Re: MCM - Digest V1 #143

[Dave Gomberg <gomberg@wcf.com>]

You know that I have not seen most of these posts.   If you expect me to
participate, you have to copy me.

At 09:59 AM 9/16/1999 -0400, Neil Frank wrote:
>>From DaveG:
>>>Now Herlong will have NOTHING TO SAY about what goes into PAM.  So I don't
>>>think his views on collecting trips are very relevant.    
>DaveG: what are your views on desired topics in general and on collecting
>trip articles in particular? 

Well, I have a hidden meta-table-of-contents for "each" issue of PAM.  It's
not real partly because it calls for more articles than we would have room
to run.   And partly because it would be a bigger magazine than I would
want to commit too at first.  But it looks like:

One article each:

Getting started
Genus or allied genera of plants (review of the genus Cryptocoryne)
Nutrition/chemistry
Tips/techniques/hardware
Field work (plant finding trips, etc.)
Great tank/fish room/public aquarium plant display
Great article from the past (so they get reprinted in a findable archived
backedup form)
Show results/announce/meetings
AGA newsletter
Occasional biography (Windelov for example, I know how shy he
is....)/vendor profile
Research (allelopathy, taxonomy, physiology)

I think that would make a killer good mag.


>>From: "Merrill Cohen" 
>if we are going to invest money, why not just
>>pay like is intended for PAM for AGM and have the one good magazine?
>What have I missed?
>Merrill, this is a good point. It is my understanding that with PAM, the
>costs of the publication are subsidized by advertising, other stockholders
>('angels'), PAM sales to non-AGA members and AGA's contribution($12per
>year?). Currently, I am guessing that AGA pays ~$9 per member for TAG
>DaveG: what is your opinion of making PAM an AGA product? If AGA were to be
>the 100% stockholder, how much would we have to put up?

I would not be willing to edit PAM except on the basis proposed to the
management committee earlier where the PAM board could give direction and
complain if it didn't like what I was doing but would have to give one
year's notice of intent to terminate me as editor.   It is too much of an
investment to ask me to make on lesser terms.   I don't know if AGA would
agree to such liberal terms.   And I was planning to take my compensation
in stock (I would expect to earn about $20 per hour for editing PAM).  So
if AGA wanted to be the only stockholder, it would change things.  AGA
would have to think a lot about whether it wanted to do that.  And AGA and
I would have to be clear about what we expected from each other and PAM.


>>From:Paul K
> what kinds of articles will they be
>>writing?  I don't think we want articles touting the author's secret
>>miracle forumlas that solve all planted tank problems. 

Sure, but I would love to run an update of the Sears/Conlin paper.

>> We don't want
>>articles each issue about a slightly different variety of Echinodorus found
>>in a slightly different ditch in Uruguay.  

Not every issue, but I would love to run a review of the genus by a revisor.

>What kind of articles do AGA
>>members want, and who will write them?  If the authors are going to be
>>mostly the active European people :C. Kasselmann, N. Jacobsen, K Horst,
>>etc., can we get enough out of them to keep PAM supplied?

I can't believe that we don't have enough well informed NAFTA folks to
produce a great mag.

>I would think (and hope) that the authors would also include hobbyists from
>the US.  But the questions remains: what kind of articles do WE want. What
>kind of articles does Dave want?  As current editor, I have published some
>of the topics mentioned above. I would not want to do it all the time, but
>if people sent me that material and it was well written and illustrated, I
>probably would! However, I don't want PAM (or TAG) to excessively focus on
>collecting trips (as someone suggested that BB has been doing) and I
>wouldn't want it to only write about the newest plant in the hobby. 

But as I am sure Neil will testify, you gotta start with the material you got.

>I like
>the hobbyist feel and would like as much as possible on advancing and
>understanding the art and science of growing plants and illustrating
>different successes in the hobby. 

Gee, that almost sounds like a mission statement for PAM.  Except I would
want to also talk about successes (and failures) in the industry as well as
in the hobby.

>However, if the collecting trip article
>talks about the habitat of Echinodorus or Cryptocoryne and mostly shows the
>plants and does not dwell on the native children, pictures of birds or
>buying trinkets in town, then I think such an article is USEFUL stuff. On
>the other hand, it would be great if PAM try to maintain a hobbyist feel
>and never become excessively commercial. 
>To properly comment on this we need to see some projections on the number
>of and type of articles and the ratio of articles to advertisements in PAM.

I want only enough ads to support the cost of the mag and return something
(25% per year?) to the investors.   If AGA wants to forego return on its
investment, that would mean even fewer ads.   I would LOVE to run 12 issues
a year with 30-35 pages (8.5x11") of text plus half that much pictures plus
ads and fluff (table of contents, indexes, etc.).   But we have to crawl
before we walk before we run before we enter the Boston Marathon or the Bay
to Breakers.

I would start with 40-48 pages TOTAL, 60% editorial, 40%  ads.  If we can
get the ads up to 25 pages, we could go to 35% ads (I think).  

>Also useful would be a comparison of pages and content of  current TAG to
>prospective PAM. (Current TAG "generally" has 22-23 pages of text/pictures
>not counting the pages with filler ads.) How much of PAM can be devoted to
>AGA stuff, including some member provided material. Could contributors
>still get something to make it fair... like a minimum of 1 year
>subscription for any published contribution?

I was planning on four pages per issue for AGA.  If it wants more that
could be arranged.  As to whether AGA give a membership to a contributor,
that is purely an AGA question and has nothing to do with PAM.

>DaveG: what do you envision for PAM in terms of pages and topics for
>articles/pictures?

See above.  And copy me if you want any feedback.
--
Dave Gomberg, San Francisco            mailto:gomberg@wcf.com
For low cost CO2 systems that work:  http://www.wcf.com/co2iron 
Tropica MasterGrow in the USA:      http://www.wcf.com/tropica 
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