New Year Greeting from the General Secretary

Dear friends near and far,

1. Review
   The highlight of the FICS year was the 58th IARC in Banbury, England, where the delegates had to judge 75 Audio-, Video- and Multimedia-Entries from nine countries. For the first time we had an audio work from the Dominican Republic, and France and Luxembourg returned with some interesting entries.
2. Outlook
   Even without much new blood in our organisation, the sound hunting hobby lives! Many interested people indulge the hobby in their own rooms or outside in the wild, but do not want to join a club. We do try to encourage these people to send in entries. Please assist to raise the awareness level of the IARC. A special thanks goes to the independent audio club Intertape, which is presenting since December 2009 IARC-entries in their new Radio Intertape transmissions (Webradio). Under the link PodCasting you will find additional productions - unfortunately these programmes are in German.
3. Soundhunters programmes on www.voxinox.ch in French
   The former radio moderator Jean-Claude Gigon produces together with our member of honour Pierre Walder regularly programmes, which can be heard on www.voxinox.ch. Actually there are three contributions on the net - the last one about the IARC in Banbury.
4. 59. IARC/ 54. FICS-Kongress 2010 in Smolenice/Slovakia
   Next year’s event will take place from 21st to the 25th of October 2010 directly in Smolenice Castle with congress rooms, accomodation and restaurant. The village of Smolenice with the well-known Smolenice Castle is situated at the foot of Male Karpaty mountains, 60 km northwest from Bratislava.
   The subject for Category G: “Castles and Châteaux” for Audio - Video - Multimedia - Maximum playing time is 8 minutes.
5. 60. IARC / 55. FICS Congress 2011 in SWITZERLAND
   The subject for Category G: “Laugh and smile”
6. IARC-CDs
   The CDs of the years 1991 to 2008 are obtainable while stock lasts. 1 CD costs €10.00, post paid. For more than one CD please ask our offer. The edition 2009 will appear in the 1st quarter 2010.
7. Each one is a reporter - Dokublog from German SWR2
   Unfortunately again in German, but the Dokublog is an interesting project from SWR2. It is an interactive website for amateur producers of features and collectors of original sounds.
8. “Wurfsendungen” on Deutschlandradio Kultur
   Already for five years various autors produce on this channel Wurfsendungen - very short radio plays (max. 1 Min)
   Should you know examples of English sites, please let me know.

I wish you all good health and much success with sound and video recording, and would be pleased to welcome you to a FICS event in 2010!

Helmut Weber, General Secretary, FICS
www.soundhunters.com