TLUG's value to community ???

[Christopher Browne]

On 7/10/05, John Macdonald <john-Z7w/En0MP3xWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> (Some reordering on the quoted sections.)
> The interested and enthused felt it important enough to go
> ahead and do it - that's fine.  That does not mean that the
> rest of TLUG is forever bound by the actions of this group.

There is a pretty forcible reason for this to in fact be the case.

Almost more than anything else, TLUG is a domain and mailing list that
are used to coordinate the meetings of a set of Linux enthusiasts
around Toronto.

Q1:  Who arranges for doors to be opened at U(T)?
Q2:  Who owns the web/mail server that operates at tlug.ss.org?
Q3:  Who is the president of GTALUG?

These three questions have *identical* answers.

There is a very good argument that the organization known as "TLUG" is
an absolute autocracy, and one that is held by just one person.

In the beginning, any incorporated LUG winds up being nearly as much
an autocracy as a small core starts out forcibly in charge until such
time as the notion of "members" is defined and it strikes out into
becoming more or less democratic.

To put the "fine point" on it, TLUG is whatever Drew Sullivan thinks
it is.  The "future direction for TLUG" is, more or less by
definition, whatever Drew wants that direction to be. If someone
doesn't like that, there is no "higher body" to go to to modify that.

The establishment of GTALUG is the establishment of a New Thing.  And
is a thing that defines some more or less democratic ways for it to be
run.

It has been pretty vital for a while now that the TLUG mailing list be
dropped; "long live the GTALUG mailing list."  The fact that the
former part would take place in an autocratic manner demonstrates the
necessity of something like GTALUG.
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