Re: Re: bias?

 

I am not sure that the You in your statement is directed at me, but I assure you that I have not ignored your efforts. They are wonderful. But just as I have failed to make AIS grow, all of your work has not been enough to make SIGNA grow. The things you have done are essential and AIS has been behind in doing the same types of things, although we are working on them. It takes more effort to move a large ship than a smaller one. About twenty years ago when I brought together Brian Mathew, George Rodionenko and a host of other people i proposed to SIGNA that they should create a distinguished service award and present it to some of the SIGNA notables at that conference. In particular since I knew Roy Davidson was coming I had hoped the SIGNA board could give him this honor. Roy was the main person who created SIGNA bringing it from a robin to a section of AIS. Unfortunately The SIGNA board was not interested in recognizing their founders individually. This is also why the board would not accept the species Medal to be named as the Bruce Richardson/Roy Davidson/JeanWitt Medal. The argument was that they could not honor individuals because so many had contributed. A year later Roy Davidson died and SIGNA still does not honor their members for service. But if there was such an award I would certainly vote for you to recieve it for all you have done. I try very hard to acknowledge peoples efforts, unlike SIGNA.

Sadly Although the SIGNA website and the Aril Society website are very, very, important for the life of the society, the average gardener does not know enough to come to those sites. Although a few connect that Irises have species, most Iris lovers only discover the species and especially the arils after they have come to AIS. In the Iris Encyclopedia most specialty groups have links on the pages that apply to them. If the Encyclopedia can be successful it should be able to drive to success of the sections and other Iris Societies. I did some comparitive analysis of the traffic of the AIS website and the section websites. The Species site is the most successful but even that site gets between a hundredth and a thousandth the number visitors. Currently traffic on all garden sites declines in November and December. But this just indicates that the AIS can be a big help to SIGNA if they choose to work together.  


----- Original Message -----
From: "Dennis Kramb" <dkramb@badbear.com>
To: iris-species@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sunday, November 28, 2010 10:40:41 AM
Subject: Re: [iris-species] Re: bias?

 

You ignored my white elephant.  And Sean's (registering JI's as SPEC).

You also said: "if one desires to attract more attention to a class, complaining about judges is not effective; promoting wider interest in the class among growers and hybridizers is!"

I like to do both.  I've re-designed the websites for SIGNA and Aril Society... developed a sophisticated online ordering system for SIGNA's seed exchange... as well as an iris species database that has matured oh so nicely over the last decade... and I host everything at no cost to either society.  Well, I like to think that's doing my share to promote wider interest in those classes.

But in 10+ years neither of those have had sufficient impact, so I think that discontinuing my membership in AIS is the next step.  It solves my problem, solves the problem of judges being complained about, and puts an extra $25 per year in my pocket.  Everyone's happier.  And I'm richer.  Why didn't I do this sooner?!?  I guess it took this weekend's conversation to focus my attention long enough to realize that was a valid course of action.


Dennis in Cincinnati (who will probably use that extra money to buy 'Dark Dude' Louisiana iris.... http://stores.plantationpointnursery.com/Detail.bok?no=242  That scrumptious thing just knocks my socks off!  "velvety black, with gold dagger signals"  damn!!!  I want it!!!)


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