On 26 April 1999, Guido van Rossum said:
In a private mail, Greg Stein suggested that the python-dev archives should be restricted to the members of the list. I prefer to make them public, but I won't want to impose this on others without discussion. So I've made the archives private for the time being while we discuss this meta-issue. (Also, the existence of the list isn't announced by mailman on its listinfo page.)
Here's my argument for open archives. I don't think that we have anything to hide from the public -- I think of us as a technical forum whose discussions may affect others (e.g. Python users) and I think it's often useful for those others to be able to see what we've said.
I favour as much openness as possible that's consistent with high signal-to-noise. Opening the archives doesn't affect SN ratio; for that matter, neither does allowing anyone to *read* the list while keeping posting privileges restricted. And letting the world know that the list exists -- even though posting privileges are restricted -- shouldn't affect quality. So I guess my position is: definitely open the archives and publicise the list -- the benefit of an open archive is reduced if people can't stumble across it like they can any sig. And consider the possibility of open subscription while keeping posting restricted. Not sure how easy that is with Mailman, but we can still consider the idea. The open, friendly nature of the Python community is a huge strength. I tentatively agree that posting privileges should be restricted to keep quality high, but the idea of a "secret cabal" discussing Python development off in a dark corner away from the grubby masses seems very counter to the spirit I've seen so far. Greg -- Greg Ward - software developer gward@cnri.reston.va.us Corporation for National Research Initiatives 1895 Preston White Drive voice: +1-703-620-8990 Reston, Virginia, USA 20191-5434 fax: +1-703-620-0913