RE: entry fee for AGA Contest (fwd)

["Dave VanderWall" <dave@vanderwall.org>]

I tend to agree with the nicely worded response.  There are too many
forums out there.  If we think it would be beneficial to lower the price
to $4 across the board (psychological factor) then let's do it, but
singling out a specific forum is not a good idea, IMHO.  How would we
monitor it anyway?  

"Hi, this is Nancy Drew from Kalamazoo, but my screen name on
AquaChatterific is '3jfie93l'.  Can I get the $1 discount?"

Know what I mean?

I had already sent a response to Birgit stating that I would be bringing
the matter forth for discussion with the contest organizers, and in that
message I pointed out that we are accepting PayPal this year in an
attempt to make it easier for the international community.


Dave VanderWall

P.s. Erik, I assume you've been seeing the viruses sent to
showcase@aquatic-gardeners.org?  Some folks' kids. :-)

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-aga-contest@thekrib.com 
> [mailto:owner-aga-contest@thekrib.com] On Behalf Of James Purchase
> Sent: Wednesday, 10 July, 2002 10:40
> To: aga-contest@thekrib.com
> Subject: RE: entry fee for AGA Contest (fwd)
> 
> 
> Erik wrote:
> 
> "But on the other
> hand, it's forums like Robert's that got a lot of the word 
> out on the first year.  We tend to think that the APD is the 
> be-all & end-all of aquatic plant folks, but there's a whole 
> bunch of little nooks and crannies, some bigger than others 
> (though I won't go into the value of posting at 
> petswarehouse.infopop.cc).  It'd be nice if these guys 
> realized that we're losing major money on the event, and 
> putting in lots of hours of our own time (taken away from our 
> own aquariums), and just entered because of that."
> 
> Whatever you ultimately decide to do with suggestions such as 
> this, I hope you realize that there will ALWAYS be people who 
> think that they deserve a "special break", or something for 
> nothing. A point comes when you have to decide just how far 
> you are willing to bend and kiss *** in order to please the 
> "cheap seats". The amount of time and energy put into this 
> event over the years by a small handfull of people will never 
> be enough to satisfy _some_ people and they will continue to 
> look for discounts on an already paltry entry fee or special 
> consideration that others cannot get.
> 
> It is great that forums other than the APD exist and help 
> promote both the hobby and the Contest, and their help is 
> certainly appreciated but I fail to see why the AGA ought to 
> be expected to shoulder even more of a financial burden to 
> keep people expecting such largess happy. I DON'T see members 
> of those forums jumping forward to volunteer their time or 
> energy to pull off events such as this (or for that matter, 
> coming up with viable alternatives).
> 
> A nicely worded response might thank them for their interest 
> and their continued support, but also point out how much it 
> costs to host such an event, both in time and money and to 
> consider the entry fee as a very minor donation to help 
> defray SOME of the costs associated with it.
> 
> Again, only _my_ opinion.......
> 
> James
> 
>   ------------------
>   To unsubscribe from this list, e-mail majordomo@thekrib.com
>   with "unsubscribe aga-contest" in the body of the message.
>   To subscribe to the digest version, add "subscribe 
> aga-contest-digest"
>   in the same message.
>   Old messages are available at http://lists.thekrib.com/aga-contest
>   When asked, log in as username is "aga-contest", and 
> password "second".
> 
> 
> 

  ------------------
  To unsubscribe from this list, e-mail majordomo@thekrib.com
  with "unsubscribe aga-contest" in the body of the message.
  To subscribe to the digest version, add "subscribe aga-contest-digest"
  in the same message.
  Old messages are available at http://lists.thekrib.com/aga-contest
  When asked, log in as username is "aga-contest", and password "second".