[HCoop-Discuss] VPS hosting for HCoop

[Michael Potter]

Adam Chlipala wrote:
> Michael Potter wrote:
>   
>> I'm a little suspicious that you're pushing this as an alternative way 
>> to bring on paid staff by at least partially outsourcing them as the 
>> staff of a VPS provider. 
>>     
>
> I'm disappointed that you're accusing me of this.  Do you have any 
> evidence that _anyone_ involved in this discussion is pushing a secret 
> agenda?  Simple disagreement is no such evidence.  For someone who 
> brings up cooperative principles so much, you seem pretty ready to 
> ignore the basic standard of civility that makes consensus 
> decision-making possible.
>   

It's not exactly a secret, from the thread above:

<quote>

Shaun Empie wrote:

> > The only reason I was saying it wasn't a great idea is that it will cost
> > more in the long run.  The setup we have now has fixed recurring monthly
> > costs and fixed hw upgrade costs to expand.  A VPS has recurring monthly
> > costs that go up once we start to expand.
> >   
>   
Adam Chlipala wrote:
Right, but a lot of those costs cover staff who keep the hardware in 
order, replacements for broken machines, etc..

</quote>

I think you're confusing directness with incivility. Also, there is no 
consensus at Hcoop, the board is in control and this list is a courtesy, 
as you underscore at the end of the message below.

> Also, I don't think you ever responded to any of the questions about why 
> you think paying people to provide services to HCoop is a bad thing.
>   

It's not the paying so much as the new class of people who are 
subservient to the board. To pay people enough would cost a lot, and I'm 
not in favor of exploiting people by paying them too little. Also, 
having employees is a whole new layer of complexity and could open the 
co-op to liability.

For what it's worth, my opinion is that VPSes might be worth it if the 
costs will not go up too much, and I'd really only support getting the 
service from another co-op like the Tech Co-op we already run the 
outpost system from, or Cernio if they have the capacity these days.

Michael


>> There is also the philosophical angle to consider, whether a co-op 
>> should move down one tier closer to retail and feed the for-profit 
>> world. From running all VPSes, it's only one more step to mass 
>> purchasing a web hosting package from a commercial provider with a group 
>> discount, and so outsourcing tech support and software configuration. It 
>> would be more in keeping with the cooperative approach to move UP a 
>> level and provide its own rackspace. This is not exactly trivial though.
>>   
>>     
>
> That's certainly true.  I wrote it before, but it's worth repeating, for 
> anyone interested in my personal position: I weight quality of service 
> far ahead of our degree of support for particular kinds of businesses.  
> In fact, I consider small businesses like Linode to be no worse off, 
> philosophically, than co-ops, and I consider for-profit businesses to 
> have significantly higher expected quality of service.  I think HCoop 
> should exist because it isn't very profitable to provide the kinds of 
> neat niche stuff that our members want.
>
> The degree to which particular ideologies influence co-op 
> decision-making will be decided by board votes.  From discussion on this 
> list, I get the impression that only a minority of members have any 
> particular preference for supporting other co-ops and other 
> "less-businessy-than-usual" organizations, so I expect that we will end 
> up favoring that position in decision-making.  It might be useful to 
> take some kind of official poll, though.
>
>   

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