Wouter,

I'm only an aspiring owner, not an actual owner, so make of this what you will...

After your first response to George, I had the impression that your main objective was to try to motivate people to assist in promoting the class. Personally I don't think that is a good basis on which to restrict membership. I think as long as an owner of a compliant boat demonstrates a genuine desire to sail as F16, you will gain little by placing additional burdens on them.

However your response to Mary raised a different issue, which is relationship of F16 to OD classes within the F16 family. I can understand your concern that subgroups may influence the class in ways not necessarily in the interests of the class overall. And I can imagine that this may be particularly important while F16 is still in a fairly early stage of development.

I think this issue needs more discussion. I don't have a clear view myself on the best way to deal with this, but so far I'm not convinced that the restrictive membership policy you've suggested is the only or best tool for the job.

Interested to hear other views on this.

Mark.