[clug] New list?

[Scott Ferguson]

 On Wed, 18 Aug 2010 16:21:37 +1000 Chris Smart
<mail_at_christophersmart.com>
> Is anyone else interested in a "technical issues only" type mailing
> list? With all due respect to everyone on the list and the list
> itself, I'd like to see somewhere where we can discuss technical
> *Linux* issues and not the latest social topics like politics,
> religion and women in open source.
>
> Does anyone else see any value in this? It might be easiest if the
> list was finally moved over to the clug.org.au domain *cough cough*,
> where we could then turn this into a "general" list, and create a
> "technical" list.
>
> -c
>

The idea has merit. However...
Lana makes a *very* good point.
The C in CLUG is for Canberra not clique.
The LUG in CLUG is about community.
Fail to recognise the argument in the last two points and you/we have no
right to the title.
Perhaps a "technical" only list is a good idea - but not as part of the
CLUG?
<gently>
It could/should be argued that most of the "technical" discussions
rightfully belong on other lists -
unless they are relevant to Canberra. There *are* many Canberran Linux
Users who don't post or subscribe to the list because they find the tone
of "cliquey" (go on - someone challenge me to prove it, provide names
and addresses etc)
</gently>
Whilst I do not propose a new list (and I don't oppose it) a
consideration might (/should?) be whether the list serves the purpose of
a LUG - one of which is advocacy.
I might be alone, but I would not subscribe to a list with no technical
discussions - I'd sooner watch television or actually fire up Slashdot
in a browser (as opposed to receiving daily summaries).

That said (and I'm guilty of OT)
There are established procedures for dealing with OT
threads/trolls/touts/and astroturfers (I'd have to hunt around to find
it, but there's a good one in Debian.org somewhere - a deliberate troll
as an experiment - ends in "thanks for playing")
It's not hard to filter. For those who find it difficult - perhaps Mr
Stallman could suggest a way to delouse posts of references to
ipeds/phone/twits/blogs and other things that irritate me </get off my
lawn> ;-p

I'll ignore the "with all due respect" - you may well be the person in
the world who says that without meaning "you're an idiot" ;-p

Cheers