North American Ships in Bottles Association

[Chasseur]

As suggested by Daniel I'll start a new thread on this topic.

Here are my thoughts:

1. Use Bottled Ship Builder to promote this idea and get active participation from members.

2. Have members participate in supplying articles to the executive board for NASBA to publish electronically.

3. Membership would be an annual fee of $10 USD per annum and someone aka myself and maybe Daniel to proofread and provide 4 PDF electronic versions of the journal to members.

4. Funds go back to Bottled Ship Builder to keep things going financially with respect to the website and possibly purchase some software for formatting purposes regarding the journal.

5. I would basically be the editor in chief and work for free!

 

Jeff

 

Edited March 15, 2018 by Chasseur
typo

[DSiemens]

Very interesting ideas.  I'll need to think through them all. 

I'm not sure how I feel about it funding the site.  Not that it wouldn't be nice but Bottled Ship Builder has always been all inclusive.  I've enjoyed the fact that we so many members from all over the globe.  I want to be careful not to exclude others or make people feel they have to join the North American Association to be a part of Bottled Ship Builder. 

  I am all for promoting all of the ship in bottle associations.  I've enjoyed the many posts from members of the European association and I've very much enjoyed being a part of at least one of their activities.  I would definitely promote a North American Association and proudly be part of one.  I just think Bottled Ship Builder has become an international community.  Would it be fair to ask all North Americans to fund an international site or imply that people internationally should join a North American Association for the sake of funding an international site?   Ethically I think there needs to be a separation.  

I think we should think about what the mission of NASBA would be.  I like the idea of a monthly news letter.  Digital or otherwise.  I would like to carry on the idea of ship in bottle day on October 4th as set up by David Lavoie and SIBAA.  I think it would be fun to expand that into something.  Not sure what but it feels like we should do something on that day.  What else can we do that would be support ship in bottle builders in our region? 

After we've decided that membership fees would reflect that mission.  For instance if we mail out news letters membership fees would go to printing and mailing.  Once we have a scope of the mission we can figure the rest out.    

           

  

[Chasseur]

Good thoughts. As far as printing and mailing I would say no to that. Here are my reasons:

I write articles for Lone Warrior and we decided to stray away from printing and mailing snail mail. There is just too much time and cost associated with it. We also offer individuals space to advertise at the end of the journal as well. It’s all digital now and readership has increased.

I think your idea of not funding Bottle Ship Builder is admirable. However people should understand that’s coming out of your pocket. If we get enough subscribers I was thinking some funds could help with your associated costs and the rest could go towards purchasing some software for editing. I just sent an email to Terry Butler and she gave me some suggestions regarding software. I also asked if her and David Lavoie would be willing to contribute articles. 

As far as the national community and North America is concerned I think what we could do is ... if you’re still adamant about not charging then ... we could do what Model Ship World does and just have a donations bar at the top of the home page and people could contribute as they feel led to do so.

If that is the route we go then I could create a journal in Word and then send out as a PDF to those who subscribe. It would still be on a quarterly basis or maybe Bi-annual?  Or maybe it’s just a monthly news letter to start with?

I like your idea about ship in bottle day as that’s actually my birthday :-)

I’ll leave this up to you and maybe we should poll our readers to see what they want?

Jeff

 

Edited March 16, 2018 by Chasseur

[DSiemens]

I have a donation bar.  Maybe I need to make it bigger.    

Many have donated and its been incredibly helpful.  I appreciate every one being a part of of our little community of ship builders.

I have a thought that would make me feel more comfortable payment wise.  I'm pretty sure I can make exclusive pages within this forum.  I'll have to look into it but if I can what we could do is basically rent website space to associations.  That means we can post the newsletters and articles online, as well as other exclusive content that can be accessed by that associations members.  I would just grant special access to that section of the forum.  If this is possible I'd be happy to set it up for any association that would like it.  

This would mean people could join associations and get exclusive content within Bottled Ship Builder based on whichever association they were a part of.  

[Chasseur]

Yes make it Bigger I had to look closer to find it. 

Okay, I like the idea of; that means we can post the newsletters and articles online, as well as other exclusive content that can be accessed by that association's members.  I would just grant special access to that section of the forum.  If this is possible I'd be happy to set it up for any association that would like it.  

Daniel .... see if you can set it up for the North American Ships in Bottles Association (NASBA) and others. If you want you can be the Executive/webmaster and I will gladly be the Editor in Chief. I'll work on formatting a template for a journal/newsletter/logo if that's okay with you?

Please advise ...Jeff

Edited March 16, 2018 by Chasseur

[exwafoo]

Can I add a couple of points ref a magazine?

EASIB publishes a quarterly magazine. I know the editor sometimes has difficulty in obtaining enough material, some times he has too much. It also takes a fair bit of time to produce, so think hard about a monthly mag , it may be a step too far to start with.  Later on, if there is enough material, then go for it. I also know that producing and posting the hard copy takes up most of the annual subs.

Soft copy is good, most people can print it out these days if they wish.

But its still nice when the mag drops through the letterbox.

Alan

[Chasseur]

I agree with Alan, monthly is just too much to cope with.

[DSiemens]

Jeff - It appears our website host makes setting up an association section incredibly easy.   If you look in the main bar there is now a tab called Clubs.  Right now anyone can set up a club.  You can make clubs public private or a few options in between.  I have set it so that clubs need to be verified before they are set up.  I'd like to test the club option out and see if it meet's out needs.  

  If it doesn't there is another option where I could set up a separate forum I'd create a group for the individuals within the association. Individuals in the association would be able to see and access the forum and those not in the association would not see it.  I'd like to try the club option first since it appears to be more stream lined.    

[Chasseur]

Okay sounds good please give it a try!

Jeff

[Chasseur]

If we set it up as a not for profit club then there is no worries about taxes or any other legalities. So we might have to look at a different name other than NASBA. Maybe we poll our members and ask for a suggestion to a club name and something really simple regarding a name like Bottle Hounds, Scallywags, or Bottle Builders etc. ?

Thoughts?