Maybe the two things (site admin and any larger group perhaps doing supportive or complimentary work) should at least start out as separate things. As a community member though I think there should be a bright line between admin and membership/moderation.
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Iāve revoked administration on my main account and will use that for regular foruming and will need to log in to this account in order to access any admin features. Not sure it really matters, but I wonāt have any of the special mod/admin powers the majority of the time Iām on here and just log on as admin for a specific purpose.
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So do you want to move forward with this jmakin? Should we start a poll? You have my vote.
Yea, letās make a poll. I am interested. There is a small risk of my feelings being hurt, but thatās ok. Lol.
We need a new admin, as I would like to step down so I can spend more time avoiding my family. jmakin has volunteered for the role. He has been an active community member with a known IRL identity for years and years and he works professionally doing system administration.
jmakin for admin?
- Yes
- No
0 voters
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I am in favor of jmakin, but I think it might be helpful to spell out a couple of things:
- what the admin actually does (youāve done this above, I think, but Iām too lazy to check)
- what could go wrong if the admin does a terrible/malicious job (here, I think the answer is that the admin could intentionally or unintentionally take the forum down, but due to the backup system everything could be restored within a reasonably short period of time. But maybe Iām wrong)
I think that I should specify the same things with regard to my treasurer position, so Iāll do that in my next update (shortly after New Yearās, I promise).
Curious to this as well. This is why I wanted a backup, and we have ggoreo. Although itās extremely unlikely anyone could fuck this up, but if possible, I would want someone else there in case something were to happen to me (not likely either).
I take stuff like this pretty seriously so the last thing in the world I would want to do is make the site experience worse for anyone or have something disastrous happen.
One thing I do not want is too much power. I am dealing with this at work right now, actually. If I can make a zero-trust system work with our admin accounts (it is possible, although I am not familiar with digitalocean yet) that would be like, the dream.
I have 100% faith in jmakin - and Iāve met him (very briefly) irl and expect/hope to see him again.
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Re: what could go wrong. Speaking hypothetically (i.e., I am not speculating that jmakin would do any of this), I can think of some things:
- The admin could completely destroy the site, including the backups, so that restoration would be impossible.
- The admin could extract email addresses and any other identifying or otherwise valuable information from the site database and do anything they wanted with it.
- The admin could do anything on the site, including banning or deleting users, making fake users, forging posts, editing/tampering with posts, and probably other stuff Iām not thinking of.
- In other words, complete and total control of the site, including all the site data (posts and user data), how the site works, who can use the site, what the site looks like, etc.
Iām speaking on a purely technical basis, disregarding any policies, norms, scruples, etc. that might be in place. But as you can see the potential for ābad thingsā is real.
Note: I want to be clear that Iām not trying to be obstructionist. I understand that zz wants to hand off the site admin responsibilities, and I would like for him to be able to do that. Itās just that the admin role, as I understand it to be structured, is an incredibly powerful one, so we should understand that and be appropriately careful.
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As a bulwark against this, some higher up people, like Iām pretty sure ggoreo, know my IRL identity. If not I will share it. It would be professionally damaging to me if I were to cause a problem here, and would likely follow me around.
Agree with all this, but if anything I expect Jmakin to take the responsibility too seriously. I think that is a real danger for him. Anyway, if it ever becomes something that is negatively impacting his life, I expect to be here and willing to do it.
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Both of your bullet points are correct. 99% of the time the admin doesnāt need to do anything at all except be on call in case something goes wrong. To date, the only time anything has gone wrong was over a year ago when a certificate failed to renew automatically, which took me about 30 minutes to troubleshoot and fix.
The only two frequent admin tasks are rebooting the server to install updates, which requires typing sudo shutdown -r now; and installing forum updates, which can be done by clicking a button and watching text rapidly scroll by for 10 minutes.
In the event of significant traffic changes or something in the future there may be additional work to accommodate that, or possibly a more involved forum software update. I have had to do both of those and they took a bit more time, but the majority of that time was again just watching text scroll by in a command prompt. The server distro we use (Ubuntu) is very widely used and well maintained, as is the Discourse software itself. There is very little real work to do.
One anticipated change is the need for more block storage which is not difficult, but I can do it a bit earlier than required and before I step down if desired. With that configuration Iād expect no need for any other significant system changes for at least a year or more.
As for security, potential abuse of power, etc. Yes, itās theoretically possible for any admin to do significant damage if they really want to. One thing worth noting though is that the admin does NOT own the domain name. That legally belongs to simplicitus. And ggoreo (or whoever else is on the hosting team account) can also download a full off-site backup himself.
On top of all that, I can say as somebody whoās done the job for a year and a half that having more responsibility tends to make most people behave responsibly, and also that none of you are interesting enough to have your personal information looked into :)
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So, one other thing, and I promise Iām not raising objections for the sake of being contrary, this is a real concern. And also donāt take this the wrong way jmakin. But just a couple days ago you made this post in the About Moderation thread:
I remember seeing more than one similar post from you in the past (Iām not going to go dig them up but if Iām wrong let me know).
So my concern here is the possibility that you get fed up and want to leave, or even just reduce your involvement in the site. I could envision that situation impacting the site negatively in various ways.
I can think of some ways to mitigate the risks along these lines, some of which have just been touched on. But could we talk about that more and flesh it out? Including specifically identifying who could/would be able to step in, immediately if necessary, if you leave the site (and this includes the āgetting hit by a busā scenario that is a risk that we have always been facing and will always face regardless of who the individuals are).
And one final thingā¦ I know Iām probably frustrating some people in this thread right now but Iām speaking my pieceā¦
Itās clear you have some strong opinions about what and how people are posting. Will you be able to resist (as zz has laudably mostly been able to) the temptation to use your admin powers or perceived authority to directly or indirectly influence the site more than any regular member could/would?
Iām asking this question because Iāve been pondering if I should step up and volunteer to take on or assist with this role. And honestly, for me, the answer could well be no, so I think Iām going to hold back for now.
Like I said, please donāt take this the wrong way. These are real questions that Iām asking because I care about the site.
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Iām a yes because heās a good person but Iām going to go on the record and say I think jmakin is a bit of a nut.
Thereās room for 2 imo and no reason you and jmakin canāt both be on Team Admin.
you donāt need to tiptoe around my feelings, I understand the concerns raised. I have thought about them too.
The drama lately is bugging me but it is trivially easy to tune it out, by just muting entire sections of this forum, which I am likely to do if it does not stop. That is just my personal consumption of the site weāre talking about here. I would treat this role like a job, which maybe isnāt healthy, but itās how I approach everything in my life.
Regarding what to do if the worst were to happen, we have a backup in ggoreo, and microbet willing to step in. One of the first things I am going to do, which maybe zikzak has already done, is extensively document all the steps and procedures involved in doing this, so it is repeatable even by a monkey in the future. That is what I do for my job - I enable other people to use complex technologies. Even though this seems relatively simple, even for a non-techie - it is daunting, and I would just want to make it idiot proof.
Regarding me abusing mod powers, and maybe it doesnāt reflect well on me, but I am far too lazy and apathetic to do anything malicious like that. And, honestly, I feel I am exposing myself to a little amount of risk on my end.
Like, I have a blog that I keep fairly intimate details of my life in. I write in detail about my mental health (I try to reduce the stigma whenever I can). If I were to do something, if someone in retaliation truly wanted to make my life extremely difficult it would be possible. And honestly that makes me a little uncomfortable. But, I really like this community, and I donāt want to cause harm to it or abuse its trust. If placing a large amount of trust in me is problematic, I can understand that, but I donāt know how else to communicate that I just want to help, I am interested and qualified, and think I am probably one of the best people here for this role.
I am open to any suggestions on how to make this more comfortable for people, I wouldnāt want any distrust. Because that shit sucks.
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it is true, but a lot of geniuses were mad
jk
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Chart of current key roles, if this is helpful to anybody:
| . | zikzak | ggoreo | simplicitus | spidercrab |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Owns unstuckpolitics.com domain | X | |||
| DNS admin access | X | X | ||
| Active server root access | X | |||
| Potential server root access | X | |||
| Forum Admin | X | X | ||
| Can download backups | X | X | ||
| Controls Patreon and Paypal accounts | X | |||
| Pays the hosting bill | X |
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Does the active server root access require forum admin? I imagine no, right? Unless you need to test stuff, maybe. If that makes anyone more comfortable, idk, maybe just remove forum admin from it.
I wouldnāt be concerned about you having forum admin, but if server root doesnāt require it, I donāt think the same person should have it. Jmakin (and perhaps sensibleperson or others) having server root and gregorio (and perhaps others) being forum admin seems perfect to me.