It’s now been just over a year since I created the
link between the Backup Central forums and this mailing list. When I
first started it, people asked me to keep a close eye on it and then see how
things went after a year. It’s been a year, and here’s what I
have to report.
First, let me say THANK YOU to everyone on this list for
supporting the idea, even if you thought it was crazy. Posts that were
made from the forum were NOT given “pariah” status; they
seemed to be given the same attention as posts made via the traditional way.
Since implementing this back in January of 2007, 1460 of the
6817 messages on this list were made by Backup Central members. That’s
21%! If you take a look at the posts (at http://www.backupcentral.com/phpBB2),
you will see that there are a good mix of questions AND answers in those posts.
Some very bright people have joined the discussion via the web interface,
and I think that’s a Good Thing(tm).
The number one concern, SPAM, has been stopped. Without
revealing the details of my method, I will say that it has been 100% effective
since it was implemented in July. It requires some manual work on my
part, but it keeps me connected to the list.
I made a change in the code a while back to address another
concern about anonymous postings. Since the forum has to post all
messages using the same email address (although the person’s Backup
Central username is given as the “real name”), I put a blurb at the
end of the post that shows the user’s real email address, and also gives
an email address to forward any spam to. That seems to have assuaged any
fears of anonymous postings.
The other concern -- that of “fly by” postings
-- does not appear to be the case. For a variety of reasons, people who
have joined Backup Central to post to the forum have stuck around. They’ve
posted other questions and answered other people’s questions.
Thank you again to all those who supported the idea by
answering questions posted via the interface. Here’s to another
good year in 2008.
---
W. Curtis Preston
Backup Blog @ www.backupcentral.com
VP Data Protection,
GlassHouse Technologies
