[OSM-talk] The long tail

[Lars Aronsson]

SteveC wrote:

> OSM is going through this difficult process with the OSMF and 
> people are losing confidence in my sanity

Thanks for sharing the stories about the postcodes and the webcam.

The issues of privacy and licensing should be discussed, but this 
discussion seems likely to need some time, perhaps several months. 
For some of the project's more urgent needs, I think we can find a 
practical solution even before that discussion has ended.

No matter what privacy and licensing policy we finally arrive at, 
there is a necessity (which overrides both law and contracts) that 
we trust whoever administrates the server, with having deep access 
both to our contributions and to privacy-related information.  
There simply is no technical means both to contribute information 
to the server and to hide it from the server admins.  Currently, 
this is Steve Coast and Nick Hill.

> If you think I'm totally mad, convince Nick Hill to do it. I 
> hope that Nick would have the same privacy and copyright 
> concerns as I do.

Instead of hoping and instead of playing one against the other, I 
suggest that you set up a closed mailing list only for the two of 
you, the server admin group, the root team, or what you prefer to 
call it.  When the rest of us see any technical problem with the 
server, this is the address we should write to, instead of either 
of you personally.  This makes it easier for us, it allows either 
of you to take a vacation without the entire system halting, and 
it also forces the two of you to cooperate and keep each other 
informed. I don't think you need to sign NDA contracts for this to 
work out. Perhaps this new e-mail alias should be hosted outside 
of the OSM servers, so it can be used even if the servers fail.

Finally, I suggest that the root team should be expanded with one 
or two more people.  Steve would be the coordinator, the captain 
of the ship, and decide who's in or not.

This would entirely be a practical arrangement, and doesn't in any 
way contradict the formation of the OSMF or its board, or the 
discussion of licensing or privacy policy.  The project needs a 
server, the server needs an admin, and we're too big now to rely 
only on any single individual.  The admin group is a necessity.


-- 
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se