[IMC-Tech] about the certificates / Re: [Imc-communication] Resigning from tech work

[Petros Evdokas]

On 2/28/2012 10:05 PM, Garcon du Monde wrote:

> the big dilemma i have been trying to face up to over the past few days
> is what to do with the global website: it is lost, isolated, without
> tech support. i (and a few others - i think unknowingly) have access to
> the publish server, but as far as i know there has been no sysadmin to
> really look after it or the primary mirror for greater than six
> months. the site itself is broken - specifically, if you care about an
> encrypted connection, as the certificate has not worked since all
> indymedia certificates were revoked last year.



Thank you GDM, for this update, and for reminding us of this dilemma.

My experience has been that for many years people who visit indymedia 
pages write to me, or tell me in person, that "the website doesn't 
work". When I query, I find that it's always the issue of the certificates.

Most people find the certificate notice that comes up to be an obstacle, 
because they don't know what to do with it. Most browsers have terrible 
and incomplete instructions on how to deal with one of those certificate 
notices, so people just give up and leave to surf elsewhere.

I always feel embarrassed to explain that this certificate system is 
something we have "because of advice from our technicians", but I can't 
really explain how we arrived at this decision, and why we still persist 
on having it.

Millions of websites on the internet work just fine without this 
certificate system. I would prefer that we lose whatever security or 
protection the certificate system provides, instead of continuing to 
lose and alienate our readers.

Doing away with it entirely would simplify our website and would make it 
more accessible to more people.

Thanks,
Petros
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