[IMC-docs] docs.i.o / how to build or destroy collective desire and practice

[intrigeri]

Hello,

I don't want to speak only to those who care about docs.indymedia.org
technical status. I also want to speak to those who care about how we
organize ourselves, how we build (or destroy) collective desires
and practices.

,----
| Technical background
`---- 

docs.indymedia.org runs TWiki. Our TWiki is not just another CMS.

a) It's complex
   * it depends heavily on the OS configuration, not just on a working
     PHP+MySQL setup
b) It's awfully insecure
   * it has to be run in a VServer carefully monitored by the host
     system
   * therefore, this VServer logs have to be sent to a syslog daemon
     outside this VServer (for example, on the host system)
   * you can easily mess up the security of the whole thing by just
     forgetting two lines in the Apache configuration
c) It's heavily customized
   * the CMS code has been patched in tons of (documented) places
   * the Apache config is quite complex
d) It requires daily work

The current kompost (host system) + humus (VServer) setup is a complex
design integrating all these parameters. It's been documented on the
Sysadmin/KompostInfo TWiki page, and the details are in a few dozens
kilo-bytes of Changelogs.

That's why migrating to a "autonomous VServer" setup is possible, but
it requires to :
   * lower our security level (and thus, involve some nice work when
     we'll discover the VServer has been root-kit'd for 3 months
     without we knowing it, ahem)
   * think of a new design integrating all these parameters and the
     ones I've forgotten.

Doing so would require a great amount of work. If, technically
speaking this is the best currently available solution, the question
becomes : who will do this work ?

,----
| Social/human background
`----

In early 2004, docs.i.o was not being admin'd for quite a long time.
I took over it, and was joined more or less one year later by Alster,
djrom and gdm. We were more or less sysadmin newbies. We founded what
is now called "the imc-docs working group". It took time, conflicts,
energy, love, patience and a one-week real-life meeting to build
a collective, to build common practice and ways to communicate, in
order to be able to work together in a cool and efficient way.
It's not finished.

A few other people have more or less tried to integrate imc-docs in
the meantime ; this generally did not work, and has still to be
thought of.

Today, the four main imc-docs members are either overwhelmed by
projects, paid work, etc., or just willing to stop spending so much
time everyday in front of a computer. I guess we more or less all,
individually, would be happy to leave imc-docs if it was possible to
do so without feeling sabotaging something, or fleeing a diving ship.
(Having not talked a lot of this recently with all imc-docs members,
I'm not sure of what I'm saying, just guessing.)

In other words, our collective level of desire in regard to imc-docs
is quite low. This working group and it's social dynamics are fragile.

,----
| And now ?
`----

The wiki has been down, then read-only, for a long time. We've all
been living hard times :
   * the wiki users miss their beloved wiki and ask their local techie
     why it does not work ;
   * various imc-tech people ask us when it'll be back, and depending
     on their level of patience and empathy, just trust us and wait,
     or ask "why don't you fix it like this it's easy it already
     should have been done for weeeeeeks", or propose their
     one-shot-help, or try to help us with friendly and motivating
     sarcasms, or offer some great help that, if we accepted it,
     would imply tons of work for us ;
   * the imc-docs tries to cope with all this, without getting too
     bitter, while waiting for the London-techie to tell us something
     about his great efforts to diagnose and fix kompost problems, and
     dreams of having something to answer to the two previous
     categories of people ;
   * the London-techie tries to fix the problems. 

We've all been living hard times, sarcasms and anger swamp #twiki, the
imc-docs mailing list and intrigeri trying to read his e-mail once in
the middle of two months offline.

As I've previously said, the current imc-docs collective is fragile.
We need an imc-docs collective. Our wiki does not need talented people
fixing emergencies twice a year, it needs an imcs-docs collective.

We can live this crisis situation in various ways :
   * ways that will strengthen this collective (possibly by heavily
     modifying it : practice changes, people leaving and
     arriving, etc.)
   * ways that will weaken or destroy this collective.

A way that would strengthen this collective could be to integrate
a few people into imc-docs, though the current situation, to bring new
energy into this collective, something like a revival. "To integrate
a few people into imc-docs" means to have a few people work *with*
current imc-docs members to solve the issues we're facing, modifying
the imc-docs practices inside it.

(To work *with* means really something else to me than what I've been
living on #twiki and imc-docs mailing list for a few months ; to work
with could have started by asking us a summary of the situation, not
just the "technical status", you know, the *situation*, this thing
that involves human beings, desire, conflicts, long term
processes, etc. Of course, I could have written this e-mail sooner,
yeah, we're not here to judge anyone nor decide who is the most
guilty so that we can punish him/her.)

A way that would weaken this collective could be to have "guest stars"
quickly "fix" the situation then disappear, leaving us in front of
a new setup poorly designed by very talented people missing 3/4 of the
parameters ; we would have been dispossessed of the situation, and we
would more or less have to start from scratch. I feel that our
collective level of desire would not be strong enough to face such
a "try again" situation. Maybe I'm wrong. If it happened, at least
I would lose my last bits of motivation and leave imc-docs, which may
actually be the good thing to do, to allow another collective to build
itself on new roots.

Anyway, I'll be offline until the end of September, let's see
what happen.

Ciao,
-- 
  intrigeri <intrigeri at boum.org>
  | gnupg key @ http://intrigeri.boum.org/intrigeri.asc
  | Who wants a world in which the guarantee that we shall not
  | die of starvation would entail the risk of dying of boredom ?