Union Board not at fault\nThe editorial attack on the Union Board (Staff Editorial, 9/18/01) was uncalled for and unjustified. I fail to see any logic in blaming UB for the Counting Crows' mistakes. The contention that this most recent cancellation forms a pattern is dubious as well. As the editorial itself mentions, UB directors serve one-year terms; I would be surprised if anyone involved in the 1999 Tom Petty fiasco is still on UB.\nThe deeper critique and the more glaring fallacy in the argument presented in the editorial is that the students running the UB ought to receive more training. UB is more or less an amateur group. Fine. That's because it's student-run. I'm sure that if it contracted out running the Union to a private company, we would get marginally better service. But we would lose the opportunities for students without "specific knowledge or experience about how to schedule a concert or manage a large-scale event" to learn about scheduling concerts and managing large-scale events.\nOf course, many of the editorial's complaints could be directed at the IDS itself. The IDS frequently fails to perform to the level of big-city newspapers; that's because it's student-run too.\nThe people I know who serve on UB are all qualified, competent and dedicated. So are the people I know who write for the IDS. Both the IDS and the UB do a good job at doing what they do, and it's unfair to ask any more of either staff than that.\nPaul Musgrave\nJunior
Union Board dependable\nI read with some amusement your editorial attacking the Union Board and its supposed lack of dependability. I am utterly shocked and dismayed to learn that the UB has allowed as many as two concerts to slip through their fingers in three years. But let us pause and consider the extent of the blame to which we should attribute to the UB. First, there's Tom Petty. The reason his show didn't go on was because his stage was far too elaborate to be built in a day. I guess it would have been unreasonable to ask that he perform on a smaller, plainer stage. And now comes the debacle of the Counting Crows concert. I cannot believe nor accept the utter lack of prescience on the part of UB for not foreseeing this disaster. But then, when you agree to pay a band to play their show, don't you expect them to fulfill their obligation? What should UB have done, hounded the Crows incessantly to ensure that they would hit the stage as planned? You expect the impossible, and you harp on what will no doubt be forgotten by semester's end. Robert Frost said he could sum up in three words all he had learned about life: "It goes on." I can do it in two: it happens.\nAll, or at least some sarcasm aside, your editorial choice for Tuesday was poor, unnecessary and utterly unproductive. You attack the dependability of the UB, the very organization who hasbrought us such great speakers as Colin Powell, Maya Angelou and Mikhail Gorbachev. The very organization which provides movies for students every weekend; not cheap movies, FREE movies. The organization which uses all of the student money you mentioned to sponsor a continuous stream of events. The very organization which in a matter of hours created a forum last week to help students deal with the tragedy. The very organization without which your coverage would be not only dull but sparse as well. No, when it comes to those things which matter most, you are wrong. The UB is dependable. But when it comes to boring columns, lackluster sports writing, weak reporting, and opportunistic attacks on those whose omniscience is limited by mortality, at least we know we can count on the IDS to provide.\nMatt Schutte\nSenior
Concert industry volatile, not fault of Union Board\nI'm sorry, but the Sept. 18 editorial about the Union Board concert committee was just plain wrong. The editorial focused on how the UB should have been more careful about making sure that the Counting Crows show would go on. While the article acknowledged that the show being canceled was not UB's fault, they completely disregarded that statement when they said that we should have contacted them to make sure that the show would go on. What exactly could UB have done? \nShould we have been required to have a person sit in on every meeting between the band and their managers, just to make sure the show happens? Should we forcibly pull them out of their recording studio to make them come here against their will? What would the IDS have us do? The music industry is a business. When a business decides that they have two events that conflict, one of them is going to suffer. \nUnfortunately for IU, the tour that we had booked happened to be one of them. Yes, it is a shame that the Counting Crows won't be playing here. However, it is more of a shame that the IDS expects the Union Board to be able to control the direction of the concert industry, and that it paints a negative impression of UB when it does not.\nBrian Balta\nSenior, UB Concert Committee
