[vcf-midatlantic] Let's add value to the club, and have fun doing it!!!

[Evan Koblentz]

Some of these are very good suggestions. Others we're already working on behind the scenes.

A few comments below...

>> Have members in various areas do membership drives at various events (Hamfests/Electronic Shows/Other computer club meetings/Etc.)

Bill Drom. suggested recently that we make a standard VCF business card and give everyone a stack for distribution to potential new members. We will probably do that soon. (The card will have contact info for the group itself, not for individual members.)


>> Since we’re doing educational activities, if anyone has experience in applying for grants, that’s one route we could explore.... contacting companies that have been in business for many years

This is the biggest fish. We are already working on it behind the scenes.


>> Have a “portable” museum.

It's not cost-effective for us to purchase, insure, and maintain a vehicle. For now our road-show focus is on having exhibits at other conferences. We already exhibit every year at the Trenton Computer Festival, World Maker Faire, and HOPE, along with various smaller events. Those events provide the most return for our effort/money.


>> Offer online social network (or member’s only/private group on Facebook)

We'll consider that.


>> Offer online/web based emulation of many vintage systems with demos and programs to help introduce millennials to vintage computing.

Already exists at Archive.org and many other places. No point in putting our resources toward reinventing it.


>> Replace/update the mail-list to one with a web-based interface.  I feel like we took a HUGE step backwards

The vast majority of our members prefer the email list. Also keep in mind that using the list format is, by design, a tribute to what we do: preserve the past.

However, there's a good chance that the VC Forum will soon have regional sub-forums.

What I think ought to exist -- but I don’t know if it does, or if it's easy/hard to do -- is a way to automatically popular a regional forum with the contents of our list messages. Wouldn't that be neat? Every message on this list would automatically show up as a post in a VC Forum subcategory called Mid-Atlantic. Someone has to do the homework to find out how to execute that.

It could also work in the other direction, but that might be more difficult because of the way forum replies function.