"Psychic News" to Close

To help us all be clearer about the issues regarding the Psychic News Bookshop - though I must say in doing so it makes what is actually going on at Psychic Press (1995) Pty Ltd and the NEC of the SNU even more curious than one might already have found it, I offer below an email sent to some churches - including those in Australia today!!! Please note carefully the email address from which it was sent:

"From: Psychic News [mailto@snu.org.uk]
Sent: Friday, 6 August 2010 6:41 PM
To: pn@snu.org.uk
Subject: Bookshop sales

Dear Customer,
The Psychic News online bookshop is currently closed for new orders, however you can still browse the site and place an order direct with us, subject to availability. For availability and to order please contact us on:

Tel: 44 (0)1279 817050 Fax: 44 (0)1279 817051

Email: psychicnews1@btconnect.com

We will notify you as soon as normal service is resumed.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Thank you for your custom
Regards from
The online bookshop team"

It would seem that Zerdini is quite correct in saying that pn@snu.org.uk are taking direct orders despite the online version being closed.

It is most interesting that a company which apparently owns Psychic Press and PN and the PN Bookshop is operating a service when Psychic Press was was supposedly being put into liquidation.

Clearly whatever has been done in relation to Psychic News (by the directors of Psychic Press and the board of the SNU) has somehow not prevented the bookshop from continuing to operate, at least in some limited/new capacity.

How this is possible is somewhat puzzling - though of course without having a full explanation of the current legal status of Psychic Press, PN and the bookshop, this might not be too surprising

More interesting is that it seems that this SNU service is able to suggest to churches around the world that "normal services" are likely to be resumed. That after all must be a reasonable interpretation of the sentence "We will notify you as soon as normal service is resumed."

So it seems we have a board (of Psychic Press) who decided that Psychic News and/or?? Psychic Press (1995) Pty Ltd) was not financially viable (even insolvent) possibly back as far as May 2010. We have the parent company (the NEC on behalf of the SNU) ratifying that decision as long ago as early or mid June 2010.

We have the retiring president of the SNU telling the members at the AGM in early July 2010, “As the situation stands at present, the Company cannot continue, as it is no longer in a viable financial position to do so and we now have no choice but to take the appropriate action and liquidate it.”

Now which "company" was Mr. Gascoyne referring to? Psychic Press? or is there yet another 'sub-company' we are not aware of which is Psychic News?

If there is no sub-company (for lack of a better way to say it in simple terms) and it was Psychic Press (1995) Pty Ltd which was "no longer viable" and there was "no choice but to take the appropriate action and liquidate it” can someone please explain to me how it is capable of still selling books.

Even if I took the last date - that is the date in the first week of July 2010 on which Mr. Gascoyne and Mr. Bruton informed the membership of the SNU of liquidation - why has it not apparently in fact taken place - when the legal requirements would suggest that after such a clear, and publicised decision it had to be.

As Churchill said: "It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma".

"The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth' is maybe an appropriate condition on anything claimed?

Maybe someone may also remind the NEC that Spiritualism is a philosophy, a science and a Truth

The paper is now gone however there is a buyer for it. I believe it is already bought with a management buy out plus the JV Trust input. Present subscribers and advertisers please expect to be contacted soon with offers from the new paper. By the way they have kept the mast head Merlin
The new owners are to keep the masthead
By the way paranormal review censure and edit the posts to suite its own agenda. At least this site here posts warts and all and are to be complimented for it, this is know as free speech.

Almera,
I will post here what was also the response to you on the Paranormal Review:

"This is not correct. My understanding is that no agreement has yet been reached between the SNU and a potential buyer. I will post news of the outcome as soon as a decision is made."

I do this, Almera, because I believe that you are incorrect in what you have posted, and while I do not wish to curtail your right to free speech I do strongly suggest that incorrect information about a matter which is of vital importance can only undermine whatever negotiations that may be taking place.

If, and when, any offer made is accepted (or rejected for that matter), and what terms and conditions might form part of any offer or acceptance if one can be achieved, must surely not be speculated upon, or pre-empted by anyone.

Whatever you think may have been discussed, the reality is, until it is announced one way or another, such speculation, or statements made with such apparent certainty, can only be detrimental to the real, and very complex situation, which currently exists.

It is unwise for any of us to put into the public domain anything regarding alleged negotiations, regardless of who may or may not be involved in them, while they are still in progress. Let us all be wise and quietly await the outcome, which will undoubtedly be made public by those who are party to the decision making, when it has really been made.

I can confirm our association has had an email cofirming the new owners will contact us for adverts soon. They also confirmed they are keeping the masthead. It is Merlin that assumes it is a management buy out and we shall wait and see if this is so. almera

Could Almera please state who the new owners are or from whom the email came from? This informartion will help us all go forward. I would like to contact the new owners as I wish to advertise.

Inspiration wrote:Could Almera please state who the new owners are or from whom the email came from? This informartion will help us all go forward. I would like to contact the new owners as I wish to advertise.

Good point Inspiration. If Almera has inside information, perhaps he/she would tell us who the new owners are. People around the world are upset about the death of Psychic News. If someone is saving it, tell us who!

Eilis

So Almera, you state that your association has received an email from "the new owners" who "confirmed they are keeping the masthead!"

Who did this email come from? Who are the new owners?

Why, and how, are these 'new owners' able to send out emails of this kind when the company Psychic Press (1995) Pty Ltd is not in liquidation or administration, and no creditors (apart from the SNU) have been informed or given the opportunity to seek clarification of the current status of the company?

Hi,
I have recieved a correction to the email regarding the online book shop. They are only advising customers to contact them for information about where to get the books in future.
I don't think too much can be read into the original mail, to me it just expresses a hope it might be revived in the future, not that anyone has actualy taken it over.
There seems to be a lot of over analysis going on.

Craske

Craske wrote:Hi,
I have recieved a correction to the email regarding the online book shop. They are only advising customers to contact them for information about where to get the books in future.
I don't think too much can be read into the original mail, to me it just expresses a hope it might be revived in the future, not that anyone has actualy taken it over.
There seems to be a lot of over analysis going on.

Craske

It sounds to me like folks are not expressing themselves clearly....

Subsequent analysis will be flawed if the original data is flawed - it's not "over analysis" that's to blame.

Hi Craske,

thank you for your opinion on this, any thoughts about the terrible loss an Independent PN is to world wide Spiritualism?

It can never be repaced by anyting other than another fully independent publication.

Hi Mac,
I think you may be correct on unclear communication.
Not very suprising in the current overheated atmosphere.
PN's staff must be at their wits end by now with all the speculation and upset caused by the demise of the paper.
Craske

I rather think that the staff of PN are far more upset by the demise of the paper, and the way it has been done, than they are at seeing speculation about what has happened and why.

I suspect more at wits end with the people who did it and the way it has been done Craske. Such speed and secrecy despite funding offers

It must be one of Spiritualisms saddest tales Craske, however you analyse it or over analyse it.

Clearly it appears to me to have been handled in a monumentally bad way (some may even say a stupid way).

But then I have only managed businesses through good and bad times (large and small) for 40 years. Always with a higher expectation of my own ethical and moral standards than seems to be apparent here.

The email sent out today making reference to that previously sent out on 6th August 2010 is as follows:

"From: Psychic News [mailto@snu.org.uk]
Sent: Sunday, 8 August 2010 2:56 PM
To: pn@snu.org.uk
Subject: Online bookshop

Dear Customer,
Please ignore the email regarding the online bookshop which contained some erroneous information on ordering.

The online bookshop is closed for further business. You may still browse the
content and contact us for advice on where to order your books in future.

We apologise for any confusion caused by the previous mailing.
Regards
Online bookshop team"

So what was the "erroneous information on ordering" contained in the first email? It said:

"The Psychic News online bookshop is currently closed for new orders, however you can still browse the site and place an order direct with us, subject to availability."

The difference in the wording between the first email and the second is interesting. The first suggests orders can be placed direct with "us" while the second suggests the same "us" can now offer "advice on where to order your books in future."

Again, I ask what exactly is the error?

May I suggest the error is really more about obscuration - that is an attempt to deliberately avoid clarity and to do so without explanation. There is a delightful old Latin saying: "obscrurum per obscurius" which means in essence 'the obscure by the still more obscure.'

Why do I say this? Well if you look closely the second email suggests they can tell people where to order your books in the future - which doesn't really say that you won't be able to order them from whoever will be operating the PN Bookshop in the future - in fact it might well be the SNU which sent the email - though they may now not wish that fact to be known and so have sent the second email to obscure the truth.

Both of these emails would appear to have been sent outside of what may be considered the normal working hours of people who have (in the past at least) been those in charge of operating the PN Bookshop and of course have gone out under the SNU banner rather than the email address used by the bookshop prior to the closure of PN.

Byzantine intrigue indeed!
Perhaps we should all send some calming and healing thoughts to the PN staff caught between a rock and a hard place.

It was I who raised this bookshop matter recently.

I think this would be a very bad time for me to bang the drum for Spiritualism or to direct enquirers to PN Bookshop as I once did.

Lucky, perhaps, that few individuals have any interest in our movement. I would certainly avoid any mention of its public face, the SNU.

What a dreadful business...

Craske wrote:Byzantine intrigue indeed!
Perhaps we should all send some calming and healing thoughts to the PN staff caught between a rock and a hard place.

Could you blame any of 'em who simply walked away....? Gross management incompetence appears to be the problem.

Indeed, the staff (the real staff) of PN deserve all the healing and loving thoughts we can send. After all, they have been and are being treated shabbily, just as all the subscribers, advertisers and those who paid good money to attend events which now wont happen.

The best healing for all those people, who, despite Mr. Gascoyne's strange assertion that no one gives a damn about PN except for historical or sentimental reasons, do actually care about PN and its need to continue as an independent voice of Spiritualism, would be for the SNU executive to hang their head in shame and hand PN over to a willing buyer - hand all of it over, masthead, archives, and everything else and let PN be a truly independent paper for ALL Spiritualists once more - just as it was always intended to be and just as the SNU was meant to honour when it took PN over in the past.

Clearly there is no honouring of that fundamental condition of sale now.

Mac,

It seems to me that the staff of PN have worked very hard to produce the best possible PN they could, especially in recent years with Susan Farrow as editor, though no doubt under previous editors the staff also worked hard. They did their job, but, did the SNU assist?

Did it, or more accurately, the NEC, when it claimed there were financial difficulties, strive to do anything to help? Did Psychic Press, or the executive of its parent company, utilise an effective marketing campaign? Did the NEC put to the SNU members the need to help? Did the NEC ask their members for their opinion via a questionaire or some other appropriate mechanism? Did the NEC, or for that matter the directors of Psychic Press canvass current subscribers to establish the value that they found in PN?

No none of those things. The SNU membership are just told there is insufficient interest, and insufficient funding and anyway the NEC has an alternative in mind - but to achieve that alternative they have to make PN disappear for a while so it can be ressurrected as an in-house SNU publication - no longer independent, no longer covering non-SNU Spiritualist's interests or news.

Well, I am a non-SNU Spiritualist - which is just as well for I suspect by speaking out about this I would be very quickly removed as a member had I been one. I contributed to Psychic News, and I did so because I cared about it as a paper that could reach Spiritualists around the world, not just SNU Spiritualists. I, like many other Spiritualists in Australia and elsewhere believed in the value of Psychic News because it played an important role in keeping us informed.

The SNU executive have silenced that voice of Spiritualism - and despite what Mr Bruton has said, he is not interested in ensuring that the real Psychic News continues to exist. He spoke of PN as nothing more than a vehicle for the SNU and it seems that is all he wants it to be.

PN did not belong to the SNU in real terms. They held it in sacred trust for all Spiritualists. But that does not seem to suit some in the SNU.

Lis wrote:Mac,

It seems to me that the staff of PN have worked very hard to produce the best possible PN they could, especially in recent years with Susan Farrow as editor

[quote]

Let's hope they can do so again under new management.

Hi Craske but under whose management, surely not the SNU, given events would anybody trust them again as an employer.

Now given this arrived 2.56pm Aus time- that is 4 am UK time, just who sent this ...surely not an employee - more likely an IT expert or could it just possibly be an NEC member. Perhaps they (the "us" who they describe themselves as) would respond that it was an automated email that was timed to go out around the round at the right time - but even so - who was actually responsible for writing it i wonder?

From: Psychic News [mailto@snu.org.uk]
Sent: Sunday, 8 August 2010 2:56 PM
To: pn@snu.org.uk
Subject: Online bookshop


Dear Customer,
Please ignore the email regarding the online bookshop which contained some
erroneous information on ordering.
The online bookshop is closed for further business. You may still browse the
content and contact us for advice on where to order your books in future.
We apologise for any confusion caused by the previous mailing.
Regards
Online bookshop team