Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2006 19:05:24 -0500 From: Samuel Lubell <samlubell at verizon.net> Subject: [WSFA] Re: New list (was Re: This list is... ) To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net> Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net> At 05:14 PM 2/12/2006, you wrote: >At 2/12/2006 02:17 PM, Keith F. Lynch wrote: > > >Right. Also, it would result in higher volume, which some current > >subscribers might not like, especially if it's from people they > >don't know. > >I don't know many of the current posters here, so that wouldn't be a >problem for me. Some I may have met and talked to, but don't associate the >person with the name, others I may never have met in person. I'm happy to >talk to just about anyone who's a fan though, whether in WSFA or some other >club, or even if they aren't active with any organized group. > > >Also, people would be (or at least ought to be) more reluctant to air > >WSFA's dirty laundry in a forum being read by people who have never > >been WSFA members. And sometimes it needs to be aired. One should never say anything online that one wouldn't in public, since everything done online could easily become public. >Since just about anyone can become a WSFA member, or show up at a meeting, >and I'm not sure why anyone who isn't and doesn't plan to be would care >anyway, I'm not sure this is a major issue. Not for me anyway. > > >Also, WSFA does need a list, and a YahooGroup is unsatisfactory > >for numerous reasons.They reserve the right to sell or give all > >information to anyone for any reason at any time, whether it's > >selling your email address and apparent interests to spammers, > >or turning you into to authorities, including repressive Communist > >authorities. Yes, but we're a sf group. We should be using a mailing list run by a company named for a rather repusulsive species in a science fiction/fantasy novel. Points to whomever can be the swiftest to name the novel without using google. > >The fact that WSFA chose to make a Communist agent, Yahoo, rather > >than me, an ex-WSFAn, their official list owner shows the club's deep > >contempt for me, and, indirectly, for the rights and freedoms of all > >its members. I should have left the club years earlier. Keith, I'm sorry that you feel this way. I assure you the club does not feel contempt for you and that the decision to use yahoo has nothing to do with you. >That's an assumption on your part, and, from what I've seen, not a valid one. > >"WSFA" didn't choose to make Yahoo the list server. The publications >officer did, with approval by those present at a particular First Friday >meeting...all perfectly legal, but done without the knowledge or approval >of those who no longer attend First Friday meetings due to the venue and >related events. WSFA voted on it at a meeting. That makes it a WSFA decision. And as I recall, it was discussed at a Maryland meeting before the vote. >Continuing to hold meetings at the Gillilands, despite the situation, and >to conduct important business there, no matter how legal under the bylaws, >is resulting in a split in the club, that is getting deeper as time goes on >and nothing is done to mend it. Some people are essentially >disenfranchised by this situation. I'm open to suggestions of a practical alternative. Mike, do you know of a place in Virginia that: 1. Would allow us to meet from 9-12 pm on a Friday every month. 2. That would have space for 25 - 40 people 3. That would have sufficient parking 4. Would not charge or require everyone to buy something. >I've heard mutterings of a power grab by a small group within the club, There's been no power grab. There's no power to grab. Continuing to meet in the same place that we've met for nearly 30 years isn't a grab of anything. >Even if the club doesn't fracture into multiple smaller >clubs, perhaps too small to be viable, it is likely to lose members as some >of us just get sick of the whole mess and decide to spend our free time on >something that is actually fun...which this sort of thing is NOT. I agree. Yet fan clubs seem extremely susceptible that this. Any suggestions for how we can avoid fracturing? > >I wish they would come forward. They may have thought they were doing > >me a favor, but they weren't. Everyone who cared to know the truth > >already did. Now probably several WSFAns think *I* mailed those > >letters. So the letters just served to burn whatever bridges weren't > >already in ashes. No one who knows Keith well would ever think he would send anonymous anything. And I've said that to anyone who asked me.