On 12/29/2010 2:22 PM, John Cochrane wrote:


Like Herb said, and time for the monthly complaint about Snoaring
Magazine content. Graphene, and advice to use Lemon Pledge in the
centerpiece story about how to clean your canopy. (Hint. Don't) In the
meantime, nothing about how to fly better, what's going on with actual
glider designs we might see in our lifetimes, new instruments under
development, how to fly safer, racing techique, strategy, developments
around the world, new airfoils, modifications and improvements,
interesting places to fly or much else. If they just reprinted
articles from S&G, Gliding international, and other sources it would
be better.

OK, the answer is stop crabbing and write. I'll pony up a contest
corner if the rest of you send in some interesting articles!

John Cochrane


Well, in all fairness to the SSA members who never write anything, the
problem is with the way that the Board chose the new editor a few years
ago.

The editor of Soaring must be good at two things. First, he must have
wide contacts in the soaring community, and be interested in all the
various topics that John describes above. With that background, he can
approach people for the articles that make for an interesting magazine.

Second, the editor must know how to produce a magazine.

Ideally, the Board would have hired a part-time editor who was good at
the first, and a full-time assistant editor who was good at the second.
As a team, they could turn out a good magazine.

But instead the Board looked for a single person to do both jobs. Maybe
there are people out there who would be good at both, but the present
editor is not the right fellow. He probably is quite qualified at the
second job described above, but certainly not at the first.