How should we determine how many dialin lines we should have?

Oct 1 17:56 UTC 1998

There are currently 13 phone lines dedicated to users who dial in to use Grex.
There is some evidence that that is more than we currently need, and it might
make sense for us to disconnect them and use to money we save on something
else.

Before we do that, though, we should come up with some criteria for deciding
how many dialin lines we should have at any given time.  That way we can
periodically re-evaluate the situation, and adjust the number of lines up or
down as appropriate.

In item:coop10,101 (oldcoop item 101), Richard Green proposed a couple of
possible criteria:

1) We should have the right number of lines so that the last line is busy
   between 1 and 5 percent of the time (i.e., between 15 and 75 minutes a day)
   and no single period of business lasts more than 5 minutes.

2) We should have 8 lines per dialin user.

Dave Cahill suggested the alternate method:

3) We should cut one line per month until we get complaints.

The goal of this item is to come to a consensus on what criteria we should
use.  To be acceptable, clearly, the criteria must refer to data that we can
actually obtain.  The most useful data in this regard will probably  be the
wtmp log, which tells when each terminal session begins and ends, and so can
be used to tell how many people are dialed in at any given time.  It's
also possible that we could get Ameritech to give us some statistics on how
often each of our lines is busy.  (I'd like more info on what exactly they
can tell us.)

response 2 of 154:

Oct 1 20:33 UTC 1998

I'm not sure there are any objective criteria that a consensus can
develop around.  Perhaps Richard Green's #1 is a good place to
start, though.

response 4 of 154:

Oct 1 23:28 UTC 1998

ok, I'll renter that response here.
>I agree with the decision to drop the ICNet service.  I also agree that we
>might want to drop a line or two for dial ins.  I would like a "busy signal"
>criterion.  I don't know if Grex can do that, or if we'd have to have
>Ameritech do it.  Basically it tells you busy signals/hour, and is a slightly
>more useful data set that our simple "duration of 'lines all in use' ".

response 6 of 154:

Oct 2 06:07 UTC 1998

Looks like I should have read this item before I entered my response to
the last one...
Criteria #2 should read "8 users per dialin line", and is a general rule
of thumb gleaned from conversations with other ISP's.  The real criteria
is how many busy signals will our users accept?
  Dropping one per month until complaints happen maximizes our expense on
Ameritech service charges, and is guaranteed to generate some at least
temporary bad PR.
  Deciding on a criteria, then going for it, minimizes service charges,
and has a good chance of being transparent to the user community.

Misti: re#2 - counting busy signals does not equal 'missed users' since
most users will attack dial for at least a minute or two before giving up
for a while.

My experience with the telnet queue at its busiest is that a port frees up
every 20 to 45 seconds.  That's with what 60? ports available? If we went
to 10 dialins instead of 13, would it be appropriate to extrapolate that
one would free up every 120 to 270 seconds?  That, in my opinion, is a bit
longer than the average user would be willing to sit there and push the
retry button, so we should set the criteria for last line in use fairly
conservative, say 1% (15 mins/day) and then only if the longest single
instance of that last line busy is no longer than 5 mins. 

response 8 of 154:

Oct 2 17:20 UTC 1998

   Yes, Ameritech can tell us exactly how many calls were denied getting
into Grex.  But as Ken Ascher once found out, they can then use that data
to demand that you get more hone lines to eliminate most of those busy
signals.  Rememebr, a busy signal is an expensive things for Ameritech to
deal with.  Overall, I'm not sure I want to be asking Ameritech for this
kind of "help".
   Given that a lot of us use the dialins, or know folks who who, I think
we'll get reports of busy signals quickly enough if it happens.

response 10 of 154:

Oct 2 22:51 UTC 1998

Ken was actually the one at the board meeting who suggested having Ameritech
do those tests.  He didn't seem to think it would be a problem.  Indeed,
Ameritech can't legally force us to order more phone lines.

8:1 user to modem ratio is about right for an ISP.  ISP's charge their
customers at least $10 to $20 per month.  ISPs also tend to have investors
pouring lots of money into them, suplementing the money they are getting from
customers.  Grex has none of that funding.

response 12 of 154:

Oct 3 04:28 UTC 1998

(the point of this item is because the excuses some board members were using
to keep from getting rid of phone lines we weren't using were getting really
old, so another method was needed to postpone making a decision for another
month).

response 14 of 154:

Oct 3 18:14 UTC 1998

I've started item #34 to discuss what we might do to increase membership. If
you have an interest in this topic, please read that item.

response 16 of 154:

Oct 4 03:39 UTC 1998

Here's Valerie's expurgated response:

>
> (Re 12: Steve, you're being obnoxious.)
>

Perhaps, but mostly I'm getting really frustrated.  We keep watching Grex's
bank balance get lower and lower.  I keep hearing endless discussions about
various projects people want to spend hours and hours on to save Grex a few
dollars a month.  I keep hearing people go on and on about the need to get
people to donate more money to Grex.  And then what do we spend the money
people do donate to us on?  We pay it to Ameritech for phone lines we aren't
using.

Every board meeting for the last several months, we've discussed what to do
about this.  Every month we've been presented with statistics showing that
at least one line, maybe two, aren't being used at all.  And then every month,
we hear the argument that something is going to magically boost our dial-in
usage in the next month, and we need to hold off on cutting them.  Every
month, the people pushing that theory say that we can go ahead and cut those
lines if their big surge in usage doesn't happen.  And then it doesn't, and
we get more stalling.  Finally, those excuses had gotten too old, and it comes
up again that we obviously need to cut some phone lines.  Unfortunately, it's
not considered good enough to cut the lines we need to cut, because we can
no postpone this for another month so that we can discuss a reason to cut
lines that haven't gotten a noticeable amount of use in months.  It's been at
least four months since this first came up, and we started hearing the excuses
for keeping them.  Meanwhile, we've sent $160 to Ameritech for the two phone
lines.  That's 2 2/3 Grex annual memberships.

I'm really wondering at this point why I still bother to come to board
meetings, or for that matter, why I've been donating money to Grex.  I
certainly couldn't with a clear conscience tell anybody else to donate money
to Grex right now, unless I had some reason to believe that that person had
nothing better to do with their money than subsidize Ameritech, everybody's
favorite charity.

response 20 of 154:

Oct 5 19:05 UTC 1998

   Well Valerie, if its any consolation to you at all, I too would have
favored the board thinking of ways to increase membersip, rather than
figure out ways to cut things.  Cutting things is really much easier to
do, I know.  But I have seen no coordinated system to do this.  Instead
we're talking of ways to cut things and arguing about it in the process.

   I'd certainly rather the board had taken a more enlightened approach,
being something along the lines of stating that we have to get nnn more
members or we'll be forced to cut yyy services.  *That* would have been
the proper Grexian approach to this, I think.

response 22 of 154:

Oct 6 05:20 UTC 1998

Grex is a volunteer organization.  Yes, getting more users to participate is
always good.  That doesn't mean that those of us who really aren't interested
in advertising are going to rush out and work on advertising.  To expect that
would be quite unrealistic.  The hungry person looking at a plate of food
analogy breaks down because hungry people are generally interested in eating.
It feels much more like we're asking the hungry person to go out and run
around, or do something else that will increase the hunger, rather than
increasing the food supply.  I can't speak for anybody else, but when I see
an organization spending a significant chunk of its budget on something that
isn't being used, my motivation to donate money goes way down.

Expecting usage of the dial-up lines to go way up, despite the rapidly
increasing number of people who have Internet access, is unrealistic.

I'm sorry, Valerie, if you thought I was only talking about you.  The board
has seven people on it.  Only four of them need to vote for something to make
it happen.  The Grex board has serious problems dealing with any issue on
which there isn't an absolute consensus.  That's the entire board's problem,
not a problem with any one person.

response 24 of 154:

Oct 6 13:21 UTC 1998

No problemo.

We should cut dialin lines now.  We're not going to markedly increase our
membership rolls because I think the idea of conferencing has kind of had
its moment of discovery.  Conferencing has to compete with lots of other
internet acctivities.  It's not 1986 anymore. 

Now, I could be very wrong about this.  But I think to hedge my bet I'd do
the following if it was my personal budget.  I'd cut the unused lines and
start being extra frugal about discretionary spending in the event I was
right.  Some expenses are going to increase no matter what happens to our
membership roles so if we spend too much time in denial and hopeful
thinking we'll find ourselves needing to beg for funding.  And if Grex
gets too desperate for money (begging and pleading) then we're a risky
venture for many prospective members and the whole project starts
to look dicey. 

If I'm wrong and our membership rolls swell to 125 or even 150 then it's
easy enough to use that (real and banked) membership money to improve
access if it looks like that's where the expenditure is most needed. 

I'd also back off on badgering people to get involved in fundraising
activities and other volunteer projects.  If folks had the time and
inclination they'd pick up on the suggestion the first or second or third
time around.  After that all you're going to do is push those feeling
guilty into volunteering but they never follow though and get much done. 

To answer Mark's specific question: some of the criteria to be 
evaluated in context when any significant expenditure is being
debated:

  1. Our current financial bottom line
  2. Any immediate threats to our being online.
  3. Expected (no choice whatsoever) expenses on the horizon.
  4. The recent (last two year) stability of our membership support.
  5. Looking at all areas that need improvement is the project being
     debated of the highest priority?
  6. Would this improvement allow us to better meet our mission?
  7. Will those improvements tend to stress other resources and 
     if so, how, or rather how much?  Think ahead.
  8. Has the membership been fully informed and given the opportunity
     to participate in the discussion?

I'm sure others could fine tune. I need my loading dose of 
caffeine.  Priorites, you know. ;-)