-delivery penalties ensuring that there's a bit more certainty of delivery may allow a truer value to be assigned to flexibility services. Resolving capacity market conflict is a good one as well. Ensuring that the rules for the capacity market are acknowledged DSO services and that there's no penalty for operation across capacity market and DSO services. And then finally addressing the potential supplier imbalance. So if DSO service that's called upon passes a potential imbalance problem across to the supplier. Are there routes and mechanisms that will redress that balance and where should the cost lie from that. So a number of important actions there that we think are the kind of suitable next steps we've identified them as barriers. We think that there would be useful and so we would look to try and gain some feedback on which ones should we prioritize and the scopes that we considered. Is it everyone agree that those are the right things that we should be looking at or if there's any sort of differences please do let us know we'd be very interested in that feedback. Thank you. Thanks Ben. I want to hand over to Lois from EMW to talk about product free. Hi there. Thanks. Thanks everyone. So my name is Lois Clark from electricity Northwest and I look after product route is active power services and parameters. And so I so in terms of the service definitions back in 2018 part of open networks we defined four services. But they were classified as reinforcement deferral or post fault or network restoration. And consequently they became interpreted in different ways and for different operations by each of the DNOs over the last few years. So last year we had a commitment to converge on the names of the branding for them, which is the these four here. So we have sustained secure dynamic and restore is the four main products and the aim of product three this year is to identify further ways in which we can converge on those services in terms of the parameters that we used to describe them and how they're operated. So these definitions are still consistent with how we defined the original products back in 2018. But now with the branding that's become a lot more familiar to everyone. And if we nip on to the next slide please. So the first aspect of our work within product three is to identify all of the parameter definitions and then those with ones which we identified as the most important and that we could converge on. So the common parameters between these four services are flexible capacity. So the minimum amount of capacity that you need that a flexible provider needs in order to participate in a flexibility tender and utilization as well. So how long a DNO will require the provision of the service and then looking to availability and utilization instructions. So the time periods that notification periods before which you will become committed or you'll get notice of being having to deliver a service. So that's what so we are consulting on that one as one of our questions in terms of do you think there are any additional parameters that we should be taking into consideration. At the moment they look like this. So this is our proposed convergence at the moment. So previously we undertook some gap analysis work that had so every DNO was operating each different product or service in a different manner. So this is the proposed new common operation of the mall. The key points to look at are that we have reduced the minimum flexible capacity to 50 kilowatts. But we've also done that. We used to have separate minimum capacities for aggregated or non aggregated resources. So traditionally aggregated resources were higher. So they might be set at 100 or 200 kilowatts instead. That's a kind of key point to note there. So we have reduced them and we set the minimum utilization and utilization duration capabilities to 30 minutes. So the main principle reason for doing this was to help remove barriers or potential flexible providers to engage within flexibility market as it provides some consistency that if you are participating or you have the ability to offer a sustained product. You know that you can offer that sustained product in London, Manchester or Glasgow and it's going to be operated in the same manner no matter which DNO you're engaging with. So in terms of our implementation plan, so these are the main aspects that we are consulting on within the paper. We just wanted to get some feedback on do you agree that this convergence of parameters does help to remove barriers to participation through simplifying the information that is there and available to you. And it's making it easier to engage with. And additionally, do you think that we have covered all of the main points? There are a lot of additional parameters, but that some of those will be covered off within other products that open networks is looking at over the next few years. So in terms of metering or base lining or dispatch and settlement processes, but this product was looking at the core functionalities of those active power services and how we operate those. So yeah, we're just looking to make things a bit easier really. So those are our main points that we're looking for a bit shorter than the other ones as we did the majority of the work was in 2019 in actually converging and all of those branding names already. So this is a bit easier this year. Great. Thanks less. Well now over to Helen. And if I could ask you speed up as well just like lowest that so we can get on to answer some questions in the QP. Great. So over time from WPD baseload determine the point of measurement from which we verify and reconcile a flex providers response. Do you want to click the next one Dan. So this is a new product for the 2020. And we'd recognize that the nose were operating different different methodologies to establish that their baselines and any possible sort of convergence or alignment in this area is really going to benefit both providers and and and the nose. So we're looking through this project to collate current industry baseline and practices so both in the UK and looking overseas as well at their baseline and practices. So we're going to assess the advantages of those practices and the ability of those to the UK DSO sexuality and recommend any methodologies that could be practical for us to adopt and any further actions that we could take to achieve consistency in this area. So as I said that this comprehensive assessment to open network to avoid the duplication of DNO is doing this individually and it also aligns to some of the stakeholder concerns that we've had and give stakeholders an opportunity to provide their input to baseline methodologies at this early stage. Hopefully, you know, increase in provider confidence in distribution flexibility and increase in station in distribution flexibility. I don't know if it to the next one. So we're taking a three stage approach for this product to keep tough in June. And we're in stage one pretty much at the moment that the mobilized and defined stage. So as a product team, we've been collating our existing practices around around baseline and and we've been developing what our common baseline in principles are. So what our priorities are that we need to be in in a baseline in methodology and identifying which of those are our priority and weight in the and considering what where we can wait those priorities as well. And as part of this product, we are also appointing a consultant to carry out some of that that research that research work for us in and assist us with the weight in and appropriateness of those. Those are the practices so they can make recommendations on on the best way for us to find a common approach. So stage two with the consultant is kind of kicked off this month's actually and we have appointed a consultant to undertake this work for us. And they'll be working with us as a product team to sort of take the the alignment of those baseline in principles and they'll be undertaking the research and existing practices. So that, as I said, UK DSO is the ESO as well and practices across Europe and USA in Australia. And it's not on there, but it's also important to note that they will be also taking into account responses from this consultation as well. So they'll be looking at consultation responses and seeing where they can feed that into to the research that they're doing. And then the final stage will be to sort of consolidate that that research review the findings and consider where we can implement a common approach for the baseline in and look at any gap analysis and how we can implement a potential implementation timeline for the DNO to converge and produce a final report on on the findings with some clear next step. When the project hopefully concluded or should conclude around early December time this year. Do you want to stick to the next one down. So, although it's in development, I've kind of just sort of a mind map there really of the some of the principles that we're looking at the characteristics and themes that that might feed into our principles to baseline in methodology. So some of those might have higher priorities than others and some of those we're still we're still considering and we need feedback from yourselves and we need feedback input from our consultants to really establish what those principles are. I'll also pop there a couple of statements that we established early at the early stage of the as a product around sort of assumptions on on baseline in and should we be looking at a common baseline in approach that fits all of our established select products. So sustain dynamic secure restore should should we be looking at a common a common baseline across those products. Should we have a suite of methodologies that would be more suitable to different technology types so turned down services opposed to generation services and should we be looking at using historical data to determine the the averages for the baseline. Which is going to support further stackability as opposed to a sort of a real time a real time baseline. So these areas on on this slide here are really where we're looking for for you feedback from from this consultation. And I think that's my last slide so I did that Chris I could down hopefully and that could be on. That's perfect. Thank you very much. I've seen that we've got quite a few questions that have come in as we've gone. We've got a few minutes left to get to some of them. We just start at the top. We've got one from Helen Stack that says to what extent does the CEM take account of the option value of flexibility. Has the work done by Frontier for SSEN and or E&W ROCBA model been considered when creating this product. I think that came in first. So it might be one for Wendy. Hi. The discussions on the option value have been ongoing throughout this product and with this the methodology that's being proposed at the moment is the sort of baseline initial methodology. So the option value is going to be sort of developed in the sandbox area of the two and you know for sort of future and speed and on that functionality in the future. And in relation to the sort of Frontier and other considerations and probably need to speak to our SSE colleagues to get a full answer on that. And that's where we're at with optionality. Great. We've also had another one from Matthew Cowan. I think on product one. How does the Beringa model take demand and certainty into account? Does it include option value of flex such as that demand comes before it becomes more certain? Sorry, I didn't catch all that. How does the Beringa model take demand and certainty into account? Does it include option value of flex such that demand becomes more certain? I mean, if it's a talking in relation to the sort of scenarios, we have the sort of different our sort of best view of the sort of requirement and load growth. And there are going to be input sort of five scenarios, which would be the best view plus the defense scenarios that can all be considered. These can be weighted with probabilities and potentially future and to sort of if demons want to have a look at that and sort of develop that further. And so at the moment that there's the sort of elements that are looking at that. Great. We've got one in Fajodi, which I think would be the product two.  Why does that technical score not include any carbon intensity when we have a net zero target? It might be for when do you offer materials? Yeah, so I think the carbon. We have the discussion. We have discussions also with optimum base around carbon. You know, carbon is priced in energy markets in different ways. So we are currently haven't incorporated this as a standard, if you like, but there's options there as the thinking develops to incorporate it. So I think it's still is still is still under discussion to a certain extent. So be good to provide feedback if the specific views in terms of how carbon should be incorporated. Great. We're about to run out of time, but I think we can get to one more. It's from Joe Kamish. Is standardization of historical flex service data along with access across PNO is, for example, prices, technologies, volumes, et cetera being thought about? Yes, in short. So what we'd like to try and do is come up with a standardized and machine readable format for some of the current and historic data on flexibility so that that can be used. Not just by DNOs and customers, but as general market information as well to use for future trending. So yes, it's very much in consideration of the scope. Great. Well, it's already three o'clock and we have this in for an hour. So if we can head to the wrap up. Thanks for sending in all your questions. We will get to them in our response document and we'll email that around to everyone who participated. So we just want to hand back to the terrorists really quickly. Yes. Really, the only thing to say is please respond to the consultation closes on the 25th of September. And if you prefer to reach out to us and have a one-to-one conversation or if you need some of the open networks team to support you with their response, then we can do that as well. So I think the key point is that all of these questions have underlying points behind them. So let's get all these points into the consultation so we can use them in the work moving forward.


everyone, and thanks for having me. My name is Jamie. This is my face on the internet. I work for a company called With Associates in London. We are 11 people making websites and apps. They paid for me to come last year. They paid for me to come again this year, and I would not be up on the stage without them. In my spare time, I co-organize Ember London. We've not quite reached the dizzy heights of NYC just yet, but we're growing. We have over 600 members on meetup.com. We run two events per month, one meetup and one hacker hours-inspired project night. We've recorded 42 talks, which have been seen over 11,000 times on Vimeo, and we couldn't have done any of that without the generosity of our speakers and our sponsors, and some of you are here today. I want you to know that we love you very, very much. So that's enough about me and enough about London. I want to talk briefly about last year's conference. I got a show of hands who was here last year. Nice. Is it just me or do these guys organize the best conferences in the world? So last year, mine started on the off-beat. My Airbnb cancelled the night before I was due to fly, and I put the call out to the community, and obviously they had my back. I spent the first night staying with Matt and Corey in what became the big hacker house, and I spent the rest of the time staying with Thomas and Emily Reynolds up in North Portland. You might know Thomas as the creator of middleman. And everywhere I went in the city, it felt like the spirit of Emma was alive. If you were walking up Burnside this time last year, you would have seen this billboard. This is a piece by a Portland artist called Maudoud Yang, and it was made with an Ember app called 2B. So two of 2B's developers were in town last year for the conference, and I got to explore the city with them as they went around trying to meet their users. People like Maudoud, and this guy Juan, aka Cool Skull. He's an artist, MC, chip thrash, empresario, and designer of extraordinary garments with an Ember app. Yeah, I do not skateboard. So as I said, everywhere I went, it felt like this, like creativity and imagination and emberiness was everywhere in the city. And as I sat in PDX waiting for my flight home, I opened up 2B and tried to capture some of that energy in a crude collage. And that's what this talk is about. How did a tech community come to be this vibrant? And how can we keep it growing in that same spirit? So to preface this, I think there's a tendency and open source to focus on the code and to assume that the community spontaneously comes about in support of it. I think that misses the big story. A community like this takes as much design and engineering as any software project. And to illustrate that, I want to look at the design and engineering of this community from five different angles. Angle number one, the Tomster. So this is the original sketch of the Tomster. It was early 2012 and mjs.com was being redesigned to become a real grown-up website. Patrick Gibson then working for Tilda was looking for illustrations to lend a bit of character to the three blocks of copy on the homepage. He found and commissioned Lindsay Wilson. And shortly thereafter, Tomster appeared. Now, at this point, he wasn't a mascot, he wasn't a logo. He was just an illustration to convey these ideas of developer ergonomics, productivity, and friendly APIs. For the purposes of this talk, I want to slim that down to just productivity and friendliness. So we all liked Don to him. And pretty soon, he was out in the world representing bug reporting, works in progress, Ember camp for the first conference, and our build channels and our train release cycle. Looking at this today, it seems obvious that we would communicate our build process this way. But recall that it's inspired by Chrome's release cycle. And the pages that explain that look like this. And this. And now, don't get me wrong, the copy on these sites does a really good job of explaining what the purpose is. But I want you to imagine yourself as a newcomer to the framework, newcomer to the platform. Looking at this, ask yourself, would you think this is for me? And that's crucial because the whole point of our beta releases is that we want people of all experience levels trying them in their apps. And we depend upon their feedback to know if there are bugs, and more importantly, if the API is understandable. The friendlier we make this process, the better our chances of getting that crucial feedback. Ember also has roles to play in our real-life interactions in workshops and podcasts and meetups. So this is NYC, Salt Lake City, Munich, and London. And in case you didn't know this already, there is a system in place for you to affordably commission and license a Tomster for your city. So many who have spoken in the past about good defaults. So this is the idea that a framework should make doing the right thing feel better than doing the wrong thing. And I think this sort of principle can be applied to our discourse as well. And Tomster helps with it. I asked him if he could make it easier for the core team. And she said if you have a brand and or a mascot that correctly emotes something specific, it makes it easier for people in the leadership roles to then actually meet those ideals. So if the things we say on stage, the way we behave, jibes with the friendly geeky hamster in glasses, we've done something wrong. He also allows us to compose together perhaps conflicting concepts. Another quote from Lea. Our tagline is the framework for ambitious apps. And it's actually really hard to juxtapose friendliness and ambition next to each other. They're not two things that you would normally package up. So ambition is a loaded statement. It comes with baggage. If you use ambition wrong, you conjure up this guy. But there's a really easy way to defuse this. This is venture capital Tomster when we get funding. So never. He's like a smiley or as a friend of mine calls it a safety wink. We can use him to punctuate those potentially loaded statements and make sure that productivity and friendliness are always part of those conversations. How has he been so useful in so many different contexts? I think part of it is his fundamental versatility and accountability. I asked Lindsay about this and she said when you create characters, you pick things that are iconic but also adaptable. Tomster wasn't overly done and he could embody what a developer is. He doesn't have a lot of distinct features but just enough to say, okay, this is for me. So I have a programming analogy for you. It's a bit tenuous but stick with me. So consider promises. Promises are an abstraction that encapsulate the complexity of eventual values and using them allows us to talk about other things knowing that asynchronicity is taken care of. You can think of Tomster in a similar way. He is an abstraction which encapsulates the values of productivity and friendliness and allows us to talk about other things knowing that those two values are part of the conversation. In other words, he's a tool. Angle number two, language. This is also a tool. It's a powerful one but it's a perilous one. Words stick and if we pick the wrong words, they'll haunt us but if we pick the right ones, they enable new conversations. I spoke to Tom about this and he said when you're operating at the edge of something, often times one of the biggest hindrances to making progress is not having a shared vocabulary. We like to help ourselves frame our thinking by trying to coin terminology. You'll see this throughout the project. Almost any time a new idea is introduced, there will be a catchphrase to encapsulate it. Things like stability without stagnation, data down, actions up, functionally diverse core team and glimmer. So these are pithy statements but they also give us terse, unambiguous ways to talk about all the mirrored ways that plays out across these projects. So our community guidelines, I'm relatively rare in having these, these are constructed from other words from the Mozilla, Twitter and Ubuntu communities and you take a statement like be open and that's an ambiguous way to talk about all the mirrored ways that plays out across these projects. But the fact that we can share values with those other communities is fundamental and hinges upon having the vocabulary to describe them. Here's an anecdote from London. So we were discussing running hacker hours and Joe List pointed us in the direction of this series of tweets. So this one doesn't bother me too much. Like overzealous border officers, I think we can work around that. But this one really gave us pause. So hack, like ambition is a loaded term that comes with baggage, Joe's suggestion was to reframe things using the more innocuous project nights. But as it turned out, that reframing and that new vocabulary opened the doors to other ways to talk about what they were. So Mike organized the call. I'm not sure if he came up with this on his own or pinched it but bring your own project became a really nice way to describe what our events were all about. So this idea of language and vocabulary takes on a more practical tone when we talk about documentation. I spoke to Trek about this and said documentation at a very high level is essentially defining public API. There have been several cases where attempts to document either EMMA or related libraries have turned into public API changes. If something is difficult to explain, it probably means we're exposing the wrong primitives. And this goes just as much for defining the public API of a software framework as it does something like community guidelines or codes of conduct. If we can't explain how we expect people to behave, then maybe we've not thought it through hard enough. Angle number three, user interface. So how much to open source projects really need websites? Like what won't a read me do the job? This is the read me for rimrath which is a library for removing files. It's two functions. A read me kind of is all you need for this. This is the one for chalk. So chalk puts a nice API on anti color codes. It's a little bit longer. I think it spends some of the time thanking people but still more or less communicates what you need to know. This is RSVP. Just does promises, right? It turns out explaining promises is quite involved. And this is browserify. It just glues modules together, right? Well, it turns out that's pretty difficult to explain concisely too. So, of course, browserify does not depend upon a read me alone. They have browserify.org. So this leads you to the happy path and sends you on your way and then gives you jump off points for when you've learned enough and feel confident enough to continue. But it does something else. It introduces the visual language of the authors. This playful, inscrutable comic style tells you something about the tastes of the authors and about how they design their APIs. And this is important because it means once you've used one of Substack's libraries, you'll recognize that taste in other places and it will make it easier for you to pick up another library. You see this in Yehuda's work as well. The websites of things like Bundler and Thor and Handelbars and Cargo have a consistent visual language that's a clue that the same consistent design ideas are present in the libraries that these things document. And also, if you've had success using one of these libraries before, you'll see this visual language and know that this is something you can trust. This is a quote from Matt Ruby's designer. And this is the quote that kind of brought the idea of developer happiness to the conversation. But I think the crucial statement is this last line. I consider a programming language as a user interface. So it should follow the principles of a user interface. And I think you can expand this outwards. If you consider a programming language as a user interface, then you can also consider the documentation user interface and the community user interface as well. And if you have that in mind, you can design the best possible community. So I love this recent example. Our community pages were recently redesigned and more better calls to action were put in place. We made it easier to find meetups. One of the really interesting things about this is because we already had an established visual language, it made it easier for lots of people to contribute to this redesign. This is literally all the pull requests that went into landing this. So user interfaces are tools and the visual language we use is a tool as well. This is a quote from my good friend Casper. He's talking about building products. But you can use that same mental model when it comes to building the community. Angle 4 is hackability. So this quote I absolutely love, this is from Stefan. An open project has that mud on the floor from the construction workers. You don't mind walking in again with your boots on. It has to feel hackable. Parts have to be accessible. And really what I think this is is about showing, like I think all open projects are intrinsically hackable, but it's about showing people that they are.  When I spoke to Yehuda he said it's really important that the feeling you get when you're an active contributor is pretty close to the feeling of being a core contributor, minus the cases where an executive decision has to be made. And again it's about communicating that to people. Like we have this in place, but people need to know. Alex put this nicely, he said Ember has a philosophy that there's nothing really set about the technology. It's more the idea there should be conventions around solving these problems. I want to take you back to this quote from Lindsay about the Tomster. He wasn't overly done and he could embody what a developer is. This idea that you don't make every decision for everybody and demonstrate that there are still choices to be made and still things to contribute to. This plays out in Meetup, so something we like to do is make sure that if someone's come up with a suggestion from the previous month, we make a point of saying that we've implemented it in the following month's Meetup. Angle 5 is roles. So last year in the opening keynote, Yehuda and Tom drew our attention to the functionally diverse core team and pointed out that there are many specialisms equally as valuable as someone writing the code. I'd like to extend this out to the community as a whole. I think there are all sorts of specialised roles you can play and this isn't to say that this needs to be your niche. It's just that when you approach the project and you want to contribute, you know that there are all sorts of things you can do that play out. So document here is an interesting one. I think we sort of consider documentation as an easy place to get started. But I consider it the metaphor I have is like a co-driver or a running mate. So implementing something like glimmer is an exhausting mental process and I think oftentimes you get to the end of implementing something like that and don't have the energy to then put it into words, put it into pros and describe it to people. But if you've got a running mate who can be helping you tackle those challenges and also translating them at the same time, that's a huge benefit to everybody. We have some wonderful mentors in this community. People like Ember Sherpa do amazing things and help people get started. One thing I think is really interesting about being a mentor is it's actually a really short hop from being a student to being a mentor and often the people who just cracked the nut for whom the penny has just dropped will make the best mentors because they understand that context of being new. There are some people in the Ember London community who seem to have limitless time and energy to go out and try new libraries and they'll often come up to me obsessed with FRP or obsessed with something new and shiny that they found and I think it can be tempting sometimes to feel a little bit cynical towards these things. But a better strategy I think is to encourage these people and say go out there explore these new ideas and then come back and tell us what you think is valuable. Bear in mind our longer term goals but do come back and tell us, come back and know that we're going to listen to whatever you have to say and we may just implement those ideas. More important than almost everything is the critic oh hey Ryan if it weren't for Ryan Florence pointing out our flaws we might not have glimmer today he really ignited a fire to prove him wrong and I love this tweet from him like his discourse on Twitter can be antagonistic but it's done so much good so actually round of applause for Ryan Florence so the point is there are loads of roles that people can play inside and outside the community and the more clearly we define them the more we give them names the more people will know what they can do, how they can play their part and it doesn't have to be just submitting pull requests I say just submitting pull requests is huge so in conclusion we've looked through the design and engineering aspects of all these five things and really my point is to consider community building as a design and engineering challenge another nice quote from Trek the value of a framework is not the source code the value is really the patterns and the understanding that people got working through what the problems were to put this another way the code is a snapshot of the best ideas in our community at a given point in time but the ideas really live with the people they live in all of us and what we're trying to do is create the best possible home for good ideas and also the most receptive to new ideas when I first started writing this talk I had this idea that community design and API design were somehow similar, were somehow symmetrical but the conclusion I've come to is that they're actually the same thing the code is like the kernel at the center but then this act of designing something that works well for everybody expands outwards through documentation, through websites into the community, into events like this but it's the same analytical process all the way through so thank you


Hello people of the internet, my name is Johnny and welcome to a very quick FNAF news video. FNAF news has kind of been a bit slow, so all this is kind of updates on previous FNAF news. I said in one of my last videos I was gonna show off more fan art, so here you go. If you have any fan art, send it my way through Twitter, Instagram, or my Discord server, it's linked down below. And also make sure to check out The Artist because you guys are, again, insane. Thank you so much for taking your time to make art of me, that still blows my mind. So let's not waste any more time, let's hop into the news starting off with Ultimate Custom Night ports. So if you missed it, the UCN ports are now out on console and Clickteam are already working on releasing a patch for bugs. They made a post a couple days ago saying here are the details for the next UCN patch to consoles. That was submitted for review today, hopefully won't take too long. In other news, Sister Location PS4 patch entered testing with Sony yesterday, finally. So also a bit of patch news on Sister Location for the PS4, but these are all of the patches coming to UCN on consoles very soon. We have submitted to all three console companies an update for Ultimate Custom Night. We hope that testing doesn't take too long and that we can get the update into your hands as soon as possible. This update includes the following and then there's a gigantic list of patches. Clickteam, thank you so, so, so much. It's only been a little over a week since the release of these ports and they already have a gigantic list of bug fixes coming our way soon. That is like Clickteam, that is incredible. Thank you. Anyways, the fixes are added controller sensitivity options, added a pod screen, added cheats, we'll take a look at that in a little bit. Moved the flashlight from A cross to B circle. That is very important. Also fixed pressing on Helpy, fixed all off button shortcuts, fixed speed of adjusting AI levels. Fixed fast coins sometimes not appearing, fixed missing sounds after Rockstar Foxy. I think there was a few more and Clickteam did specify that they went through all the sounds in the game. So if there was a sound missing for something, it is fixed in this new patch. Fixed the warning showing on the counter-intuitive side of the screen. Removed the ability to cheat challenges. I'm not quite sure what that means since cheats are only being added into this update, but I'm sure it meant something and I'm happy that it's fixed. For PS4, they fixed AI levels being randomized on the menu. I saw a lot of complaints about that. On Xbox One, it added keyboard and mouse support, and it's also available on PC and Windows 10 on the Microsoft Store. And Clickteam also released a video showing off the cheat menu. They say a sneak peek at the cheats and new options menu coming to console version of FNAF Ultimate Custom Night. And as you can see, it's almost identical, I believe, to the one in Sister Location. It allows you to pause the game, change the dead zone size, the left stick and right stick speed, the wraparound cursor, and also the speed when you are holding ZR, and I'm guessing that is on Switch. And then a look at the cheats section, you can only unlock this when you're on the main menu for the game, the roster. It gives you a bit of a warning saying you can enable and disable cheats at any time, but once you have done so, your save file will be tainted until you start a new game. And if you proceed, you go into the actual cheats menu with unlimited power, unlimited fast coins, and also fast knights. And I believe the fast knights in Ultimate Custom Night mark a brand new record for the fastest knight in the entire game. Sorry, not only the game, but also the entire franchise. Since each knight in UCN is 4 minutes and 30 exactly, the shortest in the entire franchise, enabling fast knights will set a new record. And then once you turn on the cheats, it says cheats were used on the save file, and I believe that means you can no longer get achievements on the consoles once you beat a knight with the cheats on. So that's a look at the brand new update coming to UCN very, very soon. Again, this was posted on, I believe, the 6th, and they said it shouldn't take too long, so fingers crossed this week.  Unknown Gigi was the first person to beat 50-20 on consoles. And also the first person to beat UCN 50-20 on mobile, like, this dude is cracked out of his mind. Go show them some support, please. They're absolutely insane. And then True Player was the second person to beat it on consoles. These guys are absolutely insane, and they deserve a lot of love and attention and support because they spent the past week just grinding this game and it paid off. So congratulations, you two.  They're linked down below. Again, go check them out, please. And then also, our final topic for the video I told you it was going to be quick. We have an update regarding the Curse of Dreadbear Funko merchandise being revealed later this month. So if you missed it about a month ago, a leaker revealed that on May 24th through the 28th, Funko Wien 2022 was going to be taking place. And in that event, Curse of Dreadbear merchandise from FNAF VR Help Wanted would be revealed. And not too long ago, we actually got basically confirmation about what we will be getting. And the products that we would be receiving are listed here. As you can see, we have Dreadbear Action Figure, Glitchtrap Action Figure, Grim Foxy Action Figure, Jack O'Bonnie Action Figure, and plushies for Dreadbear, Grim Foxy, Jack O'Bonnie, and Jack O'Chica. And yesterday, it was actually revealed the pages for these products. Now, this is only a screenshot of the supposed pages. I don't have the pages themselves. And this is the screenshot. As you can see, this was brought to you by Pop Freak on, I believe it was Instagram. So, you got a plushie for Dreadbear up at the top, the Glitchtrap Action Figure, the Jack O'Bonnie Action Figure, the Grim Foxy Action Figure, the Jack O'Chica plushie, the Dreadbear plushie, and also the Dreadbear Action Figure. Now, I believe that's not all of them. I think it's missing one or two, but yeah, that is the, apparently, the pages for the products. Now, that event is approaching very swiftly, actually. Again, it was being held on, I believe, the 24th through the 28th. So, very soon, we can expect to see a reveal of these products. I'm excited. I, I freaking love Curse of Dreadbear. You know me. I, I love Corn Maze, so I'm very excited to see all the Grim Foxy products. And also, finally, a Jack O'Bonnie Action Figure and plushie of him and Jack O'Chica. I feel like that took a very long time to make. And I feel like we've been waiting a long time, too, for Dreadbear and Glitchtrap, so, finally, they're coming home. So, that's it, a very quick FNAF news video. It's been very slow with FNAF news. But we do have a lot to look forward to. Again, UCN Patches and the brand new merchandise by Funk Girl. So, yeah, a lot to look forward to. So, thank you so much for watching this video, and I'll see you all on the flip side. Goodbye.


Looking for a flexible lesson to help build classroom community at the beginning of the school year? Need to find a lesson to supplement your literacy curriculum? Easily navigate the CESAW Lessons Library to find a solution through our comprehensive Standards Aligned Lessons. In this Me a Minute episode, you will take a tour through our Lessons Library and learn about all of the amazing content it provides. You can get to the lessons library by tapping the library button in your journal or tapping the green add button, a sign activity, and tapping the lessons tab. The first thing you will see is a search bar. You can search lessons by keyword, grade level, or click on search lessons by standard to find lessons that align to your specific standards. You can trust that every lesson you find provides students with that repeated practice through both hands-on and digital activities. Under the search bar, you will find thematic featured collections. These featured collections are made up of lessons from various collections all focused on a single topic like community builders. The topic of each featured collection will change each month. All of the lessons included in the featured collections are free for you to use. Classroom and community builders is a featured collection. Here you will find lessons that help you build relationships and start off your year in a positive way. You will find lessons like the one you see here from the My Awesome Year collection. This collection is designed to be a journal between the teacher and the student that helps teachers and students get to know each other. In addition to featured collections, you will also find subject collections in the lessons library. Each subject tile includes all collections that align with the specific subject. Subjects include computer science, early literacy, English language arts, math, and more. Let's take a closer look at what you will find under English Language Arts. Tapping on the English Language Arts tile opens the collections that are aligned to that subject. At the top, you can search for lessons and see the recommended grade levels for the collection shown. Notice there is a free tag on some of the lessons. These lessons are yours to use for free for the entire school year. To find more free lessons and information including implementation resources, simply tap on View All Lessons. We know educators have a lot on their plates. The lessons in the Most Popular First Grade Lessons section will generate lessons that other grade level teachers are using. This will change based on the grade levels you teach. The lessons library allows you to easily and quickly find standards-aligned lessons to meet your instructional needs. Your challenge this week is to explore the lessons library. Tap into the featured and subject collections and find a lesson you will use. Share the creativity you capture on Twitter using the hashtag TESAMEAMENI.