your exec might differ, but as far as i can tell, you are doing the same thing the last 3 have. let’s remake aoir in our image, and then slowly you come to terms with the idea, as execs, you don’t change things the way you dream them to be, but you only actually respond to the members needs, not really even their desires.

aoir has to maintain its relevance through having good research. one way to drive away good research is to keep changing the rules for researchers. right now i know, you know, and everyone that wants to know, can know that to go to aoir you either need to have a 750 word paper or artistic proposal that passes muster, or a panel proposal that passes muster. end of story, they’ve known that for 3 years. they know passing the level is a promise of future quality, and like all conferences, some people produce that quality, some do not. however, they know what counts, it is clear. they also know from that, what they get, they get to present their work. that’s good.

now, let’s say, we change the rules. then next year, lets change them again, and lets change them at anyones given whim. then what we end up with is irrelevance. it happens, and if it happens to aoir, it didn’t start with me. in fact, my voice and steve’s voice and several other voices were raised many times in opposition to the ‘continual change’, ‘reinventing the wheel’ idea. i gave one good reason above, it is not the only really good reason, believe me.

granted, there are interesting things to do, but the key here is to know first how to do a good aoir conference, then instead of arbitrarily saying ‘let’s try x’ first you discuss it with the members on air-meet, then you really think about the work involved in making the change and what it implies not just for the ‘creative spirits’ but in real terms for the organization, the members, and the future. then you think, who will this upset, and you have to think deeply about this, because there may be many layers of hidden power dynamics that have been balanced in the current design which you might not yet see, and once you’ve really decided to do something, then you have to do it, and that is when things get difficult.