March 2010 SubCommittee Report

[JWLaRue]

Folks,

As of Thursday, March 4th, the March issue of the SCR is in the hands of the post office.

Time to stake out your mailboxes!

-Jeff

p.s. I would be remiss if I didn't note that the SubCommittee still does not have an editor. Will this be the last issue of the SCR? It's up to you, folks.

[tom dougherty]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Jeff,
Thanks for all of the work in getting this issue out. Thanks also to all of those who pitched in with articles, editing, etc.
I am working on an article on IJN Submarines which I had hoped to have complete for March, but I ended up doing an enormous amount of traveling for my company (30K + miles in five weeks)

It will be ready for the June Issue, but it sounds as if there may not be one...

Tom

[roedj]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Folks,

As of Thursday, March 4th, the March issue of the SCR is in the hands of the post office.

Just wondering if I should be concerned by the fact that I have yet to receive the March SCR.

Dan in Michigan

UPDATE - Never mind - received it today March 16th.

[tom dougherty]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Nothing here in Massachusetts as yet....

[steveneill]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Same here in LA. But give it time boys.

Steve

[steveneill]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

John it's a hold it in your hand kind of thing. Soon book stores will be gone. Comics and all the rest.

Lights go out you can still grab the hard copy. Go under the tree and read.

Laptops are no good for a read in bed at night either.

Soon they will be saying print is dead.

Support print! Oh and Classical music.

Steve

[JWLaRue]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Sorry John....but Kindles (or any e-ink screen) is not really good for low light reading. I have a Sony Reader (same screen technology) and the contrast on current generation e-ink is not up to that of a paper-based book....especially of a mass market paperback. The 'white' on the e-ink screen is really sort of a light gray.

Don't get me wrong, I really like reading novels on my e-ink device, but these things are no where near the type of device that one would want for the SCR. If I had my choice, there'd be some way to distribute the SCR....in full color on every page.....in the same 8-1/2 by 11 format that we have now...but electronically. There *appears* to be a huge cost savings, but that hasn't been proven yet. There are offsets to the advantages.

-Jeff

[steveneill]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

John thanks for the kind words.

Steve

[JWLaRue]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

John,

Absolutely! some would say that the soon-to-be released Apple iPAD is one such device.

-Jeff

[Guest]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Perhaps the difference in time between individuals is owing to those who opt for bulk postage rate, and those who opt for first class ($15 price difference)?

[JWLaRue]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

That's certainly part of it......though it does seem that bulk rate mailing is noticeably slower these days......

-Jeff

[Guest]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Something to take up with the US postal service I guess.

I advocated in favour of an electronic report sometime ago. It met with a mixed response, with the main argument against it being it would push up the price of printed copy for those without computers, or those who dislike electronic publications.

You certainly don't require expensive electronic tablets for an electronic SCR- any computer fast enough to run Adobe Acrobat reader will suffice.

Of somewhat more pressing concern is that over eight months on from Pete's announcement that he would step down as editor, we have no editor, and AFAIK no prospective candidates.

I'm not quite sure what the fallout is going to be if we have no Summer issue- has this ever happened in the past?

[wayne frey]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

Mine still has not shown up???

[JWLaRue]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

I agree that any device capable of running something like Adobe Acrobat would suffice for an electronic version of what is currently a printed magazine. However, I was thinking of an electronic magazine format that was not entirely static. For example, what if that really nice build article also included one or more videos embedded within the article that shows you part of the actual build process...and there were embedded links to other, related material? I won't even go down the path of what ads might look like.

Let me just say that an electronic version of the SCR is something that I've wanted to see for a long time. Yes, there are very real concerns about that portion of the membership that cannot or will not use anything other than a printed magazine, but I think there are ways around that. The other issue (pun intended) that is always brought to me is how to retain a paid membership for something that can be copied and sent to anyone with trivial ease. That's a bit tougher to figure out.....but again, I think it can be worked.

One of the problems that the SubCommittee faces is that we do not know how a change such as this might affect the membership. I am fairly certain that a significant percentage of the membership does not use the Internet (at least for SC-related things). The Executive Committee would need to understand this, plus figure out the financial impact to any change. (both in the change in the paid membership and how the dues structure should/could be changed)

Regarding the "has this ever happened in the past?" question. Sort of. Back before Gene Berger stepped down, there was a period when he was not getting the magazine to the printer on a regular schedule. A given issue would be several months late. This had a very real impact on the membership count....as in it drove it down. I would not expect a different result this time.

-Jeff

p.s. maybe we should start a separate forum thread on the subject of an electronic SCR?

[myles yancey]

Re: March 2010 SubCommittee Report

I agree that any device capable of running something like Adobe Acrobat would suffice for an electronic version of what is currently a printed magazine. However, I was thinking of an electronic magazine format that was not entirely static. For example, what if that really nice build article also included one or more videos embedded within the article that shows you part of the actual build process...and there were embedded links to other, related material? I won't even go down the path of what ads might look like.

Let me just say that an electronic version of the SCR is something that I've wanted to see for a long time. Yes, there are very real concerns about that portion of the membership that cannot or will not use anything other than a printed magazine, but I think there are ways around that. The other issue (pun intended) that is always brought to me is how to retain a paid membership for something that can be copied and sent to anyone with trivial ease. That's a bit tougher to figure out.....but again, I think it can be worked.

One of the problems that the SubCommittee faces is that we do not know how a change such as this might affect the membership. I am fairly certain that a significant percentage of the membership does not use the Internet (at least for SC-related things). The Executive Committee would need to understand this, plus figure out the financial impact to any change. (both in the change in the paid membership and how the dues structure should/could be changed)

Regarding the "has this ever happened in the past?" question. Sort of. Back before Gene Berger stepped down, there was a period when he was not getting the magazine to the printer on a regular schedule. A given issue would be several months late. This had a very real impact on the membership count....as in it drove it down. I would not expect a different result this time.

-Jeff

p.s. maybe we should start a separate forum thread on the subject of an electronic SCR?

Well Jeff please start the new thread addressing all the points you just brought up and any other's you can think of, because we need to do something, some of these question have already been brought to my attention, I think it is time we act on it now.

Myles