2nd RFD: news.groups.proposals moderated
Dave Sill
moderated group news.groups.proposals
This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
NEWSGROUPS LINE: news.groups.proposals
news.groups.proposals Development of Big 8 proposals. (Moderated)
RATIONALE: news.groups.proposals
Proposals for changes to the Big 8 hierarchies (e.g., creating new
groups or removing dead groups) are currently discussed and developed
in news.groups, which is unmoderated. Unfortunately, the environment
in news.groups has not been conducive to this process for some time.
As noted by Russ Allbery in his recent "hierarchy management transition"
document (<11596610...@isc.org>), "[t]he biggest risk facing
the Big Eight newsgroup creation system going forward is the lack of a
congenial and constructive place for discussion of changes to the group
list."
The proposed news.groups.proposals would solve this problem by creating a
healthy environment where ideas can be raised, discussed, and developed.
The group will be manually moderated to remove personal attacks, flames,
and other inappropriate content, but disagreement and dissenting opinions
will still be encouraged.
Discussion of active proposals will move to news.groups.proposals.
news.groups will remain unmoderated and can be used for posting articles
not appropriate for news.groups.proposals, including discussions of overall
Big-8 policy and discussions of past and/or upcoming proposals. The B8MB
will continue to monitor news.groups.
CHARTER:
The newsgroup news.groups.proposals is for the announcement, discussion,
and development of changes to the Big 8 hierarchies, as documented at:
All official discussion of proposals as described in the creation documents
and elsewhere will take place in news.groups.proposals. Proponents with
active RFDs must conduct their discussions in NGP.
news.groups.proposals is hand-moderated. Discussions should pertain to
specific active proposals to create, remove, or modify newsgroups in the
Big-8 newsgroup hierarchies (comp, humanities, misc, news, rec, sci, soc,
and talk). For example, the following are not allowed:
* Off topic articles, including:
- Personal advertisements
- Commercial advertisements and money-making schemes
- Chain letters
- EMP spam
- General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
* Articles with unacceptable content, such as:
- HTML
- Copyright violations
- Excessive quoting
- Threats and/or advocation of violence
- Binaries, except PGP signatures, X-Face headers, and other
ancillary meta-data
- Personal attacks, including derogatory nicknames
- Flames
* Attempts to subvert the system, such as:
- Forgery or imitation of a valid e-mail address
- Unauthorized approval headers
- Excessive morphing/nym-shifting
Posting with a non-replyable or "munged" address is strongly discouraged.
If you feel that you must use a munged address, you are encouraged to
append ".invalid" to the end of the munged email address to indicate
that the address is not deliverable (even if ".invalid" is stripped from
the end). Users of munged addresses should not expect to get any notices
about the disposition of their posts by the moderation system, but the
presence or absence of a munged address will not be used to decide whether
a submission is suitable for posting.
Crossposting to unmoderated newsgroups relevant to a particular proposal
may be permitted, at the discretion of the moderators. With some
exceptions (such as RFD announcements and FAQs), crossposting to other
moderated groups is not permitted.
Discussions of overall Big-8 policy will remain in news.groups.
MODERATION POLICY: news.groups.proposals
All submissions will be approved or rejected by the moderation team based
on the above criteria. The moderation team will attempt to handle all
submissions promptly, and (as a team) will not knowingly "blackhole" a
poster by taking no action on the person's submissions.
Users who do not munge their email address will be notified of rejected
submissions via email. Note that submissions may be filtered to remove
spam, spews, and other attacks.
Moderator decisions can be appealed by contacting ngp-r...@big-8.org.
If necessary, the moderation panel will refer the case to the Big-8
Management Board for a final decision.
All substantive modifications to the moderation policy will go through an
RFD/LCC process before implementation.
MODERATOR INFO: news.groups.proposals
Head Moderator: Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com>
Moderator: Kevin Cannon <kca...@insurgent.org>
Moderator: Doug Freyburger <dfre...@yahoo.com>
Moderator: Aatu Koskensilta <aatu.kos...@xortec.fi>
Moderator: Kathy Morgan <kmo...@aptalaska.net>
Advisory Moderator: Brian Edmonds <br...@big-8.org>
Advisory Moderator: Jonathan Kamens <j...@big-8.org>
Advisory Moderator: Tim Skirvin <tski...@big-8.org>
Article Submissions: n...@big-8.org
Administrative Contact: ngp-r...@big-8.org
The NGP moderation panel consists of volunteers approved by the Big-8
Management Board.
If the moderation team decides that more members are needed, they may post
an invitation for new volunteers. New members must be approved by vote of
the current moderation team and are subject to veto by the Big-8 Management
Board. The B8MB reserves the right to expel members of the NGP moderation
panel as necessary.
END MODERATOR INFO
PROCEDURE:
For more information on the newsgroup creation process, please see:
http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:creation
Those who wish to influence the development of this RFD and its final
resolution should subscribe to news.groups and participate in the
relevant threads in that newsgroup. This is both a courtesy to groups
in which discussion of creating a new group is off-topic as well as the
best method of making sure that one's comments or criticisms are heard.
All discussion of active proposals should be posted to news.groups.
To this end, the followup header of this RFD has been set to
news.groups.
If desired by the readership of closely affected groups, the discussion
may be crossposted to those groups, but care must be taken to ensure
that all discussion appears in news.groups as well.
DISTRIBUTION:
This document has been posted to the following newsgroups:
news.announce.newgroups
news.groups
news.admin.announce
news.admin.hierarchies
PROPONENT:
Dave Sill <d...@big-8.org>
Co-Proponent: The Big-8 Management Board <bo...@big-8.org>
CHANGE HISTORY:
2006-10-23 2nd RFD
2006-10-09 1st RFD
Kjetil Torgrim Homme
>
> [quote is elided due to X-No-Archive: yes]
>
> [misgivings about B8MB wielding veto power over moderator team
> composition]
well, I think that's ok. we need a method of throwing a rogue
moderator team, and the power of governing Big8 has already been
delegated to B8MB. the real problem is that we, the users, can't
throw the B8MB if they abuse their mandate. we should work to fix
that -- but I don't see it as a show stopper for n.g.p.
--
Kjetil T.
aatu.kos...@xortec.fi
> Censorship and full control of what is seen and heard. I was correct
> in withdrawing from the application process. It is a overt attempt at
> censorship.
Right. Do you have some reason to suppose I, for instance, would reject
any relevant post? I have nothing to do with the board, after all.
You are right, of course, about the board being in control. But what
surprise is that? Would you be happy with them saying they will have no
control over the proposed group? Wouldn't you then, rather, point out
that, de facto, they could well overthrow any team of moderation if
they so wished? If so, you would be absolutely correct. Spelling out
that the board is holding the keys here is just being forthright.
--
Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.kos...@xortec.fi)
"Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, daruber muss man schweigen"
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
aatu.kos...@xortec.fi
> well, I think that's ok. we need a method of throwing a rogue
> moderator team, and the power of governing Big8 has already been
> delegated to B8MB. the real problem is that we, the users, can't
> throw the B8MB if they abuse their mandate. we should work to fix
> that -- but I don't see it as a show stopper for n.g.p.
Perhaps. I personally have no strong opinion about the new
establishment either way, but I don't think bickering and complaining
in news.groups is going to do any good. I'll be following news.groups,
and listening to any feeback on my success or lack thereof as a
moderator of news.groups.proposals - should I become one of the
moderators, that is. For those interested, I'm mostly doing this
because I think being a moderator of a USENET group might prove to be
an interesting experience, not out of any great love to the board. Some
of the members of the board I've known from other groups (and from
news.groups) and come to respect, while some rub me the wrong way
still. We are all stuck with the current situation, though, and it
seems to me that doing something constructive is somewhat more
satisfying than just throwing pot-shots at people (though that too
often proves most entertaining).
Jim Riley
> REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
> moderated group news.groups.proposals
Why doesn't this 2nd RFD contain a summary of discussion of the first
RFD? What changes were considered and what changes were made?
>Discussion of active proposals will move to news.groups.proposals.
>news.groups will remain unmoderated and can be used for posting articles
>not appropriate for news.groups.proposals, including discussions of overall
>Big-8 policy and discussions of past and/or upcoming proposals. The B8MB
>will continue to monitor news.groups.
What are the disadvantages to bring all discussion that is on-topic in
news.groups into news.groups.proposals or perhaps a news.groups
(moderated) or news.groups.moderated? Wouldn't this address the
concerns raised in the Rationale?
>CHARTER:
>
>The newsgroup news.groups.proposals is for the announcement, discussion,
>and development of changes to the Big 8 hierarchies, as documented at:
>
> http://www.big-8.org/
>
>All official discussion of proposals as described in the creation documents
>and elsewhere will take place in news.groups.proposals. Proponents with
>active RFDs must conduct their discussions in NGP.
>
>news.groups.proposals is hand-moderated. Discussions should pertain to
>specific active proposals to create, remove, or modify newsgroups in the
>Big-8 newsgroup hierarchies (comp, humanities, misc, news, rec, sci, soc,
>and talk). For example, the following are not allowed:
I think that the charter should focus on what separates the content of
news.groups.proposals from that of news.groups. Most of what is in
your list is not appropriate for any newsgroup. These are not the
close decisions that the moderators will be expected to make. Blocking
commercial advertisements, chain letters, binaries, and HTML are no
brainers as far as moderation decisions.
How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
> * Off topic articles, including:
> - Personal advertisements
> - Commercial advertisements and money-making schemes
> - Chain letters
> - EMP spam
> - General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
Placing this here denigrates discussion that will supposedly still be
appropriate for news.groups (unless the reason that the B8MB will
monitor news.groups will to be on the lookout for money-making
opportunities).
>Posting with a non-replyable or "munged" address is strongly discouraged.
>If you feel that you must use a munged address, you are encouraged to
>append ".invalid" to the end of the munged email address to indicate
>that the address is not deliverable (even if ".invalid" is stripped from
>the end). Users of munged addresses should not expect to get any notices
>about the disposition of their posts by the moderation system, but the
>presence or absence of a munged address will not be used to decide whether
>a submission is suitable for posting.
>
>Crossposting to unmoderated newsgroups relevant to a particular proposal
>may be permitted, at the discretion of the moderators. With some
>exceptions (such as RFD announcements and FAQs), crossposting to other
>moderated groups is not permitted.
Do the moderators recognize the problems that cross-posts will cause
if news.groups.proposals is not carried on a particular newsserver
that a follow-up poster uses? Would it better to simply block
cross-posted discussion?
Is news.groups considered relevant to most proposals (ie it might be
relevant to this particular RFD, but not those for the Haskell or
stroke group)? Would the moderators reject an articles cross-posted
to news.groups, or would they trim the group?
What are the advantages of cross-posted discussion? Is it really
needed?
--
Jim Riley
Tim Skirvin
moderator, and *a* co-proponent, but not as *the* moderator or *the*
proponent. So, well, I don't know what that means in practice. This is
my opinion, but it's based on lots of discussions.
Jim Riley <jim...@pipeline.com> writes:
> Why doesn't this 2nd RFD contain a summary of discussion of the first
> RFD? What changes were considered and what changes were made?
The template doesn't include it. But, from my list:
General opinion - not only Board members should be moderators.
How many moderators to reject a post? Approve? Probably '1' for both.
Fixes:
- Ban derogatory nicknames (definition?).
- Anti-munging suggestion is unpopular; will clarify purpose.
- "An RFD/LCC process" for mod policy changes, not "the RFD/LCC process"
Can moderators approve their own posts? - leave to new mods/software
Who chooses new moderators? - Board w/Mod support
Rejections to news.groups (or similar)? - up to mods, clarification coming
Convert news.groups -> news.groups.policy - potentially at some future date
Better define "threats", "personal attacks", "flames", "excessive morphing"?
- no, we won't do this - leave it to the mods to define
B8MB not allowed to be moderators? - they're allowed, but most don't want to
Are we rejecting "pointless" or "time-wasting" posts? - they count under
"off-topic"
Moderators are chosen
Crossposting policy is set
I may have missed something else, but I can't remember right now.
>> Discussion of active proposals will move to news.groups.proposals.
>> news.groups will remain unmoderated and can be used for posting articles
>> not appropriate for news.groups.proposals, including discussions of overall
>> Big-8 policy and discussions of past and/or upcoming proposals. The B8MB
>> will continue to monitor news.groups.
> What are the disadvantages to bring all discussion that is on-topic in
> news.groups into news.groups.proposals or perhaps a news.groups
> (moderated) or news.groups.moderated?
We don't want to do it, in essence.
>> news.groups.proposals is hand-moderated. Discussions should pertain to
>> specific active proposals to create, remove, or modify newsgroups in the
>> Big-8 newsgroup hierarchies (comp, humanities, misc, news, rec, sci, soc,
>> and talk). For example, the following are not allowed:
> I think that the charter should focus on what separates the content of
> news.groups.proposals from that of news.groups.
We want to be open about it, at first, and let the moderators work
it out over time. For now, "news.groups with only proposal discussions
and without the animosity" looks like a good start.
> How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
Up to the moderators, within reason. Initial thoughts seem to be
along the lines of starting when the proposal appears in NAN, and ending
some time after the proposed action is enacted (a day, a week, a month,
it's still up in the air).
>> * Off topic articles, including:
>> - Personal advertisements
>> - Commercial advertisements and money-making schemes
>> - Chain letters
>> - EMP spam
>> - General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
> Placing this here denigrates discussion that will supposedly still be
> appropriate for news.groups
How? Discussion can be off-topic for NGP without being off-topic
for news.groups.
>> Crossposting to unmoderated newsgroups relevant to a particular proposal
>> may be permitted, at the discretion of the moderators. With some
>> exceptions (such as RFD announcements and FAQs), crossposting to other
>> moderated groups is not permitted.
> Do the moderators recognize the problems that cross-posts will cause
> if news.groups.proposals is not carried on a particular newsserver
> that a follow-up poster uses?
We'll work to solve the problem if it exists. I don't want to
paralyze a good idea because of a potential solvable technical problem.
> Would it better to simply block cross-posted discussion?
> Is news.groups considered relevant to most proposals (ie it might be
> relevant to this particular RFD, but not those for the Haskell or
> stroke group)?
news.groups wouldn't be relevant in most cases. It would be in
the case of the NGP proposal itself, but not the Haskell or stroke
proposals.
> Would the moderators reject an articles cross-posted to news.groups, or
> would they trim the group?
I don't think there will be any trimming. They would reject if
appropriate.
> What are the advantages of cross-posted discussion? Is it really
> needed?
Discussion with the home group raises awareness of the new group
and the newsgroup creation system. Crossposting has been encouraged with
news.groups for proposal discussions for years (off-and-on, admittedly),
and I think it's been for the betterment of everybody in general. With
moderation, we'll have the opportunity to make it even better - the fights
will be nixed, and the useful input will still come through.
- Tim Skirvin (sk...@big-8.org)
--
http://www.big-8.org/ Big-8 Management Board
http://www.killfile.org/~tskirvin/ Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
<3eg%g.15820$o71....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>:
> ... How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
Until the proposal is resolved. I only see two types of resolution,
after an RFD has been published in n.a.n.:
1. The proponent withdraws the proposal.
2. The board accepts or rejects the proposal.
> ... What are the advantages of cross-posted discussion? Is it really
>needed?
Seems to me that we kicked this around earlier this spring.
Crossposting seemed to be tolerated under the old Guidelines.
This is what I worked out for the FAQ:
<http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=faqs:creation>
==== May I crosspost to other newsgroups during the discussion? ====
* All discussion of active proposals should be posted to news.groups.
The members of the Board are not obliged to subscribe to all
interested or affected groups to follow the dialogue
about the proposal.
* If desired by the readership of closely affected groups, the
discussion may be crossposted to those groups, but care must be
taken to ensure that all discussion appears in news.groups as well.
* Those who do choose to crosspost should be aware of the fact that
crossposting may cause hostility to the proposal or may run foul of
various filters set to avoid crossposts.
--
Member of the Big-8 Management Board (B8MB).
See http://www.big-8.org for more information.
2Rowdy
known as Dave Sill, that requests spam to be sent to <d...@big-8.org>
and I became inspired,
> MODERATION POLICY: news.groups.proposals
Clearly identify, using mids, the messages that would have been
moderated out of the threads starting from Message-ID:
<11614555...@isc.org> and Message-ID: <11610163...@isc.org>.
With that you can explian why the group is so desperately needed.
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me http://2rowdy.aacity.net
They killed the Credo. Viva el Credo!
2Rowdy
made by the entity known as 2Rowdy, that requests spam to be sent to
<Harry...@gmail.com> and I became inspired,
> I was reading <news:11616446...@isc.org>, made by the entity
> known as Dave Sill, that requests spam to be sent to <d...@big-8.org>
> and I became inspired,
>
>> MODERATION POLICY: news.groups.proposals
>
>
> Clearly identify, using mids, the messages that would have been
> moderated out of the threads starting from Message-ID:
> <11614555...@isc.org> and Message-ID:
> <11610163...@isc.org>.
Forgot about this one, Message-ID: <11615391...@isc.org>
> With that you can explian why the group is so desperately needed.
.
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me
http://2rowdy.aacity.net
[sig is lost, please use Google to find it]
Jonathan Kamens
like going through the exercise you've suggested, I'd
certainly have no problem with that, but I personally don't
have the energy for it right now.
I will say that we went through a similar exercise on the
ngp-mods mailing list, randomly selecting 20 articles from
news.groups and each of us weighing in one whether each
article would be approved or rejected, and we ended up with 11
unanimous rejections, 4 unanimous approvals, 3 non-unanimous
rejections, and 2 non-unanimous approvals. We discussed the
articles about which we weren't unanimous and pretty much
reached consensus about them, so it seems like the moderation
team has a pretty good idea at this point, although certainly
an idea that will evolve over time, of what they think should
be accepted and rejected.
And no, I have no intention of posting the specific articles
we sampled and our decisions about them, because I think the
only thing that could possibly accomplish is to provoke the
kind of pointless flaming and arguments that the proposal is
meant to reduce.
--
Help stop the genocide in Darfur!
http://www.genocideintervention.net/
2Rowdy
the entity known as Jonathan Kamens, that requests spam to be sent to
<j...@kamens.brookline.ma.us> and I became inspired,
You are new to Usenet and don't know how to quote?
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me
http://2rowdy.aacity.net
No, I am not demented,
just gray haired
Tim Skirvin
> Clearly identify, using mids, the messages that would have been
> moderated out of the threads starting from Message-ID:
> <11614555...@isc.org> and Message-ID: <11610163...@isc.org>.
For the record, these are the "official" RFD threads for the
soc.support.stroke and comp.lang.haskell proposals. In your other
message, you ask to add the comp.sys.laptops.thinkpad proposal.
The stroke thread is only six messages long; most of the
discussion of the stroke proposal didn't take place in the main thread.
I doubt that the last message (from 'mjanusz') would have been approved,
because there was no content, just quotes. The rest would probably be
okay.
The Haskell thread is much longer. I would have rejected some of
the alt.*-related sub-threads as off-topic flames, as well as everything
involving brain surgery (just off-topic). I probably would have had a
post or two of mine rejected. The discussion of the Apache Software
Foundation voting system was probably too policy-ish too, and I would have
tried to move that discussion back to news.groups.
The Thinkpad thread is only three messages long (again, the
discussion has been elsewhere). They all look legit to me.
> With that you can explian why the group is so desperately needed.
I think that NGP's need is more clearly shown with the threads
for soc.religion.asatru, soc.men.moderated, soc.support.vision-impaired,
and news.groups.proposals itself. The system can handle small amounts of
controversy without huge problems, but we should be able to handle truly
controversial proposals without a meltdown.
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
<tskirvin.20061024145205$41...@cairo.ks.uiuc.edu>:
> ... The discussion of the Apache Software
>Foundation voting system was probably too policy-ish too, and I would have
>tried to move that discussion back to news.groups.
Agreed.
Thread drift happens.
Sometimes, I help it along. ;o)
Marty
Daryl Hunt
"Dave Sill" <d...@big-8.org> wrote in message
news:11616446...@isc.org...
> REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
> moderated group news.groups.proposals
>
> This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
> moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
What the hell is wrong with you people. That's a rhetoric question. Wheels
are round, not square and you don't have to try and reinvent the wheel.
Plus, having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
invited disaster and failure.
Tim Skirvin
> What the hell is wrong with you people. That's a rhetoric question. Wheels
> are round, not square and you don't have to try and reinvent the wheel.
> Plus, having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
> invited disaster and failure.
Thank you, Daryl, for clearly pointing out what kinds of posts
would be rejected under the proposed NGP moderation scheme!
Aratzio
transparently proposed:
>You are new to Usenet
No.
> and don't know how to quote?
"To be or not to be"
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times"
"Your MAMA"
--
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
Doug Freyburger
>
> I think that NGP's need is more clearly shown with the threads
> for soc.religion.asatru, soc.men.moderated, soc.support.vision-impaired,
> and news.groups.proposals itself. The system can handle small amounts of
> controversy without huge problems, but we should be able to handle truly
> controversial proposals without a meltdown.
The fact that they could be handled at all in any form says the board
is now handling edge cases better than Russ and Todd were able to.
Much of the reason for a moderated forum is simpler than that - NG is
a sewer and has been since before the board was formed. When
there's a noise problem moderation removes most but not all of the
noise. We've seen potential proponents admit they have declined to
submit RFDs because they are unwilling to face NG. We've even
seen a board member say he's recommended against a potential
porponent diving into the sewer of NG. We saw the bass tournament
fishing guy leave once exposed to the sewer of NG.
2Rowdy
made by the entity known as Tim Skirvin, that requests spam to be sent
to <tski...@killfile.org> and I became inspired,
> "2Rowdy" <Harry...@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> Clearly identify, using mids, the messages that would have been
>> moderated out of the threads starting from Message-ID:
>> <11614555...@isc.org> and Message-ID:
>> <11610163...@isc.org>.
>
> For the record, these are the "official" RFD threads for the
> soc.support.stroke and comp.lang.haskell proposals. In your other
> message, you ask to add the comp.sys.laptops.thinkpad proposal.
>
> The stroke thread is only six messages long; most of the
> discussion of the stroke proposal didn't take place in the main
> thread.
> I doubt that the last message (from 'mjanusz') would have been
> approved, because there was no content, just quotes. The rest
> would probably be okay.
>
> The Haskell thread is much longer. I would have rejected
> some of the alt.*-related sub-threads as off-topic flames, as well
> as everything involving brain surgery (just off-topic). I probably
> would have had a post or two of mine rejected. The discussion of
> the Apache Software Foundation voting system was probably too
> policy-ish too, and I would have tried to move that discussion back
> to news.groups.
>
> The Thinkpad thread is only three messages long (again, the
> discussion has been elsewhere). They all look legit to me.
Thank you for your countdown.
You agree with me that the greater majority of the posts made in these
official (whitelistable) RFD threads would have passed moderation.
>> With that you can explian why the group is so desperately needed.
>
> I think that NGP's need is more clearly shown with the
> threads
> for soc.religion.asatru, soc.men.moderated,
> soc.support.vision-impaired, and news.groups.proposals itself. The
> system can handle small amounts of controversy without huge
> problems, but we should be able to handle truly controversial
> proposals without a meltdown.
May I remind you that you, with the rest of Bamby, did handle
controversial proposals.
May I remind you that Bamby did resolve the meltdowns and came to a
conclusion.
Please explain to me, again, with the above in mind, why there is a
desperate need to hide inside a moderated newsgroup?
All it will accomplish is that Bamby gives in to mistrust, adding to
it, and I honestly believe that by doing so Bamby will end it's own
administration.
I advise, again, strongly, don't go that way.
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me
http://www.aacity.net Citroen Newsgroup
Random sigs should be banned from Usenet
Tim Skirvin
> You agree with me that the greater majority of the posts made in these
> official (whitelistable) RFD threads would have passed moderation.
Yes. (Whitelistable? We aren't going to have a whitelist.)
>>> With that you can explian why the group is so desperately needed.
>> I think that NGP's need is more clearly shown with
>> the threads for soc.religion.asatru, soc.men.moderated,
>> soc.support.vision-impaired, and news.groups.proposals itself. The
>> system can handle small amounts of controversy without huge problems,
>> but we should be able to handle truly controversial proposals without a
>> meltdown.
> May I remind you that you, with the rest of Bamby, did handle
> controversial proposals.
First, I would have rejected this post from NGP for using the name
'Bamby'. FYI.
Second, while I think that the Board was able to - barely - handle
the noise, it wasn't without cost. Proponents have been chased away, most
prominently, and they won't come back again. Useful suggestions have been
obscured by the noise and the flames. And those that chose to stay had to
don their heaviest flamewar gear, which has made the discussions much less
useful than they could be.
[creating NGP]
> All it will accomplish is that Bamby gives in to mistrust, adding to
> it, and I honestly believe that by doing so Bamby will end it's own
> administration.
I believe that if we do not have a place where newsgroup proposals
can be discussed in a constructive manner, then no Big-8 newsgroup
creation system has a chance of surviving. news.groups just plain doesn't
cut it anymore, and I'm not convinced that it has for the last ten years.
While I understand that there is risk that we will grow too insular, I
think that risk pales in comparison to the danger of doing nothing.
Jonathan Kamens
>May I remind you that you, with the rest of Bamby, did handle
>controversial proposals.
>May I remind you that Bamby did resolve the meltdowns and came to a
>conclusion.
>
>Please explain to me, again, with the above in mind, why there is a
>desperate need to hide inside a moderated newsgroup?
Because it's not sustainable. Because people who have to put
up with that kind of crap on an ongoing basis burn out (c.f.
all previous inhabitants of the seat the Board is currently
occupying). Because the environment in news.groups scares
away some proponents and hences reduces the number of viable
proposals for useful newsgroups the Board gets to consider.
Because there's no reason to demand that people put up with
the environment of news.groups to get a group created, when
there is a simple solution, i.e., a moderated group, which
solves the problem.
>All it will accomplish is that Bamby gives in to mistrust, adding to
>it, and I honestly believe that by doing so Bamby will end it's own
>administration.
IDotB8MBP. Fa11!
2Rowdy
to <tski...@killfile.org> and I became inspired,
> "2Rowdy" <Harry...@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> You agree with me that the greater majority of the posts made in
>> these official (whitelistable) RFD threads would have passed
>> moderation.
>
> Yes. (Whitelistable? We aren't going to have a whitelist.)
Whitelistable. A proponent tells supporters to look for the thread in
news.groups starting with the word RFD followed with the proposed
name.
> First, I would have rejected this post from NGP for using
> the name 'Bamby'. FYI.
Why? I explained ages ago how it is intended and why I invented the
name. I am unaware of any wrong doing.
>> All it will accomplish is that Bamby gives in to mistrust, adding
>> to it, and I honestly believe that by doing so Bamby will end it's
>> own administration.
>
> I believe that if we do not have a place where newsgroup
> proposals can be discussed in a constructive manner, then no Big-8
> newsgroup creation system has a chance of surviving. news.groups
> just plain doesn't cut it anymore, and I'm not convinced that it
> has for the last ten years. While I understand that there is risk
> that we will grow too insular, I think that risk pales in
> comparison to the danger of doing nothing.
You wish to discard the successes Bamby has made so far and the proof,
you have given, that news.groups is capable of constructive
discussion.
You fail to recognize the improvements Bamby has made in discussing.
Remember who you will reward by hiding in a moderated newsgroup. And
realize what the consequences are.
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me
http://www.aacity.net Citroen Newsgroup
I drank of the purifying Nirang, the sterile urine of the spotless white bull of which there is but one in ten thousand. I am the wearer of The Secret Girdle that once belonged to DE.
Kathy Morgan
> "Dave Sill" <d...@big-8.org> wrote in message
> news:11616446...@isc.org...
> > REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
> > moderated group news.groups.proposals
> >
> > This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
> > moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
>
> having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
> invited disaster and failure.
I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.) What I do know is that
in extensive debate on a mailing list for the proposed moderators, all
of them have been reasonable, considerate, and willing to work
cooperatively with the others.
I think all of us disagree with some of the opinions of other members of
the team. We have been able to disagree without becoming offensive to
one another, or defensive about our positions. In some cases when we
could not persuade one another, we have held a vote and agreed to abide
by the voted decision even if our personal preference was on the losing
side of the issue.
I believe all of the members of the proposed moderation team will do
their job to the best of their ability, and I don't expect any of them
to go rogue. (I expect we'll occasionally make mistakes, since we're
human, but I don't think any of the team is going to do it
deliberately.) If one of us should go rogue, though, and begin either
rejecting or approving inappropriately, the B8MB has the ability to
remove that moderator.
--
Kathy - If you're reading this in your web browser from Google or
similar forum, NNTP "newsreaders" are a better way to access the
content. <http://www.aptalaska.net/~kmorgan/how-it-works.html>
Links to NNTP newsreaders at <http://www.newsreaders.com/>
Tim Skirvin
>> First, I would have rejected this post from NGP for using
>> the name 'Bamby'. FYI.
> Why? I explained ages ago how it is intended and why I invented the
> name. I am unaware of any wrong doing.
From <tskirvin.20060820144226$29...@cairo.ks.uiuc.edu>
You know that I look at people saying 'bamby' and such in the same
light that as those saying 'fr00ts', yes? It doesn't particularly
bother me, but it does make me think that the poster is more interested
in insults than persuasion.
This was reiterated to you by Jonathan a couple of weeks ago.
You may not consider it insulting, but an air of name-calling is a
detriment to reasonable discussion, and against the purpose of the new
group.
>> I believe that if we do not have a place where newsgroup
>> proposals can be discussed in a constructive manner, then no Big-8
>> newsgroup creation system has a chance of surviving. news.groups
>> just plain doesn't cut it anymore, and I'm not convinced that it
>> has for the last ten years. While I understand that there is risk
>> that we will grow too insular, I think that risk pales in
>> comparison to the danger of doing nothing.
> You wish to discard the successes Bamby has made so far and the proof,
> you have given, that news.groups is capable of constructive discussion.
> You fail to recognize the improvements Bamby has made in discussing.
I do not believe that the B8MB's actions or words have made these
recent threads acceptable, where previous threads were not. Far more
likely is that these are merely non-controversial topics, and that the
next time somebody asks for something that might actually raise tempers,
news.groups will again descend into chaos.
> Remember who you will reward by hiding in a moderated newsgroup.
The proponents, with any luck. (And we're not hiding. I'm
sticking around in news.groups, for Gods' sakes...)
Kathy Morgan
> I was reading <news:tskirvin.20061024201520$36...@cairo.ks.uiuc.edu>,
> made by the entity known as Tim Skirvin, that requests spam to be sent
> to <tski...@killfile.org> and I became inspired,
>
> Whitelistable. A proponent tells supporters to look for the thread in
> news.groups starting with the word RFD followed with the proposed
> name.
The proposal is for a hand moderated newsgroup, with no whitelist and no
blacklist. Since there is no whitelist, nothing is whitelistable.
--
Kathy - help for new users at <http://www.aptalaska.net/~kmorgan/>
Good Net Keeping Seal of Approval at <http://www.gnksa.org/>
OE-quotefix can fix OE:
<http://home.in.tum.de/~jain/software/oe-quotefix/>
James Farrar
<dh...@celticommnospam.com> wrote:
>Plus, having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
>invited disaster and failure.
Could you please name names?
Rebecca Ore
> Because the environment in news.groups scares
> away some proponents
Misread as "sane proponents."
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
It represents what I think people said. If I have made a mistake in
interpretation, I apologize in advance and will correct it as best I can
in the next version of this post. This "poll" is unscientific and offers
no warrant for statistical validity whatsoever.
Since I neglected to keep a message ID for some of the early respondents,
backtracking to verify their views is difficult. If I ever try using
this method again, I will try to track the IDs from the beginning.
I have pulled out the names of the moderation team and the proponents
to make the feedback from bystanders somewhat clearer.
Marty
* = Lines changed since last post. Many lines have been
deleted without a trace in order to rearrange
the list. All of the proposed moderators had
been somewhere in the previous lists.
* MODERATION TEAM:
* ---------------
* Head Moderator: Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com>
* Moderator: Kevin Cannon <kcan...@insurgent.org>
* Moderator: Doug Freyburger <dfrey...@yahoo.com>
* Moderator: Aatu Koskensilta <aatu.koskensi...@xortec.fi>
* Moderator: Kathy Morgan <kmor...@aptalaska.net>
* Advisory Moderator: Brian Edmonds <b...@big-8.org>
* Advisory Moderator: Jonathan Kamens <j...@big-8.org>
* Advisory Moderator: Tim Skirvin <tskir...@big-8.org>
* OTHER PROPONENTS:
* ----------------
* Dave Sill <d...@big-8.org> (Principal proponent)
* James Farrar <ja...@big-8.org>
* Thomas Lee <t...@big-8.org>
* Marty Moleski <mol...@canisius.edu>
SEEMED TO ME TO BE IN FAVOR OF THE GENERAL IDEA:
-----------------------------------------------
Bill <wkro...@sunstroke.sdsu.edu>
Chris Barnes <ch...@txbarnes.com>
Jon Bell <jtb...@presby.edu>
Charles <for...@mac.com>
"Mark Dodel" <madode...@ptd.net>
Kjetil Torgrim Homme <kjet...@kaksi.ifi.uio.no>
Jayne Kulikauskas <jayne.ku...@gmail.com>
Charles Lindsey <c...@clerew.man.ac.uk>
* Ed Mooring <moo...@acm.org> in <12je6e3...@news.supernews.com>
Rebecca Ore <spamtra...@verizon.net>
Otaku <ot...@troll4fun.c0m>
saur <sa...@nyc.rr.com>
Kay Shapero <k...@see.my.sig.invalid>
SUPPORT THE PROPOSAL IN ITS ORIGINAL FORM (moderation by the board):
-------------------------------------------------------------------
John Stanley <sta...@shell.peak.org> in <egk0k7$9pp$1...@shell.peak.org>
Jim Logajan <Jam...@Lugoj.com> wrote in <Xns985E892BBA78...@216.168.3.30>
SOMEWHAT IN FAVOR:
-----------------
Rick Pikul <rwp...@sympatico.ca>
[Add an "everything submitted" partner group?]
ryannosaurus <ryzill@@r0ck.com> in <6tbri296kci3jp81b...@4ax.com>
Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com>
WORTH CONSIDERING:
-----------------
Stig Sandbeck Mathisen <s...@fnord.no>
ON CONDITION THAT N.G.P. BE FOR NEWSGROUP PROPOSALS ONLY:
--------------------------------------------------------
goanna <spam...@crayne.org> wrote in <45305c8a$1...@news.unimelb.edu.au>
===================================================
OPPOSED:
-------
"2Rowdy" <Harry...@gmail.com>
Cyli <cyl...@gmail.com.invalid>
Graham Drabble <usen...@drabble.me.uk> in <Xns985BDC1F56592gr...@ID-77355.user.dfncis.de>
Nicholas Fitzpatrick <nf...@shell1.sentex.ca> in <452e7b43$1...@news.sentex.net>
nukleus
Bob Officer <bobof...@127.0.0.7> [No longer willing to moderate.]
Marg Petersen (moi) aka pan...@peak.org
OPPOSED TO THE BOARD'S EXISTENCE:
--------------------------------
Wayne Brown <fwb...@bellsouth.net> in <4vQXg.25147$vi3....@bignews3.bellsouth.net>
Gary Burnore
====================================================
AMBIVALENT:
----------
toto <scar...@wicked.witch> wrote in <7qrti25rgr73s433g...@4ax.com>
INDETERMINATE:
-------------
Aratzio <a6ah...@sneakemail.com>
"Chadwick StoneŠ" <chad_...@127.0.0.1>
MU:
--
"Adam H. Kerman" <a...@chinet.com> in <Pine.LNX.4.63.06...@qbbshf.puvarg.pbz>
PLAYING ON A DIFFERENT GAME BOARD:
---------------------------------
"Daryl Hunt" <dh...@celticommnospam.com> in <4532c674$1...@news.i70west.com>
Kathy Morgan
saur
> It represents what I think people said.
I neither support nor oppose the 2nd RFD. Do not list me in either
category.
Jim Riley
Skirvin) wrote:
>Jim Riley <jim...@pipeline.com> writes:
>
>> Why doesn't this 2nd RFD contain a summary of discussion of the first
>> RFD? What changes were considered and what changes were made?
>
> The template doesn't include it. But, from my list:
Shouldn't the B8MB be exemplary as proponents?
> I may have missed something else, but I can't remember right now.
>
>>> Discussion of active proposals will move to news.groups.proposals.
>>> news.groups will remain unmoderated and can be used for posting articles
>>> not appropriate for news.groups.proposals, including discussions of overall
>>> Big-8 policy and discussions of past and/or upcoming proposals. The B8MB
>>> will continue to monitor news.groups.
>
>> What are the disadvantages to bring all discussion that is on-topic in
>> news.groups into news.groups.proposals or perhaps a news.groups
>> (moderated) or news.groups.moderated?
>
> We don't want to do it, in essence.
The B8MB in its charter for news.groups.proposals places more emphasis
on types of articles that would be trivially rejected, such as MMF,
HTML, binaries, etc. than it does on things that would distinguish
news.groups.proposals from news.groups. Why is the B8MB seemingly
unconcerned about MMF, HTML, binaries, etc. in news.groups?
>>> news.groups.proposals is hand-moderated. Discussions should pertain to
>>> specific active proposals to create, remove, or modify newsgroups in the
>>> Big-8 newsgroup hierarchies (comp, humanities, misc, news, rec, sci, soc,
>>> and talk). For example, the following are not allowed:
>
>> I think that the charter should focus on what separates the content of
>> news.groups.proposals from that of news.groups.
>
> We want to be open about it, at first, and let the moderators work
>it out over time. For now, "news.groups with only proposal discussions
>and without the animosity" looks like a good start.
Then put these in the front of what is _on_ topic. If you want you
can then list all the junk that Cleanfeed will suppress in an
unmoderated newsgroup.
>> How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
>
> Up to the moderators, within reason. Initial thoughts seem to be
>along the lines of starting when the proposal appears in NAN, and ending
>some time after the proposed action is enacted (a day, a week, a month,
>it's still up in the air).
>
>>> * Off topic articles, including:
>>> - Personal advertisements
>>> - Commercial advertisements and money-making schemes
>>> - Chain letters
>>> - EMP spam
>>> - General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
>
>> Placing this here denigrates discussion that will supposedly still be
>> appropriate for news.groups
>
> How? Discussion can be off-topic for NGP without being off-topic
>for news.groups.
Because you don't appear to be able to prioritize. Is "no personal
advertisements" the first thing that you could think of when it came
to in determining what would distinguish the moderated
news.groups.proposals from the unmoderated news.groups?
>>> Crossposting to unmoderated newsgroups relevant to a particular proposal
>>> may be permitted, at the discretion of the moderators. With some
>>> exceptions (such as RFD announcements and FAQs), crossposting to other
>>> moderated groups is not permitted.
>
>> Do the moderators recognize the problems that cross-posts will cause
>> if news.groups.proposals is not carried on a particular newsserver
>> that a follow-up poster uses?
>
> We'll work to solve the problem if it exists. I don't want to
>paralyze a good idea because of a potential solvable technical problem.
How will you determine whether the problem exists?
> Would it better to simply block cross-posted discussion?
Since the default behavior of posting agents is to follow up to all
groups that are cross-posted to, you will be getting submissions from
persons who didn't realize their post would be subject to moderation;
or the posts will be lost because they won't be re-directed to the
moderators.
For those reasons, I think it would be better to restrict
cross-posting to articles that had followups set to
news.groups.proposals only. People will then be more likely to know
that they have entered into a moderated discussion.
>> Is news.groups considered relevant to most proposals (ie it might be
>> relevant to this particular RFD, but not those for the Haskell or
>> stroke group)?
>
> news.groups wouldn't be relevant in most cases. It would be in
>the case of the NGP proposal itself, but not the Haskell or stroke
>proposals.
>
>> Would the moderators reject an articles cross-posted to news.groups, or
>> would they trim the group?
>
> I don't think there will be any trimming. They would reject if
>appropriate.
How do you anticipate the transition from news.groups to
news.groups.proposals occuring?
>> What are the advantages of cross-posted discussion? Is it really
>> needed?
>
> Discussion with the home group raises awareness of the new group
>and the newsgroup creation system. Crossposting has been encouraged with
>news.groups for proposal discussions for years (off-and-on, admittedly),
>and I think it's been for the betterment of everybody in general. With
>moderation, we'll have the opportunity to make it even better - the fights
>will be nixed, and the useful input will still come through.
If there is no cross-posting, people will be more aware that they
shouldn't fight, making less work for the moderators. People will use
the moderation as a weapon, subtly triggering a response that then has
to be rejected by the moderators.
Cross-posting can be used to inform, without permitting ongoing
cross-posted discussion.
--
Jim Riley
Jim Riley
<mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 04:01:03 GMT, Jim Riley <jim...@pipeline.com> wrote in
><3eg%g.15820$o71....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>:
>
>> ... How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
>
>Until the proposal is resolved. I only see two types of resolution,
>after an RFD has been published in n.a.n.:
>
>1. The proponent withdraws the proposal.
>
>2. The board accepts or rejects the proposal.
How soon will the proposal become inactive for purposes of permitted
discussion?
>> ... What are the advantages of cross-posted discussion? Is it really
>>needed?
>
>Seems to me that we kicked this around earlier this spring.
>Crossposting seemed to be tolerated under the old Guidelines.
It works better when one of the groups is not moderated.
--
Jim Riley
Steve Bonine
> How soon will the proposal become inactive for purposes of permitted
> discussion?
How long do you think it should be? A week has been mentioned as a
reasonable period. I would anticipate that the moderators will post a
notice in the group indicating when submissions for a specific group
will no longer be accepted.
2Rowdy
to <tski...@killfile.org> and I became inspired,
I give up.
Thought you has some balls.
Be sure the moderator software you want to use is Binary-proof.
<unsubscribes again>
--
d:J0han; Certifiable me
http://2rowdy.aacity.net
IHUMFA
Henrietta K Thomas
(Kathy Morgan) wrote:
>Daryl Hunt <dh...@celticommnospam.com> wrote:
>
>> "Dave Sill" <d...@big-8.org> wrote in message
>> news:11616446...@isc.org...
>> > REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
>> > moderated group news.groups.proposals
>> >
>> > This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
>> > moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
>>
>> having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
>> invited disaster and failure.
>
>I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
>enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.)
He is referring to Kevin Cannon, a kookaholic (my term) who went out of
his way to "kookify" Daryl, and who (last time I looked) was still
hosting kook faqs at insurgent.org.
>What I do know is that
>in extensive debate on a mailing list for the proposed moderators, all
>of them have been reasonable, considerate, and willing to work
>cooperatively with the others.
So were all the proposed moderators for soc.men.moderated.
>I think all of us disagree with some of the opinions of other members of
>the team. We have been able to disagree without becoming offensive to
>one another, or defensive about our positions. In some cases when we
>could not persuade one another, we have held a vote and agreed to abide
>by the voted decision even if our personal preference was on the losing
>side of the issue.
That is a hopeful sign.
>I believe all of the members of the proposed moderation team will do
>their job to the best of their ability, and I don't expect any of them
>to go rogue. (I expect we'll occasionally make mistakes, since we're
>human, but I don't think any of the team is going to do it
>deliberately.) If one of us should go rogue, though, and begin either
>rejecting or approving inappropriately, the B8MB has the ability to
>remove that moderator.
The question here is whether the board really wants to take a chance
having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
question.
Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
maybe not. It is hard to say.
--
Henrietta
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>In article <453d9c6a$0$5604$c3e...@news.astraweb.com>,
>Martin X. Moleski, SJ <mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 04:01:03 GMT, Jim Riley <jim...@pipeline.com> wrote in
>><3eg%g.15820$o71....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>:
>>
>>> ... How long is a specific proposal considered to be "active"?
>>
>>Until the proposal is resolved. I only see two types of resolution,
>>after an RFD has been published in n.a.n.:
>>
>>1. The proponent withdraws the proposal.
>>
>>2. The board accepts or rejects the proposal.
>
>Once it is accepted it is no longer active? How does one get an accepted
>proposal adopted if it goes inactive as soon as it is accepted?
Let me try this again. Perhaps an outline will work so that
you feel satisfied that no self-referential contradiction will
cause the system to turn the system into a shower of sparks
and smoke.
1. Informal stages: proponents kick ideas around in news.groups,
with the n.a.n. mods, with mentors, with other newsgroups.
Their idea for a new group may die or get trampled to death
at this stage of the process.
2. If a proponent submits a formal RFD to n.a.n. that the
n.a.n. mods agree to publish in n.a.n., then the procedure
section of the RFD will explain that the official discussion
of the proposal will take place in n.g.p. Neither the
proponent nor the board are obliged to go elsewhere to see
what people have to say about the proposal. If anyone
wants to have input on it, they either post in n.g.p.
or send e-mail to the proponent or the board.
3. All subsequent RFDs and the Last Call for Comments (LCC)
will be published in n.a.n. and officially discussed
in n.g.p.
4. If the board votes to accept or reject the RFD at the
end of the discussion period defined by the LCC, the
official discussion of the proposal is over. Subsequent
discussion of how the board's decision was stupid,
arrogant, inflexible, illogical, tyrranical, censorious,
and destructive of Usenet will take place in news.groups.
Marty
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
> ... Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
>help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
>maybe not. It is hard to say.
Predicting the future behavior of individuals is notoriously
difficult.
I'm willing to give Kevin the benefit of the doubt.
If things work out, great.
If things don't work out, then we'll have to try
something else.
"One observation is worth ten thousand expert opinions."
Jonathan Kamens
>The question here is whether the board really wants to take a chance
>having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
>question.
It's better to err on the side of giving people a chance. If
they pull it off, great, and if they don't, then we can cross
that bridge when we come to it.
It's only Usenet, nobody dies. Quite frankly, as much as I
love Usenet, I don't think the stakes are so high that we have
to shut out a seemingly reasonable person on the off chance
that he's just putting on an act and will turn into a raving
lunatic before the ink is dry.
That same philosophy is what led to our handling of the
johnny-come-lately SMM proponents as we did. As others have
pointed out, we knew the risks, we accepted them, and we
still believe that was the right decision.
Incidentally, I must say that I found the whole SMM thing a
bit puzzling, because I don't think by their actions they
actually caused any harm to the proposal; in fact, I think
they probably made it better than it would have been if they
hadn't interceded. Although the group is having moderation
problems right now, but those appear to me to be independent
of the question of whether the proposal we ended up approving
was a good one, which I believe it was.
Tim Skirvin
> Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
> help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
> maybe not. It is hard to say.
For my part, I expect that I'll enjoy working with Kevin. He
is earnest, he has interesting ideas and is willing to talk about them
openly, and he has seemed willing to work with others before even if he
doesn't agree with them 100%. He looks, to me, like an ideal volunteer.
William Kronert
> SEEMED TO ME TO BE IN FAVOR OF THE GENERAL IDEA:
Yes, I am still supportive of the moderated news.groups.proposals
newsgroup.
After reading much debate I have formulated some conclusions and ideas.
It appears that most of the debate centers on whether the moderators can
be trusted and how to ensure this trust.
In any other moderated newsgroup this "trusting" concern would not
normally be an issue, i.e. you either accept the moderator(s) or you
don't. I can understand the concern to a degree with
news.groups.proposals since it will deal with management decisions of the
big eight newsgroup proposals. Perhaps this is a special case in which
"trust" of the moderators is a valid concern and needs to be addressed as
best as possible.
I have seen several ways to address this issue.
1) Not do anything just as it is in any other moderated newsgroup. You
either accept the B8MB as being the moderators or you don't. I don't have
a problem with this.
2) Add other moderators who have opposing views. * I don't have a problem
with this either but my concerns are listed below.
3) Re-direct the rejected articles to news.groups or a companion newsgroup
or a web page.* I have mix feelings on this.
4) Posters could use a tag or some type of identification in the 1st line
of their article that would give permission from that author to the
moderators to repost their article (if it is rejected) into news.groups.
Perhaps the tag [NG] listed in the 1st line of the actual text or some tag
that could be used as a means to tell the moderators if the article is
rejected then repost in news.groups.
5) For that matter, let the author repost it. It will not surprise if the
authors of the rejected make a big deal about it (in some cases) and
repost it themselves into news.groups. Some what defeating this concern
about trust and how to ensure it since the authors themselves will be do a
check and balance. Kind of goes back to number one, don't do anything
just let nature take its course. If there is a real problem with real
concerns about the moderators, it will show - it will come out on its own
without all this special attention given to how we should ensure this
trust.
* Concens to the above:
*(2) Adding other moderators with opposing view points is a good thing in
my opinion. However, I do not feel adding moderators who have a known
history of disruption in news.groups and/or has a known history of doing
exactly what is against the proposed charter of news.groups.proposals is a
constructive and production decision. There is a big difference between
opposing view points and disruption. Taking on moderators that have a
history of disruption is only going to take the mess out of the news.group
and put it in e-mail creating a non-productive moderators list. I haven't
seen anything in the new list of moderators to suggest a concern but a
overall general concern.
*(3) I can understand the concern of re-directing/changing the newsgroups
line in a person article, should it be rejected. It's a valid concern in
which I have mix feelings. Though I do not agree with redirecting it to a
web page, newsgroup postings are just that - newsgroups.
Bill
Aratzio
>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 13:21:16 -0800, in news.groups, kmo...@spamcop.net
>(Kathy Morgan) wrote:
>
>
>>What I do know is that
>>in extensive debate on a mailing list for the proposed moderators, all
>>of them have been reasonable, considerate, and willing to work
>>cooperatively with the others.
>
>So were all the proposed moderators for soc.men.moderated.
And you cannot imagine why you are so unfit to manage a hierarchy.
There were numerous people (see Mailman, Brian) who asked quite
reasonable questions of your "reasonable, considerate"
soc.men.moderated moderators and got a complete meltdown.
My gawd woman, you are thicker and more hidebound than the whole Bambi
combined.
--
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
Wayne Brown
>
> Incidentally, I must say that I found the whole SMM thing a
> bit puzzling, because I don't think by their actions they
> actually caused any harm to the proposal; in fact, I think
> they probably made it better than it would have been if they
> hadn't interceded. Although the group is having moderation
> problems right now, but those appear to me to be independent
> of the question of whether the proposal we ended up approving
> was a good one, which I believe it was.
Yes, of course, none of the stuff you screw up is your own fault.
Keep that excuse handy, because I'm sure you'll be needing it (and using
it) often.
--
Wayne Brown <fwb...@bellsouth.net> (HPCC #1104)
Þæs ofereode, ðisses swa mæg. ("That passed away, this also can.")
"Deor," from the Exeter Book (folios 100r-100v)
Doug Freyburger
> Kathy Morgan wrote:
> >Daryl Hunt wrote:
>
> >> having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
> >> invited disaster and failure.
>
> >I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
> >enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.)
>
> having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
> question.
Interested in being more inclusive? I would be counted as a kook
based on my history elsewhere on UseNet. Maybe the two of us
will cancel each other out.
Having been in the discussions on the mailing list I have concluded
that he won't ever be a problem. If he's gaming the system the way
Peter J Ross may have, then he'll get the boot by the board at which
time I become the most controvertial one on the list. But so far I
have
concluded that he isn't gaming the system and I'll go with that unless
I learn otherwise the hard way.
I figure he's likely mulling over similar issues with me. Part of the
deal with having a diverse team in my opinion. There is strength in
diversity and he and I add a great deal of diversity to the stances on
the team. Yet we get along okay. Do the right thing, so what that
it seems to be for different reasons.
Brian Mailman
> On Wed, 25 Oct 2006 12:23:04 +0000, Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com>
> transparently proposed:
>
>>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 13:21:16 -0800, in news.groups, kmo...@spamcop.net
>>(Kathy Morgan) wrote:
>>
>>
>>>What I do know is that
>>>in extensive debate on a mailing list for the proposed moderators, all
>>>of them have been reasonable, considerate, and willing to work
>>>cooperatively with the others.
>>
>>So were all the proposed moderators for soc.men.moderated.
>
> And you cannot imagine why you are so unfit to manage a hierarchy.
>
> There were numerous people (see Mailman, Brian) who asked quite
> reasonable questions of your "reasonable, considerate"
> soc.men.moderated moderators and got a complete meltdown.
This is a case where you're both right.
She's not talking about an objective measurement as you are, but the
self-identified subjective measure of how they--and especially the main
proponent--described themselves.
B/
Brian Mailman
> Having been in the discussions on the mailing list I have concluded
> that [Kevin Cannon] won't ever be a problem. If he's gaming the
> system the way Peter J Ross may have,
Picking up bad habits from the Board, are we?
B/
Henrietta K Thomas
tski...@killfile.org (Tim Skirvin) wrote:
> This is somewhat tricky; I'm writing this as *a* co-advisory-
>moderator, and *a* co-proponent, but not as *the* moderator or *the*
>proponent.
I think you are wearing too many hats, Tim. Not just in regard to this
proposal, but in general. And I think you need to do something about
that.
--
Henrietta
Henrietta K Thomas
This is a matter of policy, which should be stated in the Big8
guidelines, but is not.
My own personal feeling is that the discussion period should be a
minimum of ten days and a maximum of 30 days. These dates should be
listed in the procedure section of every proposal, and the moderators
should be allowed to issue such warnings as they deem are necessary to
prevent discussion from going beyond the 30th day.
--
Henrietta
K. A. Cannon
<1hnpqyd.1ko40vq1lm8neyN%kmo...@spamcop.net> in news.groups on Tue,
24 Oct 2006 13:21:16 -0800:
>Daryl Hunt <dh...@celticommnospam.com> wrote:
>
>> "Dave Sill" <d...@big-8.org> wrote in message
>> news:11616446...@isc.org...
>> > REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
>> > moderated group news.groups.proposals
>> >
>> > This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
>> > moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
>>
>> having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
>> invited disaster and failure.
>
>I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
>enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.)
It's me!?
Daryl has a problem with me because...well...I am not going into it
because it's not appropriate.
<snip balance>
--
K. A. Cannon
kcannon at insurgent dot org
(change the orgy to org to reply)
http://tinyurl.com/ldcpw
http://skywriter.diaryland.com/060811_37.html
Obstinate people can be divded into the opinionated, the ignorant,
and the boorish.
-Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Bk. VII
Steve Bonine
> On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 22:22:47 -0500, in news.groups, Steve Bonine
> <s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>>Jim Riley wrote:
>>
>>>How soon will the proposal become inactive for purposes of permitted
>>>discussion?
>>
>>How long do you think it should be? A week has been mentioned as a
>>reasonable period. I would anticipate that the moderators will post a
>>notice in the group indicating when submissions for a specific group
>>will no longer be accepted.
>
> This is a matter of policy, which should be stated in the Big8
> guidelines, but is not.
Ummm, no, it is a question of moderation policy for a group that does
not yet exist. The question is, how long after the decision is made on
the creation of the group (or the proponent withdraws the proposal)
should submissions to news.groups.proposals be approved because they
apply to an "active proposal"? It makes sense to allow the discussion
to continue for some period after the decision has been rendered, but
not to allow it to drag on forever. In most cases it will be obvious
when the discussion has trailed off.
> My own personal feeling is that the discussion period should be a
> minimum of ten days and a maximum of 30 days. These dates should be
> listed in the procedure section of every proposal, and the moderators
> should be allowed to issue such warnings as they deem are necessary to
> prevent discussion from going beyond the 30th day.
I believe that the original question was related to the time that
discussion would be allowed to continue after a decision had been
rendered. The length of the discussion itself, between publishing the
official RFD and the decision, is a different issue. I don't see
anything to be gained by putting strict limits in place. Some proposals
might merit a 60-day discussion period; others might be done in 6.
K. A. Cannon
<ppjuj2hue35638ue8...@4ax.com> in news.groups on Wed, 25
Oct 2006 12:23:04 +0000:
<snip>
>>I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
>>enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.)
>
>He is referring to Kevin Cannon, a kookaholic (my term) who went out of
>his way to "kookify" Daryl, and who (last time I looked) was still
>hosting kook faqs at insurgent.org.
I went out of my way to "kookify" Daryl?
I didn't do anything. Daryl behaves the way he does because that is
how he is.
<snip>
>The question here is whether the board really wants to take a chance
>having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
>question.
Fine...Then you should also question Tim...as he was involved in AUK a
long time ago in a UseNet far far away.
>Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
>help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
>maybe not. It is hard to say.
My experience with us.* and with you has taught me one thing.
I'll not mention that here.
Henrietta K Thomas
SJ" <mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>On Wed, 25 Oct 2006 12:23:04 +0000, Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com> wrote in <ppjuj2hue35638ue8...@4ax.com>:
>
>> ... Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
>>help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
>>maybe not. It is hard to say.
>
>Predicting the future behavior of individuals is notoriously
>difficult.
I know.
>I'm willing to give Kevin the benefit of the doubt.
Your choice.
>If things work out, great.
Right.
>If things don't work out, then we'll have to try
>something else.
Right.
>"One observation is worth ten thousand expert opinions."
My comments are based on fairly close observation of Kevin Cannon over
the past few years.
K. A. Cannon
<tskirvin.20061025141137$76...@cairo.ks.uiuc.edu> in news.groups on
Wed, 25 Oct 2006 09:14:04 -0500:
<snip>
>He looks, to me, like an ideal volunteer.
Ideal volunteer?!?!
We have a suicide mission...who would be the ideal volunteer?
KEVIN!!
I do appreciate your confidence in me.
And...there are very real reasons why I am working with the system
rather than criticizing the system.
Granted...any system created by humans is going to be imperfect and
have it's faults, failings and problems.
It's easy to sit on the outside and criticize. It is a better thing to
get your hands dirty, put your time in, and effect change from within
the system rather that sitting on the outside sniping. Change from
within is always a better choice and easier to effect that change from
without. Change from the outside is disruptive.
Frankly I am disappointed with some people who I hold in the utmost
respect not offering to contribute or withdrawing their offers to help
after making them. It is what it is, and no amount of flames and
debate is going to change that.
So far I have enjoyed working with everyone on the Moderation team.
They have all been very receptive to my ideas, some of which are not
conventional.
I hope people will be happy with the end result of the what the team
effort creates.
Kathy Morgan
> If he's gaming the system the way
> Peter J Ross may have,
I don't think Peter Ross did game the system. The moderators who went
MIA gamed the system, but Peter Ross did an excellent job while he
remained on the moderation board. I'm sorry he left it.
--
Kathy
Kadaitcha Man
invigilator, fawned:
>
> interpretation, I apologize in advance and will correct it as best I
> can
> in the next version of this post. This "poll" is unscientific and
> offers
> no warrant for statistical validity whatsoever.
>
> Since I neglected to keep a message ID for some of the early
> respondents,
> backtracking to verify their views is difficult. If I ever try using
> this method again, I will try to track the IDs from the beginning.
>
> I have pulled out the names of the moderation team and the proponents
> to make the feedback from bystanders somewhat clearer.
>
> Marty
>
> * = Lines changed since last post. Many lines have been
> deleted without a trace in order to rearrange
> the list. All of the proposed moderators had
> been somewhere in the previous lists.
>
> * MODERATION TEAM:
> * ---------------
> * Head Moderator: Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com>
> * Moderator: Kevin Cannon <kcan...@insurgent.org>
> * Moderator: Doug Freyburger <dfrey...@yahoo.com>
> * Moderator: Aatu Koskensilta
> <aatu.koskensi...@xortec.fi>
> * Moderator: Kathy Morgan <kmor...@aptalaska.net>
> * Advisory Moderator: Brian Edmonds <b...@big-8.org>
> * Advisory Moderator: Jonathan Kamens <j...@big-8.org>
> * Advisory Moderator: Tim Skirvin <tskir...@big-8.org>
>
> * OTHER PROPONENTS:
> * ----------------
> * Dave Sill <d...@big-8.org> (Principal proponent)
>
> * James Farrar <ja...@big-8.org>
> * Thomas Lee <t...@big-8.org>
> * Marty Moleski <mol...@canisius.edu>
>
>
> SEEMED TO ME TO BE IN FAVOR OF THE GENERAL IDEA:
>
> Bill <wkro...@sunstroke.sdsu.edu>
> Chris Barnes <ch...@txbarnes.com>
> Jon Bell <jtb...@presby.edu>
> Charles <for...@mac.com>
> "Mark Dodel" <madode...@ptd.net>
> Kjetil Torgrim Homme <kjet...@kaksi.ifi.uio.no>
> Jayne Kulikauskas <jayne.ku...@gmail.com>
> Charles Lindsey <c...@clerew.man.ac.uk>
> * Ed Mooring <moo...@acm.org> in <12je6e3...@news.supernews.com>
> Rebecca Ore <spamtra...@verizon.net>
> Otaku <ot...@troll4fun.c0m>
> saur <sa...@nyc.rr.com>
> Kay Shapero <k...@see.my.sig.invalid>
>
> SUPPORT THE PROPOSAL IN ITS ORIGINAL FORM (moderation by the board):
> -------------------------------------------------------------------
> John Stanley <sta...@shell.peak.org> in <egk0k7$9pp$1...@shell.peak.org>
> Jim Logajan <Jam...@Lugoj.com> wrote in
> <Xns985E892BBA78...@216.168.3.30>
>
> SOMEWHAT IN FAVOR:
> -----------------
> Rick Pikul <rwp...@sympatico.ca>
> [Add an "everything submitted" partner group?]
> ryannosaurus <ryzill@@r0ck.com> in
> <6tbri296kci3jp81b...@4ax.com>
> Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com>
>
> WORTH CONSIDERING:
> -----------------
> Stig Sandbeck Mathisen <s...@fnord.no>
>
> ON CONDITION THAT N.G.P. BE FOR NEWSGROUP PROPOSALS ONLY:
> --------------------------------------------------------
> goanna <spam...@crayne.org> wrote in <45305c8a$1...@news.unimelb.edu.au>
>
> ===================================================
>
> OPPOSED:
> -------
>
> "2Rowdy" <Harry...@gmail.com>
> Cyli <cyl...@gmail.com.invalid>
> Graham Drabble <usen...@drabble.me.uk> in
> <Xns985BDC1F56592gr...@ID-77355.user.dfncis.de>
> Nicholas Fitzpatrick <nf...@shell1.sentex.ca> in
> <452e7b43$1...@news.sentex.net>
> nukleus
> Bob Officer <bobof...@127.0.0.7> [No longer willing to moderate.]
> Marg Petersen (moi) aka pan...@peak.org
>
> OPPOSED TO THE BOARD'S EXISTENCE:
> --------------------------------
> Wayne Brown <fwb...@bellsouth.net> in
> <4vQXg.25147$vi3....@bignews3.bellsouth.net>
> Gary Burnore
>
> ====================================================
>
> AMBIVALENT:
> ----------
> toto <scar...@wicked.witch> wrote in
> <7qrti25rgr73s433g...@4ax.com>
>
>
> INDETERMINATE:
> -------------
> Aratzio <a6ah...@sneakemail.com>
> "Chadwick StoneŠ" <chad_...@127.0.0.1>
>
> MU:
> --
> "Adam H. Kerman" <a...@chinet.com> in
> <Pine.LNX.4.63.06...@qbbshf.puvarg.pbz>
>
> PLAYING ON A DIFFERENT GAME BOARD:
> ---------------------------------
> "Daryl Hunt" <dh...@celticommnospam.com> in
> 4532c674$1...@news.i70west.com
You need a new section on your LITS O' HAET.
INDOMITABLE CUNTIST:
--------------------
"Kadaitcha Man" <fuck-you...@kiss-my-big-black-ass.com>
--
alt.usenet.kooks - Pierre Salinger Memorial Hook, Line & Sinker:
September 2005 and April 2006
"K-Man's particular genius, however, lies not merely in his humour,
but his ability to make posters who had previously seemed reasonably
well-balanced turn into foaming, frothing, death threat-uttering
maniacs" - Snarky, Demon Lord of Confusion
Thou infected mind. Thou whining mammet.
Kadaitcha Man
dodged:
Keep your scraggy tits in your bra.
> Kevin could be a hindrance or a
> help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
> maybe not. It is hard to say.
Going by the list of netk0oKs on the mods and in favour list for NGP, I dare
say Kevin is the only sane person there. It could be worse; it'd be utterly
fucked before it was newgrouped if you were listed.
* Head Moderator: Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com>
* Moderator: Kevin Cannon <kcan...@insurgent.org>
* Moderator: Doug Freyburger <dfrey...@yahoo.com>
* Moderator: Aatu Koskensilta <aatu.koskensi...@xortec.fi>
* Moderator: Kathy Morgan <kmor...@aptalaska.net>
* Advisory Moderator: Brian Edmonds <b...@big-8.org>
* Advisory Moderator: Jonathan Kamens <j...@big-8.org>
* Advisory Moderator: Tim Skirvin <tskir...@big-8.org>
Bill <wkro...@sunstroke.sdsu.edu>
Chris Barnes <ch...@txbarnes.com>
Jon Bell <jtb...@presby.edu>
Charles <for...@mac.com>
"Mark Dodel" <madode...@ptd.net>
Kjetil Torgrim Homme <kjet...@kaksi.ifi.uio.no>
Jayne Kulikauskas <jayne.ku...@gmail.com>
Charles Lindsey <c...@clerew.man.ac.uk>
* Ed Mooring <moo...@acm.org> in <12je6e3...@news.supernews.com>
Rebecca Ore <spamtra...@verizon.net>
Otaku <ot...@troll4fun.c0m>
saur <sa...@nyc.rr.com>
Kay Shapero <k...@see.my.sig.invalid>
--
alt.usenet.kooks - Pierre Salinger Memorial Hook, Line & Sinker:
September 2005 and April 2006
"K-Man's particular genius, however, lies not merely in his humour,
but his ability to make posters who had previously seemed reasonably
well-balanced turn into foaming, frothing, death threat-uttering
maniacs" - Snarky, Demon Lord of Confusion
Thou lousy knave. Thou fen-sucked, conceited abhorred slave.
Jim Riley
wrote:
It seems like there will be two types of submissions.
One type will be a continuation of the discussion about a proposal,
which is nominally on topic, but at some time should be cut off.
The other type would be questions about access to a new group. Someone
might have followed the discussion, or saw the announcement, and not
really understand how to get the newsgroup added. Strictly speaking
such a query is off-topic, and perhaps more appropriate for
news.groups.questions or news.newusers.questions. But a rejection
notice is really not helpful. People were told to come to
news.groups.proposals, and then they are dismissed.
Where was the appropriate place for discussion of the moderation
problems with soc.men.moderated or soc.religion.asatru? If the intent
is to create well-used groups should this really be dumped back into
news.group?
How about:
After the B8MB makes their decision on a proposal, discussion of that
decision may continue in news.groups.proposals. If the discussion
become repetitive it may be cut off and re-directed to news.groups.
However, discussion of the implementation of recent proposals,
including access to and propagation of new newsgroups, problems
submitting articles to moderated newsgroups, etc. may continue to be
approved.
Assuming you will have some software screening that classifies
articles as to which proposal an article pertains, you're going to
have quite a few that don't relate to any active proposal, but will
likely need more careful hand screening before they are rejected (or
otherwise disposed of, eg the original ca.support.stroke proposal).
Similarly, posts about recent proposals might be flagged as requiring
greater scrutiny.
This would let you keep a fairly indefinite opening (3 months?), but
have the the ability to be more selective in what is posted.
Aside, would it be possible to forward submissions that are not for an
active proposal, but may be of interest to the B8MB or group mentors
to them? It might not be obvious that a proposal for a new group
should should be posted on news.announce.newgroups rather than
news.groups.proposals.
--
Jim Riley
Henrietta K Thomas
<s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>Henrietta K Thomas wrote:
>> On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 22:22:47 -0500, in news.groups, Steve Bonine
>> <s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Jim Riley wrote:
>>>
>>>>How soon will the proposal become inactive for purposes of permitted
>>>>discussion?
>>>
>>>How long do you think it should be? A week has been mentioned as a
>>>reasonable period. I would anticipate that the moderators will post a
>>>notice in the group indicating when submissions for a specific group
>>>will no longer be accepted.
>>
>> This is a matter of policy, which should be stated in the Big8
>> guidelines, but is not.
>
>Ummm, no, it is a question of moderation policy for a group that does
>not yet exist.
I disagree. See below.
>The question is, how long after the decision is made on
>the creation of the group (or the proponent withdraws the proposal)
>should submissions to news.groups.proposals be approved because they
>apply to an "active proposal"? It makes sense to allow the discussion
>to continue for some period after the decision has been rendered, but
>not to allow it to drag on forever. In most cases it will be obvious
>when the discussion has trailed off.
Under the previous system, the decision was made when the vote results
were posted. There was then allowed a five-day discussion period before
the decision was finalized. This was to allow people time to ask
questions, check for vote fraud, etc. Following that precedent, I would
say a week for post-decision discussion is plenty.
There was no similar rule regarding withdrawals in the previous system,
but if there is to be one, a week /after/ an announcement that a
proposal has been withdrawn should be enough.
If the former NAN team thought it was important enough to set a
post-decision discussion deadline in the guidelines, the current board
should be willing to do likewise. Otherwise, the moderators are free to
change it at will, and I don't think that's a good idea.
>> My own personal feeling is that the discussion period should be a
>> minimum of ten days and a maximum of 30 days. These dates should be
>> listed in the procedure section of every proposal, and the moderators
>> should be allowed to issue such warnings as they deem are necessary to
>> prevent discussion from going beyond the 30th day.
>
>I believe that the original question was related to the time that
>discussion would be allowed to continue after a decision had been
>rendered.
And I apparently misunderstood. My apologies.
>The length of the discussion itself, between publishing the
>official RFD and the decision, is a different issue. I don't see
>anything to be gained by putting strict limits in place. Some proposals
>might merit a 60-day discussion period; others might be done in 6.
And who is to decide this, the board, the moderators, or the proponents?
Under the previous system, the minimum discussion period was 21 days and
the maximum was 120 days. I am proposing that this be changed to 10
days and 30 days, respectively. I see nothing wrong with setting
deadlines; if necessary, the board can add a provision allowing for
extensions of time at the board's discretion, but proposals should not
be allowed to drag on and on and on. Again, this is a matter of policy
to be set by the board and incorporated into the guidelines.
This is just an explanation of why I responded the way I did, and has
nothing to do with the question of post-decision discussion of so-called
"active" proposals.
Hope this helps.
--
Henrietta
aatu.kos...@xortec.fi
> Going by the list of netk0oKs on the mods and in favour list for NGP, I dare
> say Kevin is the only sane person there.
Do you have some specific reason to think I'm not sane?
--
Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.kos...@xortec.fi)
"Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, daruber muss man schweigen"
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
Steve Bonine
> It seems like there will be two types of submissions.
>
> One type will be a continuation of the discussion about a proposal,
> which is nominally on topic, but at some time should be cut off.
And I think that in the vast majority of cases this discussion will
taper off on its own accord within a few days of the decision for the group.
> The other type would be questions about access to a new group. Someone
> might have followed the discussion, or saw the announcement, and not
> really understand how to get the newsgroup added. Strictly speaking
> such a query is off-topic, and perhaps more appropriate for
> news.groups.questions or news.newusers.questions. But a rejection
> notice is really not helpful. People were told to come to
> news.groups.proposals, and then they are dismissed.
The moderators will be encouraged, for these and similar cases, to
provide additional information in the rejection notice (and perhaps by a
separate email, if appropriate) to assist the submitter. I see your
point about them being directed to news.groups.proposals in the
procedure text of the RFD, but that's pretty clear that it's for the
discussion of the proposal itself. I think it makes more sense to try
to steer them to the right place to get help (or provide the actual
help), rather than approving an article into the wrong place.
> Where was the appropriate place for discussion of the moderation
> problems with soc.men.moderated or soc.religion.asatru? If the intent
> is to create well-used groups should this really be dumped back into
> news.group?
I hope other people will weigh in on this question. I could argue it
either way, and that's one of the reasons I'm in favor of not putting
strict limits on cutting off a discussion.
My inclination is that this specific discussion belongs in news.groups.
I am less interested in a "well-used group" than in keeping the new
group on charter. But a useful discussion of moderation issues for a
newly-approved group could be argued to be "on charter".
> How about:
>
> After the B8MB makes their decision on a proposal, discussion of that
> decision may continue in news.groups.proposals. If the discussion
> become repetitive it may be cut off and re-directed to news.groups.
>
> However, discussion of the implementation of recent proposals,
> including access to and propagation of new newsgroups, problems
> submitting articles to moderated newsgroups, etc. may continue to be
> approved.
I don't think that anyone wins if the "I can't post to X group" question
is allowed. As for discussions related to a specific new group's
problem, that seems appropriate.
>
> Assuming you will have some software screening that classifies
> articles as to which proposal an article pertains, you're going to
> have quite a few that don't relate to any active proposal, but will
> likely need more careful hand screening before they are rejected (or
> otherwise disposed of, eg the original ca.support.stroke proposal).
> Similarly, posts about recent proposals might be flagged as requiring
> greater scrutiny.
It is my hope that the moderation team will be able to do more than
simply send a canned rejection notice if something like the
ca.support.stroke proposal comes along. This is a good example of the
kind of submission that doesn't belong in news.groups.proposals but does
merit additional consideration.
> This would let you keep a fairly indefinite opening (3 months?), but
> have the the ability to be more selective in what is posted.
3 months is a long time.
> Aside, would it be possible to forward submissions that are not for an
> active proposal, but may be of interest to the B8MB or group mentors
> to them? It might not be obvious that a proposal for a new group
> should should be posted on news.announce.newgroups rather than
> news.groups.proposals.
Absolutely. I don't want to see a good idea die just because the
proponent posted it to the wrong group. It's not unreasonable for a
proponent unfamiliar with the group-createion process to see the name
news.groups.proposals and conclude that that's where an idea should be
floated. We will do our best not to lose any of those ideas.
Steve Bonine
proposed head moderator of proposed group news.groups.proposals
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>> ... Where was the appropriate place for discussion of the moderation
>> problems with soc.men.moderated or soc.religion.asatru? If the intent
>> is to create well-used groups should this really be dumped back into
>> news.group?
>I hope other people will weigh in on this question. I could argue it
>either way, and that's one of the reasons I'm in favor of not putting
>strict limits on cutting off a discussion.
>My inclination is that this specific discussion belongs in news.groups.
I feel that way, too.
I think the mod team will have to learn by doing.
Maybe "problem-solving followups" won't be a big
deal. Maybe the mods could reply to all such
posts with followup set to news.groups or another
problem-solving group.
Time will tell.
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
> ... Now, had you simply answered *I meant adopted in place of accepted* this
>discussion would be over and civility would have been kept.
Pasta faggiole!
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>In article <453f65da$0$5555$c3e...@news.astraweb.com>,
>Martin X. Moleski, SJ <mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>>Predicting the future behavior of individuals is notoriously
>>difficult.
>Yes.
>>I'm willing to give Kevin the benefit of the doubt.
>And others?
At the outset, yes, of course.
After some dialogue, we leave the field of presumption and
begin to have some data with which to judge the quality
of a person's character.
He Who Must Not Be Named <jQO%g.40219$vi3....@bignews3.bellsouth.net>,
for example, is someone about whom I have no doubts.
Tim Skirvin
> Where was the appropriate place for discussion of the moderation
> problems with soc.men.moderated or soc.religion.asatru?
news.groups. news.admin.misc might not be that bad either, if the
topic really is a technical moderation issue; and I believe that there
have been suggestions for a news.admin.moderation in the past that would
include such discussions.
- Tim Skirvin (sk...@big-8.org)
--
http://www.big-8.org/ Big-8 Management Board
http://www.killfile.org/~tskirvin/ Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
James Farrar
>In article <453f65da$0$5555$c3e...@news.astraweb.com>,
>Martin X. Moleski, SJ <mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>>Predicting the future behavior of individuals is notoriously
>>difficult.
>
>Yes.
>
>>I'm willing to give Kevin the benefit of the doubt.
>
>And others?
I think we should assume good faith until proven otherwise.
Doug Freyburger
> Kadaitcha Man wrote:
>
> > Going by the list of netk0oKs on the mods and in favour list for NGP, I dare
> > say Kevin is the only sane person there.
>
> Do you have some specific reason to think I'm not sane?
You post in news.groups and part of recent discussions is a
claim that no one sane would choose to do so. Oh wait, I
post of news.group. Ah well, not all that many people call
me sane ...
Brian Mailman
>
> He Who Must Not Be Named <jQO%g.40219$vi3....@bignews3.bellsouth.net>
Expected... like I said, quite tricksy.
B/
Brian Mailman
> If the former NAN team thought it was important enough to set a
> post-decision discussion deadline in the guidelines, the current board
> should be willing to do likewise.
Baby, bathwater, bathtub. It all went to the landfill, without any
thought of *why* things were done the way they were, or *how* those
things came about.
B/
Wayne Brown
Yeah, I was expecting something underhanded like that too. It doesn't
matter to me, though, as long as he doesn't include me in any "official"
documents that might imply I had somehow participated in the process.
--
Wayne Brown <fwb...@bellsouth.net> (HPCC #1104)
Þæs ofereode, ðisses swa mæg. ("That passed away, this also can.")
"Deor," from the Exeter Book (folios 100r-100v)
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>> He Who Must Not Be Named <jQO%g.40219$vi3....@bignews3.bellsouth.net>
>Expected... like I said, quite tricksy.
You were 100% right, of course.
As someone said, my trolling techniques
need further refinement. :o(
Tim Skirvin
>> We want to be open about it, at first, and let the moderators work
>> it out over time. For now, "news.groups with only proposal discussions
>> and without the animosity" looks like a good start.
> Then put these in the front of what is _on_ topic.
This is already in the proposed charter:
The newsgroup news.groups.proposals is for the announcement, discussion,
and development of changes to the Big 8 hierarchies, as documented at:
All official discussion of proposals as described in the creation
documents and elsewhere will take place in news.groups.proposals.
Proponents with active RFDs must conduct their discussions in NGP.
Perhaps this could be grown, but I'm not sure what purpose it
would serve.
>>>> - General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
>>> Placing this here denigrates discussion that will supposedly still be
>>> appropriate for news.groups
>> How? Discussion can be off-topic for NGP without being off-topic
>> for news.groups.
> Because you don't appear to be able to prioritize.
If you want to suggest a re-order of the priorities, I doubt that
anybody will gripe much.
>>> Do the moderators recognize the problems that cross-posts will cause
>>> if news.groups.proposals is not carried on a particular newsserver
>>> that a follow-up poster uses?
>> We'll work to solve the problem if it exists. I don't want to
>> paralyze a good idea because of a potential solvable technical problem.
> How will you determine whether the problem exists?
Hopefully, users will tell us about their problems via email; and
if they don't, they can post to news.groups, which we will monitor.
>>> Would the moderators reject an articles cross-posted to news.groups, or
>>> would they trim the group?
>> I don't think there will be any trimming. They would reject if
>> appropriate.
> How do you anticipate the transition from news.groups to
> news.groups.proposals occuring?
New proposals will have their followups pointed at NGP.
Discussion will start there if there's any discussion to be had.
Tim Skirvin
> If the former NAN team thought it was important enough to set a
> post-decision discussion deadline in the guidelines, the current board
> should be willing to do likewise.
The post-decision discussion was specifically to allow discussion
of the vote itself, and point out irregularities. Our initial policies
included such a period; it was not popular, and it was removed.
> Otherwise, the moderators are free to change it at will, and I don't
> think that's a good idea.
Their freedom to do so is entirely unconnected to a post-decision
discussion period.
Jim Riley
Skirvin) wrote:
>Jim Riley <jim...@pipeline.com> writes:
>
>>> We want to be open about it, at first, and let the moderators work
>>> it out over time. For now, "news.groups with only proposal discussions
>>> and without the animosity" looks like a good start.
>
>> Then put these in the front of what is _on_ topic.
>
> This is already in the proposed charter:
>
> The newsgroup news.groups.proposals is for the announcement, discussion,
> and development of changes to the Big 8 hierarchies, as documented at:
>
> http://www.big-8.org/
>
> All official discussion of proposals as described in the creation
> documents and elsewhere will take place in news.groups.proposals.
> Proponents with active RFDs must conduct their discussions in NGP.
>
> Perhaps this could be grown, but I'm not sure what purpose it
>would serve.
To express the purpose of the newsgroup in positive terms. To make it
clear what belongs and what doesn't. What makes news.groups.proposals
unique. Areas where the moderators are going to have to distinguish
between what belongs in news.groups.proposals and what belongs in
news.groups.
The charter should describe the purpose and scope of a newsgroup.
Moderation per se is not part of the purpose or scope, but a method of
keeping discussion within the purpose and scope of the newsgroup.
MMF, HTML, and binaries don't belong in news.groups, and they wouldn'g
belong in an unmoderated news.groups.policies. Just because it is
harder to keep it out, doesn't mean that it belongs there. And it
really is a waste of time to itemize it.
>>>>> - General discussions not relating to a specific active proposal
>
>>>> Placing this here denigrates discussion that will supposedly still be
>>>> appropriate for news.groups
>
>>> How? Discussion can be off-topic for NGP without being off-topic
>>> for news.groups.
>
>> Because you don't appear to be able to prioritize.
>
> If you want to suggest a re-order of the priorities, I doubt that
>anybody will gripe much.
[I have generally tried to word this as if news.groups.proposals were
either an unmoderated or moderated newsgroup. Ideally, you could
think of a would-be poster determining whether or not he should post
to an unmoderated news.groups.proposals. However, in certain places,
I have used words such as 'approved' or 'rejected' rather than 'is
approprate' or 'is inappropriate'. And in cases where a poster might
not be able to self-evaluate (eg when discussion of a non-active
proposal should cease), I have added mentioned moderator discretion.]
The newsgroup news.groups.proposals is for the discussion and
development of proposals for changes to the Big 8 hierarchies, as
documented at:
All official discussion of proposals as described in the creation
documents and elsewhere will take place in news.groups.proposals.
Proponents with active RFD's must conduct their discussions in
news.groups.proposals.
[Mention of hand moderation removed from next paragraph.]
Discussions should pertain to specific active proposals to create,
remove, or modify newsgroups in the Big-8 newsgroup hierarchies (comp,
humanities, misc, news, rec, sci, soc, and talk). Discussion about
creation of newsgroups in other hierarchies should be posted to
appropriate configuration groups for those hierarchies.
After the Big-8 Management Board has made their decision on a
proposal, discussion of that decision may continue in
news.groups.proposals. If the discussion become repetitive or a
rehash of the arguments made prior to the decision, it may be cut off
and re-directed to news.groups.
However, discussion of the implementation of recent proposals,
including access to and propagation of new newsgroups, problems
submitting articles to newly moderated newsgroups, etc. may continue
to be approved at the discretion of the moderators.
Discussion about the newsgroup creation policies for the Big-8
newsgroup hierarchies, the Big-8 Management Board, the history and
culture of the Big 8 and Usenet in general should be posted to
news.groups or elsewhere, unless there is a clear connection to a
specific proposal being discussed in news.groups.proposals.
Content that is not conducive to the development of newsgroup
proposals, including personal attacks, derogatory nicknames, and
flames is not allowed.
Articles about "the news" as opposed to newsgroups or netnews will be
rejected.
[two options on cross-posting]
Discussion about a proposal may be cross-posted to newsgroups that
would be affected by the proposal at the discretion of the moderators.
If a cross-posted newsgroup is moderated, approval may be given if the
moderator of the other group grants general permission for the
discussion to be cross-posted.
[in the case of the proposal for talk.religion.bahai, the moderators
of soc.religion.bahai approved the RFD discussion (I think they
decided not to for the 2nd and 3rd times the group was proposed).]
[2nd option]
Discussion about a proposal may not be cross-posted to other
newsgroups.
[Regardless of 1st 2 options]
Articles such as RFD announcements and FAQ's may be cross-posted as
appropriate.
[The next paragraph possibly belongs as part of the moderation policy]
Posting with a non-replyable or "munged" address is strongly
discouraged. If you feel that you must use a munged address, you are
encouraged to append ".invalid" to the end of the munged email address
to indicate that the address is not deliverable (even if ".invalid" is
stripped from the end). Users of munged addresses should not expect
to get any notices about the disposition of their posts by the
moderation system, but the presence or absence of a munged address
will not be used to decide whether a submission is suitable for
posting.
[Everything below could be deleted. None is specific to
news.groups.proposals]
The following types of articles are not allowed (the lists should not
be considered exhaustive):
* Articles with unacceptable content, such as:
- HTML
- Copyright violations
- Excessive quoting
- Threats and/or avocation of violence
- Binaries, except PGP signatures, X-Face headers, and other
ancillary meta-data
* Attempts to subvert the system, such as:
- Forgery or imitation of a valid e-mail address
- Unauthorized approval headers
- Excessive morphing/nym-shifting
* Other inappropriate articles, including:
- Personal advertisements
- Commercial advertisements and money-making schemes
- Chain letters
- EMP spam
>> How will you determine whether the problem exists?
>
> Hopefully, users will tell us about their problems via email; and
>if they don't, they can post to news.groups, which we will monitor.
If the message is cross-posted, and news.groups.proposals is not
present on their system, they will not be aware of a problem, other
than not getting any response.
>> How do you anticipate the transition from news.groups to
>> news.groups.proposals occuring?
>
> New proposals will have their followups pointed at NGP.
>Discussion will start there if there's any discussion to be had.
Will ongoing discussion, including 2nd RFD's be expected to continue
in news.groups or will people have to switch mid-discussion?
--
Jim Riley
Henrietta K Thomas
j...@kamens.brookline.ma.us (Jonathan Kamens) wrote:
>Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com> writes:
>>The question here is whether the board really wants to take a chance
>>having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
>>question.
>
>It's better to err on the side of giving people a chance. If
>they pull it off, great, and if they don't, then we can cross
>that bridge when we come to it.
I have no problem with that in principle, but sometimes it's easier said
than done.
>It's only Usenet, nobody dies.
Except for the person who committed suicide -- Valerie
something-or-other, I believe.
Henrietta K Thomas
tski...@killfile.org (Tim Skirvin) wrote:
>Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com> writes:
>
>> Personally, I have mixed emotions. Kevin could be a hindrance or a
>> help. Maybe he will learn from his experience on the mod team, but
>> maybe not. It is hard to say.
>
> For my part, I expect that I'll enjoy working with Kevin. He
>is earnest, he has interesting ideas and is willing to talk about them
>openly, and he has seemed willing to work with others before even if he
>doesn't agree with them 100%. He looks, to me, like an ideal volunteer.
Then I wish the two of you good luck.
-
Henrietta K Thomas
<dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Henrietta K Thomas wrote:
>> Kathy Morgan wrote:
>> >Daryl Hunt wrote:
>>
>> >> having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
>> >> invited disaster and failure.
>>
>> >I don't know who you are classifying as a known AUKk00k (and don't care
>> >enough to Google to attempt to figure it out.)
>>
>> The question here is whether the board really wants to take a chance
>> having a known kookaholic on the moderation team. I think it's a valid
>> question.
>
>Interested in being more inclusive? I would be counted as a kook
>based on my history elsewhere on UseNet.
I have no knowledge of that history, but my guess is that you were a
victim of kookology, not a perpetrator.
>Maybe the two of us
>will cancel each other out.
Maybe.
>Having been in the discussions on the mailing list I have concluded
>that he won't ever be a problem. If he's gaming the system the way
>Peter J Ross may have, then he'll get the boot by the board at which
>time I become the most controvertial one on the list. But so far I
>have
>concluded that he isn't gaming the system and I'll go with that unless
>I learn otherwise the hard way.
Fair enough. Good luck.
Henrietta K Thomas
tski...@killfile.org (Tim Skirvin) wrote:
>Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com> writes:
>
>> If the former NAN team thought it was important enough to set a
>> post-decision discussion deadline in the guidelines, the current board
>> should be willing to do likewise.
>
> The post-decision discussion was specifically to allow discussion
>of the vote itself, and point out irregularities.
I know, but that is not my point.
>Our initial policies
>included such a period; it was not popular, and it was removed.
I have no recollection of this. Not popular with whom? Please cite
chapter and verse.
>> Otherwise, the moderators are free to change it at will, and I don't
>> think that's a good idea.
>
> Their freedom to do so is entirely unconnected to a post-decision
>discussion period.
In that case, I don't think the moderators should allow post-decision
discussions.
--
If you're reading this on a website like Google,
you're not reading the real Usenet. To get the
real Usenet, you need to get an nntp newsreader.
For information on nntp newsreaders, see
<http://www.newsreaders.com/>.
Henrietta K Thomas
I know, and that's why I think this crew will be the death of Usenet
yet.
A lot of people put large portions of their lives into making Usenet
what it is today, and it's a shame to see it all flushed down the toilet
like it was nothing but a bunch of crap. :(
Jim Riley
>Jim Riley wrote:
>
>> It seems like there will be two types of submissions.
>>
>> One type will be a continuation of the discussion about a proposal,
>> which is nominally on topic, but at some time should be cut off.
>
>And I think that in the vast majority of cases this discussion will
>taper off on its own accord within a few days of the decision for the group.
Probably. The problem is that the charter expresses an objective
standard (pertaining to an active proposal), that should not actually
be adhered to.
>> The other type would be questions about access to a new group. Someone
>> might have followed the discussion, or saw the announcement, and not
>> really understand how to get the newsgroup added. Strictly speaking
>> such a query is off-topic, and perhaps more appropriate for
>> news.groups.questions or news.newusers.questions. But a rejection
>> notice is really not helpful. People were told to come to
>> news.groups.proposals, and then they are dismissed.
>
>The moderators will be encouraged, for these and similar cases, to
>provide additional information in the rejection notice (and perhaps by a
>separate email, if appropriate) to assist the submitter. I see your
>point about them being directed to news.groups.proposals in the
>procedure text of the RFD, but that's pretty clear that it's for the
>discussion of the proposal itself. I think it makes more sense to try
>to steer them to the right place to get help (or provide the actual
>help), rather than approving an article into the wrong place.
They may be posting as a follow up to the discussion or the Results
posting. I don't think that it is harmful to allow discussion about
recently created groups to continue for a bit. I think it is a case
of too literally interpreting "active proposal", and some discussion
of implementation could provide useful follow up for the B8MB. It
also may cut down on the number of people who have to redirected if
they can read discussion in news.groups. If nothing else, it can help
publicize the new group.
>> Where was the appropriate place for discussion of the moderation
>> problems with soc.men.moderated or soc.religion.asatru? If the intent
>> is to create well-used groups should this really be dumped back into
>> news.group?
>
>I hope other people will weigh in on this question. I could argue it
>either way, and that's one of the reasons I'm in favor of not putting
>strict limits on cutting off a discussion.
>
>My inclination is that this specific discussion belongs in news.groups.
> I am less interested in a "well-used group" than in keeping the new
>group on charter. But a useful discussion of moderation issues for a
>newly-approved group could be argued to be "on charter".
>
>> How about:
>>
>> After the B8MB makes their decision on a proposal, discussion of that
>> decision may continue in news.groups.proposals. If the discussion
>> become repetitive it may be cut off and re-directed to news.groups.
>>
>> However, discussion of the implementation of recent proposals,
>> including access to and propagation of new newsgroups, problems
>> submitting articles to moderated newsgroups, etc. may continue to be
>> approved.
>
>I don't think that anyone wins if the "I can't post to X group" question
>is allowed. As for discussions related to a specific new group's
>problem, that seems appropriate.
A problem specific to every new group is for an ordinary user to be
able to gain access to the group. One role of the discussion of a
proposal is to help build interest in a newsgroup. I don't see that
anyone wins by cutting off that interest.
>> Assuming you will have some software screening that classifies
>> articles as to which proposal an article pertains, you're going to
>> have quite a few that don't relate to any active proposal, but will
>> likely need more careful hand screening before they are rejected (or
>> otherwise disposed of, eg the original ca.support.stroke proposal).
>> Similarly, posts about recent proposals might be flagged as requiring
>> greater scrutiny.
>
>It is my hope that the moderation team will be able to do more than
>simply send a canned rejection notice if something like the
>ca.support.stroke proposal comes along. This is a good example of the
>kind of submission that doesn't belong in news.groups.proposals but does
>merit additional consideration.
>
>> This would let you keep a fairly indefinite opening (3 months?), but
>> have the the ability to be more selective in what is posted.
>
>3 months is a long time.
It was not a suggestion of policy, but rather possible implementation.
Your classification scheme is not going to be able to classify a large
number of articles as to what proposal they pertain to, because they
won't pertain to any active proposal. But it may be able to classify
recently active proposals, and you may get a few stragglers 3 months
out. I'm not saying that 3 months out should be automatically
approved, but articles on "recent" proposals may be your more
subjective decisions, perhaps alongside decision on name calling and
personal attacks. You can read "subjective" as "least susceptible to
screening by software.
It may be that in your role of head moderator that you are going to
have to make a policy decision on a proposal by proposal basis (eg.
this is just a rehash of old discussion, let's cut if off).
--
Jim Riley
Rebecca Ore
>
> So far I have enjoyed working with everyone on the Moderation team.
> They have all been very receptive to my ideas, some of which are not
> conventional.
> I hope people will be happy with the end result of the what the team
> effort creates.
>
I'll say that I have moderate faith that Kevin will do the right thing. He was
flexible enough to notice changes in various other posters rather than continue
in stereotypes that weren't always fitting the people.
Henrietta K Thomas
<d...@big-8.org> wrote:
> REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
> moderated group news.groups.proposals
>
>This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the creation of the
>moderated Usenet newsgroup, news.groups.proposals.
Except for the moderation scheme, there is very little difference
between this RFD and the 1st RFD, so I don't think I want to waste any
more bandwidth making suggestions likely to be ignored. I still support
the idea of news.groups.proposals, but that's about as far as I can go.
:(
--
Henrietta
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>On Thu, 26 Oct 2006 15:58:34 -0500, in news.groups,
>tski...@killfile.org (Tim Skirvin) wrote:
>>Henrietta K Thomas <h...@xnet.com> writes:
>>> If the former NAN team thought it was important enough to set a
>>> post-decision discussion deadline in the guidelines, the current board
>>> should be willing to do likewise.
>> The post-decision discussion was specifically to allow discussion
>>of the vote itself, and point out irregularities.
>I know, but that is not my point.
>>Our initial policies
>>included such a period; it was not popular, and it was removed.
>I have no recollection of this. Not popular with whom? Please cite
>chapter and verse.
In our original voting rules, we allowed a vote to be announced
as soon as it was clear to the votetaker that an irreversible
majority had been reached.
We reached that number within 20 minutes of starting the
asatru vote.
Tim announced the result shortly thereafter.
In that same set of rules, there was provision for post-vote
comments before the decision went into effect.
People howled in outrage that there was an invitation to
comment after the vote had been taken and announced. So
we modified our rules to the present "Last Call for
Comments" procedure and inserted a slowdown clause so
that board members living in different time zones would
all have a chance to vote before learning the outcome
of the vote.
Steve Bonine
agreement on the idea that discussion should continue in
news.groups.proposals as long as it's useful discussion, and I'll leave
the wording of what goes in the RFD to the folks working on that
document. By the way, in answer to your question in another article,
discussion of a proposed group will not move from n.g.p at the second or
subsequent RFD; it will stay there for the duration of the discussion.
Jim Riley wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Oct 2006 09:00:56 -0500, Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com>
> wrote:
>>I don't think that anyone wins if the "I can't post to X group" question
>>is allowed. As for discussions related to a specific new group's
>>problem, that seems appropriate.
>
> A problem specific to every new group is for an ordinary user to be
> able to gain access to the group. One role of the discussion of a
> proposal is to help build interest in a newsgroup. I don't see that
> anyone wins by cutting off that interest.
I still feel that no one wins if the question "I can't post to X group"
appears in news.groups.proposals and 17 people follow up with answers.
I doubt that such discussion builds interest in a new group; in fact it
might annoy folks to the point of actually discouraging them from
visiting the new group. I would rather work towards getting help to the
person who is having the problem by sending them an answer and/or
redirecting them to the appropriate newsgroup to get help.
If it's a more general question ("Provider XYZ has this moderated group
set as unmoderated.") that affects a larger population, that's
different. But n.g.p is not the place for an individual to go to ask
questions about how to configure a news reader.
> Your classification scheme is not going to be able to classify a large
> number of articles as to what proposal they pertain to, because they
> won't pertain to any active proposal. But it may be able to classify
> recently active proposals, and you may get a few stragglers 3 months
> out. I'm not saying that 3 months out should be automatically
> approved, but articles on "recent" proposals may be your more
> subjective decisions, perhaps alongside decision on name calling and
> personal attacks. You can read "subjective" as "least susceptible to
> screening by software.
At this point we are not planning on any automatic approval or rejection
based on software screening (other than spam). I don't think it will be
difficult to determine which proposal articles apply to; if we have that
many proposals that's a problem I would love to see.
> It may be that in your role of head moderator that you are going to
> have to make a policy decision on a proposal by proposal basis (eg.
> this is just a rehash of old discussion, let's cut if off).
I expect decision to be made on a consensus basis of the moderators; I'm
just the scribe. We're going to have to do it on a discussion by
discussion basis but I expect it to be obvious when the discussion needs
to end; actually, in most cases it will simply happen.
Tim Skirvin
> A lot of people put large portions of their lives into making Usenet
> what it is today, and it's a shame to see it all flushed down the toilet
> like it was nothing but a bunch of crap. :(
I don't believe that the Board has done anything of the sort. We
are expressly trying to build a new system on the scaffolding of the old
one; and the few rules that have been replaced have concerned the internal
bureaucracy, and not much more.
Tim Skirvin
>> Our initial policies included such a period; it was not popular, and it
>> was removed.
> I have no recollection of this. Not popular with whom? Please cite
> chapter and verse.
Marty has done so already; I assume it's enough to jog your
memory?
>>> Otherwise, the moderators are free to change it at will, and I don't
>>> think that's a good idea.
>> Their freedom to do so is entirely unconnected to a post-decision
>> discussion period.
> In that case, I don't think the moderators should allow post-decision
> discussions.
I clearly don't understand your point at all. Could you expand?
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
[speaking to Henrietta:]
>Excuse me for not commenting on everything you wrote. We're in
>agreement on the idea that discussion should continue in
>news.groups.proposals as long as it's useful discussion, and I'll leave
>the wording of what goes in the RFD to the folks working on that
>document. ...
I suggest something like this:
"Discussion of a new newsgroup, a newsgroup whose moderators
or moderation scheme have been changed, or other policy
decisions affecting the Big-8 adopted by the Board in
response to an RFD may continue in n.g.p. if, in the
judgment of the moderators, the posts subsequent to a
decision by the board seem useful either for present
operations or for informational purposes."
Or, more briefly:
"Discussion may continue in a thread even after the
board has made a decision on an RFD if, in the judgment
of the moderators, further discussion seems useful,
interesting, or informative."
The idea I'm trying to get at is that, in the final
analysis, we have to rely on the moderators to apply
the moderation guidelines as best they can, making
calls about what does and does not fit the purposes
of the group. Since there are exceptions to every
rule (except this rule, of course), no set of rules
can ever specify all exceptional circumstances. The
harder people try to anticipate all possible
exceptions in the first set of rules, the worse the
mare's nest of exceptions gets.
I think this kind of commonsense approach to rule-making
and the use of rules goes without saying, except that
it's necessary to say it because we have so many
netlawyers in news.groups who demand that everything
be put into writing and then rigidly adhered to as
if it had come down from an infallible authority.
We need enough guidelines to help the moderators
do their job but not so many that it is an insupportable
burden.
Aratzio
<gbur...@databasix.com> transparently proposed:
>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 23:05:41 +0100, James Farrar
><james.s...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 09:53:33 -0600, "Daryl Hunt"
>><dh...@celticommnospam.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Plus, having known AUKk00ks on any moderation team is just plain stupid and
>>>invited disaster and failure.
>>
>>Could you please name names?
>
>What rock have YOU been hiding under?
AUK's
--
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?