Voting Form

[Roger de Coverly]

Direct members will have received a voting form for Player of the Year 2009/2010. This would be returned to Battle and collated.

Wouldn't it be better to use the balloting facility to ask Direct Members which candidates they would prefer to see as ECF Directors and FIDE rep? The Player of the Year vote could then be done by Council based on nominations by the directors. As it stands, such a ballot would just be indicative but it would send a clear signal if Direct members had voted overwhelmingly for particular candidates.

[Alex Holowczak]

I wonder what the cost of posting them out to all the 1500 direct members was. Was there anything else with it in the envelope? 32p for a stamp for 1500 direct members comes to £480 before you even count printing costs.

Is there not a way the ECF website can have a poll that only direct members could access (in future)?

[LozCooper]

I also got a form for tournament registration for the diary. I don't recall if it came with Chess Moves but that would have seemed the most practical way of mailing it.

[Alex Holowczak]

If the ECF needs to save costs, a good way to do it would be to put more than one thing in the same envelope. I received two letters from the ECF for various things, and managed to send it back in one envelope.

I received the tournament registration form, but there's an online facility to do so; I wouldn't have needed it. All I needed was an e-mail telling me to send them the information using the online version before a certain date. Perhaps there should be the option on Membership forms to receive notifications like that online or on paper. It could save costs.

I'm not sure Direct Members are members just so they can vote for Player of the Year. If they're really that interested, they'll log on to vote for it anyway.

[Roger de Coverly]

If the ECF needs to save costs, a good way to do it would be to put more than one thing in the same envelope. I received two letters from the ECF for various things, and managed to send it back in one envelope.

The Player of the Year form came with the Regular bi-monthly issue of Chess Moves. This mailing from the ECF often includes other items like Entry Forms, so they already use one envelope where possible.

I gather that Chess Moves may soon become a "print on demand" publication. I'm unconvinced that details of the lunch menus at junior tournaments need to be preserved for posterity in print even if it's consistent with the Golombek school of chess writing.

[Alex Holowczak]

Next season then, when Chess Moves is out of print, I find it bizarre that here there is a competition that will probably cost the ECF £750-£1,000 to run, which accounts for 10% of most of the Directors' budgets for the next season. Unless I'm missing something obvious, that's an absolute joke.

[Andrew Walker]

Hello playmates
Roger is correct - the form was tucked into the CM envelope safely and mailed at the same time. There is indeed a way to make the whole poll take place online - this was mooted by the webmonkey but put aside for another year. Alex - have you a crystal ball? You do seem to know what is going to happen before we do at the Office (ie Chess Moves going 'out of print', a status usually conferred on old Jeffrey Archer novels). I understand that CM may go electronic at some stage, a severe loss for the elderly and computer-less chess folk across the country, but we have no firm news - although you seem to? Fess up, are you reading the tea leaves?

[Justin Hadi]

Good (and funny!!) to see the office fighting back against forum negativity here..

[Alex Holowczak]

Alex - have you a crystal ball? You do seem to know what is going to happen before we do at the Office. I understand that CM may go electronic at some stage, a severe loss for the elderly and computer-less chess folk across the country, but we have no firm news - although you seem to? Fess up, are you reading the tea leaves?

By "out of print", I meant in terms of printing a physical copy. A bad choice of phrase... Referring to this:

I gather that Chess Moves may soon become a "print on demand" publication

Chess Moves will surely go electronic-only somewhere down the line. Computerless chess folk are getting fewer and fewer. If more is spent producing that annually than the Board of Directors have as a budget for the things they do, something is wrong somewhere.

None of which is the Office's fault.

[Sean Hewitt]

I understand that CM may go electronic at some stage, a severe loss for the elderly and computer-less chess folk across the country.

I certainly hope that was said in jest!

[Sean Hewitt]

Alex - have you a crystal ball? You do seem to know what is going to happen before we do at the Office (ie Chess Moves going 'out of print', a status usually conferred on old Jeffrey Archer novels). I understand that CM may go electronic at some stage, a severe loss for the elderly and computer-less chess folk across the country, but we have no firm news - although you seem to? Fess up, are you reading the tea leaves?

No need for tea leaves.

CM costs over £5k pa for printing and distribution. The budget in the accounts for 2010/11 shows a budgeted cost of £800.

You do the math

[Andrew Walker]

Sean!
No jest intended - I've been in contact with people who still look forward to the magazine coming in the post, and I believe it would be a little unfair to those who don't, won't or can't run to having a computer and internet access in their homes to remove the printed option completely.
One funny thing - I do have a friend who has no mobile phone, even, but he also believes that the right-wing underground are after him, so go figure ...

[Roger de Coverly]

Chess Moves will surely go electronic-only somewhere down the line..

I think it's a proposal in the Budget report highlighted as a cost saver. So the forthcoming Council meeting is when it will be ratified (or not). If it does go pdf, then the economics of some of the other items which are printed and mailed may become difficult.

[Justin Hadi]

So tea leaves after all then...

Are there any items which the ECF can't avoid mailing out? I can think of membership cards as one, but even with that a membership list could be held on a computer somewhere and e-mailed out to FIDE rated event organisers as required.

Personally I would advocate moving everything to pdf but then again I am not someone without computer access.

[Alex Holowczak]

I believe it would be a little unfair to those who don't, won't or can't run to having a computer

It's unfair to those who don't, won't or can't become a member of the ECF to impose the restriction on not playing in FIDE-rated events (in my opinion), but they do. Such is life...

Besides, if the ECF can't actually afford it to print it, it makes sense not to. At least it's still online. That has to be better than them not publishing it whatsoever.