Sat Mar 1 10:09:22 PST 2008
Supporting NP's w/ Google Apps - Robert Williams

NP people are so cause oriented they can't pay attention to infrastructure.
Tend to be tech averse, or at least not interested.
NP's have difficulty maintaining momenteum because

•   Not proffessionally managed/staffed
•   Short terms for key members
•   Focus on cause, not process

Google apps provides

• email
• shared document space and applications for document creation
• calendar, both shared and individual (public too)
• chat (little used in NP circles)
• Start page common knowledge dispersal page
• *New* Sites  Web page groups with individual permission models ranging from private, domain, public

GA is seen as a good solution for the  NP office.  It's low maintainence,  can be used  from outside the office, provides continuity of process, and it's really cheap.

Some problems:

• GA isn't https: not very secure, not really an intranet.
• Adding users is a pain
• email lists are aliases, don't work quite right?
• Can't have subgroups

google gears: An API for doing what google apps does only locally.  Allow working off the net.  See buxfer.com