Ok guys, I've been thinking about the meeting. While I enjoyed it there were some things I noticed that really have me concerned from a security aspect. From talking with you guys it seems that the place we went to has been used as a meetup spot before. This leads into my first point:
1) Be unpredictable. Avoid meeting at the same location twice within a certain period of time; perhaps only meet there once quarterly, at most. If you do meet up again in the same spot after a while, avoid meeting at the same time as before. Above all we should never have a situation where we regularly meet at the same place and same time.
2) You never know who is listening. One thing I liked about the meetup spot is it was crowded, busy and there was a lot of chatter making it hard for the whole place to listen to us. However, I didn't like how close we were to adjacent tables such that our neighbors could hear everything we say. The location was in a university town, the employees and many customers likely are involved with the university, and even if they are cool with us, all it takes is one of them to gossip about our meetup to the wrong person on campus. Word gets around and all of a sudden you have Tampa Area Antifa hanging out at your last meetup location, hoping to catch you next time you visit. (This is why point 1 above is so important)
3) Avoid discussing specific plans for future meetups during a meetup unless you know everyone present is able and committed to participate. I know they come up spontaneously as we talk about stuff at meetups, and it can be hard at times to suppress one's enthusiasm, but think about this: Suppose we discuss a future meetup in person, where not all present can attend, and something goes wrong, antifa show up, someone gets doxxed, etc. By keeping a lid on specifics of planned meetups and only divulging them to those who actually plan to go, we reduce the likelihood of infiltrators or eavesdroppers (see point 2 above) compromising our plans. Even more importantly, this helps protect fellow members unable to attend the discussed meetup from unwarranted suspicion if things go wrong.
You have to assume that at some point in the future, if not already, someone is going to try and infiltrate and compromise us. Keeping everything as much as possible on a need-to-know basis will help greatly in narrowing down the list of potential suspects, should we ever need to ferret out an infiltrator.
This is not to say I am against any discussion of future plans in person at a meetup. General discussion of ideas for future meetups that lack in specifics such as time and location are fine, I think. I think a museum meetup would be a great idea, just find out a time most can go and limit further discussion only to them via private messaging. You can't betray what you don't know.
I hope you find my suggestions helpful. I'm not trying to be a buzzkill, but after Frank Ancona's murder you can't be too careful. It may well have been mundane foul play on the part of an associate of his, or family, but these antifags are gloating about it. They would love nothing better than for us to all be murdered and for our loved ones to suffer. We need to regularly ask ourselves what more we can do to improve our OPSEC, now, before we learn the hard way from our enemies.
