response 1 of 107:

Apr 11 15:31 UTC 1995

This is a potential problem if Grex had sufficient assets to make a group
want to obtain them. The two assets it has that could be tempting are the
name Grex, and the domain name cyberspace.org. Otherwise, I don't know why
any group would be interested in "taking over". Grex is *always* being
"taken over" by whoever are its members, and that's why it is the way it
is today. 

Seriously, though, Grex does have a couple of organizational weak points.
If a clique bought enough memberships, they could dominate the board in
*one* election, even though board members have two-year terms, because 4
board members are elected in alternate years. To make it harder to
dominate the board in one election, it would be necessary to have the
board turn over more slowly by, for example, having 9 more members with
three year overlapping terms, three elected each year. Another
organization accomplishes this by having a board consisting of directors
and officers, the latter elected by the former, with the directors elected
to two year terms (overlapping) and the officers elected by the *old*
directors. There can, therefore, always be a majority of the "old" board
members for one year after clique takes over half the directorships. 

The more serious weak point is that the members can propose and adopt
motions. Therefore a clique can run roughshod over Grex policy (and even
its bylaws, by buying enough memberships), and even a more stable board
could not stop them (though the board could repeal the member motions and
amendments - an interesting standoff!). Limiting this power is the only
way to prevent the problem.

I think that before thinking of what can be done to circumvent the
problem, it would be fruitful to speculate on who and why such a
"takeover" might come about. It is easier to design a defense if one knows
who the "enemy" might be.

response 3 of 107:

Apr 11 22:42 UTC 1995

        Egotists that want their own cyber empire.. as with any ancient
invading force, it was always so much easier to take over someone else's
well-established society than to start their own from scratch.

response 5 of 107:

Apr 12 02:15 UTC 1995

Rane, with all due respect, do you work for the IRS? :)) I am not willing
(too dern tired) to expend the considerable effort to understand all
that now.  I will tell you all a secret however, Grex has little  to 
fear from a hostile take over.  The fact is you have a wonderful
renewable set of assets that cannot be really stolen or "acquired".
You have talent and you have the abiltiy to trust - which eqauates to 
being worthy of trust.  Those assets cannot be controlled by anyone
except the people of Grex. Take away the spirit of trust, and someone
only has some equipment and money. The power to create is still
out of reach and safe in your hands and minds.  If your are worried,
the Articles and bylaws could be changed to  discourage a take over.

response 7 of 107:

Apr 12 03:11 UTC 1995

   Valerie, let's worry about real problems, first, before the fantasy
ones. ;-)

   Any organization runs the risk of being "taken over" by a group.
Thats what elections are about, too.  Take a look at Washington for a
bigger example.

   But more realistically, I don't see what there is in Grex to *want*.
Espically if we keep with trailing edge technology.

   The best defense against this I think, is to continue to run Grex
in a more-or-less even fashion, where we try to keep things as even
as possible while growing Grex when we want to.

   Let's worry about the real things.

response 9 of 107:

Apr 12 06:31 UTC 1995

        I've wondered about this somewhat too, although I don't think it's
at all likely.  Grex does have a whole lot of users now who have come to
really depend on it, so somebody might conceivably want to buy enough
votes to control the election, and then, as a board, vote to sell Grex to
a private company they control, and turn it into a for profit system,
while letting the non profit Cyberspace Communications slowly die.  It
would be possible, but I don't think it's very likely. 
        What somebody would get for their money would be a system with an
established user base.  In theory, this could save somebody wanting to
start a for profit conferencing system some money on startup advertising,
because their system would be popular before they even got there. 
However, that wouldn't necesssarily be the case.  Most of the people on
Grex are here, in large part at least, because Grex is free.  If somebody
wanted to charge for Grex use, that would drive many of those people away.
Those who are paying for Grex already would probably also be driven away,
since Grex membership is often because people want to support Grex for
what it is, not because they are buying stuff from us.  What somebody
taking over Grex in that way would probably get is some obselete hardware
and a large group of pissed off users in a mad scramble to start a
new, non profit, system.

response 11 of 107:

Apr 12 12:25 UTC 1995

Re 6:  Actually, the moment you pay for 3 consecutive months of membership
you can vote in Grex's elections.  You don't need to be a member for 3
months first before voting.  So there wouldn't necessarily be 3 months of
warning that this was coming.

I'll hold off with other comments until more people have responded to this
item.

response 13 of 107:

Apr 12 19:30 UTC 1995

In answer to your question in #0, Valerie. I do not think it is silly
to bring up this question and discuss it. I believe rational thought
will cause one to conclude that it *is* silly to worry about it.

I believe we currently require members to be verified, so it would require
a separate individual for each new membership in the takeover. This
alone makes it very difficult.

Grex's current user base would not stand idly by, though.
There are a a zillion folks out there who need a good push to become
members. An attack like this would be that push, and my guess is
that it could take 200 or more memberships to control Grex after that.

Hmmm. Maybe you just stumbled on a way to fund the ISDN connection?!

response 15 of 107:

Apr 13 00:17 UTC 1995

Hmmmm. That's an interesting proposition.  But, that won't alone won't
buy you control, as I don't think a person can hold more than one
board seat.  The person would have to buy membership for three of
his or her stooges.

response 17 of 107:

Apr 13 06:34 UTC 1995

State law forbids it. Each member must be a distinct entity. In response
to #13, other organizations *have* worried about it, and changed their
form of organization because of it. The example I know was a non-profit
with large land holdings (assets!). They changed from a member to
shareholder basis, and made the shares non-negotiable. The current
(former) members bought them, but they cannot be sold again. New shares
are only sold to whom the organization wishes to sell them. The
organization also has members, who get publications (and pay dues), but
they are "members" in name only, since the organization has no legal
members (most memberships in large organizations are of this nature).
While we are at it - the *third* possible form of non-profit is the
director based organization, where the directors elect the directors. This
form is also largely immune from an attack. 

response 19 of 107:

Apr 13 15:40 UTC 1995

  I think that makes a hostile takeover *significantly* less likely.  If
Grex's assets were worth a lot, a group with no self respect (or with an
axe to grind) might be slimey enough to go for it.  But the way computer
equipment drops in value, and the way Grex's budget goes to fund a lot of
monthly expenses, I doubt Grex's assets will ever be all that valuable
relative to the cost of a majority of memberships.  100 votes times six
dollars times three months = $1800...probably around what you'd get
selling Grex's hardware.

response 21 of 107:

Apr 14 04:44 UTC 1995

   I think we should stop thinking about this kind of dreck.

   Worrying about it is only going to get us more self-government.

response 23 of 107:

Apr 14 06:34 UTC 1995

   Valerie, do remember that $1800 would buy memberships for nnn of
your friends, which would do the same thing.  There isn't any way
to protect ourselves from that, really, so I'm not going to worry
about it.
   I think the complete opposite is much more likely, that no one
would want to contribute, and we die that way.  That, in my opinion
is much more likely.