Thread: news ticker Services Policy -- time for a change?

Folks,

Currently our approval policy says this:


From: http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/NewsEventsApproval

"The following types of news will be approved:
* Brand new products/projects/services which support or center around
PostgreSQL"

Under this policy, the new 2ndQuadrant support option was approved as a
news announcement.  Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
belongs on the postgresql.org home page.  When I wrote that text, what I
personally meant by "services" was stuff like PAAS, not a support
service.  I'm also concerned that the 2Q announcement will kick off an
arms race of similar announcements.  I know I'll submit one for PGX if
we don't change the policy.

I'd like to change the policy to:

* Brand new products, projects, companies hosting services, or cloud
services which support or center around PostgreSQL.

The idea is that I think we want announcements like Gandi's PAAS on the
home page, or StormDB launching, but not announcements like PGX
introducing new emergency services.

Comments/objections/alternatives?

-- 
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com

* Josh Berkus (josh@agliodbs.com) wrote:
> Under this policy, the new 2ndQuadrant support option was approved as a
> news announcement.

Correct (as the individual who approved it).  I did also note that we
have a bit of policy around "companies which don't contribute will be
limited to posting not more than once every 6 months" or similar.
Perhaps changing that to more generally prohibit posting of new services
to once every 6 months per company would be sufficient..?  I feel 2ndQ
probably deserves to meet the "companies who contribute" criteria, but I
did go back and check the archives for anything in the past 6 months
anyway.

> Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
> belongs on the postgresql.org home page.

I'm not entirely sure that I agree.  For one thing, it helps argue
against the "there's no commercial support for OSS!" mentality which
still exists in some industries (particularly US government).

> When I wrote that text, what I
> personally meant by "services" was stuff like PAAS, not a support
> service.  I'm also concerned that the 2Q announcement will kick off an
> arms race of similar announcements.  I know I'll submit one for PGX if
> we don't change the policy.

I'd rather not have a whole bunch all at once, but one from PGX in
another month or so would seem reasonable to me- assuming there's an
actual new service being offered.  Admittedly, that could be abused, but
companies who employ committers should, in my view anyway, be above
playing games like that. :)  And posts from companies who don't will be
looked upon with much more speculation regarding their post request.

> I'd like to change the policy to:
>
> * Brand new products, projects, companies hosting services, or cloud
> services which support or center around PostgreSQL.
>
> The idea is that I think we want announcements like Gandi's PAAS on the
> home page, or StormDB launching, but not announcements like PGX
> introducing new emergency services.
>
> Comments/objections/alternatives?

In general, please consider this an objection to prohibiting posts about
new PostgreSQL-specific service offerings.  I don't think we want to be
swamped by them either, of course, and limiting such posts to once or
twice a year is probably reasonable, but I don't like prohibiting them
entirely.
Thanks,
    Stephen

On 06/13/2013 06:49 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
> * Josh Berkus (josh@agliodbs.com) wrote:

>> Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
>> belongs on the postgresql.org home page.
>
> I'm not entirely sure that I agree.  For one thing, it helps argue
> against the "there's no commercial support for OSS!" mentality which
> still exists in some industries (particularly US government).

I haven't heard this argument in a very long time and considering I have 
various governments constantly asking me to fill out RFPs (you can have 
them 2ndQuadrant/EDB, RFPs are the suck) I am not inclined to agree with 
your statement.

Should the announcement be on the front page. I don't know. Part of me 
says, "well of course". They are a major postgresql contributor after all.

The other part of me, and problem the bigger part says, "Absolutely 
not". Why? Because it isn't PostgreSQL news. It is 2ndQuadrant news. 
Maybe it belongs on -announce but it definitely doesn't belong on .Org news.

JD

-- 
Command Prompt, Inc. - http://www.commandprompt.com/  509-416-6579
PostgreSQL Support, Training, Professional Services and Development
High Availability, Oracle Conversion, Postgres-XC, @cmdpromptinc
For my dreams of your image that blossoms   a rose in the deeps of my heart. - W.B. Yeats

* Joshua D. Drake (jd@commandprompt.com) wrote:
> On 06/13/2013 06:49 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
> >* Josh Berkus (josh@agliodbs.com) wrote:
> >>Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
> >>belongs on the postgresql.org home page.
> >
> >I'm not entirely sure that I agree.  For one thing, it helps argue
> >against the "there's no commercial support for OSS!" mentality which
> >still exists in some industries (particularly US government).
>
> I haven't heard this argument in a very long time and considering I
> have various governments constantly asking me to fill out RFPs (you
> can have them 2ndQuadrant/EDB, RFPs are the suck) I am not inclined
> to agree with your statement.

Perhaps that is a little dated- if so, all the better for us.

> The other part of me, and problem the bigger part says, "Absolutely
> not". Why? Because it isn't PostgreSQL news. It is 2ndQuadrant news.
> Maybe it belongs on -announce but it definitely doesn't belong on
> .Org news.

You know, I considered that distinction also...  Perhaps we should have
different policies for front-page news vs -announce.  I was speaking
from the -announce part (which is what I had approved, to be clear).  At
the same time, I was thinking "well, people who care about 'does PG have
commerical support options?' aren't likely to be the people subscribed
to -announce", so, from that perspective, it seemed to make sense to me.

It's certainly one of these 'edge' cases and, well, if that's the worst
thing we have to worry about, we're probably doing pretty well. ;)

Based on all that, I would still tend to lean towards the 'approve',
particularly for major PG supporters.
Thanks,
    Stephen

Hi Josh,

Il 14/06/13 00:02, Josh Berkus ha scritto:
> The idea is that I think we want announcements like Gandi's PAAS on the
> home page, or StormDB launching, but not announcements like PGX
> introducing new emergency services.

Well before joining 2ndQuadrant I have been doing open source advocacy
in the public sector in Italy for years.

The major obstacle I always found when trying to propose the adoption of
open source and free software solutions in production environments was
the lack of professional 24/7 support with proper SLAs and
responsibility levels.

I am sure that you have shared the same uncomfortable feeling of
speaking in front of hundreds of people about how good open source
software is, then being followed by O**cle or MS salesmen/speakers
saying: "Yes, open source software is cool ... but ... what happens if
on a Sunday afternoon your database breaks?".

I felt like tilting at windmills. That was the main reason for which I
started the business.

So, personally, I believe that this kind of services is extremely good
and needs to be encouraged by the PostgreSQL.org website which is by far
the most important hub resource for PostgreSQL information in the world
(therefore the main target for CTOs or strategy officers that seek to
introduce Postgres in their business environment).

My 2 cents on this.

Ciao,
Gabriele

-- Gabriele Bartolini - 2ndQuadrant ItaliaPostgreSQL Training, Services and Supportgabriele.bartolini@2ndQuadrant.it |
www.2ndQuadrant.it

On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 12:02 AM, Josh Berkus <josh@agliodbs.com> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Currently our approval policy says this:
>
>
> From: http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/NewsEventsApproval
>
> "The following types of news will be approved:
> * Brand new products/projects/services which support or center around
> PostgreSQL"
>
> Under this policy, the new 2ndQuadrant support option was approved as a
> news announcement.  Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
> belongs on the postgresql.org home page.  When I wrote that text, what I
> personally meant by "services" was stuff like PAAS, not a support
> service.  I'm also concerned that the 2Q announcement will kick off an
> arms race of similar announcements.  I know I'll submit one for PGX if
> we don't change the policy.

FWIW, I find that one more "appropriate" for the postgresql.org
frontpage than any of the other things listed on there currently.

Why wouldn't a service like that qualify, when a new version of a
third party proprietary tool does?


> I'd like to change the policy to:
>
> * Brand new products, projects, companies hosting services, or cloud
> services which support or center around PostgreSQL.

So  basically "news about anything you can think of except support
services"? It's easier to work with a blacklist than a whitelist. I
still don't see the point in this change.


> The idea is that I think we want announcements like Gandi's PAAS on the
> home page, or StormDB launching, but not announcements like PGX
> introducing new emergency services.

What about "Gandi now supporting 9.3"? Would you only allow each
service *one* announcement, ever?

--Magnus HaganderMe: http://www.hagander.net/Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 3:54 AM, Joshua D. Drake <jd@commandprompt.com> wrote:
>
> On 06/13/2013 06:49 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
>>
>> * Josh Berkus (josh@agliodbs.com) wrote:
>
>
>>> Thing is, I don't think that kind of announcement
>>> belongs on the postgresql.org home page.
>>
>>
>> I'm not entirely sure that I agree.  For one thing, it helps argue
>> against the "there's no commercial support for OSS!" mentality which
>> still exists in some industries (particularly US government).
>
>
> I haven't heard this argument in a very long time and considering I have
> various governments constantly asking me to fill out RFPs (you can have them
> 2ndQuadrant/EDB, RFPs are the suck) I am not inclined to agree with your
> statement.

FWIW, I hear it all the time.

Not from people who are clued in, but there are a *lot* of people who
are not clued in.


> Should the announcement be on the front page. I don't know. Part of me says,
> "well of course". They are a major postgresql contributor after all.

I say "probably". Not because they are a major postgresql contributor,
but because it's a service that would be interesting to a fair number
of PostgreSQL users. Certainly more than most of the other news on
that page are interesting to.


> The other part of me, and problem the bigger part says, "Absolutely not".
> Why? Because it isn't PostgreSQL news. It is 2ndQuadrant news. Maybe it
> belongs on -announce but it definitely doesn't belong on .Org news.

I'm sure any marketeer would love you for saying that. Getting
something approved for posting to -announce is *significantly* more
valuable than getting it onto the frontpage, given that it gets
delivered to more than 10,000 confirmed email addresses.

We do need to align these moderation policies. I've done some work on
a technical fix for this, but it's not ready yet.

Another thing that repeatedly comes up in discussions like this is to
separate "community news" from "commercial news", which I think in
general would be  a good thing (and have both of them on the
frontpage, in different sections, so commercial news doesn't push
community news off the page). That comes back to the definition of
community news though - what about pgadmin, pgsql-jdbc? then what
about ruby drivers? or support in CMS xyz (open source)? etc. But if
we can make an actual definition that *works* for that, I still think
that would be a better idea.

--Magnus HaganderMe: http://www.hagander.net/Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On 06/13/2013 11:30 PM, Gabriele Bartolini wrote:

> I am sure that you have shared the same uncomfortable feeling of
> speaking in front of hundreds of people about how good open source
> software is, then being followed by O**cle or MS salesmen/speakers
> saying: "Yes, open source software is cool ... but ... what happens if
> on a Sunday afternoon your database breaks?".

I usually followed up with, well I call "Insert 12 companies here" which 
lead Oracle or MS to be fairly contrite and unable to make a come back.

It has been a long time since I have ran into those issues. We aren't 
niche anymore, a lot of that is in fact thanks to Oracle.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake


-- 
Command Prompt, Inc. - http://www.commandprompt.com/  509-416-6579
PostgreSQL Support, Training, Professional Services and Development
High Availability, Oracle Conversion, Postgres-XC, @cmdpromptinc
For my dreams of your image that blossoms   a rose in the deeps of my heart. - W.B. Yeats

On 06/13/2013 07:14 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
> You know, I considered that distinction also...  Perhaps we should have
> different policies for front-page news vs -announce.  I was speaking
> from the -announce part (which is what I had approved, to be clear).  At
> the same time, I was thinking "well, people who care about 'does PG have
> commerical support options?' aren't likely to be the people subscribed
> to -announce", so, from that perspective, it seemed to make sense to me.

If anything, the policy for -announce ought to be *more* restrictive
than for the news ticker.  We already have sysadmins who refuse to
subscribe to -announce because there's too much dreck in it, and as a
result don't know about security releases.

I hate to abuse a equine corpse, but maybe we should have a
releases-only feed (mail and rss), and then we can be fairly liberal
about what we let on the general -announce?

-- 
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com

On 06/14/2013 04:36 PM, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
> On 06/13/2013 07:14 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
>> You know, I considered that distinction also...  Perhaps we should have
>> different policies for front-page news vs -announce.  I was speaking
>> from the -announce part (which is what I had approved, to be clear).  At
>> the same time, I was thinking "well, people who care about 'does PG have
>> commerical support options?' aren't likely to be the people subscribed
>> to -announce", so, from that perspective, it seemed to make sense to me.
>
> If anything, the policy for -announce ought to be *more* restrictive
> than for the news ticker.  We already have sysadmins who refuse to
> subscribe to -announce because there's too much dreck in it, and as a
> result don't know about security releases.
>
> I hate to abuse a equine corpse, but maybe we should have a
> releases-only feed (mail and rss), and then we can be fairly liberal
> about what we let on the general -announce?

This actually makes sense, having a "security/release" ONLY list/rss.

JD



-- 
Command Prompt, Inc. - http://www.commandprompt.com/  509-416-6579
PostgreSQL Support, Training, Professional Services and Development
High Availability, Oracle Conversion, Postgres-XC, @cmdpromptinc
For my dreams of your image that blossoms   a rose in the deeps of my heart. - W.B. Yeats

On Jun 14, 2013, at 8:26 PM, Joshua D. Drake wrote:

> On 06/14/2013 04:36 PM, Josh Berkus wrote:
>>
>> On 06/13/2013 07:14 PM, Stephen Frost wrote:
>>> You know, I considered that distinction also...  Perhaps we should have
>>> different policies for front-page news vs -announce.  I was speaking
>>> from the -announce part (which is what I had approved, to be clear).  At
>>> the same time, I was thinking "well, people who care about 'does PG have
>>> commerical support options?' aren't likely to be the people subscribed
>>> to -announce", so, from that perspective, it seemed to make sense to me.
>>
>> If anything, the policy for -announce ought to be *more* restrictive
>> than for the news ticker.  We already have sysadmins who refuse to
>> subscribe to -announce because there's too much dreck in it, and as a
>> result don't know about security releases.
>>
>> I hate to abuse a equine corpse, but maybe we should have a
>> releases-only feed (mail and rss), and then we can be fairly liberal
>> about what we let on the general -announce?
>
> This actually makes sense, having a "security/release" ONLY list/rss.

I think having a release only mailing list / RSS makes sense in general, regardless if -announce policies are changed
ornot.  The question then, is the release list limited to just "postgresql" or is it "postgresql + other major
communitysupported, open-source projects?"  I would opt for just Postgres. 

Jonathan

On 06/17/2013 03:03 PM, Jonathan S. Katz wrote:

>>
>> This actually makes sense, having a "security/release" ONLY list/rss.
>
> I think having a release only mailing list / RSS makes sense in general, regardless if -announce policies are changed
ornot.  The question then, is the release list limited to just "postgresql" or is it "postgresql + other major
communitysupported, open-source projects?"  I would opt for just Postgres.
 

Just PG, IMO. This would be strictly for actual release information.

JD

>
> Jonathan
>


-- 
Command Prompt, Inc. - http://www.commandprompt.com/  509-416-6579
PostgreSQL Support, Training, Professional Services and Development
High Availability, Oracle Conversion, Postgres-XC, @cmdpromptinc
For my dreams of your image that blossoms   a rose in the deeps of my heart. - W.B. Yeats

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Hash: RIPEMD160


> If anything, the policy for -announce ought to be *more* restrictive
> than for the news ticker.  We already have sysadmins who refuse to
> subscribe to -announce because there's too much dreck in it, and as a
> result don't know about security releases.

Seriously? There were 12 posts to pgsql-announce last month. TWELVE.

> I hate to abuse a equine corpse, but maybe we should have a
> releases-only feed (mail and rss), and then we can be fairly liberal
> about what we let on the general -announce?

I'm not inclined to have us jump through any hoops for sysadmins 
who can't be bothered to subscribe to such a low-volume list.

- -- 
Greg Sabino Mullane greg@turnstep.com
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 201306192343
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
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On Thu, Jun 20, 2013 at 5:49 AM, Greg Sabino Mullane <greg@turnstep.com> wrote:
>
>
>> If anything, the policy for -announce ought to be *more* restrictive
>> than for the news ticker.  We already have sysadmins who refuse to
>> subscribe to -announce because there's too much dreck in it, and as a
>> result don't know about security releases.
>
> Seriously? There were 12 posts to pgsql-announce last month. TWELVE.

Yes. 144 mails / year. (Though you should deduct the 4 PWNs from that,
so it's really 8 that month, or 96 / year). That goes for a total of
about 2.5 million emails.

A fair amount if advertisements, but we *do* have a more restrictive
policy for -anounce in reality,it seems, even if we haven't really
written it down. Because I'm fairly sure there's more of those on the
website.


>> I hate to abuse a equine corpse, but maybe we should have a
>> releases-only feed (mail and rss), and then we can be fairly liberal
>> about what we let on the general -announce?
>
> I'm not inclined to have us jump through any hoops for sysadmins
> who can't be bothered to subscribe to such a low-volume list.

There's a point to that, but flipping the coin it's also pretty bad
that we don't provide any way to get email notifications of new
releases without also receiving advertisements for third party
commercial products.

(you can get it by subscribing to the versions rss feed of course, but
you get no details there)


--Magnus HaganderMe: http://www.hagander.net/Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Thu, 2013-06-20 at 10:06 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
> There's a point to that, but flipping the coin it's also pretty bad
> that we don't provide any way to get email notifications of new
> releases without also receiving advertisements for third party
> commercial products.

Right, and we also don't have a commercial-free RSS feed about release
announcements.  It's really quite terrible.

I suspect one side-effect would be that if we do create more limited
release announcement channels (email and/or RSS), no one will subscribe
to the advertisements anymore.

On Fri, 2013-06-14 at 14:55 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
> > I haven't heard this argument in a very long time and considering I
> have
> > various governments constantly asking me to fill out RFPs (you can
> have them
> > 2ndQuadrant/EDB, RFPs are the suck) I am not inclined to agree with
> your
> > statement.
> 
> FWIW, I hear it all the time.
> 
> Not from people who are clued in, but there are a *lot* of people who
> are not clued in. 

But are those people reading the announcements channels?  Or are the
announcements channels preaching to the choir?

On Wed, Jul 3, 2013 at 4:49 AM, Peter Eisentraut <peter_e@gmx.net> wrote:
> On Fri, 2013-06-14 at 14:55 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
>> > I haven't heard this argument in a very long time and considering I
>> have
>> > various governments constantly asking me to fill out RFPs (you can
>> have them
>> > 2ndQuadrant/EDB, RFPs are the suck) I am not inclined to agree with
>> your
>> > statement.
>>
>> FWIW, I hear it all the time.
>>
>> Not from people who are clued in, but there are a *lot* of people who
>> are not clued in.
>
> But are those people reading the announcements channels?  Or are the
> announcements channels preaching to the choir?

That's probably a good point - it's definitely not from people reading
*our* announcement channels.

--Magnus HaganderMe: http://www.hagander.net/Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Wed, Jul 3, 2013 at 4:47 AM, Peter Eisentraut <peter_e@gmx.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 2013-06-20 at 10:06 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
>> There's a point to that, but flipping the coin it's also pretty bad
>> that we don't provide any way to get email notifications of new
>> releases without also receiving advertisements for third party
>> commercial products.
>
> Right, and we also don't have a commercial-free RSS feed about release
> announcements.  It's really quite terrible.
>
> I suspect one side-effect would be that if we do create more limited
> release announcement channels (email and/or RSS), no one will subscribe
> to the advertisements anymore.

This has, IIRC, been one of the largest objections against this in the past.

--Magnus HaganderMe: http://www.hagander.net/Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On 07/02/2013 07:47 PM, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
> On Thu, 2013-06-20 at 10:06 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
>> There's a point to that, but flipping the coin it's also pretty bad
>> that we don't provide any way to get email notifications of new
>> releases without also receiving advertisements for third party
>> commercial products.
> 
> Right, and we also don't have a commercial-free RSS feed about release
> announcements.  It's really quite terrible.
> 
> I suspect one side-effect would be that if we do create more limited
> release announcement channels (email and/or RSS), no one will subscribe
> to the advertisements anymore.

True, but ultimately, isn't it more important to get the word out about
releases and security updates than to provide an advertising channel?

-- 
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com

On 07/03/2013 02:44 PM, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
> On 07/02/2013 07:47 PM, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
>> On Thu, 2013-06-20 at 10:06 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
>>> There's a point to that, but flipping the coin it's also pretty bad
>>> that we don't provide any way to get email notifications of new
>>> releases without also receiving advertisements for third party
>>> commercial products.
>>
>> Right, and we also don't have a commercial-free RSS feed about release
>> announcements.  It's really quite terrible.
>>
>> I suspect one side-effect would be that if we do create more limited
>> release announcement channels (email and/or RSS), no one will subscribe
>> to the advertisements anymore.
>
> True, but ultimately, isn't it more important to get the word out about
> releases and security updates than to provide an advertising channel?
>

Yes. We are a community not a commercial product.

JD

-- 
Command Prompt, Inc. - http://www.commandprompt.com/  509-416-6579
PostgreSQL Support, Training, Professional Services and Development
High Availability, Oracle Conversion, Postgres-XC, @cmdpromptinc
For my dreams of your image that blossoms   a rose in the deeps of my heart. - W.B. Yeats

On Wed, 2013-07-03 at 14:44 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote:
> > I suspect one side-effect would be that if we do create more limited
> > release announcement channels (email and/or RSS), no one will
> subscribe
> > to the advertisements anymore.
> 
> True, but ultimately, isn't it more important to get the word out
> about
> releases and security updates than to provide an advertising channel? 

Absolutely.  I've always been in favor of a pure project announcements
channel.