Re: A few questions and comments from a member

[krandall@world.std.com]

On Thu, 31 Dec 1998, Neil Frank wrote:

>> I include my response to an email message from Robert Hudson, an interested
>> AGA member. He has some interresting ideas and will probably make a good
>> committee member. 

At 07:47 AM 12/31/98 -0800, Erik wrote:

>Robert has been a pain in the butt to me on more than one occasion, to the
>point of being abusive.  On one occasion, he attacked me for offering
>alternative advice to someone on usenet about incandescent lighting ("why
>the hell do you so-called experts have to make things difficult?
>fluorescent good, incandescent bad."). More recently, he has pestered me
>twice to summarize information on the Krib rather than present original
>data, because it is too "difficult" for beginners to understand. 

For the moment, I'll write Robert a little "something" to keep him happy
while we discuss this more as a group.

While we certainly can use all the willing hands we can find, Erik has one
of the most willing sets of hands we've come across, and he's also a pretty
easy guy to get along with, I think.  

For those of you who know nothing more about this than the two posts from
Neil and Erik, let me expand upon what Erik has said, and say that it
bothered Erik enough that he mentioned it to me a while back, although I
don't think he mentioned the guy's name, and I'm sure neither of us was
even aware that he was an AGA member.  

IMO, Erik has done a tremendous service for the AGA by taking over our web
site and mailing lists.  Beyond that, his own "Krib" web site contains more
useful information than you can find in any other single place.  Erik and I
have already discussed the lack of beginner "recipes" at the Krib site, and
I am intending to send him my school tank stuff for people who want to
follow a set-by-step plan without having to know any more than that.  

While we certainly don't want to discourage people who come offering to
help out, I am a little offput by people who come on in attack mode.  To me
this feels a little too much like an end run around Erik.

My first thought is to assign him to Merrill.  If he is interested in
working on outreach, or getting local people together, he could be very
useful in that capacity, while still keeping him out of Erik's hair.

Hope every one has a safe and happy New Year.  Our plans are cancelled due
to sick kids, so we'll have a quiet one... which could be a refreshing
change too!<g>

Karen