Question regarding conflict of interest in the administration of the forum

[Bidule0hm]

I wonder about something: how on earth an open-source project (FreeNAS) can be bought by a company (iXsystems) and then the forum of this project also hosted and administered by this company? I think that it's a bit borderline with the definition of open-source and certainly lower the liberty of the users.

 

[jgreco]

moderator note: I've separated this into a different thread.

 

[rogerh]

I don't see why an open source project can't be ruled with a rod of iron by one entity; there does, of course, exist the possibility of forking it if one thinks one can do better.

 

[Ericloewe]

Having the forum financed by a company doesn't strike me as problematic.

What needs to exist is a clear definition what the forum should be, with the ongoing discussion suggesting that this forum is stuck in a sort of schizophrenic limbo between "it's the community's responsibility" and "it's an extension of PR/tech support/whatever".

 

[Bidule0hm]

The problem is that everything is under the wish of the company higher employees, which is not a big problem if the company just host the forum. But as Eric said, if they start to touch the forum then that should be clear.

 

[joeschmuck]

I recall when the split from FreeNAS occurs many years ago. I had just started to use FreeNAS version .6x and shortly after that this split occurred. I still to this day do not understand how someone could splinter off the original FreeNAS, take it's name and the original FreeNAS be renamed as NAS4Free. It blows my mind. And a company was supporting this effort, but of course to it's own benefit with TrueNAS. And a company can do this because they are selling something with parts which are not Open Source to people, which is how they put it all together (the GUI and some other tid-bits in TrueNAS). I'm certain there is more to it. But they are offering us FreeNAS which is a slightly reduced capability product but still free, but we are the beta testers for their product. I knew this when getting into it so it doesn't bother me. To be honest, if development stopped today, well I have a very reasonable home NAS unit that only cost me the hardware and it works very well.

As for the forums and the iron fist, eh, not so much. There are good days and bad days. The only thing which bugs me periodically are when a thread becomes locked just because someone responds to it after it's 3 months without a posting. If it were just someone trying to get attention, fine, but that isn't always the case.

Just my two cents as they say.

 

[rogerh]

I recall when the split from FreeNAS occurs many years ago. I had just started to use FreeNAS version .6x and shortly after that this split occurred. I still to this day do not understand how someone could splinter off the original FreeNAS, take it's name and the original FreeNAS be renamed as NAS4Free. It blows my mind. And a company was supporting this effort, but of course to it's own benefit with TrueNAS. And a company can do this because they are selling something with parts which are not Open Source to people, which is how they put it all together (the GUI and some other tid-bits in TrueNAS). I'm certain there is more to it. But they are offering us FreeNAS which is a slightly reduced capability product but still free, but we are the beta testers for their product. I knew this when getting into it so it doesn't bother me. To be honest, if development stopped today, well I have a very reasonable home NAS unit that only cost me the hardware and it works very well.

At this point one could spend many happy hours debating the advantages of the BSD licence versus the GPL. But if there was no company I very much doubt if we would have had FreeNAS in its present form.

 

[jgreco]

this forum is stuck in a sort of schizophrenic limbo between "it's the community's responsibility" and "it's an extension of PR/tech support/whatever".

Well, that's probably true. A year or two ago, Jordan had suggested that we could take the forum and have it be a totally community supported thing, and offered to get me the vBulletin license. At that time, I raised a number of practical concerns, because, as a businessman, I could see future problems. Jordan never did provide the license. And I asked some questions, such as how to deal with trademark issues, because at a certain point, if we were "freenasforums.org", and CxO or marketing at iXsystems became unhappy, the obvious route to attack an external entity over which they had no direct control would be the legal process. Despite what Jordan said at the time, I was left with the impression that iX would rather have some control over it. (And, FWIW, I think that makes *sense*. From their PoV.)

The reality is that Dru was properly positioned as a community relations person to manage the forum, but that the sheer volume of traffic on the forum, and her background as a technical writer responsible for documentation rather than being a techno-jockey, probably means she's not the right person to actually be providing support or intervening in threads to guide them in a positive direction.

The problem is that everything is under the wish of the company higher employees, which is not a big problem if the company just host the forum. But as Eric said, if they start to touch the forum then that should be clear.

The touch has already been there, and the problem is that we've typically lost good people, great contributors, in the process. I'm sure that wasn't the intended result.

As for the forums and the iron fist, eh, not so much. There are good days and bad days.

That's why I think it'd be interesting to have a strategy where someone who was part of the community was given the time to actually guide things in a more positive direction. I think that's infinitely better than some arbitrary random third party outsiders being made the forum police.

The only thing which bugs me periodically are when a thread becomes locked just because someone responds to it after it's 3 months without a posting. If it were just someone trying to get attention, fine, but that isn't always the case.

Um, I've been doing a lot of thread locking and asking people not to necropost, and more recently I've been evicting their posts into new threads when I sense that it doesn't fit or something like that - in fact, right now, we're in one of those threads!

I'm not quite clear on what it is that bugs you about this. Please feel free to elaborate. I can take constructive criticism. I started marking when I did this with "moderator notes" when someone else noted that something I did this to ended up making poor contextual sense, and so I'm trying to be more careful in that direction to. The thread edits are not intended to be a negative thing.

 

[rogerh]

I can easily see why new people might think it more polite to open an old thread when they have what is apparently the same problem; or more useful. I also, from using forums, know that is rarely the optimal thing to do (though a link to the old thread might be useful).

So how about putting "don't re-open old threads" in the forum rules? Or either automatically, or manually if it is not possible, lock threads after, say, a month?

 

[Ericloewe]

The whole necro issue is a tricky balance between keeping things together and not expecting people to go over a discussion they've long since forgotten.

 

[Bidule0hm]

The reality is that Dru was properly positioned as a community relations person to manage the forum, but that the sheer volume of traffic on the forum, and her background as a technical writer responsible for documentation rather than being a techno-jockey, probably means she's not the right person to actually be providing support or intervening in threads to guide them in a positive direction.

As far as I can see she's doing a very good job, however one person for that much users is obviously too low.

The touch has already been there, and the problem is that we've typically lost good people, great contributors, in the process. I'm sure that wasn't the intended result.

I agree ;)

I'm not quite clear on what it is that bugs you about this.

Not sure to who you talk to, it's to me?

I can easily see why new people might think it more polite to open an old thread when they have what is apparently the same problem; or more useful. I also, from using forums, know that is rarely the optimal thing to do (though a link to the old thread might be useful).

I agree ;)

Or either automatically, or manually if it is not possible, lock threads after, say, a month?

That's a bad idea, especially for stickies. I think the thing to do is not to lock the threads that are necroposted without a good reason (because when you have a good reason to do it you can't post on it anymore) but to warn (then re-warn, and then ban) the user that is doing that, I apply this rule on my forum and it works without a problem :)

 

[mjws00]

If there was any progress in the old thread, I actually like the context. If it is a google -> necro affair I'd rather the mods just put it in a new thread and leave the old one open. Locked threads suck, imho.

@Bidule0hm The concept of open source for purchase is an interesting one. As pointed out earlier the BSD license is interesting and non-restrictive. But the code, and trademark still have value. Bottom line is we are supporting a commercial entity who can pull the plug at any point should they believe that it impacts their profits. There is no obligation to act beyond what is good for the shareholders.

The trade-off is that we have a professionally developed product. There is active and managed development and even commercial support available. And if there is any company worth supporting, it is one that helps maintain and develop open-source projects. In addition we can always fork it should the need arise and the entity become to restrictive.

The issue of paid corporate mods editing user posts and the ethical implications are also interesting. But it is what we agreed to when we joined.

 

[jgreco]

If there was any progress in the old thread, I actually like the context. If it is a google -> necro affair I'd rather the mods just put it in a new thread and leave the old one open. Locked threads suck, imho.

[...]

The issue of paid corporate mods editing user posts and the ethical implications are also interesting. But it is what we agreed to when we joined.

Actually, *all* the oldest threads on the forum are locked, a side effect, if I recall, of the transition from vBulletin. In general, the valid reasons for posting in an old thread grow fewer with age, but if there's a problem, locked threads can be reopened, misplaced posts can be moved, individual messages can be pulled out of threads, and threads can even be merged together. The forumware does have some limits, but I don't think anyone actually wants to impact meaningful discussion in a negative way.

As for the paid corporate mod thing, yeah, it's a bit of a conundrum. On one hand, the community is doing better now than it has in a while, but there's also been an increasing number of new users, and that rapidly leads to fatigue on the part of volunteer participants who get nothing for saying the same thing over and over. I've been here longer than most. I've seen it. I've experienced it. I've been snippy too.

 

[Bidule0hm]

Bottom line is we are supporting a commercial entity who can pull the plug at any point should they believe that it impacts their profits.

That is theone problem.

The issue of paid corporate mods editing user posts and the ethical implications are also interesting. But it is what we agreed to when we joined.

I wouldn't say interesting but rather problematic. And nop, I've not agreed with that.

 

[emptyBox]

The whole necro issue is a tricky balance between keeping things together and not expecting people to go over a discussion they've long since forgotten.

Tricky balance is dead on. The problem persists in many different forums, not just the freenas forums and is one of several reasons it feels like forums are being used less and less.

I've always found it quite ironic that on one hand should a user search and find a particular thread which they need further clarification or perhaps would like to continue the discussion, they must be wary as it may be deemed some arbitrary age by forum residents (mods, veterans, noobs) and as such, that particular thread is not permitted to continue though it isn't locked.. On the other hand, said user may be lambasted for posting a thread which may be deemed to not have been searched for or is thought of as common knowledge.

When I first started using freenas, I found numerous posts by a member ProtoSD, whose information was relevant to help me understand some things I was trying to accomplish with my new box. Because many of the threads were older, they weren't particularly locked but I was well aware that any further discussion needed to continue elsewhere.. And though protosd wasn't around, others may have been able to provide info, I recall seeing Cyberjock/Noobsauce in many of these threads, as well as a few other regulars here. In any case, I've always thought of forums as a place for discussion, but more and more, I think a lot of them would be better served by using a wiki. Working documents if you will, as a supplement to the actual guide. Then residents would get less wrapped around the axle regarding the age of the thread and/or OP status and may be inclined to view it pertaining to content and relevance. I think the ubnt community does pretty well with this scheme; documentation, wiki, and the community. I think the IRC channel here does pretty well too.

It's all with a grain of salt though. A lot of users get their jollies by berating others, just like some users get theirs by posting inane questions which should be searched for first. I don't think either will end anytime soon. I tend to think that the "don't necro these threads" was born in a time when server processing power, bandwidth, and storage were very much the limiting factors for a forum owner. Keeping thread counts low, archiving them, etc were all particular ways mods effectively maintained forum space and bandwidth. I think it's less of an issue now, but those ideas persist (of course, I don't own any forums so it's all speculation hehe).

Thanks for letting me throw in my .02

 

[jgreco]

I've always found it quite ironic that on one hand should a user search and find a particular thread which they need further clarification or perhaps would like to continue the discussion, they must be wary as it may be deemed some arbitrary age by forum residents (mods, veterans, noobs) and as such, that particular thread is not permitted to continue though it isn't locked.. On the other hand, said user may be lambasted for posting a thread which may be deemed to not have been searched for or is thought of as common knowledge.

I don't think this is particularly tricky. I think I can reasonably say that this breaks down into just a few categories:

1) The people who search the forum, find their answer, and move on with their lives. I honestly have no idea what percentage do this since we don't hear directly from them when that happens. But for the remainder:

2) The people who search the forum, find an answer that is lacking or that they'd otherwise wish to contribute to. This is not a large number.

3) The people who just post their question with little to no regard for searching or stickies. This IS a large number.

So, 2) further breaks down into the various ways to handle this. As a moderator, I've been evicting posts where a user appears to have necroposted and there doesn't seem to be a meaningful continuation of the old discussion. Lately I've taken to noting when I do that sort of thing, and I'm open to discussing the style used. I certainly don't mind leaving a link to the previous discussion when I snip a discussion. Alternatively, you appear to be implying that maybe instead we could be aggregating posts into existing threads. That seems to be a little more challenging, especially as it is involving the large percentage of posted new thread traffic.

A community Wiki is an interesting idea. I've been authoring lots of stickies which are effectively similar to Wiki content.

 

[Ericloewe]

The wiki format is interesting, but I'm not sure the community could handle a free-for-all wikipedia-style wiki.

A working resources section of the forum (or something of the sort, there's bound to be a plugin for a document repository of some sort) sounds easier, with most of the benefits.

 

[cyberjock]

The only problem I have with necroing an old thread is that, quite often, the information applied to an old version of FreeNAS, but is totally inaccurate on the current version.

This is one reason why I've discussed with some people at iXsystems doing a total revamp of the forums with FreeNAS 10. That way when FreeNAS 10 rolls out we'd have a new forum for questions relating to 10 and nothing else, but also a way to roll out a proper setup of the forums. So we solve 2 problems at the same time. :)

 

[Borja Marcos]

What would be the conflict of interest? iXsystems, also a hardware vendor, do not forget, do their very best to support FreeNAS users who are not using iXsystems hardware and helping them make the most of it.

The advice in their recommendation documents is very valuable and sometimes hard to acquire knowledge. I am sure that others would withhold some of that information to ensure that most users, except maybe the craftiest, would get better results with official hardware.

I dare to say that their behavior is stellar for FreeNAS users, terrible from a "MBA" (as in Master Bastard Administrator) point of view. The typical MBA types would say that they are shooting themselves on the foot, actually.

 

[cyberjock]

I think he's talking about one (or both) of the following:

1. Since iXsystems sells hardware, the conflict would be between supporting anyone's configuration versus just those that iXsystems makes.

2. Since iXsystems sells TrueNAS (a basic all-in-one software and hardware appliance) the conflict would be between supporting FreeNAS (which arguably doesn't get 'sold') and TrueNAS (which is definitely sold).

Sure, there are smaller areas of profitability (buying a FreeNAS certified system from iXsystems with no support) but the big money is always on TrueNAS as that platform is heavily vetted and tested.