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It would be interesting to hear the AMA's side of the story.....without giving whoever fields the question ample time to "cook up" an answer. This is where the email method of questioning does not work, you will stand a better chance of knowing the truth by looking the other person dead in the eye and face to face. This is one reason why I don't think contacting the AMA by phone or email about anything carries very much weight.
Might as well ask a hobo if the $20 bill on the ground is his.

BTW, when are the "AMA SOCK PUPPET" patches due to come out?

That's a good one Mr. Toolman.

The following is just a long rambling concerning this AMA Safety Officer/Coordinator thing in a general sense.

A few years ago, IIRC, it was Sandy Frank that originated the requirement, and I'm too lazy to look it up now to confirm. It's all eyewash, the current District Safety Coordinators do WHAT?? There have been a few good ones along the way, however if the Club Officers do not back the Club Safety Coordinator, he will be unable to accomplish anything worthwhile. If the Club SO doesn't do anything then the DVP appointed District SO becomes simply a voice in the wilderness and soon gives up the fight.

Anyway, I became a club safety coordinator, but after a couple years of doing little things like getting a large map up at the field of local emergency clinics, phone numbers, a fair amount of first aid supplies available, getting some safety signs in place, reporting to the club several bad habits on the facility, and every so often reviewing such with some offenders, there was one on-going thing that regardless of my harping, was getting worse and worse. That was an almost disregard for the club's posted rules concerning freq. control. (Remember AMA Safety Code requires compliance with local club rules.) A number of persons, especially old geezers, like me, that had not much time in the RC sport, just refused to take freq. control very seriously and unclipped transmitters were constantly all around the pit and shelter area tables.

OK, I hear a few already preparing a lambasting that everyone should all go 2.4ghz. Well, friends, that is a long way off, same as everyone should be a computer geek. I live more in a world of reality than the current tiptoeing in the tulips lifestyle.

Therefore I advised the club officers of my desire to address the problem. I did. The club Pres. then led his group of followers in a move to rescind the rule requiring the transmitters to have a clip on them. That helped nothing. Some of the elites walk around with 3 clips on their shirt. Try to explain to a student/newbie why he should have a clip on his transmitter if the elders and younger elites do not have to do so.

I had prepared for such and had a prepared letter of resignation along with my reasons. Copies of said letter were sent to the DVP and various Safety Coordinators. No answers were forthcoming.

The Pres appointed a new Club SC, who in the years so doing, has done nothing to enhance safety, or at least anything that I can see. He is a great human person, but will never get in anyone's face nor make any recommendations for any improvement. If a name on a form is all the Club Safety Coordinator needs, then he is a fine one.

Therefore my experience in this life for 45 years of belonging to clubs, the "required" club safety coordinator is about as worthless as a bureaucracy can come up with. It is just eyewash to make someone feel good.

I do not see AMA doing anything of such magnificence within the Safety department that requires email communication other than receiving and issuing spam. While if real items were accomplished with email or by AMA, it would save considerable money to do so. That is a fact, but just for toothless spam, it's a waste of time and effort.

Gentlemen, I do NOT conduct REAL business via email. I do not intend to start now. [>:]


Horrace Cain

"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."

Yes, so far all we have read is hearsay. I don't think RB is going to go to AMA for a face to face.
It's a sock puppet it cannot be a patch.
The 20 is mine.

This my friends is the best point made so far...No "real" buisness is done via Email...If safety is so important this is a very poor means.

BTW our SC may only check his email whenever...

Hoss, My orignal post has word for word what she sent to our v.p. (it is a copy an paste) that he sent on to me. When I was finally able to contact her, after severals tries, she said it was what some committee or something had passed and that was the way it was. She more or less told me to like it or lump it in a round about way. So I just told her to use the v.p. or my email addy. That seem to make her happy, and away we went on our merry ways...[8D]

It's the general principle of the whole thing that P****d me off Hoss. To hold up a club charter for something simple like that is just plain silly. Most rules are not passed for the peoples good as much as they are to line somebodys pocket or to add to somebodys power base.


Ronnie The Toolman

My guess is and this is only a guess. They get 2400 plus charters each year. Some are not complete and the info is required. AMA contacts the club and says we need this info but we did send charter. AMA never gets needed info and latter something happens. So what they do is We can't send you your charter until we have all the required info.

LOL, those guys would have a hard time developing that patch. You truly have a good sense of humor CP. A tiny stick drawing of a person with a stick-em-up style bandanna standing behind a huge megaphone would work.

And plus, that wouldn't be a patch to be proud of.

I will try to answer your questions for you.
The phone was in use befor AMA came along.
Mail service was in use befor AMA came along.
As for spoken language I beleive it has been around longer than AMA.

Oh, I get it. It'd be just awful if the AMA tried to use any sort of communication method that didn't exist in 1936. Brilliant!

i don't see where they say it is a requirement that the SO check the email, just that he have an address.

I dont think anyone here is against folks at the field using a cell phone to contact AMA about an accident.

Remember, this is about Muncie being able to email us,
they dont need our email address on file for us to send them an email a few days after an accident.

They would need our email address if they had info to send out to us,
info that is so urgent that it cant wait to be printed in MA (the alleged primary method of communicating to the members), yet not urgent enough to actually call us. It is for info that cant wait for the monthly magazine but can wait the day or two or week or 4 or more till some old guy gets help to check a yahoo account we forced onto him.

KE, do you really think you will be able to convince the "Illuminati" who are present here that the phone system is still the best way to go? Might as well try to get a sack of hammers to float .

I like Hosses' explanation for how and why email became a requirement, it sounds par for the course.

I'll bet at least 1/2 the guys who think that having email is necessary for a SO also think that it is necessary to dress their Little Leaguers up like hockey goalies before they go up to home plate.
It's that same kind of mentality.

This thread is even more funny than the bottom feeder thread. Thanks for the entertainment.

Frank

Mr. Mitchell, you have it exactly correct. There is no problem with using e-mail as a means of information dissemination, but requiring it to get a charter is ridiculous.

Once again I have had to step in and clean up this thread because some people in here can't seem to discuss anything without resorting to petty and childish arguments. This needs to stop immediatly. If this issue can't be discussed without the name calling and childish behavior I'll lock down this thread and start sitting some people in the corner. Does that sound silly for me to say? Well, if members here are going to behave like children then I'll have to start dealing with them as such. The choice is yours guys. Let's grow up and discuss this issue like adults

Ken

I saw no need to remove Hoss's post an my reply back to him.


Ron

Beyond that it's probably the preferable way.

Given that they are hung up on the SO having the email address, I can only conclude, as others have, that the purpose is for quick dissemination of safety related information of some sort. If time is not of the essence then a notification in the magazine would do the trick just as well. But why specify JUST the SO? Why not any club officer? Certainly the subset of clubs with no officers having email is smaller than the set of clubs with an SO not having email. AMA sets up an address group with what they do have, and for the few and far between times when some sort of emergency communication IS required out goes a broadcast email. Then, someone picks up the phone for those clubs with no email contact at all.

Can someone please tell me when was the last time AMA saw fit to make some sort of short term emergency communication to all of the clubs?

Hold up a charter for this? Someone isn't thinking straight.

The last I can recall is the "explosive venting" issues as LiPos were gaining widespread acceptance a few years ago. Reading about it in MA and RCU seemed to get the word out pretty good, though the AMA did an email push too.

All the AMA said was, "give us a e-mail address" so they can finish processing the paper work. Use anybody's e-mail who cares. They never said he had to have one in his house, just any one. It's a requirement live with it. Try and register here for the first time. If you don't give them all the information RCU wants you don't get in. Such a mountain out of a ant hill. Right now my biggest worry is getting good weather to fly. Can't do much about that either, but I'm not posting a complaint about the weather man getting it wrong. AGAIN. Dennis

Exactly. That's what we did ( use another's officers E Mail) until the new safety officer was appointed. What the big problem here? Mike

techno-facsism begins with acceptance

Ok I give up whats that mean? Mike

You are entirely correct. There are more than a few ways to circumvent the requirement and not hold up a club charter.

The other side of the coin, though, is that someone in AMA thinks that they're building this nice communications network where they can easily and rapidly contact SO's at clubs all across the country. That's not happening when they are supplied "anybody's email", or an email that was set up for an SO that doesn't have a computer.

By holding up a charter to get "anybody's" email address they are essentially torpedoing their own system. It's a GOOD idea, but POORLY implemented. Why not just recognize that there is going to be a small number of SO's or clubs that don't do email, and say "OK, give us a phone number instead" rather than "OK, you don't get a charter"? Wouldn't that make more sense?

Dads
Actually, what the meaning of what they said is
No charter for you till you give us some email address, any address, worthless or not, checked as little as quarterly by the SO.

That is the problem.
If the SO email is soooo important,
it shouldnt be kicked to the side here by folks telling the old guy SO to have a yahoo account setup for him that he will never use.

We've heard folks here say how easy it is to just put any old address in that slot.
Doesnt that kinda go against the requirement for the SO to specifically have a email listed along with the other club officer emails? Why would Muncie make that a deal breaker, that regardless of the other club emails the SO must have one too. Obviously they already know to use one of the other club emails when the SO isnt listed..... so why would that stop a charter?

Can Muncie email info to the club? Yes,
but No Charter For You cause there is one particular officer without email, that Muncie is just assuming the other officers refuse to convey Safety mails to. I used to get invoice emails at work that were clearly intended to go to accounting but got sent to IT Dept .... I didnt call the vendor and tell them to cancel the order and reissue with a different email address for the gal 3 doors up the hall, I obviously just sent that invoice along to accounting.

Just like Muncie simply contacted the club via one of the other email addresses (now post#9)

Heck, he's not even an oficer anymore, just a 'coordinator'
.... whats next, holding up a charter till they get the MowerGuy email
for important lawn care info from muncie that cant wait for our monthly ARF Ad Entertainment Publication ?

If the info is urgent, it shouldnt be sent to a blind unchecked SO email black hole.
It is not rocket science for Muncie to use one of the other club emails if there is no email for the SO.




BOB had a good question.
Just what has been so urgent that it had to be emailed to the SO's,
but only the SO's, not the club general officers,
rather than having some monthly newsletter of the AMA for getting info to the members