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2nd September 2014, 10:48 PM | #161 |
Penultimate Amazing
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If the JREF had a choice, I think they'd go for Bill Nye. Of course, he's not going to take the job, as he's already CEO of the Planetary Society and in any case I doubt the JREF could afford him. Who else can take this? I have no *********** idea. I don't know if the JREF board does, either. Maybe they can convince David Silverman to jump ship. He's good. Actually, a probably relatively less known skeptic, but who's more capable, would probably be a good choice. Hint to the JREF: JW. Too bad it's not going to happen. As an aside, yes--I also had noticed that DJ was barely mentioned in this year's TAM promotional materials (did he participate in any of the panels? I think I missed that, and I was there). That did seem strange. In previous years he was always mentioned as one of the speakers, IIRC. So maybe this wasn't as unexpected as many people think. |
3rd September 2014, 12:11 AM | #162 | ||
Nitpicking dilettante
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The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.Bertrand Russell Zooterkin is correct Darat Nerd! Hokulele Join the JREF Folders ! Team 13232 Ezekiel 23:20 |
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3rd September 2014, 12:20 AM | #163 |
post-pre-born
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3rd September 2014, 05:08 AM | #164 |
a carbon based life-form
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3rd September 2014, 05:21 AM | #165 |
Penultimate Amazing
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3rd September 2014, 05:42 AM | #166 |
Penultimate Amazing
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If I see somebody with a gun on a plane? I'll kill him. Lupus is Lupus tor central scrutineezer |
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3rd September 2014, 05:48 AM | #167 |
King of the Pod People
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3rd September 2014, 06:18 AM | #168 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Rhymes with Weff Jagg?
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3rd September 2014, 06:24 AM | #169 |
Penultimate Amazing
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If I see somebody with a gun on a plane? I'll kill him. Lupus is Lupus tor central scrutineezer |
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3rd September 2014, 10:41 AM | #170 |
Muse
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MY GUESS:
Randi stays as president/figurehead/public face/etc for the rest of his life, however long that is. The board brings in (I hope) experienced NPO people for the day-to-day running of things and the lights stay on. I'd like them to go outside the skeptical community for those jobs and just get the best available. That effectively means the JREF is a tax shelter that throws an annual conference. Randi eventually leaves us, and the JREF shuts its doors soon after. Maybe they start fresh with a different organization, I don't know. But I think we've seen the last JREF president, and he's an older version of the first JREF president. |
3rd September 2014, 11:03 AM | #171 |
A Little Ugly on the Side
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3rd September 2014, 11:13 AM | #172 |
Philosopher
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I had no idea. I guess this closes the door on my prediction that Randi and Browne were going to get married.
I thought the announcement was strange, certainly if you're fired from a large organization the public announcement drips with platitudes and often the fired individual is allowed the fiction of resignation. I didn't understand the alphabet soup of speculation about sexual harassment being the reason very well, but in the absence of some other plausible reason it seems possible to me. It provides an explanation for the minimalist announcement of the change. Assuming this was the case, I would have expected a routine announcement of the change that thanked Grothe for his services and wished him well in his new ventures. That seems like the only thing knowable at this point. Some uninformed speculation that I don't have evidence for: I thought there might be something to the estate planning idea. Perhaps Randi is in the process of planning how something of JREF survives him. Randi still seems to be mentally sharp and he probably is aware that the JREF he created depends on his celebrity for its existence. That idea supports the notion that JREF could be folded into an existing skeptic organization that is less dependent on the celebrity of the founder but that has a more stable base for its existence. Although, even though Randi seems to be a pretty well known celebrity, based on anecdotal polling I've done he is not as well known as I thought. |
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3rd September 2014, 11:29 AM | #173 |
Penultimate Amazing
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He's not very well known at all. Every year, people ask why I'm going to Vegas. When I tell them "for Randi's conference", I've never met a single person who knew who he was. Even at local Skeptics In The Pub events, I've met skeptics, especially younger ones, who have no idea who he is.
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If I see somebody with a gun on a plane? I'll kill him. Lupus is Lupus tor central scrutineezer |
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3rd September 2014, 11:40 AM | #174 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Although, Darat was similarly kicked to the curb, having administered this forum for years on a volunteer basis, and not so much as a heads-up about the changes nor a thank you. In fact, the only word from JREF (that I saw) was in the stickied thread above, where the lady representing jref (forget her name) posted some ungenerous, and apparently untrue, things about emails sent by Darat.
It may just be that Randi is running things, and he's insensitive to these formalities. I dunno. |
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3rd September 2014, 12:16 PM | #175 |
Illuminator
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3rd September 2014, 01:26 PM | #176 |
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3rd September 2014, 02:50 PM | #177 |
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The way of truth is along the path of intellectual sincerity. -- Henry S. Pritchett Perfection is the enemy of good enough -- Russian proverb |
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3rd September 2014, 05:14 PM | #178 |
Illuminator
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3rd September 2014, 05:49 PM | #179 |
Intellectual Gladiator
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A fair point. After all, DJ was the public face of the JREF. It's easy to kill the messenger.
My concern is that perhaps there are even deeper problems than those that might be attributed to DJ. If there is still considerable dysfunction on the JREF Board, then I don't see things getting better anytime soon. I hope I'm wrong. |
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3rd September 2014, 05:53 PM | #180 |
Skepticifimisticalationist
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There's that. The earlier suggestion from another competing events is also a very good point; many of the non-VIP/speakers who attend skeptic events have neither the money nor the time to budget several of these conferences per year and have to be selective. The economic downturn, plus just economic wisdom in general, might be leading people to stay closer to home. International events like the London gathering and the Galapagos cruise were quite costly and might have depleted some attendees' resources for an extended period of time.
Certainly for some, the urgency to attend TAM (or attend it again) began to wane once it seemed clearly to become a regular event that would continue to be held for the predictable future. If what some say about DJ is true - that he was basically hired to handle TAM - then there doesn't have to be some deeper motivation for letting him go than the JREF deciding not to do TAM anymore. This could well be due to declining return - but that doesn't necessarily mean DJ was blamed for that, or that there was ever necessarily considered a "fault" to assign. TAMs were fun for skeptics; but despite the valiant efforts of many, they were ultimately never anything more than a bunch of already-skeptics gathering to gam about how skeptical they are while they listen to skeptical speakers rehash the exact same skeptical talking points about the same issues for yet an umpteenth time and occasionally peddle skeptic-books doing same. Yeah, it feels kind of cheap characterizing it in such a way and I don't mean to imply that such a meeting can't be a perfectly acceptable end unto itself, and I'm sure plenty of people will be able to chime in about something new they actually learned at a TAM; but the point is, it wasn't outreach or education in the public sense that JREF has professed interest in since whenever. It was just choir-preaching and hobnobbing. A decade of TAM does not seem to have created any more visibility or awareness of the JREF, the MDC, or skepticism generally, in the public consciousness. Meanwhile, I wouldn't be surprised if TAM or TAM-related tasks began to dominate or monopolize more and more of the JREF's resources as time went on. |
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3rd September 2014, 06:04 PM | #181 |
Intellectual Gladiator
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Yeah, this was one of the reasons TAM started to become less fun for me as the years went on (I haven't attended since 2012). Don't get me wrong, I always had fun at TAM when I went, but once the sheen of being a new TAMer wore off I started to notice the same thing you mentioned.
Eventually, I became more involved in TAM on the "inside", so to speak: I participated in the TAM Talent Shows (never won, but it was fun), I helped to run a few Skepticism in the Classroom workshops, I helped to run two vaccination clinics at TAM, and I even was consulted a couple of times on the MDC (where I once got into a yelling match with Jamy Ian Swiss that he later thanked me for *swoons*). As time went on, I was less and less interested in being in "the big room" with almost everyone else watching presentations, discussions, and lectures. So that side of it wore off for me. In the last couple of years I didn't go to TAM because of financial reasons (I bought a new house last year) and the fact that I wasn't previously scheduled to do anything specific to education (like a workshop, etc). So I couldn't justify the expense. Hopefully I'll go next year |
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Visit my blog: The Skeptical Teacher "We ****** up the air, the water, we ****** up each other. Why don't we just finish the job by flushing our brains down the toilet?" -- John Trent, In the Mouth of Madness |
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4th September 2014, 05:59 AM | #182 |
Penultimate Amazing
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I don't go to TAM to "learn" anything. I don't go to software conferences to learn anything either. I go to hang out with friends, make new friends, and hear some interesting talks. And drink.
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If I see somebody with a gun on a plane? I'll kill him. Lupus is Lupus tor central scrutineezer |
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4th September 2014, 06:30 AM | #183 |
Penultimate Amazing
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It's sad that something I care a great deal about is small potatoes. I suppose this is how people who collect wishniks feel.
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4th September 2014, 03:37 PM | #184 |
Penultimate Amazing
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LA JREF office closes, D.J. Grothe no longer with the JREF
Pfeh. Topicality is for n00bs.
ETA: Heard that Ray Hall will be organising TAM2015. So that's sort of topical, yeah? |
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4th September 2014, 09:10 PM | #185 |
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4th September 2014, 09:11 PM | #186 |
Penultimate Amazing
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4th September 2014, 09:59 PM | #187 |
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I greet this news with cautious optimism. Ray Hall has done an outstanding job running the Sunday Papers for many years. I've always thought that the decrease in time allotted for these talks the last few years was a big mistake. Hopefully with Ray in charge, this trend will be reversed. |
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4th September 2014, 10:19 PM | #188 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Ray is top notch. This is good news indeed.
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If I see somebody with a gun on a plane? I'll kill him. Lupus is Lupus tor central scrutineezer |
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5th September 2014, 02:45 AM | #189 |
Penultimate Amazing
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5th September 2014, 06:42 AM | #190 |
Muse
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It's not all that mysterious. Let's state the obvious.
TAM is safe, even as you all mostly acknowledge it has no role in outreach. Million dollar oddity is safe. The new educational hand waving is un-budgeted and un-specified. Ie no strategy at all. Barely aspirational. DJs 100 grand isn't going to bankroll much of a new curriculum given the continuation of TAM management overheads. Really, all that has happened is that DJ has been burnt together with the forums. In as unprofessional a fashion as could be imagined. Even the attempted smoke screen was a farce. Bravo. Go Randi. Go JREF. You make me proud. |
5th September 2014, 07:17 AM | #191 |
Penultimate Amazing
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5th September 2014, 07:25 AM | #192 |
Penultimate Amazing
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5th September 2014, 07:28 AM | #193 |
Penultimate Amazing
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LA JREF office closes, D.J. Grothe no longer with the JREF
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5th September 2014, 08:02 AM | #194 |
Penultimate Amazing
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That, and/or acquiring Doubtful News?
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5th September 2014, 08:25 AM | #195 |
Illuminator
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5th September 2014, 03:37 PM | #196 |
Skepticifimisticalationist
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Unspecified here in the forum, you mean. No strategy having been posted here in the forum. Unless you have special awareness of the issue, for instance from personally attending actual board meetings and such, this is baseless. To my knowledge, the JREF has never posted such particulars about its business in the forum at any time during my decade-plus of usership here.
Since TAM overhead existed and was covered while DJ was still being paid his 100 grand, it doesn't make sense to suggest the continuance of TAM necessarily means that cash would not be available to use for spending on other things; but at any rate, it should be pointed out that the closing of the office in California represents a freeing up of more than just DJ's salary. |
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5th September 2014, 04:03 PM | #197 |
Penultimate Amazing
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It looks to me (based on the last three-year 990 filings) that Randi's total compensation is about 15% of the prior year's total revenues. So he's gone from 150K to 250K down to 200K. But last year's revenue was not pretty, and 15% of it is around 130K.
I speculate that part of the reorganization is to get that compensation back up for this year, regardless of the 15% trend of the past. Maybe DJ's 100K, and the office closing, will be part of that. Total speculation, of course. |
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5th September 2014, 06:23 PM | #198 |
Muse
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It is traditional when communicating "a big new strategy and change of direction" to have done enough work to be be able to supply enough detail to enthuse the troops. It's about credibility.
Now naturally everything said here is opinion (duh) - but (IMHO) the release smacks heavily of hand waving smokescreen rather than (say) Point 2 of a considered marketing strategy for a newly mapped out focus. Also, it has been a consensus here on the thread that DJ's job was to run TAM. Either by intent or by default. The opening premise was that no DJ = no TAM = more money and focus for the Big New Strategy. Keeping TAM (and the requirement for a manager) kind of mucks this calculus up - no? |
5th September 2014, 07:30 PM | #199 |
Bow Tie Daddy
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So that's who D J Grothe is.
I kept getting e-mails from him (or her) and I just assumed he was looking to play at my wedding or bar mitzvah or something. |
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5th September 2014, 07:42 PM | #200 |
Penultimate Amazing
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