[ARC5] [vmars] Re: Members requesting documents.

[Richard Hankins]

John,

I have always taken the view that the best way to preserve historic 
information is to get it distributed as widely as possible - not try and 
lock it away in archives or databases with heavily restricted access.    
And that means giving it away freely.   That was the policy that I 
instituted with the vmars archive - mind you not without considerable 
opposition from certain vmars committee members.  Since I was the prime 
contributor of scanned documents (and thus doing 99% of the work) they 
didn't really have much of an argument against it in the end, and so far 
that policy has remained in place.

I'm afraid that the wrong sort of people are currently  in charge of 
this kind of resource.   And I do recall warning you (and Chuck 
Counselman) at the time about Keith Watt and the way he behaves! There 
are two schools of thought in this field:   we either co-operate 
together and share everything for our common good, and for the purpose 
of discovering and preserving our history...........or we treat it as 
some sort of battleground where everyone competes against everyone else 
for control of whatever they can lay their hands on.    Its a shame that 
the latter view has prevailed, not just in the WS19 group, but also in 
what now calls itself "vmars".

And returning to the complaint in question, in /any/ group, the vast 
majority will not contribute visibly.   Some will not contribute because 
they do not feel they can say anything of value.  Some just find typing 
hard work!

For most of the life of vmars I was the "key contributor" - very little 
of what now exists in vmars would be there if it had not been for my 
input.   The one area I did not work on was the website, which was down 
to Colin Guy - another of the key contributors.   I did not mind that I 
was making a disproportionate contribution because I figured that the 
best way to put vintage electronics "on the map" was to enable other 
people to do whatever they were doing better.  In other words, if 
providing a free manual for an AR-88D meant that someone who owned only 
an AR-88D was persuaded to keep it and restore it - rather than leave it 
to rot or worse, take it down the tip - then that was worthwhile in 
itself.    The interest in vintage electronics since I started in 1992 
has grown like mad - not all of it healthy it has to be admitted - but 
in general I am pleased with the results.

So, I suggest that you regard your contribution of documents to that 
group as a worthwhile investment in vintage electronics.  You may not 
every see or understand the exact benefit - but be sure that there will 
be one.


Richard



On 09/06/2013 23:37, J. Forster wrote:
>
> This was received from a very prominent person in the vintage Mil radio
> circles.
>
> I believe it is very typical of those running the Group in question. IMO,
> the fault is with the Group Owner and (maybe) Moderator(s), and his
> IDIOTIC policies, not the members in question.
>
> I would suggest anyone considering providing any information to that
> Group, as a public service, carefully consider whether it will, in fact,
> be readily available. I believe that archive, WHICH I HELPED FOUND, and
> sitll has hundreds of my documents and other material, is NOT in the
> hobby's interest.
>
> YMMV,
>
> -John
>
> ======================
>
> > Hey, I have read less intelligent questions in that group...when I read
> > it, which isn't very often...
> >
> > On 6/9/2013 6:08 PM, Wireless-Set-No19-owner at yahoogroups.com 
> <mailto:Wireless-Set-No19-owner%40yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> >> We are getting a little concerned that Membership of this Group may be
> >> seen by some solely as a means of gaining access to the Document
> >> Archive. This is not what was originally envisaged; it was intended 
> that
> >> (all) members would from time to time participate in the various
> >> technical discussions that arise.
> >>
> >> There are a number of individuals who make download requests from time
> >> to time but who have never contributed to any discussion over a period
> >> of some years, and in some cases have never submitted a posting at all.
> >>
> >> Clearly it would be ridiculous to expect every member to take part in
> >> every discussion that arises, and that is not what we expect. At the
> >> same time we are becoming apprehensive that there are some members 
> whose
> >> sole reason for joining was to obtain downloads, and we are 
> beginning to
> >> see this as an abuse of membership.
> >>
> >> For those who realise that they might be in the category identified
> >> above we would ask a couple of questions: (1) do you never have any
> >> queries that other members might be able to help resolve, and (2) where
> >> others raise questions do you never have any information that would 
> help
> >> them find the right answers?
> >>
> >> We want to encourage "silent" members to be more active on the Group,
> >> and we may consider limiting the number of downloads available to
> >> members who show no inclination to take part in Group discussions.
> >>
> >> Group Moderators.
> >
> >
>
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