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Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2011 13:53:26 -0400
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Subject: Re: <id>@openoffice.org
From: Rob Weir <apache@robweir.com>
To: ooo-dev@incubator.apache.org
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On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:32 PM, Andy Brown <andy@the-martin-byrd.net> wrot=
e:
> Watching the discussions here I have a question.
>
> How hard would it be to find out which forwarding addresses are in active
> use, last six months, last year?
>

You could find out which ones are used *in the project* by go through
all OOo and AOOo mailing lists and collect the subscriber list, and
from these extract the openoffice.org addresses.   That would be a
list of all addresses that are potentially involved in project work.
But it would not include anyone using an openoffice.org address for
things entirely unrelated to OOo.

> Seems to me if an address is "active' then it should be maintained for th=
at
> user as that is where some contacts expect to find that person. =C2=A0I h=
ave one
> of those addresses and in the last year I may have received two or three
> messages, all spam, so I do not need the address or really want it. =C2=
=A0As has
> been indicated it was given when I initially registered OO.o. =C2=A0I thi=
nk I
> have received two or three actual messages with that address and that was
> over two years ago when I signed up for the Marketing Project. =C2=A0I se=
e no
> need to maintain address forwarding for addresses that are not used but d=
o
> feel that those that use them should have them maintained for the benefit=
 of
> the community. =C2=A0It seems that most of us agree that no new address s=
hould be
> assigned.
>

Whether the use of the forwarder is "for the benefit of the community"
depends on how the address is being used.  If someone has the address
"sales@openoffice.org" and uses it to sell" copies of OOo, then that
does not benefit the community. If someone has the OOo logo and
address on their business cards and claims to represent the project,
then this is not to the project's benefit.

Remember, this project is already plagued with websites claiming to
offer OpenOffice downloads, sometimes filled with bloatware or
malware, duping uses. This harms the brand and dilutes the trademark.
When someone set up the OpenOffice.com site, we try to shut it down.
The use of the OpenOffice.org trademark to imply affiliation is
something that requires approval from the trademark owner, in this
case now Apache.

I have serious concerns about having thousands of people with
openoffice.org email addresses. Other OSS projects have had similar
concerns, and problems, and have ended this practice, e.g., KDE.   In
Apache, the apache.org addresses are limited to committers.

I agree that we don't want to abruptly end the forwarding service.
But I think we need a plan to end this service, with minimal
disruption to users of that service and ample time to migrate to a new
address.

> My 2cents.
> Andy
>