[clue-admin] My view ( Gus )

[David L. Anselmi]

YES NOPE9 wrote:
> I hope everyone on this ADMIN list thinks they are speaking for themselves and not as some
> "functionary" of CLUE.

Dennis speaks as the president.  David W is free to speak as the speaker coordinator until a 
replacement is found.  It should be clear from context which capacity they represent.

> Yes there is documentation for the Drupal effort .... a lot of effort was put into the Drupal
> website in the past.  Some contributors were miffed when the Drupal effort was snuffed.  I was
> miffed that their effort was trash-canned.

The effort was not snuffed.  You should stop saying so.  There were two issues that were not overcome:

First, our server could not run Drupal without running out of memory.  Dennis and I backed out the 
change that redirected traffic to it and eventually it was disabled.

Shawn (Red Mop) had a place to host Drupal sites, our content was put there and tested (which seemed 
successful to me).

Second, some wanted to use a cheaper service provider and thought that running Drupal could be done 
more cheaply than a VPS.  But nothing was found that would also provide an email list so the 
alternatives weren't considered viable.

I don't know why the Drupal team stopped working at that point.  Perhaps they required more effort 
from Dennis than he could give.  But suggesting that the project failed because of direct opposition 
or malicious activity is wrong.

The lessons to be learned are these:

- Project management is more necessary than most people think.  So is clear planning.

- Quitting (for whatever reason) when unexpected obstacles arise is not a recipe for success.

- Using the existing server for development or experiment has to be done very carefully because if 
they interferes with its primary function they will be stopped.

- Decisions cannot always be made by group consensus and doing so (especially without governing 
rules) requires a different approach than people usually take.

 > My sense of CLUE is that some people have problems with the group being free-wheeling.

Perceptions of other people are not relevant to list discussions.  Don't bother bringing them up.

> But I have no use for anyone who says ..... "let's not do that".  They are certainly free to say
> " I don't want to do that".

Sometimes "let's not do that" is the right thing to say.  If it is, say so.  People may disagree and 
they can explain why.  Trying to discredit the person or the motives behind the statement should be 
avoided.

> I really don't like disbursing money for projects that were not discussed and okayed by the CLUE
> group ( *publicly* ) .   In the *future*, as treasurer , I will not do so.  The past will be
> honored "as is" .

I don't think this is your decision to make.  We have no rules to govern group decision making and 
without them I think it is up to the president to dictate how things will be done as much as he 
thinks is required.

Thanks!
Dave