World Wide Web Steering Committee

Minutes
April 19, 1999

1:00 p.m., Sampson House Conference Room

In attendance: Steve Blodgett, Steve Butts, Jim Evans, Steve Hirby, Robert Lowe, Pete Gilbert

Old Business

  1. Preliminary discussion of the reemergence of The Lawrentian's Web site and the staff's desire to permit advertising there by sponsors.
    Some of the issues discussed include:
    1) Our Web policy prohibits commercial activity on the Lawrence network, no matter who owns the machine or the software it's running, and soliciting advertising for the Lawrentian is arguably commercial activity.
    2) Our services relationship with WiscNet *may* prohibit commercial activity. (UPDATE: Robert checked and it seems there is no problem with subunits of members and commercial activity. We're back to having to make our own decisions.)
    3) There is a valid question about whether The Lawrentian, Lawrence's official student newspaper, should be publishing to the Web in this manner (student-owned machine; student-based domain name; site up and available erratically; presumably a new domain name when the current student web manager leaves Lawrence);
    4) If we implement a firewall that puts residence halls within it, what The Lawrentian has now set out to do would be much more difficult.

    No decision was made, pending further investigation.

  2. Appropriate location for department home pages

  3. It was agreed that the appropriate location for department home pages was in the department directory tree (aka http://www.lawrence.edu/dept/) and that departmental pages not in that tree should be encouraged to move there.

  4. Report on Firewall Discussions

  5. Bill Hodgkiss will be convening a meeting of representatives of various interested groups on campus (W3SC, CIT, etc.) to hear more about the firewall and the implications thereof.

New Business

  1. Wiscnet survey
    Evans will be attending the Wiscnet annual meeting on April 27. In conjunction with that event, Wiscnet is surveying members to determine what services members would like to receive. Contact Jim before April 24 if you have opinions about this topic.

Old Business and Announcements

  1. FERPA
    Blodgett wondered if the president's staff had had any recent discussions about FERPA issues relating to web stuff. It appears not.

  2. Writing Lab
    Gilbert announced that the Writing Lab web site (http://www.lawrence.edu/dept/STUDENT_ACAD/WRITING_LAB/) is now live and linked.

Next meeting

May 3, 1 p.m. in the Sampson House Conference Room
Respectfully submitted,

Pete Gilbert