<html> Hi Dale, Is pianotech@googlegroups still up and running? I haven't seen a single post from it in several days. I went to the web site and there were no recent posts there either. Your post to Ron came to me only on pianotech, not via google groups. I should have received it twice if google groups was up and running. Terry Beckingham At 10:32 AM 3/3/2013 -0500, you wrote: <blockquote type=cite class=cite cite>Hi Ron  Thank you for your forthright comments. Please except my personal compassion for the situation with your mom. I went thru this very thing last year and it is a very difficult and emotional task to handle and then...... the world keeps on coming at you.  Ron, the  fact that you said "I have pretty well lost my interest in dealing with PTG" speaks volumes about an organization that has lost its way. and this ..... " Once again, I find the total lack of communication from the Board to be astounding." Do they not understand anything about we the people? The people they are supposed to serve. Are they living in a bubble or what? Just so you know the majority of Indians have already left the reservation so to speak, and many on the list have gone to google groups  and unsubscribed to Myptg.org and this list. So I am cross posting this to them as well @ pianotech@googlegroups.com.  My thanks to you for helping to provide an amazing on line experience of continuing education of incalculable value. The brain trust of the organization and technical expertise and sharing lives on elsewhere to those who wish to be  involved. The Bible say that without vision..... the people perish.  Kind regards and God Bless   Dale Dale Erwin R.P.T. Erwin's Piano Restoration Inc. Mason & Hamlin/Steinway/U.S. pianos <a href="http://www.erwinspiano.com/" eudora="autourl">www.Erwinspiano.com</a> Phone: 209-577-8397 <tt>     </tt> -----Original Message----- From: Ron Berry <berrypiano@gmail.com> To: pianotech <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: Sat, Mar 2, 2013 11:00 pm Subject: [pianotech] The fate of Pianotech to the online PTG people I have been very tied up the past couple of week with my mother in the hospital and moving her to a nursing home. I have to say that I was as surprised as the rest of you about the notice in the PTG newsletter. The text in it made it look like I and the ECC were proposing that Pianotech be closed and that everyone move over to the Google+ community. Once again, I find the total lack of communication from the Board to be astounding. My report suggested leaving the email Pianotech running and starting an experiment with Google+. Next thing I know it is being announced as the new thing and that people should contact me for instructions. The G+ community has better options than the Google group and it less likely to get spam since the membership has to be approved and can be blocked. I called the G+ community Pianotech just to get that name in case we liked G+. If I had a clue that the Board was going to promote this as the replacement for Pianotech listserve I would have prepared some instructions for using Google+. This change could not have occurred at a worse time for me. I also suggested that the ECC committee be eliminated since all its past functions are now taken over by staff. I don't have admin rights to any of the web sites any more. I have pretty well lost my interest in dealing with PTG, but still love the community created by all our online communities. The listserve will probably be closed, even though there are some functions it provides which will be hard to duplicate. I am no fan of <a href="http://my.ptg.org">my.ptg.org</a> and almost never use it. When I do, it is through email. It could be OK for some committee work. I do think G+ works better than <a href="http://my.ptg.org">my.ptg.org</a>, and I imagine G+ will grow over time at a much faster rate. G+ integrates with Gmail very well, and that is the way I follow what is going on there. Also the G+ iPhone app is excellent and easy to use. It is unknown how long G+ will archive items, and we won't have much control over that. I think it is reasonable to transfer the archives over to <a href="http://my.ptg.org">my.ptg.org</a> to integrate them with that community just to save them. I told the Board when they first were looking at <a href="http://my.ptg.org">my.ptg.org</a> that the most important thing was to maintain the Pianotech archives. Here we are, years past that, and they are still in question. I"m still dealing with selling my mom's house and the stuff in it, so I don't have much computer time. I have faith in the community that created Pianotech and know that it will survive. It would be much better if it could all come together in one place rather than four. I think Google groups or G+ make sense as the place to have it. The google group is more like the current listserve and the G+ group offers some new features including Hangouts which are like Skype conference calls. I leave it to the groups to decide. -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ronald Berry Piano Service Indianapolis, IN 317-255-8213 <a href="mailto:ron@berrypiano.com">ron@berrypiano.com</a> <a href="http://www.berrypiano.com/" eudora="autourl">http://www.berrypiano.com</a> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ask me about Healthy Chocolate! <a href="http://www.berrygoodchocolate.com">http://www.BerryGoodChocolate.com</a> Public Key <a href="http://www.berrypiano.com/key/Ron_Berry.txt">http://www.berrypiano.com/key/Ron_Berry.txt</a> </blockquote></html>