[mfg-smartcam] this mail list

[Gregg Olson]

Hello everyone!   I'm sure some of you were wondering if I really existed or whether I was just a product of John Gent's imagination.   Its been great to see the response on this mail list, and I thought the first thing I should share with you are my thoughts on the list itself.   I've seen a couple questions on what's going to happen to this list?   Well ... eventually MRS is going to have to take over responsibility for the list   So at the very least, its going to necessitate a server change at some point.  But we'd like to take it further than that.  Currently there are only 333 subscribers to the list and not all of them are even SmartCAM customers.  Even so,  that's only a tiny fraction of the number of people we estimate who are still using SmartCAM in the world today.  What we'd like to do is make it a membership based list that's for active customers and subscribers and other key SmartCAM community members.  That way we will be able to share more confidential support information and business planning information with the list than I feel we currently can give out, given the current list membership.  (I'm sure the gentleman from Gibbs who is a current member of the list would understand.)   I see membership in the list being included if you're a part of the 'current' customer base.  That means  if you're on active maintenance or have a current version from MRS that includes maintenance you would automatically have free membership.   If you were a customer but not active, in other words, you have an older version and you're not on maintenance, then you could join the list for a small admin fee.  If however you're not really a customer, dealer or some other trusted member of the community  (but say a competitor for instance) you would not be allowed membership to the list.   I understand that things we publish to the list will eventually get out if someone wants it bad enough, I just don't want to mail it to them directly.   I'd like to see the list continue to carry the kinds of technical discussions and Q&A that it currently does, but I'd also like to develop it as primary vehicle for delivering company and product announcements, tech tips, support info, etc.  For it to be truly effective however we need to expand it to include a much larger segment of the customer base.  This can have both positive and negative effects.  It makes for a much larger knowledge pool to tap into, but it might also have the effect of lowering the standards for communications on the list.   That leads me to list etiquette.   This list has always operated at a very high level.  If the list membership begins to expand, we would like to count on the original membership to set an example and help maintain that high level of integrity.  We see the members of this list as probably being the most representative of the type of customer we want to have and keep.  Surprisingly, when we conducted our survey last year, we discovered there are still a small number of SmartCAM users who are completely unconnected with no internet or email at work OR at home.  Unfortunately we may have to leave some of them behind.  We aren't going to have the resources to do onsite visits.  We will need to conduct a lot more business (product and services) over the phone and internet.   Finally, I saw a comment in one of the earlier responses to 'buy American'.   I want to remind everyone that SmartCAM is a worldwide product, and the membership of this list reflects that.  We all need to remain aware of that as we post here.  Now, having said that, I think I understand the sentiment behind the statement, so given the global nature of SmartCAM,  I think the phrase 'support a living wage' conveys that same sentiment and honors the global nature of this forum, and is something we support here at MRS.   Thanks again for all the encouraging responses, --gregg