Ok, then I can say quite imperiously that DECUS needs
to go away
 since it only seems to be existing to annoy hobbyist VMS users. 
. . .
  Is there a lapse in my reasoning anywhere here? 
Well, there's free, there's commercial ($$)  and there's inbetween.
Looks like hobbyist is trying to position itself as a low-cost instead
of free service.  Certainly better than high-cost or nothing.
Maybe they simply wanted to convert a money losing department
into a break-even one.
John A.