Re: [802SEC] Responses on venue for March 2009 - Please VOTE Now !!!
Hi -
There are two concepts that have floated thru this discussion that I find
rather disturbing. I'm not trying to offend - but I know of no easy way to
say this via email (where one can't smile etc to lessen the emotional impact
of saying something someone may not want to hear) - uh, but, I'm beginning
to think SEC attitudes have taken on some of the (at least to me) negative
attributes of a government bureaucracy...
Have any SEC members ever been annoyed when government acts as if it knows
what's good for you better than you do?
Would you be surprised or troubled by the idea that you're considering
acting in the same manner?
1) Attempting to dictate behavior via taxes.
The idea of charging more for registration depending on where one stays I
find very troublesome. I perceive this as an attempt to force behavior via
taxation. I strongly prefer a free market approach - if 802 offers value,
people will stay at the meeting hotel, if we don't they won't. The "penalize
them 'cuse they aren't doing what I want" attitude is annoying. In fact, I
have to honestly say that I find it very offensive - I realize some others
don't, but I do - and I thought someone should at least offer the other
viewpoint for consideration.
2) Robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Along the same lines, I find the concept of artificially making the nNA reg
fess lower by "borrowing from the treasury" to be disingenuous. The only
reason for doing that is to make the reg fee required for nNA APPEAR to be
less. The motivation is clearly a concern that members will not attend nNA
because of the higher fees involved.
What justifies taxing attendees a lower cost sessions to pay for attendees
at higher cost sessions?
This registration fee redistribution comes smells to me like "Tax 'em cuse
we can; we'll put it in the general fund to use as we see fit; we know
what's good for 'em better than they do". The idea makes me shudder....
If one really thinks that attendance is a function of registration fee, the
logical extrapolation is that transferring part of the fee to NA venues will
negatively impact NA attendance - it seems that this relationship is being
conveniently ignored in the discussion.
I'd ask Sec members to try to strive to lean more toward "represent the
members and do what they want" and less toward "make the members do what SEC
wants".
Dave
____________
David Bagby
Calypso Ventures, Inc.
office: (650) 637-7741
email: Dave@CalypsoVentures.com or David.Bagby@ieee.org
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