[hackerspaces] Next steps -

[Petr Baudis]

  Hi!

On Mon, Apr 15, 2013 at 02:51:51AM +0200, Yves Quemener wrote:
> But am I missing another thing if I say that simply owning the
> hackerspaces.* domains just involved managing DNS records and is not really
> a big problem or a big task, as long as the servers are maintained by the
> current team?
> 
> I don't really understand why the people currently controlling the servers
> should not also own the domain names.

  Because you can fork the website and/or restore the technical
infrastructure without *that* much hassle, but then it's a matter of
where the domain names point, that's what selects the master version.

  Essentially, whoever owns the domain name has the *arbitration power*
to select the master version, and that's pretty much the only power they
have per se. It's usually a no-op when things are peachy (just pay the
bills once per 1-2 years) but important in case of a grave conflict.

  So ideally, that would be someone universally trusted by the community
but not affiliated with daily operations of the site.

> Making a whole organization only for deciding to which IP
> *.hackerspaces.org points to seems way overkill.

  It would be an ideal solution but I agree that it's an overkill
(plus, how would we select people to sit in the foundation?) and we
(well, Paul) should just pick someone. It needn't even be the person
who we trust with making the decision itself! As long as we trust their
promise to properly determine and act based on consensus of the
community.

> Alternatively, Matt Joyce proposed to take them, why wouldn't that be
> a proper solution?

  I don't know that many people from the global hackerspace community
so my first instict would be to ask Mitch Altman. :-) But quite possibly
Matt Joyce would be also a fine person to take care of the domain.

-- 
				Petr "Pasky" Baudis
	For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear,
	simple, and wrong.  -- H. L. Mencken