A resignation letter:
Here's the thing, you see: I'm a hobbyist. This is what I do for fun.
Yes, I've been administering mail on Linux and Unix systems since about 1994. But they were my systems; I didn't need to answer to anyone but myself. I have done similar things for ASI/BayCon with a bewildering array of email systems, all of them on underpowered hosts with unconventional interfaces: I make sure the email gets from point A (usually outside) to point B (usually a set of staff members.) Like racing tiny sewing-machine-motor go-karts, the constrained environment is part of the fun; doing more with less is a chance to develop and enhance a certain set of skills. I have never had to deal with retention policies, administrative lock-outs, massive email abuse, or any of the thousand other insults that corporate email administrators cope with every single day; those are not in the skill-set I have chosen to develop.
There's a reason I didn't choose IT as a profession. I'm a mathematician by training, an early user of social media by happy accident, a science fiction fan by some force related to but quite unlike peer pressure, a writer of prototypes in both code and prose by temperament, and lately, a manager of engineers by slow evolution. None of these aspects of me are particularly well-known for compliance or even acquiescence.
When I look at the future of ASI, on its evolutionary journey from "five sci-fi fans in a trenchcoat cosplaying as a corporation" to a real, serious 501c(3) tax-exempt non-profit comparable to SFSFC or AAE/FurCon, I do see places where I might be able to help. But I volunteered to do non-profit systems management for the STOP AIDS Project in San Francisco twenty-plus years ago, and it looks nothing like what I do for fun. Handling email that might have indications of someone's HIV status in the days before widely-accessible treatments gives a whole new meaning to "are you sure we need to hang on to that?" And it was in that spirit that I made my promise to [Registration Head] and [Registration Second] that we would use people's freely-volunteered health data [proof of vaccination, required to receive a badge for this year's con] wisely and discreetly, and that we would get rid of it the first moment we reasonably could.
Being told by ASI's Compliance Officer that "the first moment we reasonably could" is in fact two years from now rather than the day after con was, to put it very mildly, a shock. Being told that after the data had been collected, rather than, say, when the possibility of it being collected was being discussed on this very list, was rather more than a shock. "If you collect this from people, we're going to have to hang on to it for two years to comply with our data-retention policy" would have been a great thing to know before I pushed the button to create the list. But that button cannot be un-pushed, just as the data cannot be un-collected.
So, [Head of Registration], would you be so good as to convey my apology to [his Second, who is not on this mailing list]? Because I do feel that I have broken the spirit of my promise to you both, if not the letter. My word means a great deal to me, and I don't break it lightly, even when there are changes to external circumstances.
And having done that, and apologized for it, I find that I need to step away from my hobby for at least a little while. Just as one does not expect a tiny sewing-machine-motor go-kart to carry two years' worth of spare tires and lug nuts, the current mail system will need to be replaced by one that has provisions for rolling retention windows and other corporate necessities. I have no interest in (and no aptitude for) driving an SUV of an email system; that is best left to those with both the training and the inclination. But I hear that ASI's Compliance Officer is working for a company that specializes in training people to do such things; perhaps his company might train the next Postmaster, at ASI's expense?