BIG BREAK
The BIG BREAK, also known as the "Big-Ass Break", is intended to be a time for the members to talk and (maybe) make the club a more social entity.
Most announcements are made during this time, and there are often AMVs and other odds and ends that get shown as well.
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History
In the early 2000s and for an unknown period before, MnA showed two episodes every hour followed by a 10 minute break until the start of the next hour.
MnA shifted to a little break/BIG BREAK (5 min/30 min) format experimentally on October 4, 2003:
Yep, we gave you dinner time. Now you don't have to choose a show to miss so you can go eat. Also, we hope that with the lights on for a whole thirty minutes maybe you'll mingle among each other and figure out a plan to overthrow our current elected officials (El Presidente and me among other) come spring time and elections and whatnot.
--Ahmad Jamshid "K" Amini in that week's member email
While nominally 30 minutes, in practice the BIG BREAK became closer to 40-45, causing meetings to regularly run 10-15 minutes past the official 10pm end time. When the Cal Poly administration cracked down on after-hours silo use in 2010-2011, club voted to experimentally move to a 4:30pm start time in 2011-2012 resulting in an even bigger hour-long BIG BREAK. The first meeting to try this will be September 24, 2011 and it will become permanent a few weeks later if members so vote.