My take: They will keep reporting monthly activities, BUT will be kept in the local congregation. No more sending over. They already do that with pioneers applications.
New Upcoming Changes - No More Publisher Record Cards & Reporting Hours
by thedepressedsoul 108 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Vidiot
minimus - "The less paper trail the safer they are."
"Shred the fucking files! Shred the fucking files!!!"
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redvip2000
My take: They will keep reporting monthly activities, BUT will be kept in the local congregation. No more sending over. They already do that with pioneers applications.
yes also makes a lot of sense. This way, they still won't report aggregate numbers, but each congo will have a barometer on how their folks are doing and a measure for assignments, etc.
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sir82
Reading the OP more carefully....
"Publisher record cards...going away" could simply mean hours are recorded electronically, not on paper. Not a big deal at all.
"Reporting hours....going away"......"reporting" from whom and to whom?
Does it mean (A) reporting of hours from the publisher.... to his/her congregation?
Or does it mean (B) reporting of hours from the congregation.... to the branch?
If (A), that would be a huge change.That is what I interpreted at first, and all my previous comments on this thread were predicated on that interpretation.
But if (B), it's not that huge. It's big in a sense, it would indicate the dropping of published year-end totals. But the control mechanism on publishers is still in force. The use of "hours, hours, hours" for determining who gets to be an elder remains. The "prestige" of being a pioneer remains. The day to day life of the typical JW is unchanged.
Seems that the OP really is too vague to be of much use.
Maybe Thedepressedsoul could clarify his/her remarks?
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Jidders
Full tinfoil hat time:
If op is right they're most likely switching to digital through the use of a preaching app allowing the recording of time, visits and note keeping as a great provision in ministerial crusade. This app will either connect to the KH's master server which reports back to hq or just simply sends info directly to the hq (much like how sir82 mentioned). Possibly allows for more nebulous numbers and reports during conventions as the reporting numbers could be falsified easier or just mushed together into a generic reporting overview.
It would allow ez record destruction too since all they'd need to do is shoot out an update the wipes notes with a little patch disclaimer saying that the change to a new version unfortunately couldn't carry over previous information or something. While that would be terrible for keeping information it certainly gives more immediate control, which if the GB is as inscincere as many make them out to be, that would be the main draw. Hell even going as so far as making a lite publication app and instead of full literature carts they only carry a small amount and go full digital, encouraging people to download the publication app that gives easy access to the latest news, awakes and those Caleb and Sofia videos those kids crave!
I know there's an existing app but adding one that is for casual masses rather than the full resource with an even more spoon feeding interface makes a disturbing amount of sense to me. Afterall they do have their online personal study thing which is so pared down that anyone can follow along.
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slimboyfat
Don’t doubt the ability of the GB to make decisions that are against their interests.
The decision to stop charging for literature in 1990 was a monumental unforced error and a gross overreaction to having to pay taxes.
They could have chosen to pay the tax and keep charging for the literature and they would be in a far better position today.
So it’s entirely possible they will stop recording time for fairly trivial reasons (overreacting to data concerns, or worries about publishing declines) and it have dramatic unintended consequences for the organisation.
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Della Street
No time cards or hour requirements - HOW are they going to know who the cool kids are??
If this happens you know there is going to be real panic.
DS
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Vidiot
@ slimboyfat...
Agreed.
IMO, any webpage entry referring to The Law of Unintended Consequences should have a footnote... "(see 'Watchtower Society')".
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redvip2000
They could have chosen to pay the tax and keep charging for the literature and they would be in a far better position today.
I really doubt this. If they chose to charge specific amounts, the publishers would first pay for the literatrash (that money would be taxed) and then they would try to place it at the door.
The issue is that most of literatrash gets stashed away in Jdubs homes, because nobody wants them. Even today being free, nobody wants them. If Jdubs were charging for it at the door, even less would be placed. There would be no double dipping.
Instead today what you have is publishers buying them via a donation - that money does not get taxed. What happens beyond that is the same - they just get stashed away. On occasion someone accepts one and gives a donation which is then sent to the Org also tax free.
My take is that the decision was the right one.
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slimboyfat
redvip there was an internal letter within a year of dropping charges in 1990 that stated income from literature was down. Every downscale in literature since then indicates the trend continued.
Don't forget that the bulk of Watchtower profit came from selling special and luxury items to JWs: insight books, deluxe Bibles, tapes, videos, yearbooks, Kingdom Interlinear, concordance, calendars, daily text, bound volumes, Bible stories book, individual magazine subscriptions...
I think we tend to forget just how huge Watchtower publishing used to be, and just how many items they sold to JWs, before you even begin to factor sales to the public.
The profit on each item may not have been massive, but they certainly weren’t selling at a loss, and with a captive market of millions it's easy to see how Watchtower we’re rolling in the money until the 1990s when the cutbacks began.
Any income prompted by donations for the dwindling literature today is negligible by comparison.
