justin -- glad to talk through it with you. ring anytime. and
the $500 annually would go to l-soft (makers of "listserv" which
powers the list. the set-up fee would be for initiating the new
list and migrating all users and archives. the annual $500
covers dedicated hosting, list maintenance/upgrades, sort of
stuff.
raffi -- one of the things i like about this particular solution
is that we anchor one big archive with the 29000 messages we
have, but we continue the conversation elsewhere, on a list
called 'oslist' but also on any other regional lists, with the
content from all of them hitting the central searchable archive.
this means that where we have the conversation no longer matters.
start a googlegroup. if we hate that then we can move someplace
else, but wherever we go, we just keep forwarding a copy of
everything to the archive. that way we're tied only to listserv.
until we write our own listware, we're always going to be tied to
somebody's product. so sticking with the ones that brought us
this far would seem the best option. i don't see any reason to
spend anything to convert our listserv (brand name) archive into
google or yahoo or any other list platform, and just depend on a
different company/platform. but this way, we only depend on
l-soft for the archiving. the conversations can happen anywhere,
starting and stopping in whatever ways they will.
thanks to everyone else who's said so far that they'd like to
help with the funding end.
m
--
Michael Herman Michael Herman Associates
http://MichaelHerman.com http://RonanParkTrail.com
http://ManorNeighbors.com http://ChicagoConservationCorps.org
http://OpenSpaceWorld.org
312-280-7838 (mobile)
On Thu, Aug 19, 2010 at 6:44 PM, Thomas Herrmann
<tho...@openspaceconsulting.com> wrote: I agree with all the
thanks Michael – Txs for the work you’ve done already!
Sound like a great proposal to me, even if I cannot make a
technical evaluation I trust you and others on the list to have
that competence.
I think the Swedish OSI might have some kronor to put into this
transition/maintenance. Let me know and I’ll put a proposal
forward to our board. Best regards
Thomas
Från: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] För Michael
Herman Skickat: den 19 augusti 2010 19:38 Till:
osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Ämne: the future of the oslist --
news and a proposal
hello all, a bit of very important news and a proposal for the
future of the oslist.
the oslist -- in it's current form -- will cease to exist within
the next year. i have been in contact with our boise state hosts
and with the makers of the software that drives our list and
archives. i've developed a bit of a work-around plan (working
around paying the software company or anyone else large sums of
money annually to run the future of the list). the softward
company has confirmed for me that this (rather non-standard use
of their software) is indeed technically feasible. another nice
thing about it is that it makes the oslist structure look even
more like what we do in open space meetings.
the oslist at boise state is done as of june 30th 2011, they are
cancelling their license and migrating all university groups to
googlegroups. on that date, oslist will disappear, unless we do
something to move it.
IF we can find another organization to host us as bsu has, then
we can (pay someone to) migrate our archive and user list and go
on our merry way, subject again to the whims of their IT
department.
IF, instead, we choose to fund our own implementation of the
listserv (brand name) software, we can migrate our archives and
continue our conversation.
ALTERNATIVELY, or more creatively... we can contract with l-soft
directly to set-up and maintain our archive, control that for
ourselves going forward, AND set it up in a way that would add to
the archive going forward any postings from any other email list,
like germany, europe, australia, uk, etc. what's more, this
turns out to be the cheapest option, because we only need to pay
for listserv software for the archiving function, rather than for
a full-blown list that will deliver to 700 people at a cost of
almost $2 for EVERY message sent to the list (this assumes we
would pay for the service rather than license and run this for
ourselves. harrison is fond of saying that we have done all this
without a marketing department. why add an IT department now?)
this is my suggestion.
and this is what i'm proposing (offering) to do now:
1. migrate all of our members to a new oslist at googlegroups
(yes, googlegroups. people who pay attention to such things seem
to prefer the functionality there and since our list is public
anyway, there are no issues with privacy and control of content.
but we will also archive in two other places, a gmail account AND
a listserv system that will keep adding all new posts to the old
listserv archive.)
2. migrate the archive (12 years, i think, and on our way to
29,000 messages) to a new list that will have only one member
account.
3. make that one member account (osl...@gmail.com, for instance)
a member of the new osl...@googlegroups.com AND any other lists
around the world. THEN set that member account to forward
everything it receives to the migrated archive. so other lists
become like breakouts and the oslist archive a global community
record wall of what's happening.
it this way, we achieve:
1. a new, free, and durable oslist at googlegroups, with all the
bells and whistles there 2. the survival of the 29,000-message
archive in publicly-searchable perpetuity, hosted by l-soft
(makers of listserv software) 3. the addition of all new oslist
and other list postings to the central archive
what does it cost?
1. continuing the oslist conversation in a new googlegroups
oslist account costs nothing. 2. forwarding to the archive of all
os community list mail from any list, costs nothing 3. migration
of the oslist archive and setup of new archive list function
costs $500 4. the cost of maintaining the archive would be $500
per year
i'd expect that $500 is fundable through donations and could
easily be handled in the normal course of business and budgeting
of the osi-usa. i assume it's better to have a legal entity with
a standing bank account take responsibility for it, rather than
an individual or loose group of colleagues. but i'll leave it to
osi-usa or another group to say they'll take this on.
i *think* that any other solution to this results in one or more
of the following... loss of the archives, costs that run to $3000
or $4000 annually (and are totally variable based on list size),
reliance on volunteer community members to be our global IT
department, additional cost of paying community members to admin
the system, reliance on the goodwill of some other organization
(which might be generous initially but could pull the plug with
less warning than we've been given now), no ability to archive
many lists in our one online record.
i will check with boise state to confirm their support for our
migration. i'm told by l-soft that migrating the archive to a
new location/list is pretty simple stuff.
i'm willing to implement this, but not fund it. i'd like at
least four others to sign on as stewards of the shift. more
would be fine. and i hope osi-usa will be the official steward
for donations/funding matters.
i don't have time right now to discuss this with 700 subscribers.
i'm just one guy, one list member. this is just my personal
recommendation and proposal. BUT... if there are concerns about
any of this, i'm glad to try to keep up with clarifying
questions.
if you think this is a good way to proceed, please say so. if
you have something to contribute to the process (time, attention,
money, etc) please say so. if you have concerns, let's hear
them, too -- BUT if you think we shouldn't do something in this
proposal, then bring your own suggestions and proposals for what
we should do instead, making sure that the solution as modified
(or replaced) is still complete (technically, financially, etc.).
since we don't have anything to discuss about IF we should move
or really even WHEN we should move, the only question is HOW to
preserve the archive and WHERE to continue the main conversation.
ideally, this would all happen when things quiet down a bit at
the end of the year, mid- to late-december. that's when i would
be most able to support these things. anyone else could do it
sooner or later, but i do think that distinguishing our two
tasks, maintaining the archive AND continuing the conversation,
is a valuable way to think about this now.
what can you contribute to this (new) beginning?
m
--
Michael Herman Michael Herman Associates
http://MichaelHerman.com http://RonanParkTrail.com
http://ManorNeighbors.com http://ChicagoConservationCorps.org
http://OpenSpaceWorld.org
312-280-7838 (mobile)
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