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Grex > Coop11 > #160: Scribbling and Expurgating: Is it Effective? | |
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| Author |
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| 25 new of 128 responses total. |
jmsaul
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response 100 of 128:
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May 25 02:08 UTC 2000 |
They're vague in the sense that they are general assertions about vague
effects the policy may or may not have on human behavior, or general
statements about how you can't take speech back in other areas of life, so
you shouldn't be able to here. It was probably redundant for me to
characterize them both as "vague" and as "generalizations," but they are.
In contrast, I've been citing specific practical effects of the policy,
and how it could harm people.
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gull
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response 101 of 128:
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May 25 06:10 UTC 2000 |
Re #95:
> You'd rather let an innocent person suffer more and more defamation than
> allow one sacred posting to be deleted? Frankly, I don't agree with your
> priorities.
--> Your argument ignores the question of who decides what is "defamation."
This is not a simple issue; it's at the core of many people's feelings on
this. Once you let the censorship genie out of the bottle and say, "okay,
removing illegal items isn't enough, we're going to remove defamatory ones,
too," you've opened everything up to interpretation. Personally, I really
don't want to go there.
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jmsaul
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response 102 of 128:
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May 25 12:13 UTC 2000 |
I have never advocated allowing Grex staff to remove material other than that
which is illegal. (You'd have to if you got a court order, but you don't
need a policy for that.)
I am only advocating allowing the person who posts something to remove it.
It's their text; they should have that right. They may even legally have
that right under copyright law, because you aren't requiring posters to
execute any agreements licensing their text to Grex.
I'm about as anti-censorship as it gets -- but I don't believe that
deleting your own words is censorship, because you own those words. Your
rights aren't being infringed by removing your own text; in fact, they're
being infringed by the current Grex policy, because you lose the right to
control your own writings. Users have *less* rights under the current
policy than they would if they were permitted to delete their posts.
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aruba
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response 103 of 128:
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May 25 22:00 UTC 2000 |
Hey Joe, how about joining our community. Then you can drop the "you" and
"your" and talk about "we", "us", and "our".
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gypsi
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response 104 of 128:
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May 25 22:23 UTC 2000 |
(I think he's talking in terms of "You (understood)" which includes himself)
<shrugs> I could be wrong. =)
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jmsaul
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response 105 of 128:
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May 25 23:20 UTC 2000 |
I was in #102, actually.
On some other posts, though, I'm doing what Mark suggests. I haven't
decided yet whether I want to become a member of this community or not; I
don't always have this much time to spend in BBSing, and I'm already very
involved with M-Net. (Though I did buy a monitor in your auction. ;-)
One way or the other, though, this particular policy is one I wouldn't
be able to bring myself to say "we" about.
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remmers
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response 106 of 128:
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May 26 12:33 UTC 2000 |
(I don't agree with every policy that Grex ever adopted, but
I say "we" anyway.)
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remmers
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response 107 of 128:
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May 26 12:39 UTC 2000 |
(Anyway, I think anyone who actively participates in discussions
is a part of the community whether they like it or not. :-)
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jmsaul
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response 108 of 128:
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May 26 14:01 UTC 2000 |
(Fair enough. ;-)
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janc
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response 109 of 128:
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May 29 16:41 UTC 2000 |
I certainly think the current policy is broken.
The incident in Agora rather points this up. I think Steve ended up by
going into the censored log and deleting the text in question. I think
he acted sensibly and compassionately, but not in accordance with Grex's
policy. Which means, Grex's current policy is neither sensible nor
compassionate.
My opinions on this have varied in the past. I understand the
philosophical arguments, and agree with them. But if we don't allow
people true self-censorship, then I, as a staff member, will regularly
be placed in Steve's dilemma:
Person A says something slanderous and embarrassing about person B,
and immediately regrets it. As a staff person, I have the power to
erase the response. Do I
(1) Stand on principle and policy, and insist on leaving the
statement up to embarrass both A and B forever, or
(2) Bend the rules, erase the response, and put everyone out of
their misery.
Note that regardless of which choice I make, people are going to be
pissed off at me.
This is an uncomfortable position for staff to be in. We do stand on
principle on may other issues, but I believe more strongly in those
principles.
So currently I think the censored log should be depermitted so that only
staff can see censored responses. (I think this is better than not
keeping a log at all - staff would be expected to treat censored
responses with approximately the same sensitivity that they treat
private email, but there may be rare circumstances where being able to
reproduce what was censored may be useful.)
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jmsaul
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response 110 of 128:
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May 29 17:32 UTC 2000 |
Could you emumerate those circumstances, Jan?
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scg
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response 111 of 128:
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May 29 17:49 UTC 2000 |
I'm confused about what incident in Agora Jan is talking about. Is it
mentioned somewhere else in this item that I've missed?
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jmsaul
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response 112 of 128:
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May 29 19:44 UTC 2000 |
I was wondering that too.
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remmers
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response 113 of 128:
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May 29 19:45 UTC 2000 |
I don't know what incident he's referring to either.
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gypsi
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response 114 of 128:
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May 29 20:03 UTC 2000 |
Maybe because it was private?
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pfv
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response 115 of 128:
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May 29 21:19 UTC 2000 |
I trust the staff with my email. I would absolutely trust them
with a depermed, censored item/response.
To my knowledge, never - even when I have been a bit abrasive -
have staff here, on grex, EVER abused their powers or taken
great offensive to what I've posted or done - and I have, on
occasion, pulled real boners that staff has privately explained
to me.
If you can't trust root, then you need a new system. It's that
simple.
I would add also that scribbled/expurgated items/responses, much
like accounts people miscreate, might become something that you
would ASK the staff to quietly thermonuke completely and totally.
(I suspect a simple script could be created that would do this
with no effort beyond invocation, and that staff/root might just
process such requests in a batch).
Time to treat the users as Adults, and accept that roots *are*
godlike. AND, while you are at it, realize that folks CAN and DO
make mistakes - it's normal, natural & here to stay. HOWEVER, even
if the borg WANT and THINK the sun rises in the west, they have to
acknowledge root, mistakes, users and Reality (what a concept).
P.S. and BTW: even ROOT can make an occasional mistake. This is
why their "empowerment" can be such a dilemma, and I suspect
even marcus and janc would admit they try to be careful in what
they do. Perhaps even to the extent of doing a backup-backup
before something radical.
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remmers
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response 116 of 128:
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May 29 21:48 UTC 2000 |
Re resp:114 - Well, scg and I are both staff, and staff folks
are supposed to log actions they take as root. If it was logged
but happened a while ago, it's possible I've forgotten about it,
but if it was recent, I think I'd remember.
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scg
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response 117 of 128:
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May 30 05:08 UTC 2000 |
I, on the other hand, am so oblivious to the Grex staff communications
channels at this point that I am very unlikely to notice minor staff actions
unless they're pointed out to me.
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gypsi
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response 118 of 128:
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May 30 07:35 UTC 2000 |
Ah...okay. I see what you meant now.
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mary
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response 119 of 128:
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May 30 10:48 UTC 2000 |
Steve, is editing for content a "minor staff action"?
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jmsaul
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response 120 of 128:
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May 30 14:25 UTC 2000 |
I wouldn't think so.
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scg
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response 121 of 128:
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May 30 19:39 UTC 2000 |
re 119:
From the perspective of how oblivious I am to staff actions, it would
be a minor staff action unless it generated a huge amount of e-mail, with a
very noticable subject line. The rest of you are free to guage the importance
of things on different criteria than how noticable they are in my mailbox,
of course.
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i
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response 122 of 128:
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May 31 01:56 UTC 2000 |
My impression is that grex's root-level staff members (scg & most of the
rest who speak as staff here) face more staff work than they can even
dream about getting done every time they log onto grex, and much of that
work presents itself as e-mail. In such circumstances, i find it very
easy to see how anything that stafferx doesn't *have* to take action on
is split-second-classified as "minor" in stafferx's mind.
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spooked
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response 123 of 128:
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May 31 03:47 UTC 2000 |
Yes, very well said i (:
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davel
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response 124 of 128:
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May 31 21:01 UTC 2000 |
Um, yes, Walter, I'm in complete agreement. Just to pick a nit, note that
cfadm is the owner of /bbs/censored, so you have every bit as much power in
regard to it as any root on grex.
Personally, I don't know anyone on staff who'd view editing responses (whether
in an item or in /bbs/censored) for content as a minor matter - except in the
trivial kind of senses already referred to (by Steve & Walter). A couple of
the newer staff people I don't actually know, but I think I know enough about
how staff works to feel quite sure it goes for them as well.
I'd be pretty surprised if Mary (who asked the question in #119) is in any
real doubt, either - I'd say she was concerned about Steve's wording rather
than his reliability on this. (She may, of course, squash me flat on this
if I'm wrong. Mary?)
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