On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 6:01 PM, Alan Walker <fastalan(a)gmail.com> wrote: Had you contacted the original owner of the list? (Zanimum/Nicholas Moreau) I'm sure he would've been happy to give you the password. If he wasn't contactable, you could've created a bug and asked us to reset the password. You guys are free to choose to use a different platform from mailman, of course. I just thought it was strange and I'm not a big fan of unnecessary moves. :-) -- Casey Brown Cbrown1023

Hi, On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 6:11 PM, Casey Brown <lists(a)caseybrown.org> wrote: I'll chime in and say I'd prefer to stay on mailman, rather then moving to another list hosting software, even if it is hosted off wikimedia servers. I know some people who aren't all that thrilled with using Google software, and who would avoid the list for that reason, which I think is another reason to reconsider. (google groups are ultimately in Google's control, unlike Mailman). I'm also concerned there wasn't any on-list discussion of this prior to the decision being handed down from "above". I think it would be proper netiquette to ask the subscribers and find out the whereabouts of the list owner. Gerald

I think the Google Group has its merits, but agreeing with what seems to be consensus here; it's likely more wise to stick with an integrated, Wikimedia-hosted solution. It's the more appropriate choice for contact solely dedicated to Wikimedia Canada, and is significantly more private. That said, Google Groups gives us more refined control, a more open and customizable interface- and a lot of scalable capacity that mailman doesn't offer. It'll also make integration with other online identities (Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) a lot tighter, should that capacity be something Wikimedia Canada ever needs. Definitely something to think about. *-*Kevin *Wong* <kevinwong913(a)gmail.com> On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 10:39 PM, Bob Jonkman <bjonkman(a)sobac.com> wrote:

And that would seem to be the death knell of the Wikimedia Canada group. --Bob. On 11-03-20 02:49 AM, Alan Walker wrote:

James and Casey contacted me (separately) today, asking for me to make the list accessible. I've let Casey and Delphine know that they can try and reset the password; I can't find a trace of it in my mailbox. Until they did, I wasn't aware that the mailing list was an issue at all. People subscribe, they mail the list, it gets distributed. People send to the list without being a member, it gets blocked as spam. Except for one spam message that got through (likely because the legit member was phished), what more do we want? Beyond all that, things should be planned on wiki, announced on mailing list, I agree. But if all we're doing is announcing the new hot discussions, on the WMC mailing list, how does this new mailing list help? It could have features up the wazoo, but it wouldn't matter, because all we're doing is getting people to go to the wiki to discuss. Additionally, this new mailing list required people to sign up to view the list. Why? Hiding our process serves no benefit. Nick

"we believe the Google Groups interface will suite us better. " Who's "we"?? You sound like a politician, Alan....vaguely paternalistic "we know best" etc. Clearly there's not a broadly-based consensus for this, just looking at the number of similar replies..... MC On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Amgine <amgine.saewyc(a)gmail.com> wrote: -- Big Mike/Skookum1 http://www.isound.com/tamanassman http://www.myspace.com/tamanassman http://www.myspace.com/tamanasstyee http://www.myspace.com/tamanasshiyu http://www.myspace.com/hyastamanass http://www.myspace.com/stonetamanass http://www.myspace.com/skookumtamanass http://www.cayoosh.net/music/

Hi Alan, I take no position on whether one option is better than another, and the last thing I want to do is discourage yourself and the others who are actually putting in effort to form the chapter (as opposed to those like myself who have an interest but merely observe and send comments onwards) from continuing your efforts towards the creation of a chapter. The problem I see here resulted solely from the way you presented the information to everyone on the mailing list: - We were first introduced to the topic of a change of the mailing list through your rather brief e-mail, stating that the change would happen (3/19 @ 5:46.) This was not really a problem, but the follow ups were probably sent by yourself a bit too hastily. - When you were asked for a reason for the change, your response(3/19 @ 6:01) was, honestly, insulting. You did not answer any of the actual concerns. "We have up to 23 members" does not answer the question "Why are you switching to Google Docs?" unless this list was limited to 23 members. Nor does "we have no access to manage the list" unless you're unable to ever gain access, and you would never be able to set up a different mailman list. Your remaining statement "We are transitioning." also does not answer the question asked. - You then follow-up by saying "we" think this is best, etc. Subject to what I will be writing at the end of this e-mail, I'm sure you can see how those people who agree with the underlying ideas of Wikipedia may have concern with your statement. You aren't supporting your decision, you aren't giving any legitimate reasons to support the change, and you are saying that the decision has already been made by a body of (to us) unknown decision makers. I think the proper thing for you to do now is to take a bit of a step back, acknowledge that your replies were a bit hasty, and provide the members of this list with a thoughtful analysis of the reasons for your decision. If you and others have legitimately come to the decision to use Google, then I'm confident that it has some significant benefits. I just want to know what they are- whether it's a better interface, it allows for better archiving, it will result in more frequent use by the members, etc. Taking the time to explain the decision will also help you gain support for your ideas generally in the future, and is in any way, a good practice to have for future decisions. Both of these will be a benefit to you in whatever leadership(or other) role you take with Wikimedia. Now for those opposed, other than the reasons I mentioned above, are there any other legitimate concerns about the decision to transfer to Google Groups? My thoughts are that we may be slightly misunderstanding or misusing the principles of openness that are the central reason behind our support for Wikipedia. We know that we want the decision making process to be open to anyone, and we will not be sacrificing this tenant. However, it can come about in two ways: 1) Anyone can be part of making decisions. 2) Anyone can be involved with the operations of the Chapter. Anyone involved with the operations of the Chapter is part of making decisions. Both of those ideas support openness and allowing everyone to be involved, and allowing everyone to contribute the making of decisions. By analogy to wikipedia, method #1 is where anyone can edit a Wikipedia page, even anonymously. Method #2 is a protected page, where anyone but anonymous or newly created users can edit the page. It feels to me that people are demanding we go by method #1 for chapter decisions, but in my view, that's unreasonable. For something as important as chapter operations, which have a number of pragmatic concerns, as well as requiring interactions with regulatory bodies in the country, etc. we have to make decisions through method #2(or at least a combination of the two.) As a result, and subject to what anyone else has to say, I would suggest that Alan takes a bit of time and properly justifies the move to Google Groups, and we should wait until after that to comment. Cheers, Alex From: wikimedia-ca-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimedia-ca-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Alan Walker Sent: Sunday, March 20, 2011 3:20 PM To: Wikimedia Canada planning list Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-Canada] Moving to new mailing list - how to stay in the loop Gentlemen, can we tone down the drama. We're moving to a new mailing list that has more features and is easier to manage. Can we drop this please? I think we have much more important issues to discuss on the new mailing list, such as the projects moving forward and bringing everyone on the the new Wiki we have set up. These are exciting times, Canada is finally about to have a real chapter! I welcome all Canadians to join the chapter and tell us how they want things done. On 20 March 2011 16:24, Mike Cleven <mikecleven(a)gmail.com> wrote: "we believe the Google Groups interface will suite us better. " Who's "we"?? You sound like a politician, Alan....vaguely paternalistic "we know best" etc. Clearly there's not a broadly-based consensus for this, just looking at the number of similar replies..... MC On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Amgine <amgine.saewyc(a)gmail.com> wrote: On 03/19/2011 11:49 PM, Alan Walker wrote: Who is 'we', in your first sentence? Amgine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-ca mailing list Wikimedia-ca(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-ca -- Big Mike/Skookum1 http://www.isound.com/tamanassman http://www.myspace.com/tamanassman http://www.myspace.com/tamanasstyee http://www.myspace.com/tamanasshiyu http://www.myspace.com/hyastamanass http://www.myspace.com/stonetamanass http://www.myspace.com/skookumtamanass http://www.cayoosh.net/music/ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-ca mailing list Wikimedia-ca(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-ca -- View Alan Walker's profile on LinkedIn [http://fastalan.com]

Hello, On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 11:01 PM, Alan Walker <fastalan(a)gmail.com> wrote: Well, I am not sure I approve of the change either. While I would understand that you are moving to a self hosted mailing list (some chapters have done that), moving away to Google groups makes things much more complicated for Wikimedians who would specifically be looking for this list through Wikimedia mailman lists to find you altogether. Also, as Casey said, the password thing really is a non issue, it would have taken asking Nicholas for one, and any of us Wikimedians, to fond out how to retrieve the password and add the desired administrators on this list. Which is not the case any more if the same problems occurs and you are on a google mailing list. I such, I would formally ask you to reconsider this change. I'd be happy to assist in making sure the passowrd is handed to you in due time. Cheers, Delphine -- @notafish NB. This gmail address is used for mailing lists. Personal emails will get lost. Intercultural musings: Ceci n'est pas une endive - http://blog.notanendive.org Photos with simple eyes: notaphoto - http://photo.notafish.org