[Fwd: [members] New TC Comment Facility]

["Monica J. Martin" <Monica.Martin@Sun.COM>]

Update on comments list procedures in OASIS. Thanks.

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• From: Mary McRae <mary.mcrae@oasis-open.org>
• To: members@lists.oasis-open.org
• Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2006 11:06:30 -0400

OASIS staff is evaluating a variety of long-term solutions for enhancing public 
feedback on Committee work. On Friday, 21 July 2006, the first step was taken. 
In an effort to curb spam flowing to the TC comment lists, OASIS IT staff 
retired the "Send a Comment" web form interface. In its place we have installed 
a web page indicating that all feedback and input to a TC will come directly 
through a TC's comment email list, for which subscription is required. Since 
feedback to a TC is subject to the terms of the OASIS IPR Feedback License [1] 
which was presented in connection with the web form interface, the new "email 
only" comment mechanism requires that subscribers to any comment list confirm 
their agreement as part of the subscription process.

We believe this change has numerous benefits, including:
- closing the access point that was allowing spam to get through,
- allowing comment submitters to use their email tool of choice and the 
additional functionality it provides,
- providing an authenticated email address for the sender with a reliable means 
of responding to the submitter, and
- offering the ability to enter a meaningful subject line that is included in 
the email archive.

We have also rewritten the "Send A Comment" landing page to contain useful 
information, including:
- instructions for subscribing and other details related to the email list,
- an overview of what happens to submitted feedback, and
- reference to related mailing lists for the TC (-dev, -users, etc.).

If you were subscribed to any of the TC comment lists, you should have received 
notification that you were to be unsubscribed, and another notification to 
re-subscribe if you so wished after the rollout was complete. TC Chairs and 
Secretaries were automatically re-subscribed to their TC's comment list.

While significant testing was done prior to rollout, it's not uncommon for an 
unexpected problem to occur. If you have any difficulties subscribing to or 
accessing the lists, or other problems relating the the Comment Facility, please 
send an email detailing the problem to support@oasis-open.org. Please note that 
the comment lists themselves have not changed; all existing archives are still 
in place and can be accessed via the same (existing) URL.

The new landing page for "Send A Comment" links from a TC's Public Home Page can 
be found at:
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/comments/index.php?wg_abbrev=[tcshortname].
For example:
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/comments/index.php?wg_abbrev=emergency

Further work is planned to enhance functionality of the TC Comment Facility, 
including purging of spam from the comment list archives.

We thank you for your patience while OASIS IT staff has been trying to address 
the significant increase in the amount of spam received; hopefully we have 
stopped the flow.

Regards,

Mary

---------------------------------------------------
Mary P McRae
Manager of TC Administration, OASIS
email: mary.mcrae@oasis-open.org
web: www.oasis-open.org

[1] http://www.oasis-open.org/who/ipr/feedback_license.pdf



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