You know, I read the "80% response was to go back to HPW" line and was like "that's a bullshit figure if I ever heard one".
80% response from who? N Scale scratch builders? NTRAK members? Random people at trainshows? Dealers? Beanie baby collectors? Seriously...
the "silent majority" is not a myth. 80% of N scale modelers might actually prefer the low pros, but of the 20% left over who responded, 80% of them were for pizza cutters! thus 80% of the response
MTL received motivated them go with pizza cutters (i.e. public response).
but this is really an N scale issue, and i regret that it got put into the Z forum. Z scalers don't have a huge argument with MTL or AZL. maybe we are "too grateful" for whatever we can get, but we
like most of what we're getting (especially since we didn't have to endure the "bachman" and "lima" phases to get good rolling stock).
perhaps one other reason MTL is supportive of Z scale is because Z scale modelers are supportive of MTL's efforts. can't say the same for N scalers. so if you were MTL who would you want to encourage? that said, the lion's share of MTL product is still N scale. it seems more is never enough.
it's this kind of bitter commentary that helped drive me away from N scale -- and i'm glad it did, because with Z i'm having fun modeling again! community means as much to me in Z modeling as rivets do. no, that may not be true -- it means a bit more, which is why i'm enjoying Z so much.
and for the record, Joe is willing to speak for MTL, but he doesn't have to. we're grateful that he does! we get a whole lot more good information with joe's participation than we'd have without it. you'll notice that Intermountain, Atlas, Red Caboose, etc. employees don't participate in internet forums. the reason is that it always ends up in a snot fight, and it's just not worth the effort. and that's not my opinion, it's most company's policy.
dave f.
