Duane I respectfully disagree.?
The current "Solutions" are inadequate and extremely limiting.? Separation of powers and segregation of duties are established practices, and for entities like public companies, required business practices.? This current so called solution of multiple owners defeats those practices and regulations/? ?
Grouys.io needs to stop treating this problem from a "hobby" standpoint and enplace policies and procedures and supporting technical solutions to accommodate the reality that not everyone wants to treat the organization of their groups as the current "existing solutions" support.
I have seen other forums have internal political battles and takeovers, some justified, some not..? The decider of whether to assign co-ownership of a group is entirely the group owners, and no one else.??
I personally am owner of at least a half dozen groups.? In only one? case have I set a co-owner.? The rest are at risk if something happens to me.? Heck, currently some don't even have a second moderator..? I set them up to try to save them during? the Yahell debacle, and while they are a shadow of what they used to be,? they live on for now.??
I face this ownership at my workplace as well,? as we manage SaaS services and even though our customers are businesses,? we get cases where they "lose" the sole owner of the account.? These are paying customers and the businesses, despite their poor practices of managing those accounts, and despite use giving them "best practices" still come back needing help to fix the self inflicted problem.
Example causes:
- Company hired a contractor and the contractor leaves (sometimes not amicably)? and owns the account with a personal Email - no self recovery possible.
- Business is sold and the new owners want control? - we must verify the sale was legit.
- business changes email server (URL change related to company name change)? and cannot recover the email of the owner
While some of these may not apply to Group.io owners, parallel? causes (like the demise of an Email service) can.
This is a real problem and Groups.io does a disservice to every group it has attracted by not addressing it.
Some of the solutions we use to address different issues/causes :
- Encourage the company/customer to re-establish the email, give it to a trusted staff member; log in and say "I forgot my password" and then add a new Email/owner.? and? deal with it
- Only works if you have access to the email
- cannot be legally? used in the EU/UK/Switzerland (GDPR privacy rules.)
- Establish the true ownership of the account/Company and hack??the account in the back end Database
- Costly in time and only one person in our company is allowed to do so. - Not desirable, but necessary at times
I think several solutions already suggested are not unreasonable for Groups.io::
- add a feature for an assigned "Inheritor"
- Add a Super admin/owner over current owner level
- have a function to reassign the group ownership on reasonable proof of the demise of the owner
Note that thee is no one "solution" ;? Groups.io needs options to deal with these things, as situations that drive the need change.
The bottom line is that the status quo is not a reasonable solution, as these threads and common occurrences clearly indicate.? Saying "just do the recommended second owner" is closing eyes and ears to a real problem.
