Nan:2006-11-04-b8mb-update

From: skirv@big-8.org (Tim Skirvin)
Subject: [B8MB] State of Affairs, 03 Nov 2006
Newsgroups: news.announce.newgroups, news.groups
Followup-To: news.groups
Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 13:02:16 -0800

Recent Actions
--------------

It has been an active month for the Board.  In the last month, the Board
has published a total of 15 RESULT postings, creating one group and
removing 15.  A list:

        - Created comp.lang.haskell (control message to be sent tomorrow)
        - Removed comp.binaries.* groups (except comp.binaries.cbm, which 
          is still in use and is low-volume), for a total of 11 groups. 
        - Removed four other newsgroups - comp.unix.386bsd.announce, 
          comp.infosystems.announce, comp.sys.ibm.pc.digest, and 
          comp.ai.nlang-know-rep (control message to be sent tomorrow)

There are currently five active proposals to create new groups - nearly 
as many as have been created in the last year - and four to remove empty
groups.  


Board Membership
----------------

The applicants for open Board positions are currently being voted upon
internally, as described at:

  http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:board_candidates

The results will be announced by the 7th.  


Usenet Birds-of-a-Feather (BoF) Session
---------------------------------------

I (Tim Skirvin) will be attending the LISA sysadmin conference this
December (http://www.usenix.org/events/lisa06/), and plans to host a
Birds-of-a- Feather session for interested parties to discuss all of the
recent changes to the Big-8 and plans for the future.  Please refer to
this page for more information:

  http://www.usenix.org/events/lisa06/bofs.html

The session is currently planned for 7-8pm on 12/6, but this is still up
for discussion.


news.groups.proposals
---------------------

The Board has published two RFDs to create a moderated news.groups.proposals, 
which (if created) will be used to discuss future newsgroup proposals.  We
plan to begin the Last Call for Comments on this proposal shortly, so if
you wish to influence this proposal, make your comments soon.  More
information is available in <1161644638.11610@isc.org>, available at:

  http://news.killfile.org/?mid=1161644638.11610@isc.org


Call For Proposals
------------------

The Board would like to once again officially encourage users to propose
new, interesting groups throughout the Big-8 hierarchies.  The Board and
the newly-reformed Group Mentors would be happy to help you refine your
ideas into an RFD; and if your proposal appears to have a good shot at
creating a well-named, well-used group, we are probably willing to give
your idea a chance.  Be creative!  Extra points go to proposals that
promise to bring entirely new users to Usenet.
 

Volunteer Committees
--------------------

Our monthly reminder - the B8MB is attempting to put together several
volunteer organizations to handle individual aspects of the new group
creation system.  These groups are not currently fully populated, but they
have fairly clear (if general) goals.  And most importantly, they have
mailing lists, so it's possible to start getting them organized.

Please, if you are interested in helping out the Big-8, or Usenet as a
whole, please volunteer for one (or more) of these groups!  And if you
would like to help shape the future of the groups, and have the time to
help coordinate them, please contact the listed Coordinator.


  Usenet Volunteer Pollsters
  ==========================

  Coordinator    Tim Skirvin
  Mailing List   http://lists.big-8.org/mailman/listinfo/uvp/
  Description    http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=workgroups:polltakers


  Usenet Volunteer Moderators
  ===========================

  Coordinator    Jonathan Kamens
  Mailing List   http://lists.big-8.org/mailman/listinfo/uvm/
  Description    http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=workgroups:moderators


  Group Mentors
  =============

  Coordinator    Tim Skirvin
  Mailing List   http://lists.big-8.org/mailman/listinfo/group-mentors/
  Description    http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=workgroups:mentors


  Deadwood Groups Task Force
  ==========================

  Coordinator    Dave Sill
  Mailing List   http://lists.big-8.org/mailman/listinfo/deadwood/
  Description    http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=workgroups:deadgroups


		                    - Tim Skirvin (skirv@big-8.org)
                                      Chair, Big-8 Management Board
-- 
http://www.big-8.org/                           Big-8 Management Board
http://www.killfile.org/~tskirvin/        Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>