Before I got into details, I asked him to check with his host organization on the corporate communications or public relations policy. This was because his club is a in-house club under a host organization.

Most host organizations, especially companies, have strict policies to protect the company image or branding. The Toastmasters Clubs under the organizations also have to observe these policies on top of the Toastmasters policies.

Over the years, I had seen Toastmasters Clubs being shut down by the host organizations, partly because of the policy issues. But on the positive note, some host organizations provide free web hosting for its affiliated Toastmasters Club, either in the public or intranet domain.

Community Clubs have more options on setting up a club website, and many of such options are free.

The first one is the freetoasthoast (http://www.freetoasthost.org/) -> the official one recommended by Toastmasters International.

I personally have not used it myself, but I know there are many clubs using it. I had checked with some of the users, and in general, the feedback is most likely positive as such.
1. easy to use
2. the template is there with most of the Toastmasters publicity material

Personally, I have observed the only set back: the club website will look like most other clubs’ websites. It is not easily to stand out.

I have known other free options as follows:
1. Blogspot or Blogger (http://www.blogger.com/)
2. http://www.wordpress.com
3. http://www.webs.com

The setback for these options, is other than blogspot, the other 2 will put ads to on the website.

Of course, there are some clubs prefer to have their website with paid hosting services, and this shall be discussed in the future posts.

When I first started to judge in Speech Contest, I always tally my placing with the result. If my placing is close to the result, I would feel proud of my judgment. However, if my placing is way off the result, I would question my judgment. Is there any problem with my judgment?

As years go by, I had taken up the role judge and chief judge for many speech contests ranging from Club, Area, Division and up to District levels. I have the opportunities to observe and analyze many competitive speeches. I also have the opportunities to observe other many other judges’ placing when I was the chief judge. I had noticed how varied the judges had put their placing.

These experiences had given me a new perspective on Speech Contest judging. Toastmasters International has a clearly defined listing of judging criteria for speech contests. In International Speech Contest, Speech Content carries the heaviest allocation, followed by Delivery and Language used.

Every judge votes to the best of their ability to eliminate biasness, perception. However, there are many factors which contribute on how a judge places their points. These factors include the judge’s background, preference and knowledge. The contest rule book also further defined the minimum number of judges at different level to minimize the biasness of the judges.

I learned that, how difference people judge contest speeches despite of the clearly defined judging criteria. The most important is that, we did our best as putting our past perception away, and judge as objective as we can.

During my most recent speech contest judging, only one out of my three placing was placed. In fact, I already guessed how other judges had placed their votes. I had voted as objectively as I can, just like the other judges in the contest. The main thing was, we had different perspective which differed in the way we judged.

What matter most was not how close was our placing with the placing, but how we had put our votes. We judged the Speech Contests to the best of our ability; the result would up the majority votes.