Howdy, all.
I must admit that I've been taken by surprise, a little, by the strong
differences of opinion voiced here about potential 7 participation on
chapman-era.
Could this be a milestone? The first extended and really interesting debate
to arise, on chapman-era?
Keith Gustafson commented:
>>> I have to agree that the seven list is a disappointment to me as a Lotus
>>> Seven owner, it has a lot of traffic about various seven clones, but very
>>> little relevant to original sevens. I was thinking of suggesting that the
>>> Lotus Seven people might hang out on the chapman era list
I asked:
>> What do other chapman-era residents who get the 7 list mail, think about
>> this idea? Should we be recruiting folks presently on the 7 list, as
>> potential chapman-era customers? Let us know what you think...
Dick Carlson responded:
> As a former 7-lister, I think Chapman-era describes this list
> adequately. The 7 List turned into a Graham Nearn-era list, then Sylva
> Stryker, and every other 7 clone.
Rod Bean responded:
> I say WELCOME Seven enthusiasts! I find a lot of common interest on
> chapman-era and I hope they do too.
Ummmm.... well, we definitely seem to be in agreement that *Lotus* 7
enthusiasts are welcome. To me, this is sort of a default, intrinsic
assumption of chapman-era, so it is a darn good thing for us to agree on!
;-)
Phil Bradshaw wrote:
> I am sorry but I do not entirely agree here. I like both Chapman era and
> kitracers lists as they tend to be more hard core technical - which is
> the info that is hard to find.
Well stated, Phil. It has been one of my personal agendas, in trying to
nurture chapman-era along, to try to attract people who have real technical
interest and significant technical ability. That is why Phil Bradshaw is
here... I invited him, because he meets these criteria.
<SOAPBOX>
One of my frustrations with Lotus Cars, has been that there is too much
idle chatter. As people there have observed, it is as if hangin' around
the corner pub, chewing the fat with the guys. This OK as far as it goes,
and I don't object to it in principle. In fact, I sometimes *partake*
in the idle chatter that goes on... But...
My objection is that if you want to ask a real, serious question, and
then read peoples' responses, you can't do it very efficiently; you
have to wade through many kilobytes of high noise-to-signal ratio fluff,
to find serious responses. Since no one has a content searchable
message archive available on the web, you also can't easily go look for
the info you want from Lotus Cars, using your favorite search engine.
I kinda wanted to attempt to differentiate this mailing list, by making
it a little bit more technically focused. Not to criticize Lotus Cars,
just different strokes for different folks!
The result, so far, is that we have had a small readership, with a pretty
specific focus, and not a very large amount of list traffic.
This is _just_peachy_, if you ask me... I am quite pleased with the way
chapman-era is progressing, and I have been reluctant to broadcast its
existence loudly around the web, because I don't really want high byte,
low content people hanging out here, clogging our list with silly stuff.
</SOAPBOX>
So, if you buy into what I am saying, we may really be in violent
agreement up to this point, rather than disagreement.
But then, Phil continued:
> please lets not get involved in this 'if it ain't a Lotus
> it ain't worth shit' bullshit....
Phil, no one said that! If they did, I would have flamed them myself!
This is all about the *people* that are represented on our list, not
about what kind of badge is on their cars. Give the people here some
credit; I think we are all mature enough to not fall into the typical
Marque bigotry trap.
My personal opinion (and this may be controversial, let me know if you
disagree) is that what we are looking for here is a type of person, not a
type of car. How do we attract the right type of person? That is *my*
interest...
Let's hear some more opinions about this!
Erik Berg
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