Clay, as a volunteer for PAPA and Replay who has sunk more hours into helping out at the building(s) and other behind the scenes work (which, even then isn't that many compared to the number of hours volunteered by people that live in Pgh) for the last couple of years, I can tell you that you have ZERO idea what you're talking about. You're entitled to your opinions, but lucky for all of us, there just that; opinions, not fact.

You don't think we've already tried fixing the roof? You don't think the discussion has happened? Having been up there to help fix it at one point, I've seen that the roof is extremely old. Old roofs can develop new leaks. Roofs are roofs. Weather is weather. Combine the two, and new problems develop. Shocking, right?

Nobody is suggesting that PAPA is just turning into a warehouse where the games will just sit and do nothing for 355 days a year.... WAIT! This is already what happens, even if Pinburgh takes place at PAPA or if it were to take place at the convention center. There are a handful of events taking place there in April; I think the IFPA and PAPA World Championships or something. Seems like it'll end up being an abandoned place for sure. So again, I can't see what point you're trying to make here.

"As for PAPA parking, I've never personally found it to be an issue". Ah, well fantastic! It's good to know that since you personally have never had issues, that no people have ever had issues. If you'd like to come down again soon and survey the area and tell us where we can fit vehicles to accommodate 700 people and the ever growing number of people that attend PAPA, I might concede this point to you. Until then, I wouldn't be too confident in your assessment of the immediate and surrounding areas providing "plenty of parking" as you believe. In reference to walking not being a big deal, yes, to some attendees it isn't, but I'm not entirely convinced that two to three handicapped parking spots is going to cut it as we continue to grow.

That building across the street is a safety and liability issue, period. It certainly hasn't been kept there on our accord to make people feel all warm and fuzzy when they arrive. While I don't know any of the specifics, I do know that it's on a list of things to be handled, and has been for much longer than you might think. I can say however, that they can't just take Kickstarter money and throw it at the city to tear down a building that they don't own. If you have any experience handling these kinds of matters, please offer some of your advice to us on how to handle it rather than recommending that we throw other people's money at the problem to fix it. I'm serious, if you know of a better way that you would handle it that we aren't, share it with us. After all, keeping the PAPA facility open where it's at is very important to you.

In terms of making it "just pinball", I hate to tell you that we've generated a lot clientele that have different preferences than your own and quite enjoy seeing old video games that they used to play when they were younger, sitting next to the pinball machine that they also played when they were younger. Can't give much more insight here.

I have no idea what you're talking about in terms of a lot of broken and unleveled games. We had a massive team of techs to fix things as soon as they were noticed and the majority of the credit issues had been resolved. You learn a lot about those things in year one. Ah, and I'm sorry that the crazy number of volunteer hours that came from several people that went into leveling games as they arrived to the show didn't meet your standards. I'm sure they'd appreciate your sentiments. Aside from that, there is almost ALWAYS someone at PAPA busting their ass going through games making sure that they are in top working order, and out of everything you've talked about, I find this issue to be the most disrespectful because a lot of their work goes on behind the scenes and is totally thankless. To discredit the amount of work and time they put into the number of games they have to maintain is absolutely laughable.

The Replay Foundation, the PAPA facility and brand, and the ReplayFX Convention are continuing to grow; the data certainly doesn't show anything to the contrary. We listen to our patrons and guests about things they want to see, things they want to do, and things that we could do better. We take these things very seriously, because honestly, it doesn't matter what we like, what we are comfortable with, or how we want to see things done. We aren't doing all of the work and making all of the decisions we do for us. We do it for the gaming community at large. We'll continue to move forward with the community's and organization's best interests in mind in terms of the long terms goals.

With that in mind, the issues that you seem to have with all of this seem to be quite personal in nature, less than constructive, self serving, extremely short-sighted, and frankly, unwarranted. It's okay to not be a guest at the show. It's okay to not like certain things we do. Its okay to have your voice and opinions; nobody is taking that away from you.

It's not okay, however, to be completely classless in the process of bringing these things up on a social forum when you know almost nothing about the issues that your spouting off about. Seriously, comparing a gaming convention move to over-augmentation of breasts and subsequent dissatisfaction of your significant other because of their new size? Yeah we need more of that. That'll help the community grow.

Let me be very clear that everything written is coming from me personally. It doesn't reflect the thoughts or opinions of PAPA or Replay. I want the pinball hobby to grow, and we're at a critically important point in time of potential where we can maximize its growth if we do it correctly. I personally would much rather see us all work together, which would help all of us in the long run, rather than tear each other down. I hope to make it to VFW at some point and see your show and I hope future years are just as successful. You have a great collection there and a fantastic opportunity to provide the pinball community with a great event.

Best of luck moving forward.

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