[Wylug-discuss] Suggestion for website

[Dave Fisher]

On Wed, May 16, 2007 at 12:46:43AM +0100, Smylers wrote:
> Often the best way to get any new thing granted any kind of 'official'
> blessing is for whatever-it-is to demonstrate its existing utility or
> popularity.
> 
> Just run your 'unofficial' planet for a while (one in which those
> aggregated all happen to have some connection with Wylug, but which akes
> no claims to being representative of or speaking for Wylug).  Nobody can
> stop you doing that.
> 
> Then perhaps in a few months time you can point to your planet, show
> people how good it is, and then ask if Wylug would like to encompass it
> as the official Planet Wylug.  It will be much easier to allay the fears
> of those who fear an overload of vegetable matter by, in the future,
> pointing out the distinct lack of articles on that subject that have
> appeared on the planet, than it is now to make persuasive claims about
> what will happen.


I'm not taking sides here, but I'd like to bring everyone's attention to
a couple of factors which could have a bearing on how persuasive people
find Smylers's argument.

In the last few hours, it's come to my attention that hosting a planet
could be irreconcilable with hosting the WYLUG site at Leeds University
... because the University could be construed as (re)publishing the
planet's content and, therefore, be liable for its contents.

This is not a reason to reject Chris's proposal, because we have many
alternative hosting options.

It does, however, mean that choosing to host a planet ourselves would
necessarily involve making new hosting arrangements.

Since that might conceivably alter the nature of our relationship to the
University, and the School of Computing in particular, I think that
these potential implications should be considered.

Two virtues of Smylers's suggestion are that it could give us time to:

  1. Consider these implications more fully.
  
  2. Evaluate the usefulness of an 'unofficial' planet

I can see both pros and cons to a hosting move, but I suspect that the
'cons' may not be so obvious to newer and non-University members, so
I'd like to hear them aired before leaning decisively one way or the
other.

Dave