Mail Archives: djgpp/1997/03/05/07:18:05
On Wed, 5 Mar 1997, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>
> On 4 Mar 1997, Jesse Bennett wrote:
>
> > I feel obligated to reiterate my concerns about the R-M approach that
> > has been proposed. This seems a very slippery slope, allowing
> > postings to be anonymously canceled with no accountability. There are
> > some technical issues here as well. What is to stop a disgruntled
> > individual from canceling legitimate posts as well (or worse, running
> > a CancelBot which targets his "enemies")?
>
> I think you are pushing this issue way too far. The authority to
> cancel messages is not given to everyone: the news group has to come
> up with a (hopefully small) number of individuals who are *trusted* by
> the group to exercise this authority only in those cases where the
> postings don't belong to the group. Thus the risk of *arbitrary*
> cancellation on *personal* or other irrelevant grounds does not exist;
> making that risk a real concern could IMHO dupe people into thinking
> that this is a moot issue. Trust is the basis for any DJGPP-related
> activity. (As a matter of fact, most human activities in a society
> involves certain degree of trust; you won't be able to make any
> significant progress in almost any field without trusting that certain
> ``rules of the game'' are mostly kept by others.)
Eli, I think you may have misinterpreted the point I was trying to make.
I did not intend to imply that those individuals who might be designated
as moderators would become `renegade cancelers'. I do not have any
concerns about the integrity of those who might be so designated. I
apologize if it appeared that I was, in any way, suggesting that the
*official* moderators would take *any* action based on a personal grudge.
Please accept my apology if this was your interpretation.
OTOH, it is naive to believe that only designated individuals are able to
cancel posts. Anyone with a working knowledge of USENET can cancel a
post. I can cancel your posts and you can cancel mine. It is simply a
matter of understanding the system. I made the above comment because the
situation I describe has occurred - on more than one occasion. In fact, I
am personally aware of a case where an individual who was somewhat
unpopular was targeted by an unauthorized CancelBot. Not by an
"authorized" individual but by some a**h**e who was seeking revenge. In a
similar vein, someone recently decided to be cute and issue a forged
rmgroup for the alt.2600 newsgroup. Guess what? Most news servers
removed the group. Of course it was restored in a day or so but needless
to say it was a MAJOR disruption. It only takes one person who feels he
has been treated unfairly to create a MAJOR problem for the group. This
is the situation that I would like to avoid.
In summary, the risk of *arbitrary* cancellation on *personal* or other
irrelevant grounds DOES exist. Sorry, but this is the current state of
USENET. I wish it weren't true.
Having said this I admit it is not the primary issue. I was not trying to
be an alarmist. I am not predicting an apocolypse if R-M comes to pass.
Please do not take a single sentence out of context (maybe I am guilty of
not putting it in the proper context). My point was simply that R-M
creates the possibility of fostering ill-will which is not without
consequence.
> My real concern is how well *trustworthy* and *well-meaning*
> individuals can indeed classify the borderline postings in a way that
> doesn't prevent useful information from getting to people who might
> find it helpful.
I agree that this is the principal issue here. As you have stated, TRUST
is the basis for any successful community activity. I believe that given
a well defined charter that is consistent with the interests of the djgpp
community we can trust this community to police itself.
I understand that I am not well known in this group, but I have been a
silent member of the djgpp community for many years. I subscribed to the
mailing list long before there was a newsgroup. I voted for the newsgroup
and have followed it since its creation. In my opinion it has been and
continues to be one of the best newsgroups in existence. If I am "pushing
this issue way too far" it is only because I HONESTLY believe it is in the
best interest of the group to understand the issues involved. If the
concensus is that R-M is the Right Thing I will accept that as the will of
the community. But I want to feel confident that it was an informed
choice.
> > Independently of any moderation disscussions I think it is worthwhile
> > to review the group charter periodically. What should be considered
> > on-topic for the group? For example, none of the following are djgpp
> > specific - should the group charter ban these discussions?
> >
> > * Discussions about gcc in general (language extensions,
> > optimizations, assembly language programming, etc.).
> >
> > * Discussions about C programming methods. Tips, tricks, etc.
> >
> > * Discussions about porting code using gcc but not djgpp specifically.
> > For example, I might be interested in porting an application using
> > Linux. Since the code should compile with little or no
> > modification under djgpp it seems likely that there might be some
> > interest in the djgpp community.
>
> These are all those ``borderline'' cases that worry me. My best
> answer to the above question is that discussions on these subjects are
> *somewhat* relevant to DJGPP, therefore they should *not* be banned.
> However, it is true that more often than not, these threads gradually
> become less and less relevant to DJGPP as they evolve. It would be
> wonderful if people had a degree of self-restraint to stop pursuing
> the issue (publicly; private email is OK) after a certain point. But
> it's naive to expect something like that in a real world. Even
> reviewing the group charter won't help here, I think (for example, I
> estimate that about 30-40% of the messages are covered by the FAQ, but
> people still post them, although the charter says they shouldn't).
>
> The *real* issue here is not whether a bunch of criminals will take
> control of this news group's traffic, the issue is this: how much are
> we annoyed by the noise that we get on an unmoderated group, and how
> much can we trust our trustees to let them cancel and/or re-route
> some of the messages. That is the issue that DJ was talking about;
> FWIW, I agree that it *should* be raised and discussed by everybody
> who cares to make their views public.
I do not agree that this is simply a matter of trusting a group of
individuals. I personally trust DJ, you (Eli), and many others who have
been long term contributors to this forum. Even though I don't know any
of you personally. My trust is based on my observation that many people
here have made substantial contributions to this group without any
expectation of personal reward.
Nor do I think the issue is "whether a bunch of criminals will take
control of this news group's traffic". I never intended to imply this.
IMHO the *real* issues are:
1. What is the group consensus on what constitutes "noise", i.e. what is
to be considered off-topic?
2. Given a definition of "noise", does the current level of noise
warrant the measures that are being proposed?
3. Are there better ways to limit the proliferation of off-topic
discussions?
Common sense and good judgement go a long way towards solving the type of
problem being discussed here. There is no shortage of either in this
group. I believe that given an answer to (1) and some guidelines about
how to curtail unwanted discussions the problem would resolve itself. For
example, if an off-topic question is posed it should not be answered in
the newsgroup. If someone wants to be helpful they should reply by email.
This will discourage future requests of this kind. No anti-spam messages
in the group. This is counterproductive. Similar guidelines about
cross-posting should be considered.
My position on this issue may not be popular, but it is based on many
factors. My opposition to R-M should not be interpreted as a lack of
trust. I simply don't believe it is necessary.
Best Regards,
Jesse
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