FW: How to communicate among the Task Force + Procedure for our Google Group to avoid spam
Attinger, Steve
Thank you GARY for implementing #1. Great! That should really help.
IMPORTANT: Since Gary cannot easily do #2, I recommend that EVERYONE
join the GENERAL DISCUSSION email list if you are not already a member.
That will be the forum the Task Force members will use to communicate
going forward...so sign up now!!
Have a great weekend...
Steve
-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Young [mailto:gary....@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 2:43 PM
To: Attinger, Steve
Cc: MV-env-sustainab...@googlegroups.com;
bken...@earthlink.net; Julie B. Lovins; janis...@roche.com; Bruce
Karney; yfar...@mac.com
Subject: Re: How to communicate among the Task Force + Procedure for our
Google Group to avoid spam
Hi, All
I've implemented Steve's item #1. And all of the existing task force
members should have been marked "managers" of the groups they're in
(and are welcome to be managers in the others), and they should all
have the ability to approve membership requests. So feel free to help
screen membership in response to the membership requests. I suppose
it's still a great thing for us to have more people helping and aware
of environmental concerns. :)
Unfortunately #2 is not very feasible. Many of our members asked me to
switch their email addresses, and many members have changed their
email addresses in the group membership themselves, so I don't have a
comprehensive list of the task force's email addresses. But if anyone
still wants to join the groups, they should still be able to.
Also, I went through all of the groups, and manually removed all the
spam I could find, and banned all of the spammers I could find. So the
discussion lists should be cleaner. It's possible that I accidentally
banned a couple legitimate users, so please extend my apologies to
anyone who mentions getting banned, and I'll be happy to assist them
in re-joining. I did try to err on the side of leaving people in the
group, though.
Please let me know if I can be of further assistance.
-Gary
On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 6:59 PM, Attinger, Steve
<Steve.A...@mountainview.gov> wrote:
> Hello Task Force,
>
>
>
> For some reason we've had a recent deluge of spammers attempting to
join one
> or more of the groups. A few have joined successfully, but I believe
at this
> point Gary has deleted them all.
>
>
>
> Based on a conversation with Julie Lovins, and an email thread with
the
> Waste group, the Task Force needs to lock things down to avoid
spammers.
>
>
>
> So, via this email I'm asking GARY YOUNG to do the following 2 things:
>
>
>
> (1) Make it such that any new person must "apply" to join ANY of the
working
> groups, the General Discussion list, or the Official Notices list. As
part
> of this process, require the applicant to explain why s/he wants to
join by
> typing an explanation in a field. The working group chair or Gary will
then
> decide whether to grant access on a case by case basis. If this
> "explanation" field is not possible, I'd recommend the following
option
> provided by Gary:
>
>
>
> "Make some best guesses on who to admit. Hope we get it right by
extremely
> cursory inspection. Stamp out remaining spammers manually."
>
>
>
> (2) Re-send an invitation to ALL 68 task force members to join the
"GENERAL
> DISCUSSION" email list. I understand that not everyone is subscribed
to this
> list, and I propose that General Discussion be the list you use to
talk
> amongst yourselves going forward.
>
> (GARY: is there any way to have the invitation only go to those Task
Force
> members who aren't already members of the General Discussion list?)
>
>
>
> IMPORTANT - PLEASE NOTE:
>
>
>
> From this point forward the Task Force is a self-operating entity. I
will
> not be making any further decisions regarding how to structure the
Google
> groups, or other such things. I simply don't have time to handle this,
and
> it is outside of my responsibilities at this point. I am happy to
provide
> guidance or feedback on questions specifically related to getting the
89
> recommendations implemented going forward, but outside of that the
Task
> Force is self-governing.
>
>
>
> I hope this helps get the group on a level playing field, and able to
easily
> communicate among the members.
>
>
>
> Cheers,
>
> Steve
>
>
>
> -----
>
> Steve Attinger
>
> Environmental Sustainability Coordinator
>
> City of Mountain View
>
> Public Works Department
>
> 500 Castro Street
>
> Mountain View, CA 94041
>
> steve.a...@mountainview.gov
>
> 650-903-6602
>
>
>
> "Intelligence, filtered through the heart, is wisdom."
>
> --------------
>
> Please think twice before printing this or any email.
>
>