Author Topic: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se  (Read 261047 times)

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Offline John Noonan

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #285 on: August 15, 2014, 12:52:00 AM »
It seems that Heather Black is doing a better job updating the SCTA FaceBook page than the official SCTA website is being done, looks like we need to give her a raise and take it from the people that are not updating the "official" SCTA page.

I was told SpeedWeek was cancelled early Saturday morning by a long time SCTA volunteer which saved us the drive out from California, 3 or 4 years ago I said I was not going to sign up on s h I t t t e r, myface, or spacebook however as I learned it is a way to stay in touch, informed and aware.  You can either embrace it or drive to Bonneville and find put when you get there it is rained out.



Offline Jack Gifford

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #286 on: August 15, 2014, 01:46:17 AM »
... SCTA/BNI "officials"... They don't like your "rag", Jon...
Some of us "New folks" don't have a clue what that's all about. :?
M/T Pontiac hemi guru
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Offline makr

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #287 on: August 15, 2014, 06:49:18 AM »
This is the funniest thread on this forum, ever!


GET OFF MY LAWN YOU PUNK KIDS! LOL!
Ride fast, safety last.

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Offline flatman

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #288 on: August 15, 2014, 09:49:05 AM »
So let me get this right.  We're going to blame social media for the weather.

Offline 7800ebs

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #289 on: August 15, 2014, 10:12:52 AM »
YEP.... :-D

and them darn Spiders for the web mess... or was that al gore?

and that idiot that invented that phone thingy

the smoke signals I got the first two years it rained when I first build my car.. way back in the 80's

got lost on the way to cali.... damn wind any how..  I thought the smoke said go west..

Let me tell you folks... there ain't no salt flats in Santa Cruz..

I'm so thankful for facebook... and all the TMI and stupid pets.. and salt updates..

Offline Seldom Seen Slim

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #290 on: August 15, 2014, 10:49:10 AM »
Hey -- it could be worse.  I've managed to stick my size 14 foot in my mouth - about to the knee, at least - twice during this "discussion".  I think I'm going to bow out before anything worse happens. :-o  I'll still watch and read -- just won't try to jump in with stuff that I think is important for me to say, so to speak.
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Offline SPARKY

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #291 on: August 15, 2014, 11:05:48 AM »
Some of us "New folks" don't have a clue what that's all about. huh

Welcome to our world --- This just about sums it up:

---people who THINK they know---meet those who KNOW they know!!

That  just about sums up any organization I have ever been associated with---In  reality all one has to do is change the subject matter, to move one, from one group to the other!--- ymmv
Miss LIBERTY,  changing T.K.I.  to noise, dust, rust, BLUE HATS & hopefully not scrap!!

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Offline MMorgan

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #292 on: August 15, 2014, 11:42:04 AM »
I guess I missed a lot of what kept going in this thread.  I will throw my $0.02 in.  I do all of the social media for our teams and our biofuels project.  Personally "getting the word out quickly" for me starts with Facebook as it is directly from my phone and disseminates to the greatest amount of people the quickest.  By starting there I am then able to go forward and send out texts and make calls etc. Each one of those texts and calls are very time consuming, especially in sending out information quickly.  Group texts really don't work because when people respond everyone sees and it gets a little crazy.  I would believe those who don't have social media and/or smart phones likely aren't immediately seeing emails etc. and probably won't have the most prompt information because they don't have a million notifications popping up in their pocket immediately.  Sometimes it would be really nice to easily remain unplugged but I am from a generation where because everything is so immediate we also expect immediate responses etc.  I also greatly benefit from prompt information and have chosen to sacrifice other things in order to have this.  I don't think everyone needs to do that however!  I know for my teams I am the point of contact and stay on top of the goings-on and then it is my job to relay that as quickly and efficiently as possible.  I think a lot of teams would benefit from having someone associated with them plugged in as such, I think it is a great way to get even the MUCH younger involved in LSR and in a way that they are familiar and comfortable with!  I love all my LSR friends and hope we will continue the sport for generations to come!  I hope everyone will stay civil towards each other and remember that when mother nature has her way we ALL lose and we all try our best to work around/with that.  This was a good opportunity for all to learn better how to work with this type of setback. The weather came in after many teams arrived and it sucks.  I am grateful for all those who worked so hard to try to make it happen and who are yet willing to try again.  I know I found things I can do better next time and also how better to keep everyone up to date.  Fingers crossed that mother nature cooperates and we get some fantastic racing in here between now and the end of the season!  I think you are all awesome and look forward to getting to know more and more of you!  It's only my third season at Bonneville and I am blown away how many racers there are and I love getting to know each of you!  We have such an awesome, and addictive, sport.  If I can ever help any of you please let me know and I will do my best!  Let's get back out there and set some records!
Mike Morgan
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Offline hotrod

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #293 on: August 15, 2014, 12:54:41 PM »
I might add another comment here regarding emergency notification.

As I mentioned before, I spent 14 years working in emergency management and one of my duties was as communications officer.

We had test exercises and actual emergencies every year that tested our notification systems and there are some lessons learned from that constant exposure to the multitude of ways that Murphy can stick his finger in your eye.

The most robust and failure resistant notification is some sort of tree cascade of notifications preferably with redundant notification for the most important points of contact. At the time we started using these we were very limited in communications compared to today, and much of our first notifications went out by land line telephone, fax systems or paging systems.

The weakness of paging and similar one way notification systems is that although they are fast to get the word out, you have no way of knowing if the intended recipient ever got the message. Same goes for cell phone text messages today (at least until you get a response back).

Pagers got left in cars over night, pagers got turned off while going to a movie and never turned back on, batteries died, user was outside a paging area, the pager went off but because it was under a pillow on the couch in the other room no one heard it, pagers got dropped in the toilet --- just about every operational error you can think of happens sooner or later.

Phones on the other hand are positive communications (although slow) if you get no answer you know that the message never got delivered, but you can still have failures as messages left with family members sometimes got forgotten etc.

As a result of those breaks in the communication chains you should always plan on at least 2 communications paths reaching each person who urgently must know about the situation.

The phone tree was the most reliable system we had then.
We sent out pages to our primary contact group and then started phone calls (including the same people for confirmation). We worried most about getting the message to at least 2 individuals in each operational group. It was their responsibility then to fan out the message to their co-workers and team members, with both people calling the same people but in reverse order. That way the first person called by X was the last person called by Y. That way each person got called twice but each person was called early in the fan out by one or the other of the primary contact people.

This same sort of system can be used by today's technology with only a few modifications necessary depending on who you work with and what level of technology they are comfortable with and have access too on a day to day basis.

As mentioned above finding a younger communications savvy member of a race team and making it their responsibility to keep up to date on what is going on and then updating key members of the teams regarding breaking news developments would be a wise idea.

Sending multiple manual text messages on many cell phones is painfully slow. On a full lap top or desk top computer system which can send text messages via email quickly and efficiently you can do it very quickly as a batch of BCC emails. Each person gets a single text message with one push of the enter key.

The response would best be a single text message back to your point of contact for your team that you got the text message.
Where I work, we do a lot of communication by text messages, for obvious messages we only send a single character response back. Just a "K" is all that is needed to say Okay I got your message and understand. It is mnemonically obvious as the letter K sounds like Okay.

By the way I just tested responding by text message back to a text message sent via the email message. At least on AT&T the response worked and went back to the same email account I sent the text message from.

Bottom line it should be the responsibility of each team to get the word to their people.
You need to take responsibility to pick and choose from the menu of available information sources and work out a system that fits your needs.
It is physically and financially impossible for the SCTA or any other organization to cover all bases all the time promptly when things are changing rapidly.
A communications fan out tree however is very efficient in both time and resources and can notify a vast number of people in a very short time.

official SCTA web page
SCTA face book page
phone message from a designated person
email or text message from a designated person
period stop an personal phone call to the SCTA phone number
monitoring traffic on various web sites including this one
etc.

For example lets assume our fan out for notifications involves 5 communications at each step.

SCTA (USFRA etc.) puts out a notification to 5 different paths.
(tier 1) The person making the announcement notifies 5 people.  (5 people notified)
(tier 2) Each of those people notify 5 other people. (25 people notified)
(tier 3) Each of those people notify 5 other people. (125 people notified)
(tier 4) Each of those people notify 5 other people. (625 people notified)

Now lets make a small change ( the most important tiers are the 1st and second tier)
(tier 1) The person making the announcement notifies 7 people.  (7 people notified)
(tier 2) Each of those people notify 6 other people. (42 people notified)
(tier 3) Each of those people notify 5 other people. (210 people notified)
(tier 4) Each of those people notify 5 other people. (1050 people notified)

As you can see geometric growth rapidly expands the numbers contacted to huge numbers.

In our case with modern communications methods, we can have 40 or 50 people in that second tier group if it includes FB, web pages and similar mass communications methods. If the first tier was a text phone message to key staff of the organization plus 4 or 5 mass communications paths like web pages, face book pages, and web forums and interested people monitoring those pages made just a few contacts to friends or team mates, you could contact the entire country in about 3-4 hops.



« Last Edit: August 15, 2014, 01:01:07 PM by hotrod »

Offline Nortonist 592

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #294 on: August 15, 2014, 01:18:27 PM »
Time to close this thread as its teetering on the edge of lunacy.  What's next?  All SCTA members get a small device implanted in our bodies that will buzz, vibrate, cause great pain every time there is rain in the vicinity of Utah? 
Get off the stove Grandad.  You're too old to be riding the range.

Offline dw230

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #295 on: August 15, 2014, 01:27:28 PM »
OK Hot Rod,

You want to go ahead and set that up.

DW
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Offline hotrod

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #296 on: August 15, 2014, 01:45:35 PM »
Sent you a PM DW

Offline Milwaukee Midget

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #297 on: August 15, 2014, 01:55:11 PM »
Being in Wendover last Saturday, the news got to me via Buddy Walker, who was at the next table having breakfast with the FlatCad crew.

He had his mobile device in his hand, and I don't know what source he gleaned the information from, but consider this . . .

20 years ago, how would this information have been sent to us?

The explanation letter would have arrived via the post office - we still wouldn't have seen that yet.

Those on the road on their trek to the event would have been stopping at payphones and making calls to hotel rooms of other competitors - and if their contacts were in the bar or the parking lot, the call would have gone unanswered.

Depending on the person behind the desk, a call to your hotel may or may not have gotten you a straight answer.

As to the issue of Facebook getting first priority over the SCTA Website, consider this -

From a hand held phone/device, you can access Facebook and post news and pictures in less than a minute.  I'm not sure what the setup is to post information on the SCTA website, but I'm quite certain it's much more time consuming than a Facebook post, and probably required someone to actually sit down at a computer to make it happen.

The SCTA volunteers were probably quite harried Saturday morning.  I think the Facebook post was a smart move to minimize as much unnecessary travel as possible for those who were traveling.   

As to those who don't much care for Facebook - and while I have a page, I stand foursquare among you - a quick Google search gets you there - enter SCTA Facebook.

One of the things that often gets talked about here is "tribal knowledge".  The routine things are easily picked up on, but it's been 20 years since a Speedweek rain-out. 

And while this will likely put into place protocols for future rain-outs, who's to say that the technology available to those involved in the next rain-out - whenever that is - is going to be what was used this time?

You'll get no complaint from me about the SCTA on this one.  They made every effort to pull this event off, working against a stacked deck and hoping against hope to make it happen.

My thanks goes out to everyone involved in trying to make Speedweek possible, and a special thanks to those who were delegated the task of informing the public  as quickly as they did with the resources they had available to them.

 :cheers:





"Problems are almost always a sign of progress."  Harold Bettes
Well, I guess we're making a LOT of progress . . .  :roll:

Offline zzcruzin

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #298 on: August 15, 2014, 02:15:36 PM »
Whew,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,my hair hurts after reading all this. Me no text, no facebook, no twitter, no titter, no carrier pigeons, nuttin. Just my flip phone from 1987. I guess i will get by.
Jon, Ray and myself think your site is still the best. Mark.

Offline DSR88

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Re: SpeedWeek 2014 - the event per se
« Reply #299 on: August 15, 2014, 02:20:22 PM »
Sign of the times!!!! I remember when you had to go to the café in town and look at the chalk board to get your official info.
Now on another note I was impressed that they were doing everything they could. My car was all inspected in the parking lot if we got to the salt we were ready.
Thank You SCTA/BNI for doing all you could Do!!!!!!!!!! Donnie Stringfellow