"Do the newsletters still exist? Haven't seen one in several months...." is a recent question posted in the Glen-L.com Boatbuilder Forum.

It seems that some confusion has arisen since the institution of our new Glen-L website, so let me explain...

Once upon a time there was the WebLetter, begun by Barry Witt. Upon Barry's retirement I became the editor of the Glen-L WebLetter; it changed somewhat over the first few months of my tenure as editor as I put my own spin/personality into it and also added some new features. During the time of the WebLetter people sometimes referred to the WebLetter as the "newsletter", and so the two names "WebLetter" and "newsletter" inadvertently became somewhat interchangeable.

Some years after the institution of the WebLetter (also sometimes called the "newsletter") which was published approximately once a month or as often as there was enough content to make publishing it worthwhile, Gayle instituted the publishing of the "Glen-L Newsletter"

which was intended to "fill-in" the empty spaces in our lives in between the publishing of the next WebLetter and thus keep everyone from having to wait a month (or sometimes longer) to be encouraged ("kicked in the ass") by our fun- and fact-filled missive of boatbuilding we called the WebLetter.

Now, as much as I enjoyed putting together the WebLetter, in order for it to be the magnificent "piece of art" that I envisioned publishing each month (or so) it took a LOT of time. While I considered it a labor of love, all the time I would invest in it was time that Glen-L (our business) really needed me to be doing other, more productive, projects.

So, when we realized the need to update our tired old (some say "confusing") Glen-L.com website, it was decided that things like Customer Photos, Project Registries, and the WebLetter would be incorporated into the new website. We went to great lengths to set up a system whereby all of our boatbuilders could post their photos, their Project Registries (their own accounts of their boatbuilding progress), even their miscellaneous thoughts and stories, and they could do all this immediately themselves without having to wait for us folks at the Intergalactic Glen-L Headquarters to find time to post them for you. This fantastic area of the Glen-L.com website which we created especially for you is called the Glen-L Boatbuilders' Blog - which you obviously have already found since you're reading this.

It's gratifying for us that some of our boatbuilders/friends/co-conspirators have found the Boatbuilders' Blog and have begun posting their photos and stories. We sincerely hope you'll all get into the habit of also doing likewise. It only takes a minute to register (you only have to register once) and afterwards you have complete freedom to immediately see your thoughts, stories, photos, whatever's-on-your-pea-pickin'-little-mind (as long as it's pertinent to boatbuilding or boating) posted for the whole world to share in.

Now that you're here, be sure to Subscribe to the RSS Feed" (click on the leftmost button in the "Connect with us:" box near the top right of this page) to be kept up-to-date on all the new blog posts from your fellow boatbuilders...when you subscribe to our feed, new content is automatically downloaded from the website, so the feed is always up to date. Thereafter, whenever you want to know if there's new content in the Glen-L Blog, all you have to do is to click the "Favorites" button in your web browser, and then click the "Feeds" tab, then click on "Boatbuilders site on Glen-L.com" and your browser will open to the latest posts on our blog. Easy! Or as Gayle would say, "Easy-Peezy!"

There are "Twitter" and "Facebook" buttons adjacent to the RSS Feed button too, so you can automatically share your (and others') blog posts with just a click.

Okay, now that you know the history and have been brought up-to-date on the difference between "WebLetters" and "Newsletters", you might be asking "what about all those great features we used to enjoy seeing in the WebLetter?"

Instead of one big WebLetter publication that you have to wait for a month or more between issues, we are sending it out via the Boatbuilders' Blog in smaller, much more frequent pieces.

And, of course, Gayle's "Glen-L Newsletter" is still coming out very frequently to everyone who's signed up for it. If you're not already receiving it, sign up to get it by going to the Glen-L.com Home Page and entering your first name and your email address in the form at the top of the page for requesting our free "A Consumer's Guide to Building Your Own Boat" then click on the "Yes I want this free guide!" button.

And you can still read past issues of the WebLetter here or look up individual articles here.

I sincerely hope that this clears up any confusion that may have occured due to the similarity of names of our wonderful publications. If you have any comments or ideas to make our publications and/or our website more useful or easier to explore please don't hesitate to let us know.