by Dave Bunnell » Dec 9, 2005 1:06 am
Hey folks,
Glad I checked back here, hadn't realized my post had started a discussion about the News and what goes in it.
Many of the things mentioned are good ideas and ones I have tried to encourage:
Cave diving: I've talked with some of the CDS people about a column devoted to cave diving a few times, but without a motivated volunteer it hasn't happened. But I do have a big series on the Woodville Karst Plain, which has our longest underwater cave (in the usa) coming up.
Sport caving: Sean suggested more on this, but I'm not sure what that would mean. We run gear reviews, safety and techniques, and occasional travelogue type things, or articles on unusually interesting sport trips, which are all relevant to the sport caver. Other than that, all I can think you'd mean are trip reports, and I still think they are more generally suited for grotto newsletters unless they are especially entertaining. Even so, I can only think of maybe four articles I've rejected in almost 10 years of editorship as being too much of just a basic trip report.
Reprint stuff from grotto NL: I actually think this is a great idea, and when I first became editor encouraged people to send me copies of their NL. I get about a half dozen, and when I see something of interest will ask the author about running it in the News. I'll ask newsletter reviewer Bern Szukalski to keep his eye open for stuff he thinks would be good for the News, but also, if you are a NL editor and have an issue with something you think merits being in the News, please send me a copy and/or encourage that person to submit it.
Fiction: I seem to run about one a year (the last being Paul Aughey's little piece on the cow magnets). I don't get very many at all, and of those I do get I'd say I've run more than half. Of those I didn't run it was a matter of being overly long for the interest the story had.
Regular pieces on state cave surveys: when I first took over the News I tried to follow the tradition of older News issues that had "regional correspondents" that sent in news. I recruited a bunch of folks, and never got a single submission...
Untried ideas department: I had a notion to run a series on "great caves of the world" which would just highlight some significant cave each month. Or it could be focused on just the USA since so many people think the international stuff is overdone in the news already...any interest in this?
Also, putting something about the discussion board in the News is a good idea. No one has ever submitted something about it, but I could put something there. Seems like the new board never got back to the level of participation it had before the BIG CRASH.
Dave
NSS News Editor