Recreational Trawler

[refugio]

As a large number of posters are from the PNW (or PSW, if you're north of the border), maybe we could consider what name we give to the waters we boat in. Common usage is 'Puget Sound'. When we all know that 'Puget Sound' is the area south of the Narrows at the south end of Colvos Passage, why do so many insist on calling every body of water south of the Canadian border 'Puget Sound'?

I'm comfortable with Salish Sea, and I'm seeing that pop up in stories from (for instance) the Seattle Times. It's nice to have a term that includes the "Canadian San Juans"

 

[Art]

Marketing folks are not stupid. Of course the current Grand Banks company uses the word 'trawler." If you want to sell boats to literary ignoramuses you have to speak on their level. GB, and all the others, would be fools to call their boats anything BUT trawlers. Having trained Pavlov's dog to salivate at the ring of a bell, they have to keep ringing the bell to get the dog to keep salivating. Or buying in this case.

Anyway, it's been very entertaining reading the lengths people will go to to defend the fact that they've totally fallen for a marketing ploy and swallowed it hook, line and sinker. It's been a great illustration of the powers of persuasion and perception, regardless of whether the persuasion and perception are based on reality or not.

Careers numbers one and two for me have both been in marketing, first in network television and then in aerospace. This discussion, as juvenile as it's been, has been a terrific verification of all the basic principles practiced by every ad agency and marketing group on the planet. You really can get most people to buy into any concept you want them to buy into. Be it a brand of pizza, tires, cars, or the use of a word, it really is amazingly easy to lead people around by the nose in any direction you want.

The fact so many of you are absolutely, 100-percent convinced that your boats are "trawlers" is the definitive proof that humans can be convinced of anything, no matter how far-fetched it might be, if you use the right techniques.

We are currently working on a campaign to change our customers' perception of a particular aspect of one of our products. I've been using the whole "trawler" thing and the vehement defense of the term on this forum as an example to our creative team of how effectively an initial perception can be molded into a completely different perception that is so firmly clung to by its target audience that they will defend it to the hilt even though the concept it's based on is faulty.

The human mind is a wonderful thing to jerk around.

This brings me back to religion(s) and Federal Reserve "marketing/sales/ploys/hype".

Appears obvious Marin that you would have been a very good "marketer/sales/ploy/hype person" in some form of high dollar religious or financial BS institution. Can't help but to wonder... Did you miss your Really BIG $$$$-making calling?? Read last paragraph in your post above.

The king has no cloths.

See bolded items in your post above. Pay close attention to underlined and italicized words. IMHO - Only Jerks - get great joy for the capability/opportunity to "jerk-around" easily led humans. Altruism (i.e. a truthful, giving-nature) is not part of the pervasive "jerk around" equation so broadly flaunted by so many, Marin - Self Expanding Greed IS!

But, hey... what the heck, why not... strictly in the name of money... Feeling good to jerk around (i.e. falsely provide marketing/sales hype/ploys to) people's susceptible, truth seeking minds for attaining ever more money, power, and all attainable forms of career-advancement/self-perpetuating glory is perfectly OK... and a damn good thing for making untold numbers of dollar$$$$! - Right Marin?

Applicable word and its true meaning:

ROTTEN [rot-n]

adjective: rottener, rottenest.
1. decomposing or decaying; putrid, tainted, foul
2. corrupt or morally offensive.
3. wretchedly bad, unpleasant, or unsatisfactory; miserable:
a rotten piece of work; a rotten ploy.
4. contemptible; despicable:
a rotten little liar; a rotten trick.

 

[Rebel112r]

I will start referring to my water-craft(boat), not officially a T-word, as a Floating slow moving recreational vehicle.

 

[Heron]

For the record, most view Merriam-Webster as irrelevant as rotary dial telephones, antiquated in the current century.

Ted

So maybe the Urban Dictionary would be better??.....

trawler
A person who is too stingy or poor to pay for drinks in nightclubs so they proceed to drink the dregs of any drinks that are left unattended. They usually end up totally wasted by the end of the night, puking their guts up in the loos, because of all the different drinks they've consumed.
Ann is so poor that when she goes out she's a trawler.

and:

trawler
A girl or woman who belives she still has,or has,feminine charm and good looks but,who is in fact,sadley misstaken.
my god did you see that old trawler?

 

[stubones99]

Everyone knows the Portobello or Portobella mushroom?

Back 20+ years ago, it was known as a "common brown crimini mushroom. Then a marketer got involved to try to drum up sales for the poor misunderstood common brown crimini mushroom, they invented the "Portobello" name and started hyping it.

It worked and now everyone knows Portobello mushrooms...

What Marin is trying to say is that marketeers have to sell a product and will call it something that they can get you to buy. How do you know a salesman is lying? his lips are moving.

 

[refugio]

Everyone knows the Portobello or Portobella mushroom?

Back 20+ years ago, it was known as a "common brown crimini mushroom. Then a marketer got involved to try to drum up sales for the poor misunderstood common brown crimini mushroom, they invented the "Portobello" name and started hyping it.

It worked and now everyone knows Portobello mushrooms...

And kiwi fruit (was Chinese gooseberry)

And Chilean sea bass (was Patagonian toothfish)

 

[stubones99]

The TrawlerFest is coming to Riviera Beach at the end of the month...

I wonder how many exhibitors will actually be trawlers?

Very few?

BTW, I heard that Riviera Beach renamed a street for Obama...

Need to move trawlerfest!

 

[refugio]

And you guys all realize Marin is "trolling" you, right? I love the double entendre...

 

[RT Firefly]

 

[RCook]

I will start referring to my water-craft(boat), not officially a T-word, as a Floating slow moving recreational vehicle.

Mine can be an RV too, although somewhat faster moving when in RV mode. I sometimes have to explain to campground staff that the boat IS my RV, since I stay on it in campgrounds along the road between Utah and the west coast. One or two have refused to accommodate me - too weird for them, I guess.

 

[Hawgwash]

Having trained Pavlov's dog to salivate at the ring of a bell, they have to keep ringing the bell to get the dog to keep salivating. Or buying in this case.

You really can get most people to buy into any concept you want them to buy into....it really is amazingly easy to lead people around by the nose in any direction you want. The human mind is a wonderful thing to jerk around.

Naw, really?

 

[Hawgwash]

When we all know that 'Puget Sound' is the area south of the Narrows at the south end of Colvos Passage...

Are you sure?
This past summer, a couple from Tacoma told me they had been "all the way up to Campbell River at the north end of Puget Sound."

 

[Baker]

Wrong. All it means is that a small group of people have been being ignorant for several decades. If you decide to call a cat a dog for twenty years is that going to make cats dogs from then on in the eyes of the world? Of course not. It's a stupid, simplistic position to take, sorry.

Marin, your argument does not hold water. We now have a previously known man(Bruce Jenner) that everyone is now calling a woman. And Time magazine named "him" "Woman of the Year". Which, by the way, just proves that men are better at everything than women....even being a woman!!!!

 

[Marin]

John--- You prove my point very well, thank you. Cat, dog, and human are things that do not change meaning over time. Male and female are merely a means of distinguishing one human from another. Trawlers are the same way. As I wrote earlier, there are otter trawlers, beam trawlers, side trawlers, etc. Change the gear and you change the type of trawler it is, but it's still a trawler. Bruce Jenner simply changed his gear. He's still a human.

BTW another great example of how you can change people's perceptions any way you want is the tanner crab. Not a very romantic or appealing name, but the crab had a potentially large market with consumers. So some very clever person--- I have no idea who it was-- coined the name "snow crab" and applied it to the tanner crab.

In the same manner as the term "trawler" it was wildly successful in fooling the market--- the general public--- into thinking they were ordering or buying an exotic seafood. When in fact, it is still just the lowly tanner crab. Just as the "trawlers" that populate this forum are, despite the "exotic" name, still just lowly playtoys.

 

[Grae]

When I joined the forum I assumed the usage of "trawler" was simply another example of the "American Evolution" of the English language.
In other words like "hood" and "trunk" instead of "bonnet" and "boot" for the car (auto?) parts and many other similar variations.
Although there is a lot of "advice" dispensed here it seems to be spelt the same as the verb "to advise". We get spell corrected for many words (US English) that are correct in our dictionary (English English)! A recreational trawler has always been a launch or maybe just motorboat (not "engineboat"!) here in NZ and I believe in Australia and the UK?

 

[rwidman]

..............at least, like the word trawler, I can derive great satisfaction from laughing at the people who don't know enough to use the right words..............

You will be laughing alone.

Words change over time whether we like it or not. In years past, "gay" meant fun loving and jolly. Do you understand what it means today?

How about the word "green"? In my day it was a color. There were green crayons in the box. Now, it means something on the order of "environmentally friendly" or non polluting.

There are dozens, perhaps hundreds more.

And if you go back and red things written a couple hundred years ago, they can be very difficult to understand because of the changes in meanings and spellings of words.

 

[rwidman]

................ Male and female are merely a means of distinguishing one human from another. .........

Not any more.

 

[Nomad Willy]

Those arms and shoulders are much more Calvin than Caitlyn.

 

[Nomad Willy]

Re post 101.

Marin if it's so easy to lead people around how ya do'in w that TF group?

 

[Old deckhand]

Eric,
If I recall correctly, I met your father in Angoon and he owned a lobster trawler.
Ken

 

[rwidman]

Or -

 

[FlyWright]

Language is a fluid, evolving, ever-changing tool of communication. Word meanings come and go like the ebb and flood of a tide. Those stuck in yesterday's vernacular are trapped in the past. I see no sense in hanging there with them.

Anyone who has had children knows that while we do teach them, we also learn from them. I've learned much from my two daughters who are wise beyond their years, in part because of their perceptive ways, open minds and mental flexibility. I find it refreshing to surround myself with young adults who bring a fresh perspective to this old world of ours.

Read this account of Faragut's victory over Buchanan at Mobile Bay.


Damn the Torpedoes! Full speed ahead!

 

[markpierce]

Damn the Torpedoes! Full speed ahead!

In modern vernacular, one would say "damn the mines ..."

 

[Nomad Willy]

Eric,
If I recall correctly, I met your father in Angoon and he owned a lobster trawler.
Ken

Old deck,
Look at post #25 anchor rode thread. His boat. It was the "Free at Last" w a FB when he had her in Angoon. Last I saw of the boat was in Craig about 4 years ago when I took that pic. Got a real nice refit and was a beautiful boat then. Could'a bought her for $75000 but a fisherman did and she'll get much more use that way than mostly sitt'in in a marina w me pay'in the moorage. Would'nt need covered though.

WesK,
You have no fear. Good thing at times we don't all live on the same block.

Hawg,
The Starbucks thing went right over my head.

 

[eyschulman]

John--- You prove my point very well, thank you. Cat, dog, and human are things that do not change meaning over time. Male and female are merely a means of distinguishing one human from another. Trawlers are the same way. As I wrote earlier, there are otter trawlers, beam trawlers, side trawlers, etc. Change the gear and you change the type of trawler it is, but it's still a trawler. Bruce. end quote

You forgot the, call it a Trawler, and sell a boat variety. That along with an exchange of coin(much gold) and some hazy idolization of bounding over the seas in a Trawler will always trump logic with the average human mentality. Marin You are probably right but no way will you win or change thinking amongst the general population.

 

[SCOTTEDAVIS]

 

[eyschulman]

That the T word is being applied to so many boats does not bother me so much as it has no significant meaning in regards to the craft it is applied to. One boating magazine writer acknowledging this tried to define the term and came up with something like its a boat you would like to spend some time on. Basically he was saying it is ok to label any boat a trawler. So by his definition I have a 16 foot dinghy trawler. Unless somebody can define just what a recreational trawler is what use is the term? Trawler as used for recreational boats is in need of a definition . language evolution is only of value if there is a meaning associated with the new use. The word is presently nonsense as applied to many boats.

 

[eyschulman]

Maybe the Trawler Forum should take the bull by the horns and come up with a definition of a recreational trawler. I don't know of any other party better qualified to deal with the evolution of this word. Even if the definition turns out to be its a foggy word used to sell boats it would be better than nothing. The Trawler Form could make some waves in the marine world if it publicly defined the term and supported the meaning given to it. I know let a sleeping dog be. But he is peeing all over the floor.

 

[kulas44]

Ive said on a few occasions, if you really have a trawler you dont need to ask,"is this a trawler". But not everyone knows they dont have a trawler. Case in point. I was looking at a marina in oklahoma, in Okmulgee IIRC, at the end of the canal system. The dock master told me he lived on a trawler in the marina. I was looking for a slip for my Krogen trawler and was interested in other trawler owners. Well,,, his "trawler" was an aft cabin motor yacht with a pair of 375 hp 3208s. He just went slow. So it was his trawler.

 

[healhustler]

I dunno. TF's usage of the term seemed perfect for getting us all here, and I'm thankful for that. Who cares if it's liberal, permissive, or even politically correct. The term worked, here we are, I like trawlers, maybe you've got one, maybe I don't, visa-versa, who cares, it worked and there's a great community. If you don't like trawlers, (whatever that means to you), you're probably not here.