Membership is a function of what you do and how you act; it has
nothing to do with paying money. (Hua Fu belongs to several
professional and industry organizations that learned this lesson.)
Such a fundamental change was counter to the SCA's atmosphere of
inclusiveness, and would have cut us off from many people who have
value to contribute to the group either because they were not able to
or were not willing to pay for the privilege.
<p>
Still there needs to be some membership base in order to support the
corporate structure (and we believe there is a need for the corporate
structure).  Insurance is a good thing; effective insurance that makes
sure that our officers and society as a whole are not held financially
responsible for the idiocies of others is good.  The issue of current
membership requirements for certain activities came up recently on the
sca-east mailing list, so we know there's disagreement about where the
line should be drawn.  In general, we think the current location of
the line is reasonable.
