If you want to find an excuse, or a scapegoat, you can find one. These jerks want something for nothing, and to he!! with those who made it possible.
Just try to go to an NRA club and shoot with them if you're not an NRA member- or try to go to the Whittington center (NRA's National Shooting Range) and not be a member. Try to race in a sportmen's category with the NHRA, SCCA, or one of those groups, or use the club's facilities, without joining.
People gotta *****, want to have their fun, and not return anything to the sport/hobby/passtime.
I'm personally fed up with the babies.
Roger

MustanFan psst... pssssst........ sometimes its better to let sleeping dogs lie.

J_R psst ... pssssst ...... you may be correct.

But I have more questions than answers.
I for one am not against the AMA, but I'm becoming aware that there is a lot of activity within that is being questioned by the members. This would seem to point to several possible problems, poor communication, inadequate leadership, inadequate support, or corruption.

The analogy of the NRA may or may not fit here. This analogy is good if all you want to do is participate in NRA or AMA sponsored events. What about all of the members that just want to fly at their own field period, no competition etc.. Does this attitude support their needs, or are we asking them to subsidize the actions/desires of the few. Good question huh ......

Again I will say, our club is 200+ strong. Out of 200 about two dozen are active, of the two dozen only about 6 are very active and attend other club functions. If we do the math that is 3% of our club that is active. If this holds true for the whole organization then approximately 5100 members of the 170,000 are active enough to get full benefit from the AMA sanctioning. That leaves 164,900 members subsidizing their (the AMA) activities. These members may only need the insurance provided.

Now the question is, do these 164,900 members really care about building an insurance complex in Muncie they will most likely never see or use. Don't know, but some seem to question this endeavor.

Do I .... as long as the cost is reasonable I don't mind. But please don't just tout the efforts of the AMA as being for the general mases without VERY VERY good programs focused at the local clubs with HELP ( monetary or physical), the 164,900 may not be listening (poor communications).

By the way, I know of a church group that when they start a new church establishment ( club if you will ), the word goes out to the entire organization. People sign up to build this church. Then on a given day, everyone shows up including those who will cook for the workers. In a week the entire structure is finished, the group holds a worship service, then go back to their own church (club). Now you got to give them credit, that is organization / support / communication. Is the AMA up to the task in helping our centers (clubs). The local clubs are the organizations strength in "my" opinion. The few at Muncie cannot do the work of 170,000, just organize it and provide assistance/guidance. Are they accomplishing that to the members satisfaction, or are most just into it for the insurance ..... I sure don't know ..... but I have a guess.

J_R psst... pssssst .......... should I have let this sleeping dog lie .... sorry!

MustangFan

You entirely missed my attempt at humor. Look at the picture of scottrc. He has not answered back to his own post to help out with additional information and must be asleep.

There is certainly nothing wrong with your quest for information nor the expression of your opinions

JR

Oh ...........

I must be asleep also.

Well its time for a nap anyway .....

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Huh? Wha the?

Oh, ok, I'm awake now........

Here is the deal. I belong to a club of about 15 flyers that are comprised from three small towns. At present, there are more than 12 flyers in the area that will not, and do not give a damn about being insured, they claim they are poor and want to spend their money on airplanes. I cannot change that, I have tried, but have been told to go fly myself. We fly from both city and a private field. 7 years ago, only three flyers belonged to the AMA and the rest said the hell with them. We convinced these guys all the benefits of being protected and then got the city to let us fly at their abandoned airport. I commended the AMA for its support at that time. But since they "reorganized" to the new Muncie site, there has been a lot of problems as far as communication (First notice calculated our increase at 70%, the second made about 40%)and handling paperwork (Lost membership papers, lost the charter application, and lost the site insurance paperwork that was sent registered mail). I was the secretary and had personally good relationships with the gal that was handling our account, she was honest and sincere, but had problems getting information at her end. But some other members who had their memberships screwed up claimed they had different dealings (rudeness, feeling of being ignored), and that did not help matters when I got the notice of the charter dues increase and announced we had to increase our dues as well.

Now, since these guys joined, much of their flying budget has gone to dues increases, both local, individual, and site. They now feel that the charter fees are not worth the hassle and want to dissolve the club. As of September, our club will begin the cease and the charter will be allowed to run out as of December 31, 2003.

We live in an area where the economy was always so so, and now the GNP here is almost compared to El Salvador, 2/3 of our flyer's are either unemployed, or have taken huge cuts in salaries. All of us are experiencing huge increases in insurance premiums, taxes, and utilities. We just feel we need to make cuts, and dissolving our club was the first before not being able to fly at all. The paperwork screw ups at AMA did not help convince our members that they wanted to stay. Out of fifteen voting members, only three of us voted to keep the charter. Many express that the AMA seems to focus too much on the Muncie site, and since these members claim they deal with insurance companies and banks everyday messing up information, they didn't want to deal with it in their hobby.

13 out of the fifteen members will still keep their individual memberships (Remember, only 3 of these 13 want a club). The other two will become rouges and besides forcing them at gunpoint to stop, can and will continue to fly wherever they can get away with it.

As far as flying, well, I'm still trying the convince these guys that the City is now off limits. And since one of the pilots that voted to stay in AMA is the son of the land owner who has our field, the rouge flyer's will lose that option as well. AMA members ONLY will be allowed on the property.

It would be nice if we could buy a site coverage policy for this land owner without having a club.

What will happen? Us that want to support AMA will now fly at the private field with an invite from the owner (at his own risk), and join surrounding clubs that belong to the AMA. (1 to 2 hr drive)

And the rouges will go back to flying off dirt roads and sneaking onto the golf coarse.

To get back to my personal issue with AMA, I think it needs to revamp it's image. All I get is publicity on how it is insuring its members, Some old guy with a rubber powered airplane, what improvements are being made at Muncie, and a few blurbs about kids building Delta Darts and a flying site that has been saved.

To me, it should be the other way around. There should be huge publicity on kids building airplanes and news about clubs and flying sites being saved, how it is working at protecting our frequencies and lobbying for more support from the government, Using events like TOC as huge marketing campaigns, and small blurbs about the problems we are facing with insurance. AMA loves to air dirty laundry which is quite upsetting. Yes, we need to know about it, but does it have to be so strung out in every issue and in every forum?

Scottrc:

Basically I agree with everything you say, however I just wish to expand on several thoughts. It's been said before and I'll say it again.

AMA Insurance: The insurance is, IMO, not to protect me financially as I carry a bunch of other like 2 separate HO policies, Umbrella liability, and UMA primary. WHAT AMA DOES DO is protect me from that other nimrod that may not have any current HO, UMA, or Umbrella insurance in case he HURTS ME.
Therefore I do NOT participate where non-AMA persons are allowed to fly, or in any place I see the AMA Safety Code being openly violated. For those persons that cannot afford $58 per year to provide financial protection for others that they may do damage to, then they cannot afford gas to drive to the field, so I am not concerned about their interest in the sport.

The AMA Club Charter is good through March 2004. Only the individual membership expires on Dec. 31, '03. Under the Bylaws Art. VI, you have a 30 day grace period to pay your dues. My research says that AMA would be hard-put to win a court case filed by a 2003 member in January '04, that had not paid his/her dues by 12/31.
My Club extends that same grace period.

I suggest, prior to the Club being dissolved, that you formally advise your *rogues* that if their selection of flying sites causes damage within your selected site (established farmer's field) that legal action for damages will be instituted. Otherwise their choices should be of no concern to you.

Unfortunately airing of dirty laundry is a necessity. As a veteran of 41 years of professional aviation, I assure you that the AF (13 years) was a much safer place with much less experienced aviators because they aired dirty laundry VERY WELL. OTOH, the airlines (28 years) cover up everything and no significant discussions of errors are tolerated, even among the pilots themselves.
IMO there should be a whole lot more of the accidents and the outcomes.

Now, I am definitely for getting National and Media's recognition of our sport/recreation/hobby and NOT simply in the choir-box, but by national media.
Hey, the recent crossing of the Atlantic by a model made the Wall-Street Journal. Did that blurb come from AMA? I doubt it but I do not know.

Only through national recognition of this model aviation activity can we ever attain the power to really negotiate for flying facilities at the local levels.

There are people available that could apply a lot of rudder to the current AMA course. Elect them or be one of them.

BTW, the TOC is (WAS) a private activity, and could not be a function of AMA.

I suggest, prior to the Club being dissolved, that you formally advise your *rogues* that if their selection of flying sites causes damage within your selected site (established farmer's field) that legal action for damages will be instituted. Otherwise their choices should be of no concern to you.

So if you are poor, why would you care if you are sued? No money to pay.

Hi Horrace,

I didn't think about the charter ending in March 2004. so we would be ok until then since we still have 13 members, this gives me a few months left to try to reorganize. I got a PM from a guy by here that says his club can help in trying to persuade our rouge members from leaving since a few of them end up at his field, he even suggested incorporating our club into his club and list our private site as an alternate site and to keep the dues down even more since the membership will increase quite a bit. This will also help out since he has a few members that can take the time to work out any AMA issues. Everyone in my club is working, looking for work, or supporting young families or all the above.

Back to the original subject, I was using TOC as an example to get public support for AMA since it is a very exciting event. I also used examples of AMA getting involved with Reno and Oshkosh or anything else that is aviation / public related. I feel that there is a big void in public relations if the time comes that we need support in keeping frequencies, or worse yet, rights to fly period.

Scott

IMHO, I think it would be much easier to get many people in very high places into and very much hooked on RC aeromodeling. I've mentioned this several times, but no one seems to be interested in such an idea. Get local and national government officials and their kids to visit any club so they can see just how important in the grand scheme of things our great RC endeavor truly is.

Otherwise, everyone can complain till the cows come home since no one at AMA headquarters will be fired even if they never utter another word to the membership nor do anything at all to change the hobby's downward direction.

nascarjoe

Sport-
Right, being judgment proof is one of the few advantages of being poor. "Sue 'em" seems to be Cain's favorite theme these days; must like shelling out shekels to his ambulance chaser. Of course there is no basis for legal action against the 'rogues' in this case, as they have equal rights to use of the FCC allocated frequencies and can fly anywhere they damn well please, unless prohibited by ordinance of recognized authority (that doesn't include Cain, or AMA). Maybe the rogues can get another hungry legal eagle to defend them on contingency, and counter sue for harassment by a frivolous litigant. Then they'll have Cain's big bucks and he'll enjoy being judgment proof.

Abel

>>>>>>>>>>>
I got a PM from a guy by here that says his club can help in trying to persuade our rouge members from leaving since a few of them end up at his field, he even suggested incorporating our club into his club and list our private site as an alternate site and to keep the dues down even more since the membership will increase quite a bit.
<<<<<<<<<<<<

Sounds like a great plan to me.

>>>>>>

Back to the original subject, I was using TOC as an example to get public support for AMA since it is a very exciting event. I also used examples of AMA getting involved with Reno and Oshkosh or anything else that is aviation / public related. I feel that there is a big void in public relations if the time comes that we need support in keeping frequencies, or worse yet, rights to fly period

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<


Very much in agreement. The only problem is to get AMA redirected from this Insurance Consortium that is demanding all their attention, relieve modelers from this ludicrous *Safety-Code* albatross around the member's neck and move in that publicity direction, again becoming the CHAMPION for Model Aviation and I mean the sport not the magazine.

Abel-P:

>>>>>>>> "Sue 'em" seems to be Cain's favorite theme these days;<<<<<<<<<


I had a great teacher: the AMA EC.

Hey, don't use such a wide brush. Was it really the entire AMA EC or just J.Spence driving?

Hi MustangFan

Sorry for the misunderstanding about the humor. Horrace says I don't have any. Maybe I am just a misunderstood lost little soul... LOL

I happen to agree that only about 3% or so of the AMA members care about what the AMA does or does not do. The clubs are the key to the organization and the AMA founders realized that when they put it together. What I find at my club, and any other I have been a member of, is that as long as the vast majority of members can fly, they do not care what the AMA does. Even the amount of dues is not much of a topic. They simply do not care as long as they can fly.

As far as your analogy of other churches/clubs pitching in, if my club is a any example, only about 15 % of the members will help. The other 85% just want to fly. As with the AMA, they want someone else to watch out for them and they don't care how it gets done as long as it does get done. Again, as with the AMA, a few will question what is happening, but, if it involves participation by them, they are not interested.

That leaves a very few to take care of the interests of the many. In the case of most clubs, as with the AMA, the job does get done. Those that come into this forum with opinions based on changing the AMA becasue it is an insurance company lose interest and leave when they realize that there is more to the story. Only a very few stick around to find out what the story is.

Personally, I wish that those that don't care would not vote. It is everyone's right to vote, but, casting an uninformed vote, is counterproductive. All too many members will vote for the incumbent because he is the incumbent. Very few even understand the organizational make up of the AMA. I can't count the number of times someone has posted that whatever is paid the EC, it is too much. LOL

I do have one concern with your post. You seem to believe there are problems, yet, you don't state specifically what they are. The specter of corruption really bothers me. What does that refer to?

JR

I have been modeling aircraft since I was 9 years old and I'm 79 now. I belonged to NAA before there was a branch called AMA. My first # was only three numbers long and cost $1. I can tell you from experience that without AMA we would be in deep trouble with RC right now. I'll be the first to agree that all is not perfect with AMA but then perfect is not attainable for some people no matter what the endeavor. That being said there is nothing to stop any member from trying to improve the organization, I just think it can be done without all the recrimination and name calling. We still have nationwide elections for the people that run the USA and that is our weapon. Get out and campaign for the people that at least promise what you would like to hear. Even that's no guarantee that it will turn out the way you would like but it's the way our founding fathers left us. Let's give credit for good intentions even if they aren't what we like. If a volunteer position has that much "power" let's just start from scratch and hire someone we can dismiss whenever they can't keep up with their assignments.

J_R

Your correct about the percent of caring members.

It is the same with our US government, only a handful of people vote, and some, maybe most , are uninformed voters. Some cast their vote for the person that is handsome/pretty, some for the incumbent, some to support their own agenda .Seems to be the same across the board in all organizations.

Even this church group I'm talking about most likely operates the same. The whole 170,000 or whatever do not show up Its just that they put the word out way ahead of time, and get it very organized then execute their plans to the max. Its the organization that seems to be key.

As far as who should vote and uninformed voters. Is it up to the officers to educate/help the members? We all have voting rights, but personally, I will not vote if uninformed. But who is informing/communicating. Not much activity in the campaign department.

Now for the last part that I seem to believe there are problems, corruption etc.. That mostly comes from what I have heard at the club and what I have read on RCU. If you read replys from Red and others, you get the felling all is not well in Muncie and some districts.

I really hate to say this, but personally I have NEVER viewed the AMA as anything other than the provider of secondary insurance.
The only other area I knew they had input in was contest rules and some safety guidelines. But most of this was established before AMA existed ... correct. So they just had to copy and paste and print. Then modify as necessary. Not much for an organization to handle is it? Then came frequency issues, and they coordinated that pretty well. But that is the most contact I have had with them. The remaining is more observation and curiosity that anything. I personally do not have issues. But I am just an average modeler flying with my own bunch of guys, and we need insurance to use the land owned by another. If nothing else, to cover our butts if something happens to a spectator. To my knowledge, most of the accidents to members have been covered by their own medical insurance.

But $58 bucks is OK for me. I read the mag to see what other clubs and members are doing. But I don't pay a lot of attention to the political, just some.

One thing I noticed in the Sept. mag was that District V was the only report that did not list Associate VP's. They don't have any ... or an omission? Odd!

You are not wrong about the percentage of people who actually are involved. There's an old saying, I'm sure you've heard, that says "10% of the people do 100% of the work". Fortunately I'm a member of a club in a small town, about 40 active members, and most of them show up at meetings and we have some lively discussions but no one goes away angry. We have two flying fields but as ever there's a chance that we could lose either at the drop of a hat. We do not have uninformed members who vote. All is explained in the discussion preceding a ballot. WE have a by-law that states the one who abstains is counted as a no vote. Just lucky I guess. The thing I disagree about with AMA is Muncie. I still think it could have been located differently or better still with one HQ building and 5 or 6 different flying locations around the country. But the matter is settled and no future votes will be held. It's just that Muncie was presented as a fait acomplie. I'll never be able to go there so I guess that's that, but if a chance comes up to vote against it I will.

Dennis,

I hope you don't mind a few pointers about errors in assumptions you have made or have been told.

Let me start with the "problems, corruption etc." issues.

Yes, there are problems within the organization. However the truly committed people around the country are trying to find workable solutions that are fair and equitable to all members. Note I did NOT say that the EC was working in a vacuum in this effort. Everyone in all of the various forums has an opportunity to contribute as has been indicated elsewhere. Some do and many try to destroy out of fear or something else not worthy of discussion here.

Please do not confuse moral shortcomings as corruption. I am committed against those who live under the umbrella of moral failure, as I think you know. Nor should you assume that others who scream corruption are right when the facts are available to all AMA members to verify the validity of the claims. There are some with a limited viewpoint and ulterior motives in their comments.

The rules of competition may have been a cut and paste copy 50 years ago, but today they represent many hours of volunteer work in efforts to keep them relevant with technology. Please do not assume anything less as that is dissing the organization and all its hard working people.

Your observations about insurance are correct, but you may have missed the most important single value the AMA has for most. If you want to take a trip somewhere and 'show your stuff', competitively or not, the AMA enables that to happen through the standardization of insurance coverages and expiration dates.


Ballgunner you have made the same type of observations that many have and I agree with you in part. We already spent the money on the site and own it and the special use improvements. That is an unrecoverable investment we need to capitalize on. In my opinion that is the next challenge WE need to address rather than worry about the past wrongs done by others.

Jim
I don't mind pointers at all.
Sure sad that the organization, as small as it is, has succumbed to big business shortcomings. But that seems to be human nature. Where there is money, seems there are problems and or people taking advantage.

Sure hope that the truly committed people get it sorted out and work together to inform the not so committed so we can cast "good" votes. As always in America, the majority rules, even if the "majority" is wrong. One problem it seems is that a "large" majority do not vote, which leaves a "small" majority to govern. A problem even the American Presidential election has.

But I DO feel "committed" to the RC pastime ( don't like the words hobby or modeling ... seems childish). I promote it on the local level. And I believe that "MOST" of the promotion of our pastime is accomplished on the local level. The AMA can support us and give us good guidelines etc., but the strength in numbers is not at Muncie, its "at the flying sites" ... (don't like the words flying field either).

Has anyone ever thought that the AMA has or is becoming something they need not be. Are they just deceiving themselves as to what their mission should be in order to create "their establishment". Just a thought ... but it may stir up too much. Just what does the local guy at his flying site need compared to the relatively few that will travel and compete.

But ballgunner has stated something that seems to be reiterated by many. If this is/was the common thinking, just how did all this money get spent on something that most will not get a chance to enjoy? And just how did the vote get cast to go forward with the project?

Jim, I've been out of RC for some time and just recently (2 yr.s) started back, so I don't have any idea what went on. You do not owe me any explanation just because I ask and am not informed. Just questions in my brain that I'm sure can be answered from members at my club.

But I do agree with you that we must capitalize on it ... well stated! I guess we are all hoping that when the org. "finds workable solutions that are fair and equitable to all members", that good decisions from here on will be made.

I liked how you stated that .... hmmmmm "finds WORKABLE solutions that are FAIR and EQUITABLE TO ALL MEMBERS". Did you ever think of running for office .... or have we covered that already .... oh .... we did. Go JIM go !

Why is it that this hobby has no recognition in the world outside of AMA members? Year after year, I see televised events of pool tournaments, surfing, skatboarding, bowling etc. I don't know why this hobby just don't catch on? Ask anyone thats not in the hobby who Quiche Somanzini is? they'll probably think he's some breakfast dish, or Chip Hyde, Bob Hunt, Dave Brown, and the list can go on. NOW ask someone, who Tony Hawk is? Oh yeah the knarly skateboard dude, I'm sure they heard of Dick Weber, Minnesota Fats, The whole world watched Bobby Fisher play chess! I am in no way discrediting these fine gentlemen, they do what they do very well, as does Quiche, Dave Brown, Bob hunt etc. I think part of the problem is ignorance, for example, My club's council members contacted local people in real estate plus city council members. We asked them to put out some feelers on finding us a new flying site for our radio control aircraft, we were handed back the most useless places to fly, you would'nt believe it! Some of the places you could'nt fly control line let alone R/C. We invited some of those same people to a club meeting, and they were floored at the size of some of the aircraft there, they had no idea how huge a .40 size trainer was, A .40 SIZE TRAINER! I've been into modeling since 1958, and the public's view has not changed since.

It still amazes me why modelers keep asking these questions. Fact is, as Pogo, the great philosopher said, "We have met the enemy, and they is us." We all, to some degree, suffer from the favorite fishing hole syndrome. I've belonged to and/or visited many RC flying clubs over the years, but have just recently, thanks to a most amazing RC flight programmer, (instructor just doesn't do this guy's teaching ability justice), learned to fly and fly quite well.
In literally all of these clubs, beginners are for the most part, given only token help. So-called "instructors" only go through the motions of providing training and after talking to many veteran fliers, I've discovered that literally no one talks about their hobby to relatives, friend, neighbors, people they work with...no one. Which may be the reason our sport is so unknown.

The impression I get is that if a club member gets someone interested, they will have to provide training. Those who teach absolutely don't want to further inconvenience themselves by bringing in more newbies, and those who don't teach, may have been told by those who do, in no uncertain terms, not to volunteer someone else's flying time and whoever brings people into the hobby will do the teaching. Imagine if a 100 member club did the right thing and trained everyone to fly solo, talk about incrediably crowded flight lines.

If clubs really wanted to get more people into the hobby, why don't all clubs provide instruction 4 or more days per week, instead of the one or two days, (if at all) some clubs offer?

Suppose clubs asked government officials to come to your club's training night or a meeting. First thing he would notice would be there would nothing but retirement age members there. He or she might ask that if this is such a great hobby/sport, why is there only 25 members at a meeting and only 15 active members and only 2 instructors and that the roster never seems to increase?
Also, why after its 60 years of existance, there are only 170,000 AMA members? And of those 170,00, there are only 20,000 kids in a US population of 281,000,000? How many voters from clubs would there be in a given location?

I'm sure many, many exuses will arise, but chances are it will not impress the government official when it comes time to asking for more flying fields.

nascarjoe

Hmm, where to start.

Nascarjoe, please do not take anything I say as a personal remark but as an observation based on what 'shows'. Before starting I have to say that Pogo was right on target, even here.

I am afraid your point of view is/has been poorly colored by the crowd you fly around and with because I know that what you have described happens, just not everywhere! In fact what you described as normal seems to be less than acceptable in the places I have been, visited, and am familiar with.

In my club instruction is given whenever by who ever. I admit that there are few instructors, but better few willing to fly someone else's plane than lots of newbie crashes by unprepared instructor wanna be's. An example of that is I have a student that everyone who instructs has washed their hands of, he may solo around the first of the year. In almost every club I have ever been a part of, getting new members was always a goal and teaching them was part of the community effort. That makes me think you are seeing a local oddity rather than a serious problem nationally, but I could be wrong.

As for club meetings, it is a reasonably rare case when much over 20 to 30 percent of the membership shows up. I guess that is good for clubs with membership over 100 since meeting places tend to get expensive as more people need to be seated. The issue is not how many people go to the meeting, but how many (percentage wise) are having what they define as fun.

The better way many have found is to get the local politicians involved with a visit to the flying field on a weekend before asking for things. That gets them 'educated' to what our "needs" are and what kind of things we do. Those visits also set the tone of things so that potential complaints are viewed a little less enthusiastically against us.

One of the important things everyone seems to miss is that old folks vote more than kids. That means showing your politician a flight line of old folks on buddy box has more impact that a bunch of kids flying with instructors. The latter is ballyhooed as the great AMA way, but we all know that sooner or later they will discover girls. The politicians are not as dumb as we insist because they know that also. The politician also sees kids with R/C models as spoiled rich brats and that point of view does not help us at all.

My opinion, but I am willing to be educated into a different one.

frankflyboy1

We do what we do away from people, as much as we can. Although some of us fly at parks, most of us fly as far away from people as we can. We build our planes pretty much in private, again, away from people.

There are plenty of hobbies/sports that get little or no attention. Biathlon comes to mind. Because it is an Olympic sport, it gets 5 minutes of coverage in the middle of the night on TV. Except when Bobby Fischer play against a computer, chess gets zero coverage. About the only time we see mountain climbing is when someone falls off or dies on a mountain. There are a tremendous number of examples of activities that get no exposure.

I think that most of us would agree that Pattern is the pinnacle of our sport when measuring mastery of a plane (sorry racers and scale guys). Have you ever watched a Pattern contest? After a couple of flights it is like watching the grass grow. Even at the TOC, the spectators found something to do between freestyle rounds in order to stay awake. It's just my opinion, but it would make horrible TV. Ever seen a thermal duration sailplane contest? Even the contestants have been known to fall asleep. Talk about watching the grass grow.

The best we can hope for is a minute or two of air time with planes boring holes in the sky and/or a quick interview. Our stuff makes better commercials than actual coverage.

Keep in mind that it takes a special sort of person to be involved. This is not for the risk adverse activity. We tend to be the sort that are not interested in having government control us. We don't want to be put in a bubble to protect us from risk all of our lives. We put our fingers, our hearing, and our bodies at risk each time we go to the flying site, not to mention some of the stuff we use to build with. That fact alone alienates us from a huge portion of the population.

And then there are women. Women, in general, show very little interest in what we do. I don't know why. I tried to get my daughter interested when she was younger. No way. Now she is married and her husband enjoys going to the field with me, but she still finds something better to do. There goes another 50%+ of the population.

It's always seemed to me you can spot a potential member of our hobby. Just look for the guy that looks up when a plane goes over and watches it. On any street you can see it. It's not a very high percentage of the folks on the street.

All of this does not mean we can't have political clout by pulling together through our numbers. I have never seen a guess or statistic that shows the actual numbers involved. Mine is somewhere around a million. Enough to demand support from government IF we pull together.

So.. we remain an almost invisible, relatively small and committed group of friends and buddies having fun at what we do. A group that ranges from the very young to the very old. Maybe that is as it should be.

JR

Jim,
No problem, I won't take it personally. My main point was that the politician will not see kids in the hobby. If someone wants a little league, baseball, football or soccer field for the kids, who can turn down such a request? Surely not a politican as the kid's parents are the voters. My idea was to present RC aeromodeling to the politician in the same vein as for little league and as an educational tool. Problem is, there are no kids to show the politican. Keep in mind, we would be selling this from a non modeler's perspective, not from what we think might be the true situation with kids. What about RC school programs?

You do have a good idea about getting the politican out to the field to see what our sport is all about. And if he gets hooked on the sport, that would be the icing on the cake we need.

I've been studying this situation for many years from personal experience as a member of a half dozen clubs, not to mention information from close to a hundred beginners, who have shared the same sad story over and over again. Even the best clubs may bring in only a very small number of members annually. My point is for the politican looking at the big picture, i.e., after 60 years, (on paper), there are only 170,000 members. No matter how you look at it, it definitely looks like we are keeping our "light" under a very deep and dark bushel.

AMA tried to essentially triple their numbers with their Sign 3 and Fly Free Ambassador program, but after 3 years, only 151, out of 150,000 members took advantage of the program; only 3000 new members have been signed up. Is it that difficult to find 3 new members?

nascarjoe