My name is Rosemarie Knechtel, and I am delighted to be a member of the Fanclub.
You all know me, and I know you from the telephone, through e-mails or via the VARIO Helicopter forum. In personal conversations I find that the right words come easily, and it is not difficult to concentrate on the essentials. However, this is a one-sided dialogue with this, my own, and I am not quite so confident of finding the right note.
My task is to look after the VARIO Fanclub - a project which was immediately received with great enthusiasm by all my colleagues, both male and female. The appearance and format of the Fanclub is fluid, and may not be the same tomorrow as today; in just the same way my hope is that its content will constantly change and expand.
But I'm getting ahead of myself - allow me to tell the story from the beginning.
In the Summer of 2005 (of which only a few days deserved the name "Summer") Gonzalo Martinez sent us a Link to his website, which at that time was documenting the early stages of the construction of his Lama. I just looked at this briefly, then sought out Uli Streich and discussed it with him. Almost immediately we were in agreement: we had to create a platform where all pilots' Internet websites could be accessed readily. Anybody who has struggled to get good results from a search engine will know why this seemed to be so important.
The decision was made to set up a Fanclub, but this is not quite as easy as it sounds. Should we make programs available for use by our club members? And if so, which ones? There were many questions to be answered, and several hurdles to be overcome. However, we were in the happy position of being able to turn to our team of Beta-testers, who had also advised us about setting up our On-line Shop.
Our thanks in particular are due to Edward Eckstein, Stefan Hanke, Dave Hollins, Roger Hubschmid, Matthias Kenngott, Juergen Malberg, Rainer Vetter and Christian Zweig. These gentlemen were amongst the Fanclub's very first members, and offered to make use of their own sites to tackle the pros and cons of programs etc. Rainer Vetter took on the job of project director, and at this point I would like to express our grateful thanks for his efforts.
The Internet is popular as a source of information, but also as a reflection of the current culture of the young, dynamic individuals of our era. That is why we have entrusted the design and administration of the VARIO Fanclub’s website to the hands of our younger trainee staff at VARIO Helicopter: Loreen Spaenig and Sabrina Reusch. These two are delighted that they are now gaining experience with modern technology in addition to their commercial training, which tends to be a matter of extremely dry routine. By taking on the administration of the Fanclub they also accepted considerable responsibility.
However, my Fanclub site is not intended just to be a general explanation. My main task is to lay to rest the personal question which dozens of people have asked me over many years. Do you also fly helicopters?
And what do you think my answer might be?
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