Erlang forums (was Re: PING TEST)

[Benjamin Scherrey]

I understand the desire and intent but, frankly, the forum is an awful UX
that feels like what we had in the 90s (and in which I never had nor would
participate). I'm an old time Erlang dev having consulted to Ericsson in
the early 90's and have recently caused my company to adopt Erlang with
some core products. The quality of the Erlang email list has been
outstanding. Having that history in my email has been an invaluable
resource. Moving to the forum will greatly diminish this value for us -
there's just no way of getting around that. I think there's a lot of people
who feel the same way. I will, of course, try out the "forum as list"
feature but we all know it's not designed for that and interactivity will
not be as strong as the email list.

Frankly I don't get what value we're anticipating from the forum that is
better than the current email list. If we wanted to move to something that
captures discussion threads better then I would recommend gitter or
discord. This forum software is horrible, imho. I'm sure everyone on this
list wants to create the best experience for supporting Erlang/OTP. I don't
doubt anyone's intentions here. But the forum solution just doesn't cut the
mustard to me.

thanks for listening,

  -- Ben Scherrey

On Wed, Dec 15, 2021 at 11:03 PM Kenneth Lundin <kenneth.lundin@REDACTED>
wrote:

> Thank you for your feedback about Erlangforums.com everyone. See some
> clarifications below:
>
> Erlangforums is setup by Aston with the Erlang/OTP team in full
> cooperation. The intention is to stimulate interest and discussions about
> Erlang and other languages running on the “beam”.
>
> We are happy with the forum’s objective to foster a positive inclusive
> community. We reviewed the terms before the forum went live and feel they
> are fair and reasonable.
>
> We are Admins on the forum and while we advise the forum team when
> necessary, we prefer to leave daily operation and forum management to the
> forum team. This was a major reason to why we chose this route instead
> running a forum ourselves at erlang.org: we want an experienced team to
> manage the forum, marketing, growing the community, policies, moderation,
> daily operation, and whatnot (Aston has been managing the Elixir Forum in a
> similar capacity for over 5 years and has 20 years' experience managing
> online spaces).
>
> With a forum like this we are better able to focus on Erlang/OTP. We
> weighed up all the options before concluding this is the best option for
> Erlang, the Erlang community, as well as the overall BEAM community.
>
> As indicated in the various announcements the mailing list will be
> deprecated soon and we hope you will join us on Erlangforums.com. The
> Erlang/OTP team will be focusing our efforts on the forum moving forward
> because we believe it is an exciting platform and has the potential to
> offer the most value.
>
> For those who would like to use the forum as a mailing list please see
> this thread:
> https://erlangforums.com/t/how-to-use-this-forum-as-a-mailing-list/146.
> However, keep in mind that the forum was never meant to be 1:1 copy of the
> mailing list (it is meant to be much more). To attain an experience similar
> to that of the mailing list you may want to subscribe to the following
> sections as a starting point: Erlang News, Erlang Libraries, and Erlang
> Help/Questions.
>
> /Kenneth, Erlang/OTP Ericsson
>
> On Mon, Dec 13, 2021 at 6:23 PM Michael P. <empro2@REDACTED> wrote:
>
>> :-)
>>
>> On Sun, 5 Dec 2021 16:57:11 +0100
>> Loïc Hoguin <essen@REDACTED> wrote:
>>
>> > The Erlang forums have this monstrosity: https://erlangforums.com/tos
>>
>> Trying to understand the "monstrosity" I found it practical to keep in
>> mind:
>>
>> The basic right of freedom after speech does not give one
>> the right to speak one's mind in anyone's living room;
>> even after an invitation one can be shown the door at any time,
>> for any reason or none.
>>
>> And that it is not practical to go into detail, because:
>>
>> People who do not want to live together cannot --
>> by no amount of rules or force --
>> be made to live together.
>>
>> So ...
>>
>> > are not owned by the Erlang/OTP team but instead by a third party (and
>> > possibly set up by their initiative, not the Erlang/OTP team's).
>>
>> ... to be fair:
>> http://erlang.org/pipermail/erlang-questions/2021-October/101583.html
>>
>>
>> > If the Erlang/OTP team wants to make the forums a more
>> > official/permanent venue to reach them then they should also ensure that
>> > the conditions to use the forums are the same as their other venues.
>>
>> Is the "monstrosity" not merely a paraphrasing of the conditions
>> for staying in this old living room here?
>>
>> Without a Sugarmountain of money or a space-dildo for Captain Kirk,
>> one cannot afford to get to know the legal situation, or differences,
>> or consequences, or do anything about them.
>> And: Two lawyers -- three opinions.
>>
>> So I will simply continue trying to do the Austin Powers ("Behave!").
>>
>> :-)
>>
>> ~Michael
>>
>> --
>>
>> Normality is merely a question of quantity, not one of quality.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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