Hi Jon,
It's going to be a lot of work for you, and only you know whether
you're up for the task or not. I remember layout construction
increased it's membership by around 200 in less than a week.
There were militating circumstances to be sure, but that's still
a lot of traffic!
I agree that in order to stimulate discussion we should encourage
more folks to get involved in the group. Having said that, I'm pretty
sure that you will still have to put up with a number of "off topic"
threads such as:
1) The homasote/foamboard controversy
2) Aged lumber vs. ripped plywood along with a treatise on the
various types and grades of said plywood,and
3) The ubiquitous DCC threads that tend to last as long as a good flu.
These topics seem to be part and parcel of the construction side of
things which is the second item in your mandate. Although they do
nothing for me personally, I don't know how you can avoid them when a
lister announces or questions the merits of materials in the
construction of their own small layout.
To encourage further list membership, one could advertise at train
shows, preferably with a module or small layout present to emphasize
the concept. Better yet, get one of the groups' layouts published in
a popular mag and plug the site!
You could also consider a website or SIG membership to promote the
concepts internationally.
I realize this is alot of extra work, but hey, you asked :>)
I think you've put a tremendous amount of work/thought into the group
so far, and I'm interested in seeing it develop.
Realistically, the quickest way to expand a group is to go public.
Release the hounds Jon, and good luck!
Jeff Hatcher
"Please fasten your seatbelts and observe the no flaming signs"
--- In small-layout-design@y..., jonp@b... wrote:
Hello All --
How would the members of this list feel about the list finally
"going
public"?
small-layout-design (SLD) is presently "not listed in directory" at
Yahoo Groups. I wanted to keep it this way initially to see how
things pan out at LDSIG and LayoutConstruction.
LDSIG has gotten to be quite a noisy place without a lot being said
about layout design lately.
LayoutConstruction is growing nicely and it seems to be evolving
into
a pretty good general discussion group.
So – I'm thinking that the time may be here for SLD to do an
IPO and
finally go public – that is, get listed in the Yahoo Groups
directory
and undertake some self-promotion to build membership and get more
discussion happening.
As the moderator of the group, there's just one thing that I would
really like to encourage:
** I'd like for us to stay on topic. **
On topic for this group is small layout design, construction and
operation. On topic for us can range from how you found and
researched a layout design element to how you actually built and
operate your layout. Even if you have a larger layout, you can
stay
on topic here by discussing your approaches to planning and the
lessons you learned in the process.
OFF topic for this group would be posts about where to find
homasote,
which type of homasote to use, how to carry homasote home in the
car,
whether it's worth it or not to rent the pickup truck from Home
Depot
for $19 per hour to carry homasote home, "hey, my local lumber guy
carries my homasote home for me for free so give him a call if you
live in South Carolina"… you get the idea! General modelling
and
construction posts are off topic here unless they illustrate a
particular aspect of small layout construction and design.
If we're straying off topic and things are getting overly noisy or
too general, I may try to nudge the list back towards its focus.
If
things get really out of hand, I may change the settings on the
group
and make it completely moderated where messages are reviewed before
being posted on the list. I'm not trying to be a control freak or
anything like that, but I just want to see this list stick to its
goals.
So – let me know what you think about going public. If there's
another way that we could increase the list membership and
stimulate
discussion, let me know and we'll see what we can do.
Thanks –
Jon Piasecki
Moderator
Small Layout Design
