What do you think of FILSCA?

No for the pro baseball analogy to work you'd have to use steroids in
your example

Hello,

I have been the one with idea for FILSCA.

I am glad that nearly all posters are beyond the "FILSCA wants to take
the world over" crap. :-) But let me start with that.

We have always made it clear that "FILSCA is a club". Which means
nothing more and nothing less than that people - league admins in this
case - join to work together and to push what they do. FILSCA members
take their matters into their own hands and share their ressources.
Now that does not bother anyone not being a member but helps a lot
those being a member. It also does not exclude anyone - everyone
running a league is invited to join and may join when he/she accepts
the rules. The rules are sent to any applicant (sorry Art, still no
mail from you re. your league, so you do not have received the rules
<g>). The whole club may get a decisive role in representing league
racers if a majority of leagues have joined FILSCA. That hopefully
happens as then league racers could really be represented towards
sponsors, companies and towards the public. What will surely not happen
is that all leagues join.

The club is autonomous, and the leagues are independent. You don't see
about the decision making processes and the discussions between the
members because these are solely up to the members. We are not a forum
bunch or a news group. You can see however some things in public, e.g.
one dealing with driving aides in statistics:
http://forums.filsca.com/index.php?showtopic=258

As it seems many are bothered about the statutes not being published.
Well, first any league who is interested gets the rules. They are not
published because they are not completely revised and because I want to
ensure that its the members who decide about their rules, and that they
can do it without being influenced from outside. But rather soon these
papers will be published as well. BTW: some of the leagues have given
the papers ot their drivers to decide about joining, you can assume
that more than 1000 league racers know em, so there is no conspiracy
behind. The most "draconic" issues probably are that you must not be a
member in a similar club, that your league must comply with the human
rights (oh well), and that you must upload all results to the FILSCA
database - well, you get your standings, results from there, and your
drivers get career stats, all for free, so anyone not doing and being a
FILSCA member, would be insane anyway. But if it counts, I can tell
you: if you are no member and not an admin interested to make your
league a member, I don't see the sense in discussing them with you.

FILSCA is a club of independent member leagues. It will not stand
against e.g. FIRST-racing if there the big investments go into pay for
play portals. FIRST-racing championships could become a FILSCA member
though - that could help a lot of smaller leagues and many sim racers.
But with the many great sims around I am sure there will be many league
racers who deserve as much public as they can get, and that is
somehting FILSCA can ensure already now. As of its midterm goals -
sponsorships, prizes for bigger championship - that depends on the
engagement of the leagues (this is not a commercial one-man show). But
what the leagues already have now is that they can get a better
visibility by being presented at the FILSCA site, and each league, each
team and each driver may also put up sponsorship banners at the its
pages. I think that is a good base for everyone involved.

In another thread Art has asked if it weren't up to FILSCA to step in
to take over RSC or compesate for the USPits. My answer is no. I
believe in a community that stands on more than one feet - one for each
sector. League racing is different from running a general forum (and a
lot of work - all respect to Tim Wheatly , or from running a racing
games newssite, and download space is again something else. All can
work together and support each other. The FILSCA offers a platform for
leagues, its teams, and its drivers, and in addition an advanced league
management system which saves any league many hours in a season, or
the work to write programs. If more work on the same everything is much
simpler.

------
Some questions raised:
"elections": up to the members. Currently there are no elections as
there are not even enough volunteer member admins to fill, let alone to
act in the necessary positions. You can also say that no one wanted my
job. E.g. we lack marketing and sales - volunteers are welcome, and
sales can even earn money by bringing money to the FILSCA members -
please contact me.

"training leagues"/"driving aides allowed": There FILSCA can be
compared with the FIA. We accept all kinds of leagues - from the
beginners to the pros, and there are atm 2 leagues who definitely allow
for driving aides. It's their fun, and there is no problem with it. The
data just do not show up in general rankings, track stats etc. because
there some level must be kept, and be it for comparison reasons only,
so that the rankings and stats have some value.

"European name": now what is bad about European? Of course a club is
more a European idea - other than companies as NASCAR or NBA. You
cannot deny that the branding has worked. And you can spell it any
language.

You can find more info at the FILSCA site:
http://www.filsca.com

I may also recommend the interview in issue 1 of AutoSimSport:
http://www.autosimsport.com/issues/autosimsport_1_1.zip

Cheers
Christoph

I have virtually no opinion of FLISCA at present, but i know that i wouldnt
walk into a shop and ask for a magazine thats calling itself ASS.



pez

"Bombshell" > wrote in message
...
> Just wondered what people's thoughts were on the whole FILSCA thing?
>
> Good, bad, indifferent, never heard of it?
>
> Cheers.
>
> Bombshell.
>
>

Good to hear from you directly Chris, I think regular posts from the
man at the top will clear a lot of things up.

>The most "draconic" issues probably are that you must not be a
>member in a similar club

I'm a bit curious about the thinking behind that one. Again to use a
professional real life racing analogy last weekends Rolex 24 run under
the "Grand Am" banner had drivers and teams from CART, IRL, nascar,
alms and elms. I think it was all the better for it.

Yes I suspect the elections will be a formality for quite some time,
but I submit an important one.

Cheers,

Art.

mcewena wrote:
> Good to hear from you directly Chris, I think regular posts from the
> man at the top will clear a lot of things up.

Actually writing here is cumbersome, but thanks ot your hints I got it
working via google. Although it is irritating that new posts can take
hours to be visible.
It would also be much better if questions were put into the FILSCA
forum because there is the central place to find information. But maybe
you are willing to provide questions and as far as available answers
for a FAQ, Art? :-)

>
> >The most "draconic" issues probably are that you must not be a
> >member in a similar club
>
> I'm a bit curious about the thinking behind that one. Again to use a
> professional real life racing analogy last weekends Rolex 24 run
under
> the "Grand Am" banner had drivers and teams from CART, IRL, nascar,
> alms and elms. I think it was all the better for it.

We can keep the analogy
Drivers often run in many leagues, as do teams, some FILSCA others not.

It is just that there non-FILSCA league races are not covered in the
career stats. Which is why I think it can only be good for drivers and
teams to convince their leagues to join FILSCA.

But lets go further: The anti-competition rule is also called the
anti-cherry picking rule. Let's says cart, irl, nascar, alms, and elms
are filsca members, and members in second-recing as well. in
second-racing they form with their drivers to a super duper money
making championship. In FILSCA they just upload their results.

It should be pretty clear that a club cannot survive with such members.
The members join to profit from each other, and to grow together. In
the above example that is not the case, and the other FILSCA members
would be betrayed, and also FILSCA itself - it had just the costs to
care for their results, but not any revenues from what they gain by
their membership. You can assume that they got better exposure via
FILSCA as well. It does not make sense to market unreliable members.

Now let's assume a third option: the above leagues join under the
filsca banner with second-racing, or FILSCA and second-racing organize
an event with some FILSCA member. This can be a very good opportunity
for all working together.


>
> Yes I suspect the elections will be a formality for quite some time,
> but I submit an important one.

???
>
> Cheers,
>
> Art.

Pez wrote:
> I have virtually no opinion of FLISCA at present, but i know that i
wouldnt
> walk into a shop and ask for a magazine thats calling itself ASS.

Well, for the sake of correctness, the magazine is called AutoSimSport
which makes reference to a famous auto magazine. And the official
abbreviation is A.S.S. - all were very aware of how that could sound.
But: it's really your freedom to make one word of it. Honi soit qui mal
y pense. :-)

Next, A.S.S. has just a special relationship to FILSCA, and otherwise
acts on its behalf.

> Actually writing here is cumbersome, but thanks ot your hints I got
it
> working via google. Although it is irritating that new posts can take
> hours to be visible.

Try http://groups-beta.google.com there's only about a 5 minute delay
and the thread context is retained.

> It would also be much better if questions were put into the FILSCA
> forum because there is the central place to find information. But
maybe
> you are willing to provide questions and as far as available answers
> for a FAQ, Art? :-)

But wouldn't that be preaching to the choir? It's fair to say that
Ken's query was prompted by the more public discussion. There's been a
couple other who've replied to this thread with "never heard of them".
Everybody's free to use your public forums of course but I presume
there's a wider viewing audience here.

>
> It is just that there non-FILSCA league races are not covered in the
> career stats. Which is why I think it can only be good for drivers
and
> teams to convince their leagues to join FILSCA.
>
But shouldn't that be penalty enough? Sort of like when F1 used to
have races that didn't count towards the championship.

> second-racing they form with their drivers to a super duper money
> making championship. In FILSCA they just upload their results.
>
> It should be pretty clear that a club cannot survive with such
members.

Sorry I just don't see the harm, almost every hobby/sport has a group
of participants who are "really serious" and another group who are
"casual" where there's only a fairly small overlap between them. (such
as Micheal Shumaker and joe club racer).

> >
> > Yes I suspect the elections will be a formality for quite some
time,
> > but I submit an important one.
>
> ???

You may think your town mayor is a great guy, and he's so popular that
he's been acclaimed 4 times in a row. But do you really want to cancel
next year's election anyway?


Cheers,
Art.

mcewena wrote:
> > Actually writing here is cumbersome, but thanks ot your hints I got
> it
> > working via google. Although it is irritating that new posts can
take
> > hours to be visible.
>
> Try http://groups-beta.google.com there's only about a 5 minute delay
> and the thread context is retained.
>
> > It would also be much better if questions were put into the FILSCA
> > forum because there is the central place to find information. But
> maybe
> > you are willing to provide questions and as far as available
answers
> > for a FAQ, Art? :-)
>
> But wouldn't that be preaching to the choir? It's fair to say that
> Ken's query was prompted by the more public discussion. There's been
a
> couple other who've replied to this thread with "never heard of
them".
> Everybody's free to use your public forums of course but I presume
> there's a wider viewing audience here.

Don't get me wrong: I don't think that the FILSCA forum is preaching to
the choir, but its the first place where people seek information. That
is something different. And those people do maybe not google for
further information. Simply a matter of power.

>
> >
> > It is just that there non-FILSCA league races are not covered in
the
> > career stats. Which is why I think it can only be good for drivers
> and
> > teams to convince their leagues to join FILSCA.
> >
> But shouldn't that be penalty enough? Sort of like when F1 used to
> have races that didn't count towards the championship.

Sorry, but now your are trying to change arguments. F1 would be a
league, not a club or another form of sanctioning body. So if F1 is a
league and if it is a member its races are stored. If the F1 drivers
also race in cart in cart is no member league, then these races are not
stored. Yes, that may be a penalty against the drivers but its a
penalty put on the drivers by the leagues, not e.g. FILSCA.

>
> > second-racing they form with their drivers to a super duper money
> > making championship. In FILSCA they just upload their results.
> >
> > It should be pretty clear that a club cannot survive with such
> members.
>
> Sorry I just don't see the harm, almost every hobby/sport has a group
> of participants who are "really serious" and another group who are
> "casual" where there's only a fairly small overlap between them.
(such
> as Micheal Shumaker and joe club racer).

Again, you are talking of drivers I am talking of leagues. But to take
your example: with the money the FIA gets from its special member F1
for sanctioning the FIA F1 the FIA supports - via its local member the
club racer. And in the same sense I say, we don't want a member that
runs for a F1 championship within another sanctioning bodies because
that would betray the club racing leagues. We want that all together
come to organize the F1 championship.

>
> > >
> > > Yes I suspect the elections will be a formality for quite some
> time,
> > > but I submit an important one.
> >
> > ???
>
> You may think your town mayor is a great guy, and he's so popular
that
> he's been acclaimed 4 times in a row. But do you really want to
cancel
> next year's election anyway?
>
First of all: why are you so interested in this? - it is none of your
business.
Second: as soon as there are enough to candidate for all management
posts there will be posts. Sad as it is, there are not even enough
active members yet.


>
> Cheers,
> Art.

That former post was sent a bit too fast, so here an edited version,
sorry for the confusion.


Christoph Schirmer wrote:
> mcewena wrote:
> > > Actually writing here is cumbersome, but thanks ot your hints I
got
> > it
> > > working via google. Although it is irritating that new posts can
> take
> > > hours to be visible.
> >
> > Try http://groups-beta.google.com there's only about a 5 minute
delay
> > and the thread context is retained.
> >
> > > It would also be much better if questions were put into the
FILSCA
> > > forum because there is the central place to find information. But
> > maybe
> > > you are willing to provide questions and as far as available
> answers
> > > for a FAQ, Art? :-)
> >
> > But wouldn't that be preaching to the choir? It's fair to say that
> > Ken's query was prompted by the more public discussion. There's
been
> a
> > couple other who've replied to this thread with "never heard of
> them".
> > Everybody's free to use your public forums of course but I presume
> > there's a wider viewing audience here.
>
> Don't get me wrong: I don't think that the FILSCA forum is preaching
to
> the choir, but its the first place where people seek information.
That
> is something different. And those people do maybe not google for
> further information.
Deleted "simply a matter of power", replace with: It is simply a matter
of man power to collect all that and put it up on the FILSCA site.

>
> >
> > >
> > > It is just that there non-FILSCA league races are not covered in
> the
> > > career stats. Which is why I think it can only be good for
drivers
> > and
> > > teams to convince their leagues to join FILSCA.
> > >
> > But shouldn't that be penalty enough? Sort of like when F1 used to
> > have races that didn't count towards the championship.
>
> Sorry, but now your are trying to change arguments. F1 would be a
> league, not a club or another form of sanctioning body. So if F1 is a
> league and if it is a member its races are stored. If the F1 drivers
> also race in cart AND (instead of in) cart is no member league, then
these races are not
> stored. Yes, that may be a penalty against the drivers but its a
> penalty put on the drivers by the leagues, not e.g. FILSCA.
But of course it is also the job of FILSCA to attract drivers and teams
to convince the leagues. But so far we do not want to interfere with
the leagues, and the mediation is done by the leagues themselves. Maybe
that is a disadvantage of a club where the members have full power, but
that is the freedom within a club in difference to a corporate
approach.

>
> >
> > > second-racing they form with their drivers to a super duper money
> > > making championship. In FILSCA they just upload their results.
> > >
> > > It should be pretty clear that a club cannot survive with such
> > members.
> >
> > Sorry I just don't see the harm, almost every hobby/sport has a
group
> > of participants who are "really serious" and another group who are
> > "casual" where there's only a fairly small overlap between them.
> (such
> > as Micheal Shumaker and joe club racer).
>
> Again, you are talking of drivers I am talking of leagues. But to
take
> your example: with the money the FIA gets from its special member F1
> for sanctioning the FIA F1 the FIA supports - via its local member
the
> club racer. And in the same sense I say, we don't want a member that
> runs for a F1 championship within another sanctioning bodies because
> that would betray the club racing leagues. We want that all together
> come to organize the F1 championship.
>
> >
> > > >
> > > > Yes I suspect the elections will be a formality for quite some
> > time,
> > > > but I submit an important one.
> > >
> > > ???
> >
> > You may think your town mayor is a great guy, and he's so popular
> that
> > he's been acclaimed 4 times in a row. But do you really want to
> cancel
> > next year's election anyway?
> >
> First of all: why are you so interested in this? - it is none of your
> business. :-)
> Second: as soon as there are enough to candidate for all management
> posts there will be ELECTIONS (instead of: posts). Sad as it is,
there are not even enough
> active members yet.
>
>
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Art.

>Sorry, but now your are trying to change arguments.

Yes I probably aim, it's hard to think of a real life example (part of
the reason I have a hard time with the restriction). Back when CART
was on the rise and looking for venues outside the US it was at least
partially sanctioned by USAC (but mostly it was both league and
sanctioning body), I think FIA (the sanctioning body) threatened to ban
any driver and team who competed in F1 (the league) from competing in
any other series. It sounded petty and vindictive then and there was
real money involved.

> > You may think your town mayor is a great guy, and he's so popular
> that
> > he's been acclaimed 4 times in a row. But do you really want to
> cancel
> > next year's election anyway?
> >
> First of all: why are you so interested in this? - it is none of your
> business.

You're asking that leagues follow human rights but you're reserving the
right to be autocratic, you don't see a contradiction there?

BTW I'm not even sure how a race league could violate human rights? I
suppose there are certain logistical considerations if drivers can't
converse in a common language that might cause a restriction.

> Second: as soon as there are enough to candidate for all management
> posts there will be posts. Sad as it is, there are not even enough
> active members yet.

Ever read Catch-22?