Re: Split off ActivityPub CG or WG

Pierre-Antoine asks:

> "Would it make sense to start by creating an Activity Pub Maintenance WG
> for maintaining AS2 and AP?"

AS2 and AP are in great need of maintenance. It would make a great deal of
sense to do maintenance first in order to create a solid foundation for
later efforts to move forward.

bob wyman


On Tue, Oct 10, 2023 at 3:22 AM Pierre-Antoine Champin <
pierre-antoine@w3.org> wrote:

> Dear all,
> may be a middle ground would be to
>
> 1- keep the SocialWeb CG as one umbrella group with a wide scope, and
> 2- create one (or several) more focused WGs
>
> This is, for example, what happens with the Credentials CG
> <https://www.w3.org/community/credentials/>,
> that has spun off the Verifiable Credentials
> <https://www.w3.org/2017/vc/WG/> and the Decentralized Identifiers
> <https://www.w3.org/2019/did-wg/> WGs.
>
> I also wanted to raise awareness about the notion of "maintenance WG":
> a WG that is chartered to produce no new recommendation, but only to
> maintain existing ones:
> applying errata, making editorial and substantial improvements (but not
> adding brand new features).
>
> Would it make sense to start by creating an Activity Pub Maintenance WG
> for maintaining AS2 and AP?
> Nothing would prevent this group from requesting a rechartering at some
> point to start working on ActivityPub2,
> whenever they and the CG find it is timely.
>
> Nothing would prevent, also, other WGs to emerge from the CG. The CG would
> remain the place where the broad community incubates and exchange new
> ideas. WGs, on the other hand, could focus on delivering specs.
>
> my 2¢
> On 04/10/2023 20:06, Christine Lemmer-Webber wrote:
>
> BTW, I agree with Evan: the CG *is* the home of ActivityPub currently.
>
> I made the suggestion to make a separate CG or WG for ActivityPub is
> mainly to provide more focus within the standards process, and it was
> primarily a suggestion about if a WG was made in particular.  It could
> be that this is a *sub-group* or outgrowth of the SocialCG, but I am
> also okay with it not happening.  I appreciate the massive amount of
> work Evan is doing organizing and reviving the CG right now, by the way.
>
> But I see the "official home" of the specification, and the authority of
> what constitutes ActivityPub, as the SocialCG at present.  I think
> SocialHub is an excellent place to coordinate, and works with the
> SocialCG.  But the SocialCG is where AP's editing authority resides, and
> I think that's good and appropriate and it was designed to be that way.
>
>  - Christine
>
> Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name> <evan@prodromou.name> writes:
>
>
> SocialHub is a great place for CG members to chat.
>
> I think the FEP process is a great way to develop extensions.
>
> The core ActivityPub and Activity Streams 2.0 specs are maintained by this CG.
>
> Evan
>
> On Oct 4, 2023 03:21, hellekin <hellekin@cepheide.org> <hellekin@cepheide.org> wrote:
>
>  We do have an ActivityPub Community Group -- a Special Interest Group
>  actually, in the form of the SocialHub.
>
>  If Aaron Parecki thinks it's good to keep the SocialCG and work with
>  ActivityPub within a broader context of the Social Web protocols, then I
>  see no reason to split again. We can continue ActivityPub ground work on
>  the SocialHub, relay to the SocialCG and get the best of both worlds.
>
>  The SocialHub was created to give momentum to the ActivityPub community
>  following the ActivityPub Conference held in Prague in 2019, and
>  organized very generously by Sebastian Lasse. It was a great success and
>  we anticipated much work to do that would become much noise for the
>  SocialCG mailing-list, since this list was larger than just ActivityPub.
>
>  If now the people we wanted to avoid spamming are fine with getting the
>  heat, I see no reason to move away and apart. On the contrary, I feel
>  like we are in a situation where we have a real grassroots community
>  that is grounded in free software and works on Codeberg and the
>  SocialHub, and a standards-oriented community group who can relay and
>  give body to already chewed on ground work. This is the best situation
>  we can imagine, where the grassroots implementors lead the way and the
>  standards-oriented people renders that body of work normative.
>
>  I am not a driving force in the specification process, so I'm happy
>  whatever decision is made, but I want to underline both the grassroots
>  effort that have been going on over the last four years around the
>  SocialHub, as well as the renewed interests by the Chair to consolidate
>  the normative form of ActivityPub and ActivityStreams. This is a great
>  opportunity to engage more people with more confidence in the process,
>  and not isolate other protocols that, if they are less visible, are no
>  less important to our common success.
>
>  ==
>  hk
>
>