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Grex > Coop > #261: Where is Grex moving to when provide.net closes in a few months? | |
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| Author |
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| 25 new of 60 responses total. |
mary
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response 30 of 60:
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Feb 25 21:26 UTC 2010 |
I think we could move forward here without beating up our volunteers.
Really I do.
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slynne
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response 31 of 60:
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Feb 25 22:01 UTC 2010 |
I think that the beating up of the volunteers just makes things run even
slower
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richard
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response 32 of 60:
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Feb 25 22:47 UTC 2010 |
re #30,31 I disagree. I think the fact that the board members are
volunteers should in no way insulate them from user/member criticism.
If you agreed to serve that is a contract between you and those that
elected you, and you therefore have to accept whatever heat comes from
doing or not doing the job, regardless of whether you are being paid
for it.
I have served in volunteer positions, on campaigns and other such, and
I have never thought that the fact that I was 'volunteering' gave me a
free pass to be less responsible than those who were doing paid
positions.
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krj
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response 33 of 60:
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Feb 25 22:49 UTC 2010 |
I think having Tony on staff is a great idea.
I'm less enamored of the idea of having Tony as Grex's landlord.
Grex has always tried to stay in commercial space because there
were some issues in Olde M-net Days about having the system in
someone else's home.
Having a private individual host Grex in his or her home works
great -- until it doesn't. When it breaks, it breaks spectacularly.
Possible bad things:
1) Law enforcement could decide to seize Grex. Since it wouldn't be
clear to them which computers were Grex and which were Tony's, they
would find it easier to take everything.
2) Access by other staff for hardware issues might conflict with
family needs of the host: say there's a sick kid or something.
3) The host and the rest of the Grex community could sour on each
other. (This is not meant as a dig at Tony, it could happen with
anyone.)
4) Not to be too morbid, but something could happen to the host --
unemployment, incapacitating illness, stuff like that.
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mary
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response 34 of 60:
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Feb 25 23:00 UTC 2010 |
Worst case - off-site backups installed on new hardware or hosting. I
think we could worry so much about all that could go wrong that we'd
simply die from paralysis.
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slynne
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response 35 of 60:
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Feb 26 01:28 UTC 2010 |
resp:32 Do you think that being very critical of volunteers makes other
people more likely or less likely to volunteer? If Grex had hundreds of
people who wanted to volunteer and only a very few volunteer slots,
there would be room for a lot of criticism. That isnt the case here. And
it is especially galling when the people who do the most complaining are
not people willing to do any work themselves.
It is one thing to helpfully point out things that need to be done and
perhaps even suggest possible solutions. It is quite another to demand
someone else's unpaid time. It really bothered me when I was on the
board that no matter how much effort I put into things, there was always
someone bitching that not enough was being done and it was usually
someone who couldn't be bothered to do anything themselves.
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tonster
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response 36 of 60:
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Feb 26 02:04 UTC 2010 |
Note that in my scenario there should be no need for anyone to touch the
hardware grex is hosted on, any more than if grex were hosted as a
virtual machine at a commercial company would it have physical hardware.
Unlike now, however, I could provide access to the machine it is hosted
on so that grex staff (all grex staff, or whoever staff appointed to
have access, and I would not be the sole person to give that access)
would be able to access the machine remotely as if they were sitting
right in front of it. Power on the machine, power it off, get on
console, reboot, whatever.
I do understand the hesitation due to m-net's beginnings, though I have
no intentions of doing anything like that. As mary said, though, theres
always the option of offsite backups. Staff can also take snapshots of
the VM and probably copy those offsite occasionally. I've never
actually done that, but I'm certain it's possible.
As far as being critical of board and staff, I have to say that it's
coming to a point that something more harsh needed to be said. The
conversation has sat stagnant for the past 3+ months. Offers and
suggestions have been made since grex was down late last year with
little or no mention by most of the board and staff. At some point the
clock is going to wind down on provide.net's service and they're going
to call someone and say 'hey, we've been telling you for months that our
service is shutting down. You need to be out by Friday.' and noone is
going to know what to do because noone will discuss it.
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slynne
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response 37 of 60:
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Feb 26 02:23 UTC 2010 |
FWIW, it is very different when criticism comes from someone who is
obviously willing to do things. It is also fine to point out things
which need to be done which is a much different thing from demanding
that someone else do those things.
The real problem with Grex is a leadership void though and nagging isnt
going to solve that problem unfortunately. It has been my experience
that harsh criticisms can sometimes get people to do things in the short
term but in the long run, those harsh criticisms result in things like a
board of directors who dont log on, dont participate in online
discussions, don't attend board meetings and so on. It sucks but that is
how I see it.
Maybe it is too late for Grex. Maybe there really is no one willing to
step up enough to save it.
(if I cared enough, which I don't, I would make sure that board meetings
happened by organizing them and calling board members to remind them to
show up. Then I would insist that Grex be moved to Tony's house and I
would do everything I could do to facilitate that. That might include
calling staff people and encouraging them to participate by doing things
to make it fun for them.)
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tonster
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response 38 of 60:
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Feb 26 04:07 UTC 2010 |
I should also make clear that i'm not encouraging berating volunteers.
I've been volunteering for m-net long enough to know that what slynne
says is correct, too much of it happens. however, after months of
getting no response at some point you've got to get more firm. Whether
it's to my server or finding another solution, the problem isn't going
away, time is running out, and a decision must be made.
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richard
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response 39 of 60:
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Feb 26 18:26 UTC 2010 |
I think when/if Tonster takes the box, that should also be the time
that Grex formally stops offering email. There is really no reason for
Grex to be offering email these days, there are only eighteen zillions
places where you can get free email from places that can provide better
services than Grex. There was a time years ago when Grex offering free
email was a valuable service. Not anymore. Besides I think that
without the email, it might discourage trolls from bothering to come
here.
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slynne
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response 40 of 60:
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Feb 26 18:27 UTC 2010 |
I agree that it is probably time for Grex to stop offering email
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tonster
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response 41 of 60:
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Feb 26 19:23 UTC 2010 |
alternatively, it could be offered in the same way it's now offered on
m-net.
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nharmon
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response 42 of 60:
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Feb 26 20:33 UTC 2010 |
^^^^^^ Yeah, that!
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richard
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response 43 of 60:
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Feb 26 20:44 UTC 2010 |
but why offer it at all with grex's limited resources when there are so
many other places that offer better free email? I think offering
censored email is contrary to grex's mission of being fully open
anyway. Censoring/whitelisting email and validating new user are
really getting away from grex's mission of being open access.
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goose
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response 44 of 60:
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Feb 26 22:43 UTC 2010 |
Is there any more news about Provide.net and where they stand? Are they
really closing imminently?
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tsty
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response 45 of 60:
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Feb 26 22:43 UTC 2010 |
thisitem begins with an unsubsatntiated calim that proviede.net is closing.
anyone haev a real fact from provbide? or is thns just scholar messing
his fingerttips dipping in prejudiced pixels?
i thoght not.
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tonster
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response 46 of 60:
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Feb 27 00:25 UTC 2010 |
resp:43: I agree that censoring/whitelisting email is not the best way
to do things. I don't really like veek's plan, but that's not to say it
can't work. It's just not the way I'd do things. The method I'd suggest,
and the way that m-net does it, uses 0 of m-net's (or grex's) resources
but still allows people to maintain their email address. You can either
use the web-based email account (I've just posted instructions and
opened ports so that this works with pine on m-net now, I'm sure you
could use other text-based clients similarly as well) or just login
after creating the account and forward the email to the address of your
choice.
resp:44: I certainly haven't validated the claim that provide is
closing, but I don't think it should come as any surprise. They're a
small town ISP in a dying industry. They were big dial-up guys and few
people in this area continue to use dial-up. They're probably only
surviving because of the colo these days.
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slynne
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response 47 of 60:
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Feb 27 02:38 UTC 2010 |
They sell dsl service too
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tonster
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response 48 of 60:
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Feb 27 03:44 UTC 2010 |
Traditional DSL is really a dying industry too. It was a nice service
when Northpoint and Covad were selling the SDSL service, but the future
lies in FiOS and Uverse, which isn't resold by external providers.
Unless provide is going to redefine themselves a colocation facility, I
don't think they're going to survive. It's a shame really. I liked the
small providers.
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tsty
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response 49 of 60:
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Feb 27 07:59 UTC 2010 |
i;m glsad noonwe other than this item's instigator makes the claim
that provide is going bellyup. (alsong with some sympatico dolts who
also would wish grex dead and crap on the staff.cf)
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remmers
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response 50 of 60:
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Feb 28 12:26 UTC 2010 |
Well, STeve did raise the possibility at the December board meeting.
It's not just "this item's instigator" and "sympatico dolts".
Regardless of whether our current provider is in imminent danger of
folding or not, I think it behooves Grex to have a plan for moving if
the need arises.
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tod
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response 51 of 60:
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Feb 28 14:42 UTC 2010 |
re #33
LOL! Yes, Tony is a magnet for cop raids
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scholar
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response 52 of 60:
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Feb 28 16:32 UTC 2010 |
Re. 49: No, I'm not the only one who's saying that provide.net is closing.
I'm repeating what Steve said at a board meeting which you attended.
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richard
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response 53 of 60:
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Feb 28 19:45 UTC 2010 |
I don't think it matters one bit whether provide.net is closing. The
fact is that provide.net has ceased to be a viable hosting solution.
Grex goes down and stays down because nobody authorized can get over
there to reboot the box. In addition nobody is thinking about *why*
Grex needs to be re-set this often? Are they taking the power up and
down over there?
I think it is clearly time for the grex box to be moved to a staff
member's house.
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tod
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response 54 of 60:
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Feb 28 19:49 UTC 2010 |
I think its time to recode Grex as a hosted Moogle solution.
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