Subject: FILM - the more you use it, the cheaper it gets! Date: Thu, 22 Mar 2012 16:59:58 +0000 From: Magee, Tony <t.magee@imperial.ac.uk> Dear FILM User, *FILM - the more you use it, the cheaper it gets!* The FILM management team has just met to set the*charges for next year* – this has *important implications for you* as users that I want to bring to your attention. You may not be aware of the financial model FILM operates on – College requires us to recover /all/ our costs but /not/ to make a surplus. You can imagine this is not a straightforward challenge, but we do our best and so far have thankfully broken even or made only a slight surplus! To set our charges for the upcoming year, in essence what we do is divide our costs (which are more or less fixed – service contracts, consumables/minor equipment and salaries) by the number of hours usage of the microscopes and other services we offer. So you can see that this simple calculation means that the more the microscopes get used, the less we can charge for usage in the next year – so, *the more you use FILM, the cheaper it gets!* ** The “catch” is that the savings are made in the /following/ year, i.e. there is a lag. Nevertheless, if you are a regular and long term user, you can use FILM more and it will get cheaper, so you get more use for the same amount of money in the medium/long term! There /is /such a thing as a free lunch, and FILM provides it! *Please use FILM as much as you can – it benefits us all!!* Many thanks. Tony Anthony I. Magee Professor of Membrane Biology Section of Molecular Medicine National Heart and Lung Institute Faculty of Medicine Imperial College London Sir Alexander Fleming Building Exhibition Road South Kensington London SW7 2AZ UK Tel. +44 (0)20 7594 3135 FAX +44 (0)20 7594 3015 http://www1.imperial.ac.uk/nhli/molecular/lipidation/ <blocked::http://www1.imperial.ac.uk/nhli/molecular/lipidation/> http://www1.imperial.ac.uk/medicine/people/t.magee/ *****Regulation of protein trafficking and function by palmitoylation**** *St Anne's College, Oxford, UK. 23 August - 25 August 2012 Visit: http://www.biochemistry.org/Focused.aspx