[Foundation-l] Status of cloak requests

[GDonato]

geni wrote:
> On 26/02/2008, GDonato <gdonato at blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
>> I think Wikimedia having its own IRC setup would probably be quite a
>>  good idea. I agree with your point that it could remove bueraucracy and
>>  irc.wikimedia.org already exists (albeit only for recent changes etc.).
>>  It seems it would put the ball back in our own hands as it were. I doubt
>>  there are any issues regarding expense or staffing (but I may be wrong)
>>  so go for it, I would say.
>>
>>  G Donato
>>
> 
> The procedural and legal issues are such that we would be insane to
> run one. Procedurally that means that the IRC would then be regarded
> on site which would make the politics even worse. Or do you really
> want IRC policy and process?

The basics of IRC "policy" are pretty much already written at 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/IRC_guidelines, anything else is common 
sense and it should not be too difficult to sort out things procedurally.

> Legally it would mean the foundation would have certain
> responsibilities towards the channel which given it's role as a
> general clearing house for wikipedia gossip may be less than ideal.
> 

This is the foundation which hosts a Top 10 website which allows anyone 
to post whatever they feel like ;) The legal issues of that are surely 
infintiely bigger

> Using Freenode gives us denial both plausible and legal.
> 
> Then there is the advantage that it is fairly easy to contact other
> free content/software groups through freenode.
> 
I'm not sure how often your average IRC user needs to do that.

G Donato