HOW CAN THE READERSHIP LEAD
THE FIFTH EPOCHAL REVELATION
1. We Should be Led by the Will of the Readership - The expectation of leadership for our UB-reading community should be centered on the READERSHIP, not on any particular existing UB-related organization. Ideally (no snickering please), the Foundation and Fellowship should CONSENT to such leadership of the UB-reading community. If they DO, then a kind of three-tiered (NOT branched), confederation can come into play. But it is not necessary to gain their consent in order to rest the reigns of leadership for the movement. Lack of support from the orgs would only negatively impact those orgs anyway.
2. To Empower the Readership - To empower themselves, the readership needs to have a central, online place where voting can occur (I would suggest UBRON). Votes would be anonymous, simple majority. A relatively pure democratic polling or voting system would be established.
3. A Urantia Book Readers Representative (UBR) Should be Voted for - One possible method for deriving candidates would be: (1) The Readership nominates 7 people (being the seven most-commonly submitted names - if there are less than 7 that have multiple submission than only the people with multiple submissions would become nominees - and people CAN submit their own name too). These 7 nominees will have one month to "campaign". (2) The Readership then chooses 2 candidates from that 7 (or less) nominee pool. Those 2 candidates then have one month to campaign. (3) A grand election is held the next month. The new UBR Representative is announced by noon PST the following day, and serves for one year. There should be no term limits (the UBR can be re-elected as many times - years - as the Readership wants). This allows for very talented leaders to have more influence.
2. To Empower the Readership - To empower themselves, the readership needs to have a central, online place where voting can occur (I would suggest UBRON). Votes would be anonymous, simple majority. A relatively pure democratic polling or voting system would be established.
3. A Urantia Book Readers Representative (UBR) Should be Voted for - One possible method for deriving candidates would be: (1) The Readership nominates 7 people (being the seven most-commonly submitted names - if there are less than 7 that have multiple submission than only the people with multiple submissions would become nominees - and people CAN submit their own name too). These 7 nominees will have one month to "campaign". (2) The Readership then chooses 2 candidates from that 7 (or less) nominee pool. Those 2 candidates then have one month to campaign. (3) A grand election is held the next month. The new UBR Representative is announced by noon PST the following day, and serves for one year. There should be no term limits (the UBR can be re-elected as many times - years - as the Readership wants). This allows for very talented leaders to have more influence.
THE THREE TIERED LEADERSHIP
A new power structure would come into play. It would not be a 3 branch leadership like the US. It would be a 3 TIERED leadership.
TIER I. The UBR would play the part of both Chief Executive and Primary Legislator. She or he would be both a representative of the Readership's voice AND then would INITIATE the most popular direction as it is dictated by Readership (through polls every 3 months) in a quarterly newsletter sent to all orgs and the Readership itself.
TIER II. The next tier down would be the functioning of the Urantia Book Fellowship. Nothing would change for that org, except that they would have to have an ear open to the new UBR. The Fellowship would never be obligated to follow the desires of the UBR (though they will reflect the dictations of the Readership). Yet the Fellowship IS important and has the outreach system and established resources to make the nuts and bolts of plans come into play. They would be like a Senate.
TIER III. The Urantia Foundation would preserve the text inviolate, certify newly published public domain Urantia Books, continue to publish their own UB and complete the translation activities. Because the Foundation holds the Michael Emblem copyright, and was partially established by the Revelators themselves, they will serve in a Judiciary capacity. They WILL NO LONGER have control over MAKING the plans for the movement (if that even ever happened anyway?).
By implementing some cleaned-up version of the specifics above, combined with the three ideas I proposed in my essay, a GREAT push forward COULD be achieved realistically, and with relatively little extra effort on every-one's part.
I volunteer to advise people on whatever they may need in any of these regards.
ONE UNORTHODOX IDEA FOR URANTIA BOOK DISTRIBUTION
To digress for a moment.
Let's look at one possibility out of many.
The CD dropping thing.
Now, here's an example of an easy, cheap, but EFFECTIVE method of distribution...
* Buy these: Business Card CD- R's - you get 100 for $35, or a price break for quantity (there are better deals out there too).
* Download the UB text to your computer. Here's a good site (and there are others) Urantia.info Download Center I would suggest the pdf version (other languages are available).
* When the discs arrive, pop a Business Card CD into your computer. Drag the UB text folder to the CD Folder. Rinse and repeat. :) Couldn't be much simpler. I was wrong I said your cost would be $1.00/CD, it would actually be more like $0.40 (w/S&H and your time and effort).
* Finalize the CD's, write "The Urantia Book" on them or make a fancy label (or print directly to the disc, like I do). The CD's come with free little plastic protectors and are 50 MB each (more than you will ever need to fit the UB text on it). By the way, that's enough extra space to add files of your own with the UB (Urantia art, music, informational pages, web link pages to the Fellowship and Foundation, etc...you name it).
* Then take a dozen or so and just clandestinely drop them into people's coat pockets at parties, in waiting rooms, in the entrances of libraries, stuff them into free local newspapers at the supermarket, go into work early and put one on each of your co-worker's desks, leave them behind at restaurants with the tip, put them in phone booths (if there still are any around), put them in information stations and rest stops along turnpikes, put them in the collection dishes at church (for the minister ;]), or if you're Jess, just walk up to people and say, "Would you like a CD with the Urantia Book on it?" :)
I mean look at the potential for spreading the UB this way...
Let's look at one possibility out of many.
The CD dropping thing.
Now, here's an example of an easy, cheap, but EFFECTIVE method of distribution...
* Buy these: Business Card CD- R's - you get 100 for $35, or a price break for quantity (there are better deals out there too).
* Download the UB text to your computer. Here's a good site (and there are others) Urantia.info Download Center I would suggest the pdf version (other languages are available).
* When the discs arrive, pop a Business Card CD into your computer. Drag the UB text folder to the CD Folder. Rinse and repeat. :) Couldn't be much simpler. I was wrong I said your cost would be $1.00/CD, it would actually be more like $0.40 (w/S&H and your time and effort).
* Finalize the CD's, write "The Urantia Book" on them or make a fancy label (or print directly to the disc, like I do). The CD's come with free little plastic protectors and are 50 MB each (more than you will ever need to fit the UB text on it). By the way, that's enough extra space to add files of your own with the UB (Urantia art, music, informational pages, web link pages to the Fellowship and Foundation, etc...you name it).
* Then take a dozen or so and just clandestinely drop them into people's coat pockets at parties, in waiting rooms, in the entrances of libraries, stuff them into free local newspapers at the supermarket, go into work early and put one on each of your co-worker's desks, leave them behind at restaurants with the tip, put them in phone booths (if there still are any around), put them in information stations and rest stops along turnpikes, put them in the collection dishes at church (for the minister ;]), or if you're Jess, just walk up to people and say, "Would you like a CD with the Urantia Book on it?" :)
I mean look at the potential for spreading the UB this way...
If 20 of we UBRONer's did buy 100 of those CD's each, and downloaded the UB to all of them and dropped them around town next weekend, about 2,000 new UB's would suddenly be circulating, by Christmas! Expand to 2,000 readers doing that, and 200,000 more UB's would go into circulation. If 20,000 people made half as many CD's (50) each and distributed them in one month, 1 million new UB's would be out there.If the same amount of UB readers did that repeatedly for 1 year. 12 million new UB's would be out there in only one year (cost to each person: about $240 or $20 per month). And if 10% of the people who received those UB's became readers, there would be 1,200,000 new readers. And if 10% of THEM bought UB's from the Urantia Foundation and Uversa Press (the Fellowship), 120,000 new book would be bought (if these orgs can print enough of them).
I guess I'm wondering how this wouldn't be a win-win situation? And that little B-Card CD-scenario was just one of about a dozen strategies I've come up with in only the last two days. You're all going to laugh now, and I don't blame you, but if we could get our asses in gear, we could set a goal of getting 100 million UB's (in one form or another) out there by this time of year 2012. Hey (and I'm kidding about this): Maybe *WE* are responsible for 2012?? Maybe that's the year the UB becomes a household word.
I understand how skeptically "big" plans like this are treated in our community. Please understand that this stuff is just coming to me after years of contemplation about it.
I will say (again) that I certainly wouldn't want the next three years or so to be treated like an emergency. And why should it be? We choose to increase our efforts because it is our PLEASURE to do so, for the planet, for Michael and for our Father. There's nothing bad about any of that. It's like a kid in school. Do you tell him or her to go slow, and that a mediocre level of effort is ok? Or do you try to inspire them him/her to do their very best? Until now, we have been in a mode where, we don't feel the personal obligation to spread lots of the UB's around because there were organizations whose job it is to do that. But if we rely only on the orgs (who ARE doing their best), we are still being mediocre.
Isn't it worth trying something that is definable (I've just partially defined it) and timely? with all the positive private emails I've received in the last two days, I KNOW that something like what I've described above can work. I'm just brainstorming here. People should not be afraid to think big. Even more important they should not hesitate to DO BIG THINGS with their big thoughts.
Their are only three aspects that might make plans like the above fail: (1) The orgs put up a DAMN big fight about it. (2) The Readership doesn't want to do it. (3) We adopt the changes but can't stick with the program. Even if only number 3 happens, we will still kick out a small wave across our community.
All I am asking people to do is THINK about it. Smarter people than me will come up with much better ideas. But the above is a start.
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