How to get people to not read the Commission on Appraisal’s new report

So the Commission on Appraisal’s issued its new report, Who’s In Charge Here? The Complex Relationship Between Ministry and Authority. So where, as a responsible and engaged Unitarian Universalist, do you do download the report to read? Download like all the recent reports? Download, even like some pre-Internet reports which have been subsequently scanned? Even the first, from 1936 from the American Unitarian Association. (Worth a read, too.)

Well, you don’t download it. You may buy it, though. It may be read by dozens!

In 2013, the cost of printing is high enough, and the number of PDF-reading devices (good ol’ HTML might be even better) is higher still. And then there’s the budget crisis that, if I recall, recently threatened the running of the Commission on Appraisal itself.

Something’s screwy.

Or perhaps a free PDF is embarged against the sales of a print edition? You think you’d want to warn your buyer/sponsors against the “sucker factor” of simply waiting…

Sonething’s screwy, or ill-conceived.

By Scott Wells

Scott Wells, 46, is a Universalist Christian minister doing Universalist theology and church administration hacks in Washington, D.C.

3 comments

  1. I’m voting for ill-conceived, and bet this has something to do with Skinner House book sales. You know every candidate for ministerial fellowship will be required to read it! There is nothing like selling your own required text books.

  2. In case you missed it in the UUWorld Interdependent Web roundup:

    Mary Benard, editorial director of Skinner House Books, says the report will be available as an ebook soon after GA.

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