Meta-Portal and -Hosting

[Friedrich Lindenberg]

Hi again :-)

Ok, let's talk about what we CAN do together:

During today's phone conference, Liqd (Liquid Democracy e.V.) decided
to build a public platform for the promotion of LD and the available
implementations. We decided to rent a high-performance web server for
this purpose. The server will be loaded with installations of
LiquidFeedback, Votorola and Adhocracy. Other packages will be added
upon request.

== Hosted Services ==

The packages will be run in separated instances, both as public demo
systems and as on-demand ASP/SaaS/Cloud/Whatever services to any
organization willing to evaluate some version of LD. Software will be
deployed in a manner that will allow users to migrate their ASP
packages to other servers once they outgrow the Liqd incubator. All
services will be free, but donations (or individual memberships) will
be appreciated.

== Wiki Portal ==

The current Liqd Wiki (http://wiki.liqd.de) will be updated and turned
into a portal describing the general idea of LD and giving detailed
information on each of the systems. I would especially like to invite
Mike to contribute the extensive documentation available on Votorola
as a piece of a foundation for this.

== Tbd: Identity Server ==

The idea of establishing an OpenID identity service for verified
accounts (i.e. guaranteeing the user to be a unique individual) was
discussed. We will explore possibilities of doing this in a
privacy-conscious manner. The service would of course be based on the
ID protocols discussed on this list.

== Tbd: Project Hosting ==

In the future, the platform will also offer source control, mailing
lists and bugtracker hosting for any interested projects.

Of course, these technical measures are only a prerequisite to the
much larger task of promoting LD to other groups, organizations and
the public. While Liqd is actively involved in doing this in Germany,
we're inviting everyone (especially you, David!) to join this effort
and use the provided infrastructure for such means!

We're certainly interested to find a way in which your domain names,
David, could become a part of this effort. As you mentioned earlier,
you're linking their use to the adoption of some kind of legal
framework. I hope we can find a mode of cooperation which both allows
us to accommodate your proposals and is compatible with our group's
direction.

Cheers, Friedrich