[steering-discuss] libreoffice.org e-mail accounts

Hello,

as discussed yesterday in the confcall, we're planning to give out official LibreOffice e-mail accounts to people who are community members per the membership committee's decision. (For information on the membership committee, refer to yesterday's confcall as well. It will be online as audio recording soon.)

My plan is to hand out only e-mail forwarders, not real mailboxes with POP and IMAP, as the latter one requires lots of maintenance.

However, as we had lots of irritating issues with @openoffice.org e-mail addresses, I would like to avoid these mistakes. It's evident that @documentfoundation.org accounts are only for those who work for/with TDF and are eligible to represent them in certain aspects, like the SC or administrators.

For LibreOffice, I'm a bit hesitant to hand out @libreoffice.org, as this may seem like people are acting on behalf of TDF, causing liability issues. Maybe I'm too touchy, so I'm happy for comments, which is why I am writing this mail. :slight_smile:

My plan is actually to have something like

  volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org
or
  volunteer.nickname@libreofficemail.org
or
  volunteer.nickname@libreofficevolunteers.org

I'd like to avoid subdomains (@community.libreoffice.org), as they are really ugly for e-mail accounts.

What are your thoughts?

Florian

Hi, :slight_smile:

Small idea: have you considered using Google Apps for the project's
mail needs? *So* easy to set-up, *so* easy to maintain,
feature-packed, and I'm sure they will give TDF a free upgrade to an
enterprise account. Lots of other benefits, too.

David Nelson

In general, IMHO etc. I believe a forwarding setup, as well as being
easier fits into most people's existing mail flows rather better. Also
using a proprietary software hosted service for our project would not be
an ideal choice IMHO :wink:

  ATB,

    Michael.

Hi,

  In general, IMHO etc. I believe a forwarding setup, as well as being
easier fits into most people's existing mail flows rather better. Also
using a proprietary software hosted service for our project would not be
an ideal choice IMHO;-)

I agree. :slight_smile: IMHO, Google Apps also doesn't allow easy creation via API/scripts/command line, which is what we need. I envision an interface where all eligible people can maintain their forwarding themselves, and Alex already agreed to hack something in Python for that. I even have a spare server that could take of the forwarding.

Florian

Hi *,

I'll only give short feedback on the suggested names

My plan is actually to have something like

volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org

+1 (long, but fits)

or
       volunteer.nickname@libreofficemail.org

-1 (sounds like it would be a webmail service like gmail, gmx, web.de, ....)

or
       volunteer.nickname@libreofficevolunteers.org

-1 (I just prefer the "community" one - with volunteer there is a
(slight) distinction between community members that are paid by
someone, and those who "only" spend their spare time - at lest in my
brain :-)))

ciao
Christian

Hi, :slight_smile:

If it's not a "real" libreoffice.org or documentfoundation.org
account, I don't think anyone will be interested..... I know I
wouldn't bother using one of these "libreofficecommunity.org", etc.,
accounts myself.... i'd just use my own mail account in that case....

0.2 cents. :wink:

David Nelson

Hi,

       volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org

       volunteer.nickname@libreofficemail.org

       volunteer.nickname@libreofficevolunteers.org

-1 (I just prefer the "community" one - with volunteer there is a
(slight) distinction between community members that are paid by
someone, and those who "only" spend their spare time - at lest in my
brain :-)))

But anyway, there will be the word "volunteer." at the beginning of
the mail-address in any case. Wouldn´t that disturb your brain as
well? :wink:

Stefan

Hi,

Hi,

volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org

volunteer.nickname@libreofficemail.org

volunteer.nickname@libreofficevolunteers.org

-1 (I just prefer the "community" one - with volunteer there is a
(slight) distinction  between community members that are paid by
someone, and those who "only" spend their spare time - at lest in my
brain :-)))

But anyway, there will be the word "volunteer." at the beginning of
the mail-address in any case. Wouldn´t that disturb your brain as
well? :wink:

Are you kidding? I didn't understand that you will have
volunteer.swubuntu@libreofficevolunteers.org .

For the rest: I do not like any of the offered domain names, they all
are too long. I would like to see nickname@libreoffice.org for the
members.

@Florian: What "irritating issues" do you mean?

Bye

Volker

Hi Stefan, *,

But anyway, there will be the word "volunteer." at the beginning of
the mail-address in any case. Wouldn´t that disturb your brain as
well? :wink:

Oh, I read that at "volunteer's nickname" - didn't read minutes or something

and yes, it would bother me if it would really be prefixed like that.
it just "blows up" the address....

ciao
Christian

Hi,

Hi,

> Hi,
>
>
>>>        volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org
>
>>>        volunteer.nickname@libreofficemail.org
>
>>>        volunteer.nickname@libreofficevolunteers.org
>
>> -1 (I just prefer the "community" one - with volunteer there is a
>> (slight) distinction  between community members that are paid by
>> someone, and those who "only" spend their spare time - at lest in
>> my brain :-)))
>
> But anyway, there will be the word "volunteer." at the beginning of
> the mail-address in any case. Wouldn´t that disturb your brain as
> well? :wink:
>
Are you kidding? I didn't understand that you will have
volunteer.swubuntu@libreofficevolunteers.org .

I don't understand it like that. I think it means something like
john.doe@libreofficevolunteers.org

For the rest: I do not like any of the offered domain names, they all
are too long. I would like to see nickname@libreoffice.org for the
members.

@Florian: What "irritating issues" do you mean?

I think he means that anyone logging on to OpenOffice.org automatically
had a default @openoffice.org and that some people started to use that
alias while they were neither speaking on behalf of the project nor
even regular contributors. And since there was no real membership
management you could spend years away from the project and still
using @openoffice.org And I think that the marketing project of OOo had
quite a lot of work to "discipline" people, yet there was no effective
control because addresses were essentially given to anyone.

So that's what we would want to avoid, but there's a fine line between
avoiding this and rebuking actual contributors.

Best,
Charles.

Hi Charles, *,

For the rest: I do not like any of the offered domain names, they all
are too long. I would like to see nickname@libreoffice.org for the
members.

@Florian: What "irritating issues" do you mean?

I think he means that anyone logging on to OpenOffice.org automatically
had a default @openoffice.org and that some people started to use that
alias while they were neither speaking on behalf of the project nor
even regular contributors. And since there was no real membership
management you could spend years away from the project and still
using @openoffice.org And I think that the marketing project of OOo had
quite a lot of work to "discipline" people, yet there was no effective
control because addresses were essentially given to anyone.

So that's what we would want to avoid, but there's a fine line between
avoiding this and rebuking actual contributors.

I understand now what has been meant. But I think this is prohibited
by that what I read about membership in the bylaws.

Volker

Hi,
[...]

For the rest: I do not like any of the offered domain names, they all
are too long. I would like to see nickname@libreoffice.org for the
members.

Agreed with Volker here, wouldn't be possible to have it as simple as

nickname@libreoffice.org?

Other wise, my preferred choice would go to volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org for the same concern as Christian's brain ones :wink:

Kind regards

OTOH if people use the email address "person@openoffice.org" then it gets the
name "OpenOffice" out there and being seen by a lot of people. Free
advertising!

Yes, i think the problems that can be caused by people mis-representing the
organisation can be costly but then a lot of people have "person@gmail" or
"person@yahoo.co.uk" or similar and no-one assumes they represent those
organisations!

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Howdy,

If you are going to issue email addresses just use the real name, if the
risk is perceived as large then just say no.

If you decide to issue these vanity email addresses I can see for
leading word volunteer:

nickname@libreofficecommunity.org

is a better choice IMO.

Adios,

Drew

Hi Florian, all

Florian Effenberger wrote:

Hello,

as discussed yesterday in the confcall, we're planning to give out
official LibreOffice e-mail accounts to people who are community members
per the membership committee's decision. [...]

My plan is to hand out only e-mail forwarders, not real mailboxes with
POP and IMAP, as the latter one requires lots of maintenance.

+1

[...]

For LibreOffice, I'm a bit hesitant to hand out @libreoffice.org, as
this may seem like people are acting on behalf of TDF, causing liability
issues. Maybe I'm too touchy, so I'm happy for comments, which is why I
am writing this mail. :slight_smile:

As membership has to be requested and approved in a formal way, I could
imagine to include a passus in the formalism where community members
declare not to act as representatives or spokespeople for the LibreOffice
community or TDF unless they have been approved to do so.

Perhaps a mandatory signature like the following would be sufficient:

(First Name) Name
- LibreOffice community member -

In this case a mail address like nickname@libreoffice.org might be sufficient
IMHO.

And in case of possible abuse (or deliberate misinterpretation) the community
membership can be revoked...

If usage of the @libreoffice.org mail address still looks too risky, I'd vote for

My plan is actually to have something like

   volunteer.nickname@libreofficecommunity.org

nickname@libreofficecommunity.org
(or nickname@libreoffice-community.org)

Best regards

Bernhard

+1
For some people this is even a matter of pride, like wearing a t-shirt with a well known brand or message.

So, nickname@libreoffice.org

Leave the mail for TDF oficials as @documetnfoundation.org

Regards

Brilliant! I definitely like the sound of that as it solves all the issues
there. Good thinking :slight_smile: Can we do this?

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

I totally agree with Olivier. Just to make the concept stronger, and to protect us from possible email trolls, we can add a specific paragraph in the bylaws.

Hi all!

> So, nickname@libreoffice.org

> Leave the mail for TDF oficials as @documetnfoundation.org

I totally agree with Olivier. Just to make the concept stronger, and
to protect us from possible email trolls, we can add a specific
paragraph in the bylaws.

Yep, agree as well. (Especially since we'll never get rid of less
informed people who spread strange information ... independent of any
email address.)

And if there are still some concerns, my proposal would be:
forename.lastname@community.libreoffice.org

Cheers,
Christoph

Hi all!

And if there are still some concerns, my proposal would be:
forename.lastname@community.libreoffice.org

Sorry for this proposal, I totally missed Florian's earlier mail
containing a statement concerning sub-domains. Bad if one starts reading
from the most recent mails :wink:

Cheers,
Christoph