Re: Policy for expiring lists WAS: Idea for a secondary list server

On 02/28/2015 08:52 AM, Stefan Kaltenbrunner wrote:
> On 02/27/2015 01:36 AM, Josh Berkus wrote:
>> On 02/24/2015 01:32 PM, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
>>> Josh Berkus wrote:

> all nice and clear - but who is going to check whether lists fall under
> that termination rule or not on a regular base? Are you volunteering?

I don't have the permissions.  And this is a task better automated, no?

> 
> Also to put some numbers to this - we currently have 35 PUG lists, out
> of those only 5(6 if the cutoff would be 10) would make the cut per the
> above rules and only 13(!) had more than a single mail in all of 2014.
> There have been only 268 mails in total over all of those 35 lists.

Good, we can immediately clean some stuff out then.  That's what we
want, correct?

Also: does that include the non-English lists?  If so, I'm surprised.

> 
>>
>> One question is: for terminated lists, what is our policy/practice on
>> archives?
> 
> dont think we have one

Right, I posted here so that we would *create* one.  I'm not in a
position to *propose* one because I don't know enough about the
infrastructure of our archives.

>> For example, I'd like to terminate the SFPUG list.  Given that we have
>> Meetup, RSS *and* Twitter, we really don't need it anymore.  However,
>> I'm reluctant to delete the archives.
> 
> uh isnt that actually _the_ prime example why we dont actually need more
> lists? If a PUG as large and successful as SFPUG does not need one
> because there are better ways to coordinate a PUG and make it successful
> why are we not promoting those?

No, it's not.  We need the mailing lists for PUGs which are not
successful *yet*.    The reason that SFPUG has outgrown its mailing list
is that we have other resources:

* Meetup.com, paid for by David for $140/year.
* Website/RSS feed, paid for by me, $75/year.
* Twitter acct., registered by me.

Prior to having those things and getting big, our mailing list was
*essential* for the success of SFPUG; we used nothing else for the first
6 years we existed.  There's also the fact that most of our local folks
are very active on the main lists (-hackers, general, etc.) which is the
reason why we don't see a lot of discussion and peer-to-peer help on
SFPUG anymore.

This is not a solution for new PUGs because:

* We're not proposing to pay for Meetup accounts for every new PUG.
* Meetup is only used in certain cities in the US/Canada, and is unknown
elsewhere.  It's also not multilingual.
* Some people hate Meetup because it's proprietary and external.
* We're not proposing to offer website space to all new PUGs.
* Twitter is not a substitute for other ways of contact.

Now, if you said to me "Josh, I think we should be offering those other
things *instead of* mailing lists to new PUGs," then I think that would
be a possibility worth discussing.  I didn't think the infra team was
eager to offer hosted websites for PUGs again, though.

Also, I'm only suggesting that we could terminate the SFPUG list *if* I
can re-create the list later if something happens to Meetup.  If I can't
get the list back once it's gone (which has been the de-facto policy in
the past), then I'm going to fight to hold onto it.

Further, we're not just talking about PUGs; people will also request new
mailing lists for other purposes, such as specific development projects.For example, I could see that a pgsql-fpga@ or
mailinglist could be
 
useful at this point, except that the involved developers haven't asked
for it.  Certainly if such a list were requested, we wouldn't tell them
to use Meetup.

And ... to be blunt, I really feel like a bunch of folks on this thread
are discussing this in bad faith; that is, they're looking for any
excuse at all to say no to new mailing lists, regardless of other
considerations.  If that's the case, then please say so now, we can see
if this is a majority of the infra team, and if it is, I'll stop wasting
my time.

> Per the above numbers it is obvious that we dont need more mailing lists
> but what we need is a solid set of recommendations on how to run a
> successful pug and what tools to use for that (wiki?).
> 
>>
>> A second question: what about reactivating lists?
>>
>> Example: SLCPUG stops meeting and their list goes dead.  We terminate
>> the list but keep the archives.  Two years later, a new community member
>> wants to re-organize SLCPUG.  Do we have a way to give them a list which
>> will archive to the same place?
> 
> dont think there is any technical issue with doing it that way but again
> I have some doubts that it is actually needed at all.

This is *exactly* what I'm talking about.  The reason the infra team
runs up against a wall on terminating lists is that list members know
that once a list has been killed, the infra team will throw every
possible sandbag in the way of reviving it.   If you guys were more
flexible about reviving lists, then the owners would be more flexible
about terminating them.  You're digging your own hole, here.

-- 
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com