Lawrence Day will write every month in the CCN

[Kerry Liles]

Moreover, Lavin published in the CFC governor's newsletter (President's report) that I was not up to the job from a technical standpoint. (A money saving action...but a lie nevertheless)

Bill Evans

I wonder how the hell Lavin could have determined your technical competence? Seems to me, HE was completely clueless about technology.

[Kerry Liles]

That is in no way obvious, Bill - what exactly did he lie about? Where is your evidence?

The executive as a whole reviewed what work you did do, and decided to look for other options. Lawrence decided that he would not work without you and so that was that.

If you want to write slanderous comments, go get yourself a blog - maybe Kevin Spraggett will link to it and give you some tips. This board is not the place for them.

Bill's post clearly states what he felt was a lie: his lack of technical competence.

[Christopher Mallon]

I wonder how the hell Lavin could have determined your technical competence? Seems to me, HE was completely clueless about technology.

Are you saying the entire CFC executive was completely clueless about technology? As I already stated before you posted this, it was a decision made by the whole exec.

[Kerry Liles]

Are you saying the entire CFC executive was completely clueless about technology? As I already stated before you posted this, it was a decision made by the whole exec.

Once again, I will say my message was very clear.
I even UNDERLINED the word "HE", so I was saying Lavin did not understand technology well enough to judge the competence of others. That is my contention.

Just because a decision is made collectively does not make it sound; too many times I have seen sheep on committees blindly vote with the person they feel will best protect their interests.

Of course, no one, especially anyone outside the CFC Executive would have any knowledge of what was promised, what was required, what was delivered etc. because it is clear that almost all of the decisions made 'by the CFC' are made by the Executive. On odd occasions it seems the Governors are consulted (in my view simply to be able to say 'yes, the governors were consulted').

[Christopher Mallon]

You were inferring that it was David and David alone who determined that Bill's "technical competence" was not where it needed to be. That was simply not the case.

The Governors gave the Exec the authority to create and manage a webzine and that's what they (we) were trying to do. No sense complaining about the Governors not getting consulted on it when they specifically gave the authority to the Exec without requiring updates or consultations...

[Garvin Nunes]

Lawrence did not drop out of the Webzine project because of lack of technical support.

I spent a great deal of time and money working with Lawrence as his technical assistant.

I never received a penny of the $1000 retainer I was promised. Moreover, Lavin published in the CFC governor's newsletter (President's report) that I was not up to the job from a technical standpoint. (A money saving action...but a lie nevertheless)

Bill Evans

Bill,

Do you have your agreement for 1000 dollars in writing?

[Jonathan Berry]

I didn't know why there wasn't another issue under Lawrence. The picture painted in this thread seems to confirm what Bill Evans writes, though there are still facts unrevealed.

So the CFC agreed to pay Bill $1,000 to edit and publish the first issue? We know that there was an issue. It wasn't perfect, but first issues hardly ever are (the first issue of Inside Chess had the wrong year on the cover; and if somebody hadn't cut the Gordian Knot of wanting the masthead page to look just so, they'd still be waiting for the computer to render it, two decades later.). The CFC exec wasn't satisfied. At this point, I'd imagine that the CFC exec would write an e-letter to Bill stating that they weren't happy because the presentation did not fulfill clause 7f of the tender or clause 5d of the bid and as a result we felt that the job was worth only $750, would you be prepared to accept that? That would be a hardball but proper reaction. But the tone of this thread seems to be that the CFC actually paid $0. In which case the CFC would owe Bill a mutually agreeable amount, plus interest, plus an apology.

It is extraordinary that a person would be hired, do a job, and then be fired without pay if the result is not perfect. Maybe not in 1808, but certainly in 2008. Learning on the job, perfecting an idea, experimenting, these are all perfectly acceptable. Nobody arises fully formed from the forehead of Zeus.

I'll say this slowly: t e c h n i c a l _ c o m p e t e n c e _ i s n ' t _ j u s t _ o n e _ t h i n g . One might know how to program a computer, but not know how to use a VCR (sorry, that's a dated example, eh?). One might play a good game of chess, but not know how to drive a car. Equally inside the realm of computers. If publishing requires the use of a Content Management System, and you don't know how to use it, then you lack that area of technical competence (though assuredly you can learn it). That is easy to see. But some lacks are more difficult to diagnose. For example, I know something about desktop computer based electronic typesetting. Don't do that, you'll get your knees dirty. It's no longer fashionable to worship that skill set. You're showing your age. In fact, in these html-happy times, one sometimes runs across web mavens who don't know enough about it to realize they are missing some useful skills. So it is possible that the CFC Executive contained "technical" people, but no expertise in the world of publishing. For sure, the person with the most experience in chessic e-zine publishing is not a member of the CFC Exec.

Now, regarding the technical competence of Bill Evans. Well, he produced the first CFC e-zine, or Lawrence's part of it at least. He asked me for comments, which I provided. He came back with a PDF version of one of Lawrence's articles. I still had some comments, but in fact I had never seen a chess PDF conversion done better without some expensive software. So it seemed to me that Bill, aside from being a very bright guy, also came with at least a modicum of technical competence. Maybe a lot more. A bright, chessy guy with skills. That sounds like a good first step on the road to publishing a chess e-zine. Or a good place to quit if you don't want to publish a chess e-zine.

The most frightening part of this thread is Chris Mallon's statement: "No sense complaining about the Governors not getting consulted on it when they specifically gave the authority to the Exec without requiring updates or consultations..."

It is, or should be, part of the Zen of the Executive that they update the governors. What is a thing that acts like a human but doesn't breathe? At best it is a robot.

This Olympian direction--remoteness--on the part of the CFC Executive was one of the reasons I retired as a CFC Governor, oh those years ago.

[Christopher Mallon]

I wasn't trying to be frightening. Kerry noted that the Governors were not asked for their opinion on the deal before the exec made any decisions. I pointed out that the Governors gave the exec full privileges for making the decision. If they wanted to be consulted, they should have put a clause in there for that.

Note the difference between "consulted" and "informed" - I never really saw the need for super secrecy on all of these things but it wasn't really my job and I had enough other things to worry about than personally ensuring that the Governors were fully informed on everything - especially over the objections of other Executive members.

My PR type advice was usually ignored anyway - look how badly the office changeover went over. I'm not saying I could have worked miracles or anything but it couldn't really have been any worse either, IMHO.