At 06:59 AM 12/21/98 EST, John E Kline wrote:
>I bought my Bricklin in 1975 and was one of the original members of BI. BI
>didn't do anything and I lost contact. ... I dropped my car off with Terry
>Tanner to have him do a restoration. During our discussions I mentioned to
>Terry that I was looking for the info to join the club and he said that he
>would give it to me. Well after a delightful time with Terry I left and
>forgot to get the info.
Well you apparently are on-line. There is a membership form on the web
page that you can fill out and print. Then mail it with $30 dues to
George Malaska, the registrar. If you don't have a printer, you can
simply write the info on a piece of paper and mail it to him.
>I will join the club, but am not in favor with restricting info. Lets
>face it. If we just wanted a car to drive we would buy a Ford, Chevy, etc.
>We are interested in preserving the BRICKLIN. Becoming a secret society
>is not conducive to preservation.
While I agree with you, we also have to be realistic. If we make all
information about the car, maintenance, etc. available to everyone,
is there a need for a club? If there is NO club, will there be vendors
to support us? If the vendors disappear, then will we be able to maintain
our cars?
I am one of the maintainers of the web page, and we had to fight for club
support about 1 1/2 years ago when we really started to get a 1st class
web page going. The bottom line here is to let the Bricklin survive.
To do that, we need vendors. For the vendors to survive, they have to
have customers. With less than 3,000 car produced, they need a forum
for their wears. That forum is basically the club and its members.
With out the owners support for the club, the vendors and their cars,
all that is left is a pile of rusting metal and some weathering fiberglass.
And Greg Monfort wrote:
>.....I like the idea of a members only area for this type of data. The
>question is how much hassle / time / cost is involved in adding it to
>the site and keeping the data and PW's updated?
Unfortunately, Ron Auger got transfered to CO and nolonger is sitting next
to the hardware. So maintanence is a little more difficult. However, this
is one of the items he was talking about before his transfer. We now have
a database that would allow us to set something like this up. The real
problem now, is Ron getting the time to do the work. As with all volunteer
efforts, there are many other items that get priority over the volunteer
work.
>What about this mailing list? Seems it should be in there also since
>this is where some of the info currently resides.
Again should this be restricted to club members? I think not. This
mailing list (as was the web page) were established to try and reach
the owners that have lost touch with BI, or owners that don't know any
thing about BI. There are many cars that are sitting in garages or fields
being neglected because the owners have either lost contact with BI or
have no idea how to find help. The web allows us to make a lot of info
readily available to those owners. So far it appears to be working as
we have probably gotten around 50 members in the last 1 1/2 yrs. because
of the web page and the mailing list.
In addition to helping the owners that ARE on-line, the mailing list has
really helped those that are NOT on-line. As the editor of The Brickline
mag. I am a major contributor to this forum. I also draw on the
communications here for material for the magazine. In addition, several
of the people on this list have contributed articles to the magazine.
It is unfortunate that only about 1/3 of the people that are taking advantage
of the information and help that is available here are club members. I
would like to see everyone on the mailing list also be a club member. But
if we try to force that issue, I think that the club will suffer. I know
that we wouldn't be getting some of the questions for the new owners that
help make up articles for the magazine. If a person was forced to join the
club, would they contribute? I don't think so. One only has to look at
the fact that we have over 330 members in the club, about 120 members on
the mailing list, and I still have to beg for articles.
The magazine is FOR and BY the club members. The people that for what ever
reason have not joined the club are mission out. While there is a lot of
good technical info. being disciminated on this list, there have been many
articles in the last 1 1/2 years that have NOT been desciminated on this
list.
For me personally - being on-line is great! I love the help that is quickly
available. Being a member of BI is also great! Even if I don't make it to
the National meets. I'm one of the lucky ones, both on-line and a BI member.
I definately have the best of both worlds.
John
John T. Blair WA4OHZ email: jblair@exis.net
Va. Beach, Va Phone: (757) 495-8229
48 TR1800 65 Morgan 4/4 Series V
71 Saab Sonett III 75 Bricklin SV1 77 Spitfire
www.team.net/www/morgan bricklin.shel.olsy-na.com/bi
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