[tor-project] Localized mailing lists

[ilv at torproject.org]

On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 12:45:50AM -0400, Roger Dingledine wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 05, 2018 at 07:30:53PM -0300, ilv at torproject.org wrote:
> > Someone might "hey, but if we have a mailing list for language X, we should
> > have one for language Y". To avoid this (supposing that we want) we could set
> > some requirements like for example there should be at least one core member
> > willing to run the list. 
> 
> I think yes, we should try the experiment of making this list and seeing
> how it goes.
> 
> I like your notion of "there should be at least one core member willing
> to run the list." I'm tempted to suggest "at least two" to prove that
> we have some sort of critical mass before making a list, but I think we
> can figure out the more exact policies when we have tried this list and
> we're considering a second one.
> 
> But to be clear, it needs to be more than just "one core member
> interesting in *starting* the list" -- they need to commit to *running*
> the list, meaning keeping its discussions on track, moderated against
> trolls, etc.
> 

I agree. And in this case that's what I was thinking when I offered to
maintain the list.

> A second principle that I would propose is that we have a periodic
> check-in point, like every six months or something, to decide whether
> the experiment is working as intended. If the list hasn't been used much
> lately at the check-in time, or things are otherwise not going as you
> originally imagined, that's a great time to decide to change things.
> 

Yes, we can evaluate the status of this (and others if we go for it) at
each Tor meeting.

> George is totally right that there are risks with creating new lists,
> first because maybe you make a list that never takes off, frustrating
> the people who signed up hoping it would be something, but second because
> splitting communities can kill existing lists *too*.
> 
> So a third principle that I would propose is that the list runners should
> keep an eye out for things that happen on the list that people from the
> more "mainstream" lists probably want to know about, and send a periodic
> summary or something. Same thing goes for watching other lists for things
> that folks on the new list probably want to know about. And if you find
> yourself spending a lot of time telling people from different lists about
> what happened on the other lists, then it's time to stop and wonder if
> things are set up wrong.
>

Makes sense. I can do that for this first list and after some time we can
evaluate how it is going.

Thanks for the comments,
--i
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