SCN: RE: RE: SCNA kaput -- irrevocably? - from Ken Gillgren

Fri Jul 1 07:56:56 PDT 2011

Ken,

SCN nominally still has 185 mailing lists on the books. (I sent
Majordomo a "lists" command a while ago, and eventually it
responded with the list of lists. My text editor says that file
has 185 lines.) It's impossible to tell whether any of them are
still in use, without useful login access to the system.

But a few days ago when I set up a mailing list for a school
board candidate on a local non-profit system, it wasn't SCN. I
would have preferred to be able to do something like that on
SCN, but realistically it's not possible to believe that things
would work satisfactorily. The problems mostly aren't with the
hardware, which is puffing along arthritically well enough to
continue running, but that no one is left at the switch. It's
all ghosts, except for Randy's occasional touch-up here and
there when he can get to it. I'm amazed that it's still up, and
that Randy has kept it up all this time. But it's become a
museum on disk.

No one has succeeded in starting a new community group site on
SCN for years. A quick read-only look via FTP at the directory
names and dates shows that none of the roughly 350 sites still
on SCN's server have been updated in years, with the exception
of these four - Phil Bartle's CMP/RDI/MPFC/GCAD (tech support by
Al Boss), Jean Buskin's calendar (my 1998 Perl calendar program
still chugging along), Qwest Pioneers (updated in 2010 - that's
Lois), and OWL's Hoot (I'm guessing Lois). That's it. Otherwise,
multiply your experience times 350.

Randy is suggesting a work party to install six new servers.
They'd have a current operating system and software, something
normal and not frighteningly weird. That would give us a system
that normal Unix people could walk up to and understand. I've
volunteered to help with that, although there's no schedule yet.

But mostly, volunteers would need to get together and come up
with something on the people side of things. What do you
actually want from a local non-profit Internet group these days,
if anything?

Rod Clark

> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Thu, 30 Jun 2011 12:44:22 -0700 (PDT)
> From: "Kenneth" <kgillgren at igc.org>
> To: "'Randy Groves'" <randomgrace at gmail.com>,
> 	"'Steve Guest'" <steve at steve-guest.com>
> Cc: <ljbeedle at scn.org>, <douglas at publicsphereproject.org>,
> 	<alboss at sisypheans.org>, <al.boss at metrokc.gov>, <jj at scn.org>,
> 	<scn at scn.org>, <douglas at cpsr.org>, <steve at advocate.net>,
> 	<jmabel at speakeasy.org>, <jimh at scn.org>, <bb615 at scn.org>,
> 	<anamioka at gmail.com>, "'Joel Ware, IV'" <jw4 at scn.org>,
> 	"'Joel Ware, IV'" <joelware at yahoo.com>,
> 	"'Ti Locke-Computer Giveaway'" <tgreyraven at yahoo.com>
> Subject: RE: RE: SCNA kaput -- irrevocably?
> Date: Thu, 30 Jun 2011 12:54:59 -0700
>
> Out of curiousity, how many volunteer/technical staff are still supporting
> SCN? I know the Wedgwood Community Council was hosted on SCN until the
> council's Web admin was unable to get a response from SCN support (I don't
> remember what the question or issue was anymore, this was probably 2-3 years
> ago), and so they weighed anchor and moved to a commercially hosted service.
>
> Are people still signing up for email addresses and/or mailing lists? Can
> people still sign up for email addresses and/or mailing lists?
>
> I'm guessing there could still be a niche for SCN, although the type of
> support might be different, and therefore the volunteer pool may or may not
> be available.
>
> Just wondering.
>
> Ken Gillgren
> (206) 755-9578
> <mailto:ken at gillgrencommunication.com> ken at gillgrencommunication.com
> Skype: ken.gillgren
>
>
>
>  _____
>
> From: Randy Groves [mailto:randomgrace at gmail.com]
> Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2011 12:32 PM
> To: Steve Guest
> Cc: ljbeedle at scn.org; douglas at publicsphereproject.org;
> alboss at sisypheans.org; al.boss at metrokc.gov; kgillgren at igc.org; jj at scn.org;
> scn at scn.org; douglas at cpsr.org; steve at advocate.net; jmabel at speakeasy.org;
> jimh at scn.org; bb615 at scn.org; anamioka at gmail.com; Joel Ware, IV; Joel Ware,
> IV; Ti Locke-Computer Giveaway
> Subject: Re: RE: SCNA kaput -- irrevocably?
>
>
> I was a bit curious that Joel, Alan, and Ti were not included in the e-mail,
> but forwarded it to them as soon as I saw it.
>
> I think that it is a little early to start dancing on SCN's grave.
>
> -randy
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 12:16 PM, Steve Guest <steve at steve-guest.com> wrote:
>
>
> Hi Lois
> Having officially resigned from the SCNA board about 3 years ago I cannot
> tell you the current situation.  I do not see Joel or Ti listed in this
> email and they were still board members when I resigned.
>
> As for the disposal of the SCNA assets and funds the articles of
> incorporation, the constitution and the by-laws where appropriate were all
> very clear - these must all go to CPSR.  Having tried to change a small
> aspect of these by-laws to give the board the ability to perform a required
> and expected management function - and failing - I would expect these asset
> and fund dispersal requirements have not changed.  Therefore they cannot
> simply be transferred to another non-profit.
>
> The ACLU attorney who setup the rules did a great job.  I had discussions
> with four attorneys on ways to change these documents, including the one who
> did the original work.  There are copies of the documents on the web site
> should you need them.  I would have your own legal counsel look at these.
>
> Steve
>
> Dr. Steve Guest
> 206-364-5636
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-scn at scn.org [mailto:owner-scn at scn.org] On Behalf Of
> ljbeedle at scn.org
> Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2011 2:34 AM
> To: douglas at publicsphereproject.org; randomgrace at gmail.com;
>
> alboss at sisypheans.org; al.boss at metrokc.gov; kgillgren at igc.org; jj at scn.org;
> scn at scn.org; douglas at cpsr.org; steve at advocate.net; jmabel at speakeasy.org;
>
> jimh at scn.org; bb615 at scn.org; anamioka at gmail.com
> Subject: SCN: RE: SCNA kaput -- irrevocably?
>
>
> I would hate to see SCN die totally.  I am not sure how many active users
> we still have but I do have 4 non profits with directories on SCN that I
> keep up.  I also still try to keep up the Spirituality menu.
>
> What would it mean to our users if your group took over Doug?
>
> What does the SCN Constitution and By-laws say about the disposition of
> assets if we were to dissolve SCN?
>
> Having gone though this with a church I do know that not much is required
> to reactive except for filing an up to date Constitution and By-laws and
> the fee.  At least that was all we had to do for the church.
>
> Is there anyone left who can call a meeting of the members to approve any
> actions?
>
> Lois
>
> Original Message:
> -----------------
> From: Douglas Schuler douglas at publicsphereproject.org
> Date: Wed, 29 Jun 2011 21:07:36 -0700
> To: randomgrace at gmail.com, alboss at sisypheans.org, al.boss at metrokc.gov,
> kgillgren at igc.org, jj at scn.org, scn at scn.org, douglas at cpsr.org,
> steve at advocate.net, jmabel at speakeasy.org, jimh at scn.org, ljbeedle at scn.org,
> bb615 at scn.org, anamioka at gmail.com
> Subject: SCNA kaput -- irrevocably?
>
>
>
> After 10 years or so of inaction it looks like the SCN board finally
> ceased re-upping with the secretary of state.
>
> I'm guessing that it would still be possible to re-initiate the
> organization if  anybody wanted to.  I'd be willing for the Public
> Sphere Project (a non-profit,  501.c.3 organization) to  absorb the
> assets (probably just the machine) to continue the operation of the
> machine.  I  think that my students could  take  some  degree of
> custodianship over  the machine as part of their civic  intelligence
> work.
>
> -- Doug
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