Thinking of moving the SubRon sections to members only

[myles yancey]

Hi Al and thank you

Hi Al and thank you again for clearing up your point of view.

Mr Yancey, I don't want to appear repetitious, as I clearly understood the question, however I probably wasn't making myself very clear. I'm affraid many of the active members don't really have a handle on the SC financial expenses so it would be difficult to determine exactly where to make cuts to any such expenses if possible,

Al I understand that the members of the SC do not know what the finical status of SC has been for the last 6 yrs and that was out of my control , but to correct that I am having a finical Report printed in the next SC report and will be trying to publish the finical report every 6 months.

but my thoughts were first directed to eliminating the formal SC Report magazine that is mailed out to members throughout the world and possibly made available by a PDF file.

Al there are many members who do not want the SC Report in PDF form

This along with any other possible avenues to reduce the overall budget MAY help cut membership cost, which appears to me as one of the reasons some members felt it was not in their best interest to continue on with their membership. You have a lot of competent folks serving there with you in the executive committee and more than likely you will get a lot of input in ways and means to accomplish this difficult task. I have no problem with trying to further help in any small way that I can. I would further like to clear up a point you have made about retaining the status of the Subron's. My comment to that regard simply stated that I thought that a portion of the SC forum should be isolated from non members, not particularly those of the Subrons, as I felt that members should have some small advantage with accessing specific info. compared to that of Non Members. Regards,

Al I was simply trying to tell you that the commodore's of the Subron's feel that it is a mistake to make the SubRon threads members only, While thinking about everything they said I realized that they had a very good point and do not want the SubRon's status changed.
The Commodore's feel that the SubRons are a very good recruiting point for the SC, I do agree we have to look at other methods of cutting back, but with out the support of the members certin things will just not change that is the reason for asking for the memberships impute, So maybe it is time for a direct polling question about the SC Report and you are correct I have very competent officers.

[Rogue Sub]

Myles I am not sure

Myles I am not sure if you notice the trend here but every time you talk about the SC being broke, someone brings up the SCR. Nearly every time you bring up increasing membership, the SCR still comes up. It sees to be what the members want changed but, in what manner? New thread Yancey!

Al dont worry about myles he can be a bit abrasive I see where your going.

[myles yancey]

Myles I am not sure

Myles I am not sure if you notice the trend here but every time you talk about the SC being broke, someone brings up the SCR. Nearly every time you bring up increasing membership, the SCR still comes up. It sees to be what the members want changed but, in what manner? New thread Yancey!

Al dont worry about myles he can be a bit abrasive I see where your going.

Hi Kevin

I never brought the topic of the SC being broke up, that seem to be the major miss conception here, all we are talking about is what we can do to increase the membership and maintain the membership levels and provide better services for the membership.

[Rogue Sub]

fair enough.

fair enough.

[davinci]

Personally I've been looking for

Personally I've been looking for a Sub related website where the users are having FUN and ejoying RC related subjects, but so far, like this one, most are more of a business and the forums are run like a business. Way too Seriously.
Isolating some of the forums from none members just makes that worse, for getting people interested in the website and the organization.

I know my opinion, as a non-member doesn't mean much to this business venture, but I felt a need to respond anyway, as an example from someone on the outside looking in.
Thanks,

[myles yancey]

Re: Membership

How did the Subcommittee membership grow so much in 1996?
Maybe try and replicate what was done in that year to create more membership.
The one thing that stands out in my mind is how some very impolite members berate some design ideas of new forum members and club members.No one should be berated for talking about ideas or asking the so -called dumb questions.There needs to be more of a welcome committee here than a "take my seaway or the highway" attitude ! Not everyone is a hardened admiral submariner yet. I have seen some nasty comments here and have heard of the battles behind the Subcommittee scenes.You can attract more members with friendliness than salt spray blown into your face.

How did the Subcommittee membership grow so much in 1996?

This is a very good querstion one of the big draws to the SC back then was the New London Sub base as soon as the base access was stop membership started dropping off amoungest other reasons as well.

John as for your later comments well I beg to differ with you , because
most if not all are members are polite to everyone and any new comer on the board.

The web site moderators do not allow rude or nasty coimmets to other members to stay on the board, granted not veryone of those comments are seen right away but when they are they remove.

as far as the disdputes behind the scenes that is a fact of life in any organization and you nor I will ever beable to change that.

as far as a website this web site has been open to the public since it was
created and I see nothing wrong with the members wanting to think of it as a business after all the members dues support it and make it accessable to the public free and if they want it changed they have that right

john I am not try to be rude or nasty to you I am only trying to point out some of the facts since I can see you have only been a member of the board for 4 months and it takes a lot more than that to know what is happening in the SC.

[Guest]

This website is funded by

This website is funded by members of the Sub Committee.

No members equals no forum.

If things are considered by some as 'business like', then it's purely from a point of view of remaining solvent.

If after say a month of browsing this forum,and benefiting from the advice given, membership is still not forthcoming, it's doubtful it ever will be.

Why buy the cow when the milk is free.

If replies seem sometimes acerbic or blunt, it's rarely from a point of view of wishing to see ideas stunted. More likely it's through experience of what does or doesn't work.

Too many times has it been seen that folk approach this hobby chock full of ideas, often casting a snoop at those who've been there and done that, only to often end up vanishing with no results or the project failing to meet the expectations of the builder.

The mechanics of model submarines are well sorted- there is nothing new under the sun. The main areas of innovation left to the model submariner lie in the field of ever more sophisticated electronics.

[virg]

I'm not posting this to

I'm not posting this to take "shots" at anyone but I noticed that some of those who posted and are not paid members of the SC have not said what it would take to entice them to join. One did say that if dues were around $20.00 he would consider it. Perhaps it is time to pose these questions to non-members who do frequent the forum:

1. Why have you not joined?
2. If you are a former member, why did you leave?
3. What would entice you to join/re-join?

I realize that there are those out there that do not even look at our site but for those that do it could provide valuable insight towards increasing our membership.

Just a thought.

Virg

[myles yancey]

I have ask some of

I have ask some of these same questions in a separate thread so I will ask them here also.

1. Why have you not joined?
2. If you are a former member, why did you leave?
3. What would entice you to join/re-join?

Thank you Myles

[davinci]

The point I was trying

The point I was trying to make is that to the majority this a HOBBY.
When you let it mainly become a business, it can No longer be a Fun Hobby.
The Key word there is Fun.
Without interesting and entertaining, as well as informative, replies to questions and comments it's not fun, but becomes a negative experience.

Also, when Newbies visit the website the most important thing is not to 'Talk Down to Them'. No one enjoys that.

Well that's the last of my Negative comments,
Thanks

[Guest]

I hear this a lot,

I hear this a lot, I just want to have FUN. That's fine, so do we all, but for those to have fun, people have to work.

Most of the duties involved with running an organisation like this one have got little to do with the hobby, and are usually anything but fun.

If you disagree with that, then please step-up to the plate. Volunteer your services, and suggest improvements/alternative ways of running things.

Now for a longtime I've been an advocate of electronic publication. I suggested it years ago, but it was rejected by the majority of those who responded. My thoughts are that it is inevitable that eventually the report will have to go electronic, especially if the Sub Committee wishes to remain an international organisation.

Printing things out and posting them is an expensive game, and will only get more expensive in the future.

The website is in need of a major update IMO. The forum has kept pace with the times, but the main page hasn't- it looks rather tired, and a lot of the information on it is old and stale.

This is our window to the world. A few things at would help things along.

A new home page image that can be regularly refreshed to keep things topical. Teasers from the report. Also, make it easier to upload pictures to the home page for members.

[tommydeen]

Re: Membership

How did the Subcommittee membership grow so much in 1996?
Maybe try and replicate what was done in that year to create more membership.
The one thing that stands out in my mind is how some very impolite members berate some design ideas of new forum members and club members.No one should be berated for talking about ideas or asking the so -called dumb questions.There needs to be more of a welcome committee here than a "take my seaway or the highway" attitude ! Not everyone is a hardened admiral submariner yet. I have seen some nasty comments here and have heard of the battles behind the Subcommittee scenes.You can attract more members with friendliness than salt spray blown into your face.

How did the Subcommittee membership grow so much in 1996?

This is a very good querstion one of the big draws to the SC back then was the New London Sub base as soon as the base access was stop membership started dropping off amoungest other reasons as well.

I disagree
1. unless you lived a days drive it was simpley not worth the drive/planetrip across the country. to justify a trip to the regatta in groton I had to turn the visit into a full vacation visiting many other historical places as well.
I remember people driving for long distances just to be turned down at the base gate and that was a HOT subject, not a problem in Carmel, IMHO the Carmel is a much better draw than Groton was because the people that organized it do a good job and is more central.
2. we lost access to the base after 9-11. and i think that is what made the membership drop off.

as far as the SCR on PDF? no. if it takes just as much work to put it together in paper than whats the point?

John as for your later comments well I beg to differ with you , because
most if not all are members are polite to everyone and any new comer on the board.

The web site moderators do not allow rude or nasty coimmets to other members to stay on the board, granted not veryone of those comments are seen right away but when they are they remove.

as far as the disdputes behind the scenes that is a fact of life in any organization and you nor I will ever beable to change that.

you can say that again. were did the whitch& the wizard in the vendors section go...

as far as a website this web site has been open to the public since it was
created and I see nothing wrong with the members wanting to think of it as a business after all the members dues support it and make it accessable to the public free and if they want it changed they have that right

john I am not try to be rude or nasty to you I am only trying to point out some of the facts since I can see you have only been a member of the board for 4 months and it takes a lot more than that to know what is happening in the SC.

[cnutting]

Good points Tommy, but you

Good points Tommy, but you end up with the same deal with the regatta being held in Carmel. Too far for many of us to drive, but pretty good if you are in the midwest. I would suspect you would get that argument no matter where the event was held, nice big country we have. I remember many a thread on the old pages regarding this very same issue.

Yes, no base access issues out there, but we seem to manage pretty well with it. In addition, the pond is a nice depth and you have the museum and NAUTILUS as well. Every location where you would host a regatta would have its pluses and minuses.