[ga] The GA Mailing List.

["Sotiris Sotiropoulos" <sotiris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Subscribers,

A few comments from the Chair...

In the interest of bandwidth conservation and general mitigation of inbox
annoyance(s), please do not instinctively hit the "Reply to All" button in
your email client as this can be misconstrued as bad netiquette; instead,
reply only to the ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx email only when addressing subscribers
to this mailing list unless the message in question is also to be
cross-posted in some other mailing list. Thank you in advance for this
small consideration.

As a result of the recent onlist debacle which I will not dignify by
labelling it as an "election", I have found it necessary to step forward
and provide some guidance out of this mess. Those of you who have been on
this list for longer than the past couple days are probably aware that
several months ago I begged off participating in the co-chairing of this
list for personal reasons, one of which included an extended absence for
which I unsubscribed from the ML. During the last "election" by which Mr.
Dierker and I were (to all intents and purposes) provided with a mandate,
if you will, of 'chairing' this ML, I voiced my concerns about Mr.
Dierker's suitability for any such undertaking – both onlist and to
him, offlist.  At the time, although  I gave in and offered Mr. Dierker
every benefit of the doubt, I soon saw what direction his 'chairmanship'
was to develop along: that of consolidating an administrative position, as
opposed to the collation and presentation of thoughtful, engendered and
relevant discussion papers on issues that pertain to the purposes of this
list.

So, what do I have in mind?  First off, I'd like a show of 'hands' from
the subscribers (this likely means you) who see some value in producing
cross-constituency and stakeholder discussion reports to address issues
that relate to the purposes of this list.  This would inevitably require
some de facto organizational status to effect, so please keep that in
mind. Don't be shy, let's see who is still here on principle as opposed to
caprice.  Once we have ascertained that there is a common purpose, we can
proceed accordingly.

Amiably,

Sotiris Sotiropoulos
Chair