Re: AROC-USA Display advert on AD Home Page

[JHertzman@xxxxxxx]

In AD7-321 Bernie Zelazny, one of the Director of the (USA) Alfa Romeo Owners'
Club, took Richard Welty to task for being unresponsive to some business
communications about placing an advertisement on the alfa-digest home page. 

I should say that I have been a serious booster of the AROC, as an absolute
necessity for any serious American Alfa owner, for some thirty-five years, and
at the same time a serious critic of some of the Club's shortcomings (in my
opinion) for about a third of that time. I have also been (as Peter Krause can
testify!) a rabid defender of the Club's Board of Directors against what I
felt were occasionally unwarranted criticisms, while at the same time being
not entirely uncritical myself. I also served for one term on the Board-
probably a mistake, as temperamentally unsuitable- and also tried to serve the
both the Club and its members in various ways, including as a colaborator with
Fred Di Matteo in assembling a "Tech Notes" publication series, which got as
far as one volume each on Spica injection and Bosch injection before burnout
and some other factors interrupted our efforts.

At one of the last AROC national conventions I attended the possibility of an
AROC presence on the then new-fangled web had been bruited about, and Richard
Welty presented an exhaustive study of what it would entail and what he could
contribute- his time, his work, his money, his experience and knowledge- and
the cautious troglodytes (nice troglodytes, well-meaning troglodytes, some-of-
my-best-friends-are-troglodytes, but troglodytes just the same) simply said
naaah, risky, premature, thank you, good-by. That, and a couple of other odd
BoD calls, disenchanted me enough that I left before the fun parts of the
convention began.

I have no idea what problems and preoccupations Richard Welty has had over the
last five or six months while he has been taking on the added risks and added
work of establishing a new business, raising venture capital and God knows
what other problems, but he has certainly proven himself to me as one of the
very finest friends an Alfa owner could ask for, and has given me a vastly
expanded version of what the Club magazine "Alfa Owner" was in its first
fifteen years or so, an open, lively, and almost always interesting forum for
the owners. More power to you, Richard.

I also do not know what else may have been behind the tenor of the last five
paragraphs of Zelazny's screed about Richard Welty's cavalier treatment of
himself and the AROC. Perhaps Bernie got audited, or maybe somebody graffiti's
his car, or he may have overdosed on jalapinos. Who knows? Whatever it is, I
hope Bernie gets over it, and I hope Richard isn't as offended as I feel.

Sincerely, 

John Hertzman

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