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1. God - 9/17/1999 7:11:34 PM So where were we? Oh yes, we had just decided that everything should be decided by me ... 2. Ace of Spades - 9/17/1999 7:12:58 PM
Oh, god.
Here's the problem, God: I'm a low-rent Dennis Miller. You're a low-rent me.
Please. Enough with the comedy. It's so horrible. 3. Angel-Five - 9/17/1999 7:16:11 PM Hey, this is nifty. 4. Ace of Spades - 9/17/1999 7:16:53 PM
God:
Please answer:
Why do you insist on pushing the envelope of our privacy policy? Do you intend to violate people's privacy? Or is this the only way you can get people to talk to you?
Err on the side of caution. If you're not sure, ask Wabbit or Irv or CalGal. There is generally NO EXCUSE for revealing personal information. If you're on the border and you cross it, it's your damn fault you crossed it. You shouldn't even have come near that damn border.
Do you understand? 5. ChristinO - 9/17/1999 7:17:08 PM It's very nifty, but I'm currently freezing my ass off and thinking I should go to bed. 7. God - 9/17/1999 7:18:35 PM Oops, thought we had hit a lull. Back to civility. 8. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:18:48 PM Pelle, #1016
It seems that the argument is more or less over which is good. Nevertheless we need to go back and try to understand what happened and at what junctures things started to go bad. I agree with Glenda that the civility and consensus the developed during the lasdays of the old place, at the refuge in TT and during the beta phase here probably lulled us into a false sense of confidence that meltdowns would not happen. There was a sense of community which would be able to withstand pressures and provocations. This was not so, and consequently events became characterised by crisis management. Mistakes were made in the heat of the moment. I will try to give my view on them. There is not one iota of anything personal in this.
My personal view on the issue that started all this is that the G-handle should not have been allowed. It is offensive and provocative and intended to be so. I accept the decision that was eventually made, but it should have come much earlier.
The first mistake was to let the matter go to a vote. This always leads to a hardening of positions, cheap shots, the bringing in of secondary issues. I think Americans are familiar with that.
The second mistake was to create a special thread. It gave a minor matter the status of being something Very Special. If it had stayed where it was a lot of people would have become exasperated and would have moved to have the thing done and over with.
The third mistake, a grave one in my view, was not to kill the thread immediately after the decision was made. This allowed the thing to restart as a debate about the debate which is seldom a good thing. And it was there the matter of outings was brought up, a matter that was not really a problem in the old place. I think jay's suggestion about personal profiles is good. Some of the objections against it can easily be dealt with by adding "or has been revealed by her or himself in the Mote".
9. Ace of Spades - 9/17/1999 7:19:05 PM
Jesus.
It's sort of like a really bad Elvis impersonator, but doing a bad impersonation of me.
This is awful. 10. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:20:18 PM 1017. pellenilsson - 9/18/99 12:07:08 AM
It is obvious that the Mote needs a management, but not management behind closed doors. Let us create a Mote Policy thread. When issues of particular import for certain Moties emerge a mailing list can be created - as mentioned by jay and things can be hashed out there.
A couple more issues. I think the registration procedure is too lax. TT requires a "real" e-mail address. Why shouldn't we? There is still no intro page for newcomers. There are no e-mail addresses for wabbit and JJ in their "official" capacities.
1018. CalGal - 9/18/99 12:16:17 AM
Pelle,
I have not been able to get to the development site for over a week now. First the FTP was down, now the site itself is down. I find it very frustrating. That's why no changes have been added.
Actually, I'm not sure the camaderie has disappeared among the people that went to TT together. Have you seen any of them fighting? I have not.
1019. pellenilsson - 9/18/99 12:18:22 AM
I must admit I haven't thought about it from that angle.
1020. CalGal - 9/18/99 12:20:48 AM
As for outings--it wasn't a problem in the old place because there was a strict policy. One that I thought we were using here, as well. I still don't understand why the statement that we intended to use the same policy (as was agreed when we were in beta) caused so much upset.
And Pelle--personal profiles? We only get to discuss what's in there?
What the hell was wrong with the way it worked in the Fray? No one seemed to object to it there.
11. God - 9/17/1999 7:20:27 PM Ace
I don't care what your privacy policy is. I've spilled all the beans I'm going to spill. Since EVERYONE already knows what I said, I wish I could elaborate on what I've already said, since presumably the damage has been done. But that would be a double standard of sorts and reward misbehavior, so I'll keep my tongue bitten. Anyway, I don't have any private information to share and like I said, no interest. 12. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:21:46 PM 1021. pellenilsson - 9/18/99 12:46:06 AM
A thing I forgot. The big fracas was obviously not good for our image. I saw a post by Rosetta yesterday saying that some from CNN and some other place had been aghast at what they saw. Knowing Rosetta, how do you think they came to see it?
CalGal
Let's not start all over again.
1023. pellenilsson - 9/18/99 12:49:30 AM
But CalGal, it was not a problem in the Fray because it was not made into a problem. Now that has happened and, as much as I hope that we can turn the clock back, it might not be possible and then it must be dealt with in some way.
13. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:22:15 PM 1027. CalGal - 9/18/99 1:05:24 AM
Pelle,
You ask questions. I answer them, and you tell me not to start all over again?
So what--you want different answers? Ones that will agree with you? What is it that won't be starting it all over again?
What I find utterly astounding is this--we are here. We survived. We have created this place. Against considerable odds. We need to get started. We had a forum with rules that everyone lived with.
And people want to discuss and make new rules? Do you have any idea how hard it is to get people to agree on policy? The posts were normal volume for policy debates.
I had no idea that there would be this resistance. What was needed, I think, was a clear statement that when in doubt, we were living by Fray rules. If we weren't going to do that, we could then wait another six months to reach consensus.
I was foolish enough to think it was a given. I find it astounding that some people wanted to take this site for granted and start agitating for changes in policies that they had happily accepted at the Fray. Why? Must we do everything at once?
Every single person who came in and made any comment on privacy that was different from what we had at the Fray was in effect agitating for change. Any person who came in and demanded that we have an anything goes attitude towards handles and resisted any notion of a central decision maker--agitating for change.
We've had enough change. I'm not trying to hold back progress. I'm just trying to slow things down. Hell, in the first week we had a problematic situation--a moniker chosen to cause trouble.
This would have been tough at the Fray, much less here. Did people back JJ? Not until he called for a vote--at which point people figured they had the free speech numbers to let it "win". Yeah. Big win. They made life very difficult for a reasonable central authority. A volunteer one at that.
14. Ace of Spades - 9/17/1999 7:22:51 PM
ChristinO:
You're going to bed now? God's only halfway through his Tribute Act. 15. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:22:59 PM 1028. CalGal - 9/18/99 1:06:07 AM
Incidentally, I am not singling out anyone in particular. But many of you focus on the volume of posts and hold people responsible based on that, rather than what was being said. That is shortsighted in the extreme.
People should ask themselves if they are backing the policies that were in place at the Fray. If they didn't, they might want to ask how much volunteers can accomplish in less than two months and give us a fucking break.
Speaking for myself, much of the joy in this has gone away.
1030. coralreef - 9/18/99 1:14:05 AM
Just want to say that I think the Mote has turned into a raging success. Now I wish there was less literal raging, true, and there are various little things I'd do differently if I were King of the Mote, but there have been stretches of wheat in this place far exceeding my expectations. Even though the chaff kind of sucks sometimes.
As to the requests that the policy not be formulated "Behind closed doors", this is a big part of the problem I have with the notion of this as a community. A false expectation of democracy. To me the ideal management would be "Whatever Alistair says goes, end of story".
This place exists at all because a handful of volunteers labored to make it exist. Best not to forget that.
16. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:23:44 PM 1033. CalGal - 9/18/99 1:20:22 AM
But CalGal, it was not a problem in the Fray because it was not made into a problem.
It was not made into a problem because at the Fray we had an central authority who was often questioned, but had absolute final say. Actually, we have that here as well. But people seem less ready to accept it.
Do you really think that the beginning of a forum is an appropriate time for anyone to get into a free speech debate about whether or not KillNiggers is a valid id? Yet that's what the people who opposed JJ's decision felt was appropriate. Let such a person come in and deal with it from there.
Don't get me wrong. That might be a valid policy. The point is, once JJ said "no"--which he said on the first day, about the more extreme monikers (excluding the G issue)--was that a time when everyone should get up in arms about free speech? Do you really think that the people involved had any intention of making this a soppy, wishywashy forum? And is it ever appropriate to hold back?
I'm not saying that we shouldn't debate these things. But I got very upset when I saw the accusations. People who know better, dammit.
So to those who tsk-tsked the numerous posts and the ugliness and the bad impression we gave--did they go in to the thread and make a strong statement backing JJ? If not, why not? If it was because they disagreed with him and felt that he should be persuaded to change his mind, then they can look in the mirror if they need someone to blame.
I don't think unity among the people who know each other and, supposedly, value each other should be all that much to ask in the early days.
17. God - 9/17/1999 7:23:53 PM pelle's thoughts weren't that insightful the first time, do we need to see them all over again? 18. wabbit - 9/17/1999 7:23:57 PM God,
You will notice that post #6 is gone. Leave the flaming in the Playpen and let's stick to discussing the topic at hand.
19. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:24:43 PM 1037. Angel-Five - 9/18/99 1:29:07 AM
"Do you really think that the beginning of a forum is an
appropriate time for anyone to get into a free speech debate
about whether or not KillNiggers is a valid id? Yet that's what
the people who opposed JJ's decision felt was appropriate."
Let's not whitewash. The people who supported his decision apparently felt it was an appropriate time, too, because they dove in. One of them, I believe, out-posted anyone else by at least a 2:1 margin. And you most certainly participated in that whole debate, from end to end and then afterward. As a matter of fact, afterward, you got incredulous that we were content to let the matter rest with JJ's eminently fair decision.
" Let
such a person come in and deal with it from there.
Don't get me wrong. That might be a valid policy. The point is,
once JJ said "no"--which he said on the first day, about the
more extreme monikers (excluding the G issue)--was that a
time when everyone should get up in arms about free speech?"
Well, if policies affecting the entire future of the forum were to be made then, I would have to say yes. When else were we supposed to discuss them? Next year?
"If it
was because they disagreed with him and felt that he should
be persuaded to change his mind, then they can look in the
mirror if they need someone to blame. "
Once again, it very definitely takes two to dance this particular tango and I remember a lot of people being willing to oblige -- and even ask for an encore. I think it's pretty vulgar of you to disassociate yourself from it now.
20. God - 9/17/1999 7:25:10 PM Or is she actually cutting and pasting the whole damn discussion? I wonder whose posts she'll skip.
==);-) 21. CalGal - 9/17/1999 7:25:17 PM 1038. Ace of Spades - 9/18/99 1:31:49 AM
Reading Comprehension Boy:
Cal's point is that those who agitated AGAINST JJ's decision were agitating for a change of Fray policy. We all presumed that those policies would be carried over to the Mote.
And her point, Censor Boy, is that such deviations from tried-and-tested Fray policies could have waited.
1039. Angel-Five - 9/18/99 1:35:45 AM
To echo what Coral has added:
I think that for most of the free speech liberals here the ideal forum would be entirely free and entirely self-regulated. I also expect that this will never happen. Ideals never do. The notion, then, is to keep as close to the ideals as possible. It isn't an absolute position because only a fool can afford to truly take that position. Pragmatism has to intrude.
If there has to be some kind of central authority -- and there does, I believe, as we've seen already -- then the best way for that central authority to proceed is in the vein of laissez-faire. I can't speak for anyone else, but to me that's a good direction to take, especially when the starting ground appears to be a lot more hands-on and controlled. (Keep in mind that I'm only talking about the overall authority). I think that a lot of people feel the same way, and I would hope that -- at least for now -- that can be our agreement to disagree between ourselves and the people who want a central authority figure. That we can at least for now have a central figure who tries to be as minimally involved as practicable. Fortunately for us, in the spirit of compromise, we seem to have this sort of a situation available. All we have to do is agree to embrace it for the moment, and move onward.
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