[vote] Create private mailing list for OpenWrt committers

[Hauke Mehrtens]

On 4/5/25 00:45, Fernando Frediani wrote:
> Hello
> 
> Can you elaborate more on about what specific subjects and conversations 
> have to be done on this new e-mail list that cannot be done on either 
> devel or adm lists ? I am on both for over a decade and have almost 
> never seen any issues with the subjects that are discussed there either 
> been development or adm related.

The topics discussed on -devel and -adm are fine and it should stay 
there. All votes should stay on -adm. There is not discussion coming to 
my mind which we had on -devel or -adm which I think should better have 
been done on a private list.

The Problem from my point of view are the discussions which are not on 
-adm or -devel, but which are done in private mail conversations which a 
subset of the OpenWrt committers. You are probably not aware of them, 
and I am probably only involved in some of them.

 > Perhaps a creation of a third list > should be better considered if 
really necessary and dig deeper into find
> out what exactly topics really cannot be discussed on both or publicly 
> that should be restricted to this new one proposed.

For example discussions about people. When someone post unappropriated 
content somewhere and we would discus about deleting it and banning this 
person. The real content might be gone from the internet, but the 
discussion stays and might harm the person still in 10 years when their
potential new boss finds it.

When we interact with some other organizations or companies which are 
not so open. We still need to build up an opinion on our side and talk 
about pros and cons of different options.

The example I gave in the initial mail. When someone contacts me about 
OpenWrt. I  do not want to put mails from people onto a public mailing 
list without their explicit consent. I have no problem to add the 
internal list into CC.

> Even though some of the people who are subscribed to both lists don't 
> have voting power on decisions - and nothing wrong with that - they 
> follow and participate on discussions and may have significant inputs 
> that can certainly suit to those who vote to better decide.
> 
> Regarding the meetings coordination what would be the difference from 
> the current adm list to another one if some may not have the self 
> organization to read and filter the emails accordingly ? If the issue is 
> people's interest of capacity to better organize I doubt a new list 
> would be necessary to resolve that.
> 
> I would rather explore better the need to create a new mail email and 
> try to use the 2 existing ones for each specific subject.
> 
> Best regards
> Fernando

Hauke

> 
> On 03/04/2025 17:49, Hauke Mehrtens wrote:
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I propose creating a new mailing list that only OpenWrt committers can 
>> read. All OpenWrt committers should be subscribed by default, and it 
>> should be possible to send messages to the list without requiring a 
>> subscription. Additionally, this list should replace the current 
>> abuse at openwrt.org and contact at openwrt.org addresses handling with 
>> freescout.openwrt.org.
>>
>> This would be similar to the old openwrt-hackers at lists.openwrt.org
>>
>> Please vote Yes or +1 if you support the creation of this list.
>>
>> I will conclude the vote on 26th April 2025.
>>
>>
>> Rationale:
>>
>> Currently, some of the project's internal communication happens 
>> through direct emails, Signal, or small private groups. While some 
>> discussions should remain private, they shouldn’t be limited to a 
>> highly selective subset of individuals. A dedicated internal mailing 
>> list would provide a structured way to handle sensitive topics without 
>> resorting to fragmented, ad-hoc communication.
>>
>> Public discussions and voting should still take place on openwrt-adm, 
>> and key management topics (e.g., release planning) should remain 
>> there. However, we may also want to consider merging openwrt-adm and 
>> openwrt-devel to streamline communication, but the merger is out of 
>> scope of this vote.
>>
>> From an operational standpoint, responding to external inquiries is 
>> often challenging. I hesitate to CC a public mailing list without 
>> explicit permission, but I’d have no issue including a private list. 
>> This would improve transparency while maintaining appropriate 
>> confidentiality.
>>
>> Additionally, organizing OpenWrt meetings via direct emails to ~40 
>> committers is inefficient and prone to missing recipients. A dedicated 
>> mailing list would simplify coordination.
>>
>> Finally, freescout.openwrt.org was broken for about six months, 
>> causing all incoming emails from this period to be lost. While it is 
>> now functional, it appears nobody is reading the mails. A dedicated 
>> private list would provide a more reliable channel for handling such 
>> inquiries.
>> We are getting more than one spam mail per day on freescout, the spam 
>> filter on the mailling list is working much better.
>>
>> Hauke
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> openwrt-adm mailing list
>> openwrt-adm at lists.openwrt.org
>> https://lists.openwrt.org/mailman/listinfo/openwrt-adm
> 
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