Owners' Manual

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Thank you for subscribing to Good Old Boat magazine.
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Contact us

We’re not like the big guys: there are no 800 numbers to call to talk to a bank of clerks. We answer our own phones, write our own email, mop our own floors, and maintain our own boat. So get in touch anytime:
Good Old Boat
7340 Niagara Lane North
Maple Grove, MN 55311-2655
701-952-9433 (phone) 701-952-9434 (fax)
http://www.goodoldboat.com

Karen - editorial
Tim - editorial assistant
Jerry - technical
Mark - subscriptions
Karla - classified ads
Michael - advertising

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Get your newsletter

The Good Old Boat newsletter is published between issues of the magazine exclusively for subscribers. If you have an email address listed in our database, we’ll send you an email message saying it’s posted and giving the web address. Don’t have your email address in our database? Send an email with “Subscriber Newsletter” in the subject line to Mark. Don’t have an email address? Please ask a friend or family member to print out a current newsletter issue from our website. The current issue of the newsletter is always linked from the starburst at the bottom of our homepage. We have MS Word and podcast versions also. For the podcast, go to http://www.audioseastories.net.

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Use your complimentary classified ad

Each year you are welcome to use one complimentary classified ad on our website. You can visit it at:
http://www.goodoldboat.com/resources_for_sailors/sailing_classifieds. Non-subscribers pay $40 for these ads. Our website sees 60,000 visitors a month, and the most popular page is our classified page.

Mail or email the text for your classified ad to Karla. Or submit it online at http://www.goodoldboat.com/reader_services/classified_ad_submission.php. We reserve the right to edit. Include your first and last name, email address (if you wish) and phone number for use by those who’d like to contact you. (Please be prepared for bogus and spam offers if your email address is published. This is a very persistent problem on the Internet).

If you want to include a photo, email us a jpg or send it in the mail. It costs $20 to run a photo with your ad. Running an ad in the magazine costs an additional $35. For more details about what information to include and pricing for classified ads, visit http://www.goodoldboat.com/resources_for_sailors/sailing_classifieds/classified_guidelines.php.

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Contribute articles

We receive articles on speculation from our subscribers and pay the going rate for those we accept for publication. Contact us with an idea or send a completed article. Contact can be made by mail or email. We’ll get back to you within two to six weeks (deadlines and vacations can cause six-week delays — after all, we have to go sailing, too).

If you’d like to see the writers’ guidelines we’ve developed telling what we do and don’t publish and standard payment for articles, they're posted at http://www.goodoldboat.com/writers_guidelines. We pay our authors 60 days in advance of publication. Articles in a March issue are paid in early January, and so on.

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Make address changes

We don’t want subscribers to miss a single issue. Please keep us informed of changes at least 45 days prior to the next issue. Send a mail or email message telling us what your address was and what it is changing to. Or phone us. Or change your address online at http://www.goodoldboat.com/subscription_services/change_of_address.php.

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Buy gift subscriptions

Want to send Good Old Boat to a sailing friend? Visit us online at http://www.goodoldboat.com/subscription_services/gift_subscriptions.php. Tell us the individual’s name and full address. Also send us your name, full address, and payment, please. We'll send a note telling your recipient that you sent the gift. We'll either include the first issue of the subscription or let him or her know when to expect it.

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Order back issues, reprints

Previous issues are still available as back issues at $8 for addresses within the U.S., $9 for Canadian addresses, and $10 for overseas addresses. Prices are in U.S. currency or its equivalent. If you order and pay for issues which are no longer available, wel'll extend your subscription by that number of issues. No shipping charge. To see a list of available back issues, go to http://www.goodoldboat.com/reader_services/back_issues.php.

We are producing CDs with all back issues for our earliest years in PDF format. These work on Macs and PCs. Go to http://www.goodoldboat.com/books_&_gear/back_issue_cds.php.

We have a searchable list of articles posted at http://www.goodoldboat.com/reader_services/articles_search.php.

A simple overview of articles we have published is also available in hard copy on request and included annually in the December newsletter.

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Decode your mailing label

The top line of your mailing label tells your subscriber ID number and the number of issues remaining in your subscription after the issue which arrived with that label. Or you can find your subscription status online at http://www.goodoldboat.com/subscription_services/subscription_status.php.

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Buy books

We sell approximately 3,000 sailing books, calendars, and videos. We have them in a searchable database on our site at http://www.goodoldboat.com/books_&_gear/good_old_boat_bookshelf.

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Enjoy our web resources

We’ve created our website as a source of information for you. We’ve got the biggest list on the Internet of owners’ associations, websites, and people dedicated to specific types of sailboats. To see all of the owners’ associations in our database go to http://www.goodoldboat.com/resources_for_sailors/owners_associations.php. If we’ve got sail insignia, they’re posted by the types of boats. And we have a link to http://www.msogphotosite.com/MSOG/pdfpage/mslogo.pdf for you to download a printable booklet of sail insignia. In addition we have a neat boat identifiers section to help you recognize boats by their cove stripes at http://www.goodoldboat.com/resources_for_sailors/boat_identifiers/. There’s more. Have a look around.

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Buy “logo stuff”

We’ve also introduced a few denim shirts, T-shirts, fleece vests and jackets and ball caps. Because we’d love to see our logo on you, we’ve kept the margin low to make them affordable. See them on our site at http://www.goodoldboat.com/books_&_gear/clothing.php.

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We don’t publish your data

We hope you’ll come to trust us. We have your address, phone number, email address, and the kind of boat you sail in our database. We could make money selling our list to other publishers. But we don’t do it. Why? Because we don’t like it when publishers sell our names to others. We were readers before we were publishers, and we remember the things publishers did that irritated us. We’re trying to avoid those pitfalls (such as billing people before they’ve received a copy of the magazine or re-invoicing them nine months early).

Think of us as your “kinder, gentler publishers.” We think of you as friends. We hope it shows.

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The founders

A married couple, Karen Larson and Jerry Powlas, founded Good Old Boat in the fall of 1997. The first issue appeared in summer of 1998. Our cruising ground is Lake Superior, where we spend as much time as possible on weekends and vacations on our C&C 30, named Mystic.

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