@richiev you make some interesting arguments but I agree with
@RandyC, it's not really about incentives. It wouldn't hurt, certainly - but that's not the root cause of the issue in my mind. If you look at barcode right now, there are a LOT of frags available and a LOT of people who want those frags - they just aren't moving. So I stand by my original thesis that one of the main issues is simple logistics, and a tool or process to minimize the pain of said logistics (like being able to easily coordinate several pickups and dropoffs at once) would help a lot.
Another thing to keep in mind is we need to really get away from any bitterness about "freeloaders." I know you all know this, but a very small percentage of hobbyists are actually successful. Let's say it's 10% for the sake of argument - only 10% of people are going to actually be able to successfully grow out frags and return them. They have good intentions (a very tiny number of folks are just looking to "freeload,") they just lack the success needed to really put back a ton of frags. I think our club can help increase that 10% number over time, but it's always going to be the reality of the hobby. We just need to embrace this for DBTC to be successful. And the more frags we put into it, and the more volume of DBTC that get traded, then that 10% number represents a larger and larger quantity of completed chains and active chains. If we have 10 active chains, maybe 1 will get completed. If we have 100 active chains, maybe 10 will get completed. The latter is healthier and more successful than the former, IMO, even if the 10% rule stays true over time.
Regular DBTC meet ups would help (and be fun), but I was also thinking about leveraging LFS (or local "whales") to act as Amazon lockers. Kenny would do it for us, no doubt - reserve a small section of his frag system for us to drop off DBTC corals and pick them up. If I knew I could drop off 5 frags and pick up 5 frags with a single visit to Kenny...I would be all over it. I bet Robert would support South Bay. My tank could be the drop-off location for the North Bay, etc.
Another thought is the idea of a "common" DBTC chain for very easy/common corals. Do we really need a bunch of different lineaged purple stylo? What if we consolidated these corals into a single DBTC thread with a ton of available frags - ONE chain for purple stylo, ONE chain for red monti cap, etc. Newbies could quickly fill their tank with the easy stuff and it would move some of these swaps from PIF activity into DBTC activity.
In short: 1. volume is
good. 2. Ease of coordinating drop offs and pick ups is
good. 3. Whales who contribute a ton of frags to the system without bitterness or expectation that all their chains get completed is
good.
Of course for very high end corals, #3 maybe doesn't apply - but those will get traded within a pretty small circle anyway. A circle I hope to contribute to and be a part of, but that shouldn't be the heart of DBTC either IMO.
@RandyC shouldn't ever be expected to give a frag of Froot Loops to some newbie (give it to me pls), and I think an expectation that a frag of that value gets a chain completed is quite reasonable.