Maybe I'm totally wrong here, but I'm getting what seems to be a STFU attitude from this reply...and...given that there's a whole lot that I don't know about the new setup vs current, I am (possibly/probably? mistakenly) seeing this differently...using Frank's van analogy, instead of buying a new 8-pax van or even a 12-pax one, what I perceive is a 32-pax BUS...and as a partial "owner", I don't see the need for that much expansion in capacity or change in costs...especially when the costs of that may or will force me out.
-- Franklin Gordon Bynum <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On 04/30/2007 12:02:46 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > As far as I'm concerned, I AM looking at this as a business, and the > fact that it's a coop is a minor detail... It doesn't matter how you look at it. It's a co-op, not a business selling you a service. You can keep telling yourself that it's a business, but that won't change anything. > I have no problem paying my share to get the EXACT same level of > service as when I first joined, which was more than adequate for my > needs Let me beat this point to death: you did not contract with a company to give you a set service at a set price. You joined a cooperative and in effect purchased a share of an organizaiton that is growing and needs capital contributions from its members. This has always been clear. > I'll use this analogy: Suppose I used a airport shuttle service that > operated a van...it got me and my luggage to/from the airport...then > the service became more popular and needed more capacity...so they > bought a stretch bus...and then raised the price to double what it > was...the bus doesn't get me there any better than the van, which was > adequate for my needs...so because they got more users, instead of it > costing me the same or less due to more users to carry the increased > expenses, it costs me more...in that case, I'd have to find another > service that still uses a van and charges that cheaper rate... Your analogy misses the mark. Let me help you out: imagine you are part of a vanpool where you commute in to the city center everyday. Four people all pitched in and bought an old eight-passenger van to do this. They split monthly gas and maintenance costs. People volunteer to drive. They added more people, and got to eight passengers. Things went well enough, but the van was pretty cramped and was starting to have major mechanical problems. So, the group decides they can either: a) quit vanpooling and all spend more to drive to work separately; b) Get rid of other people in the pool to make it less crowded, and spend a lot of money spread across only a few riders to fix up the van; c) temporarily put in more money to buy a brand new bus, and later recoup the costs when others join the vanpool. The answer is so obvious that I won't waste anyone's time explaining it. You're an owner, not a customer. One of the many benefits of ownership is the ability to use user-written cgi scripts. If you can't afford ownership or would otherwise rather not deal with ownership, that's your choice to make. _______________________________________________ HCoop-Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://hcoop.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hcoop-discuss
