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Grex > Coop13 > #179: Grex Board of Director's Meeting Minutes - May 21, 2004 | |
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slynne
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Grex Board of Director's Meeting Minutes - May 21, 2004
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May 24 18:29 UTC 2004 |
Board members present: Mark Conger, Lynne Fremont, Joe Gelinas, Bruce
Howard, Mary Remmers.
Others present: Steve Andre, Glenda Andre, Kip DeGraaf
1. Opening Gavel Tap
2. Treasurers Report:
April and May were bad. $313 taken in and $372 spent so we are down
around $60. There were no new members in April. We received official
notification that our 501 c 3 is current and active. We are currently
at 80 members with 67 paid up.
3. Staff Report:
Kip has been doing some visable things such as locking certain users
accounts and deleting posts for copyright violations.
User jp2 has asked for a board discussion about copyright issues. Board
and Staff discussed this. The Board has appointed staff and will
continue to leave issues like this up to the staff. The Board will
continue to trust Staff s judgement.
DSL Modem The new modem donated by tod has not been installed. The
modem will be replaced this weekend. There has been no lag since
Wednesday. The issue may not be the modem at all but might be the
wiring in the building.
Discussion of moving Grex to the Ann Arbor Public Library since the
library is getting a new high speed connection. Kip works for the
library so he ll look into this informally. Our insurance is due in
August but if we pay for a whole year and don t use it, we can get a
refund, there is no real time limit for making a decision about a move.
Other co-location options were discussed.
Next Grex is still on hold. It just needs people to get working on it.
The staff have been feeling discouraged by atmosphere on Grex.
Staff will explore the option of going with Fronttalk on Grex rather
than Picospan since Fronttalk is already installed on Next Grex. They
also need quotas on newuser. Steve has a work around. Staff to have a
partial staff meeting immediately following board meeting.
4. Next Meeting Monday, 6/28 at Mary Remmers s house.
5. New Business - Post office box keys. We have 2 but we might be
able to get three. Mark is going to look into it.
6. Closing Gavel Tap.
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| 45 responses total. |
keesan
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response 1 of 45:
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May 24 19:46 UTC 2004 |
Is Fronttalk graphical?
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slynne
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response 2 of 45:
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May 24 20:29 UTC 2004 |
From my understanding it looks pretty much like picospan
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gelinas
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response 3 of 45:
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May 24 21:17 UTC 2004 |
"Fronttalk is a experimental command line interface to Backtalk.
I'm announcing it here in the garage conference because it's really just
a hackers toy - very flakey and incomplete now, might not ever turn into
anything real" (janc, in Item 130 of the "garage" conference, Tue, Dec
4, 2001).
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mary
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response 4 of 45:
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May 24 21:42 UTC 2004 |
I believe Jan has done some work on it since that last comment
because when I asked him about it, maybe a month ago, he said
it was loading a little slowly but otherwise shouldn't be much
slower that Pico. He also said that if BackTalk was running on
top of FrontTalk, that he'd be able to do some creative things
with BackTalk.
Anyhow, it's on Grex and anyone can try it out. At whatever
Unix prompt you have simply enter ft. It's a little sluggish
loading but then seems quite perky.
I think he said it was already on Next Grex.
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aruba
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response 5 of 45:
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May 24 21:47 UTC 2004 |
I gather Jan's done a good bit of work on it since that message. You can
run it on CurrentGrex by typing "ft".
We currently have 2 keys to the post office box. One is on my keyring,
the other is at janc's house. I asked at the post office, and they don't
have a third key, and can't make copies. So they will re-key the lock
in order that we might get a third key.
The first two keys are free - each one after that costs $4.50. So I paid
them $4.50, and will exchange my key and Jan's for 3 new ones when the box
has been re-keyed. No charge for re-keying.
Thanks for taking notes, Lynne!
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aruba
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response 6 of 45:
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May 24 21:48 UTC 2004 |
(Mary slipped in.)
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albaugh
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response 7 of 45:
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May 24 22:06 UTC 2004 |
> The staff have been feeling discouraged by atmosphere on Grex.
Can anyone explain just what that has to do with Next Grex?
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keesan
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response 8 of 45:
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May 24 22:34 UTC 2004 |
I just tried ft. 26 sec to get into bbs, where it looks just like picospan.
Typing bbs gets me the bbs in 2 seconds. If I type n in bbs it lists all the
conferences where there are no responses almost immediately. With ft it is
about 2 sec between conference listings. I am dialed in directly. I would
use this as an emergency approach but not out of choice. I hope Marcus can
find the time to compile picospam for next grex, soon.
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aruba
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response 9 of 45:
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May 24 22:38 UTC 2004 |
Re #7: Kevin - when the staff feels discouraged about Grex, they are less
likely to take the time to work on it. Since they are all volunteers, that
is their perogative. Your name was mentioned, BTW, as being particularly
supportive and helpful.
So we should all act more like albaugh. :)
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gelinas
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response 10 of 45:
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May 25 00:54 UTC 2004 |
I included the date in the citation specifically to show that the comment was
three years old. I included the conference and item citation so that people
can check the item and see the record of progress for themselves.
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richard
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response 11 of 45:
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May 25 03:26 UTC 2004 |
re item #3 in minutes...Kip has been locking certian users accounts and
deleting posts for copyright violations? What is the point in locking user
accounts when they can run newuser and just get another one? As long as
newuser is open, what is the point of locking accounts? seems like a waste
of time
Also, whether something is a "copyright violation" constitutes a legal
opinion. You can't just say something is a "copyright violation", you have
to have a legal basis for it. If Kip or any other staff member is deciding
what is a copyright violation, and what isn't a copyright violation, they are
opening a potential hornet's nest of dissenting opinions. I think its best
to leave it alone. Don't remove posts for copyright violation unless there's
a court order saying to do so.
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other
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response 12 of 45:
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May 25 03:44 UTC 2004 |
Better yet, ignore richard.
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mary
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response 13 of 45:
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May 25 12:04 UTC 2004 |
Copyright vs fair-use issues are a muddy area. We could hire specialized
attorneys and still get conflicting advice, I suspect. But Grex isn't in
the position to do anything but use our best judgement, be open to user's
advice on how it should be handled, and hope our staff doesn't burnout
while doing the very best they can.
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twenex
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response 14 of 45:
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May 25 12:29 UTC 2004 |
Re: #13: "We could hire specialized
attorneys and still get conflicting advice[.]"
Doesn't one hire attorneys *in order* to get conflicting advice?
8D
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slynne
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response 15 of 45:
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May 25 15:06 UTC 2004 |
I completely agree with resp:13.
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keesan
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response 16 of 45:
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May 25 16:06 UTC 2004 |
It does take a few minutes to run newuser, which might discourage vandals if
they have to keep opening new accounts to be annoying.
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albaugh
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response 17 of 45:
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May 25 18:30 UTC 2004 |
Re: #7/#9: I knew the answer before I asked. :-) Obviously I understand
that humans can get discouraged, especially when they feel unappreciated.
I was wondering if by "atmosphere" it was meant "there are ingrates over-
criticizing staff" etc. or that there was so much time cleaning up after
vandals there was no time to do the interesting stuff, i.e. Next Grex?
If it's the former, then all I can say is "try to ignore them and do what ya
gotta do" - at least some of us aren't worried about / make an issue of
administrivia re: punks...
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aruba
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response 18 of 45:
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May 25 20:13 UTC 2004 |
Re #11: Richard - you're right that we shouldn't be making a determination
as to what's a "copyright violation" and what's not. But we should still
have our own policies/reactions when something is clearly in violation, as
was the case with realugly's post of russ's poem.
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cmcgee
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response 19 of 45:
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May 26 00:57 UTC 2004 |
With the request from the author to remove it, not a determination of
copyright violation in a vacuum.
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richard
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response 20 of 45:
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May 26 03:05 UTC 2004 |
query...can newuser be modified so it locks out people that are running it
from specific ip addresses? that might at least discourage users whose logins
have been taken away from creating new ones, because they'd have to re-route
the way they connect to grex (changing their ip) before running newuser
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remmers
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response 21 of 45:
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May 26 14:18 UTC 2004 |
That's an approach to consider, but it has the downside that other users
might want to connect from the same ip.
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remmers
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response 22 of 45:
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May 26 14:29 UTC 2004 |
Re #8: I suspect that speed differences between Picospan and Fronttalk
will be far less noticeable on NextGrex than on CurrentGrex.
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tod
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response 23 of 45:
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May 26 18:00 UTC 2004 |
re #20
Why are you chasing the rain? Why not just change your perspective?
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twenex
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response 24 of 45:
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May 26 19:14 UTC 2004 |
Chasing the rain is a nice expression.
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