DC Guy

Actually only partially true. The corps have full rights to everything after 1 year, i.e., Phantom owns rights to all their stuff from 2009 after 2010 finals are complete.

I assure you, I am NOT Hoppy! I'm not even Happy about all this stuff!

If there were no G7, no FA16, no DCI ... what would be the best thing to do to start over from scratch? I would hope that a new "next generation" organization would have the following characteristics: Governance - The Board of Directors would be composed of people that are passionate about the Drum Corps activity, but not directly involved with any single drum corps (as there should not be a conflict of interest when deciding issues that affect everyone). The Board of Directors would be comprised of individuals who are "business savvy" ... after all, we're talking millions of dollars a year budget for this organization. Also, the board should not be elected by "members" (i.e., drum corps) ... it should follow a self election model, where new board members are chosen by their capabilities, not by their corps affiliation. I.e., the NFL board isn't selected by the member football teams, why should the board of the controlling drum corps activity be elected by corps? Open - While there are a number of reasons to not open everything to the public (i.e., there are privacy issues which must be respected, i.e., salaries, etc.), the business dealings, and meetings of the organization should be open to the public. Mission - The mission of the new organization should be spelled out very clearly ... is it a "marketing organization" to promote the shows? ... is it a "training organization" to train musicians? ... is it a "sales organization" to sell DVDs and t-shirts? Once defined, the new organization should stick to its mission! What characteristics would you like to see in a new organization?

Read more carefully: I said "DCI picks stadiums that are controlled by TicketMaster". If DCI picked non TM stadiums (which, I admit, might be harder), then no TM fees on top of show fees.

Let's decompose this ... Ticketing - We all pay more to see shows, now that DCI picks stadiums that are controlled by TicketMaster ... so now we get to pay a TicketMaster "Convenience Fee" to buy drum corps tickets. Would you rather pay TicketMaster or a group related to Drum Corps? DCI Fail. System Blue - Is not staging "DCI Clinics", is staging "System Blue Clinics". DCI was supposed to do this via their "On Q" educational division, which floundered. DCI Fail. Event Management - How many shows does YEA! manage each year ... LOTS. You might not like band shows (I do ... but not as much as drum corps shows!), but YEA! does a good job of managing shows. I've spoken to people who run "local shows", and they get little more support from DCI other than "an envelope to send the proceeds check in". DCI Fail. There are reasons why Crown / BD / YEA are where they are ... they create a business model that works, they spend the effort to streamline that model as to not waste time / talent / resources / money. (edited for formatting)

We have a winner!