A few observations about GIMPNET

[Andrea Veri <av gnome org>]

I've been a long time GIMPNET user and tried to propose multiple ideas
without success and without receiving a good rationale about why
things couldn't change. I've seen many people using home-hosted bots
to administer channels, I've seen people having to join #opers
multiple times to request an OP status or a simple channel update and
I feel it's time to find a solution.

What's currently missing on the GIMPNET network:

- services. (there's no nickserv, chanserv at all)
- TOR is banned. (there is no way to hide your hostmask if you run
your IRC client from your home connection)
- SSL is not enabled, so all conversations happen in plain text. (even
private ones, yeah)
- even having a bot administering a channel, setting up its access
list is hard with a dynamic IP and DNS. (you can use a wildcard, true,
but that will result in someone spoofing your identity if he just
wants to)

So, the question is, should we migrate away to another network? (like
Freenode) or is there a way for GIMPNET to improve its services?