[gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Steve Long]

I was thinking about the recent discussion re flames and firefighting on the
dev m-l. One thing that occurred to me, as a user who has been on one side
of those, is that it would have been better if I had never been able to
post more than two posts in a day. (I mean this for the technical dev m-l,
not project.)

That's plenty for me to say "I think that's out of order" and to answer a
response, but it also means I can't get too emotional if I get flamed by a
stressed-out dev. After all, since the proctors have gone, there's no one
to respond in anything like mail-list time in the (admittedly unlikely ;)
event that there is another flamewar on the dev list and more cogently
no-one to mute a troublesome user (in real time). A dev who is consistently
anti-social (especially out of the blue when they should just ignore the
thread) can be dealt with by devrel. (And have been in the past.)

If the user is making a valid point, surely others will post in support, and
in any event they can respond the next day. That would minimise the chance
that a user unused to the rough-and-tumble of dev behaviour would react in
a hostile manner, and can in no way be seen as censorship of the user
community, at least to my mind.

What do you think?


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Re: [gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Wernfried Haas]

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On Sun, Aug 05, 2007 at 02:36:02AM +0100, Steve Long wrote:
> What do you think?

Sucks like every other technical solution to non-technical
problems. :-P

cheers,
	Wernfried

-- 
Wernfried Haas (amne) - amne (at) gentoo.org
Gentoo Forums - http://forums.gentoo.org
forum-mods (at) gentoo.org
#gentoo-forums (freenode)

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Re: [gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Neil Bothwick]

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Hello Steve Long,

> I was thinking about the recent discussion re flames and firefighting
> on the dev m-l. One thing that occurred to me, as a user who has been
> on one side of those, is that it would have been better if I had never
> been able to post more than two posts in a day. (I mean this for the
> technical dev m-l, not project.)

Self-control would work just as well, and still allow you to participate
fully in constructive threads.

Technical solutions to behavioural problems never work.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

Sex is hereditary. If your parents never had it, chances are you wont
either. -

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Re: [gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Roy Bamford]

Steve,

I've in lined my words of wisdom ... you may not agree with them but 
they are mine, after all.

On 2007.08.05 02:36, Steve Long wrote:
> I was thinking about the recent discussion re flames and firefighting
> on the dev m-l. One thing that occurred to me, as a user who has been 
> on one side of those, is that it would have been better if I had 
> never been able to post more than two posts in a day. (I mean this 
> for the technical dev m-l, not project.)
That's ok as long as you only want to respond to flames and be off 
topic. It would limit the noise a non dev can create. As soon as you 
want to use -dev for its intended purpose, it would cramp your style.
This could not be usefully automated

> 
> That's plenty for me to say "I think that's out of order" and to
> answer a response, but it also means I can't get too emotional if I 
> get flamed by a stressed-out dev. 
Nor can you easily take part in technical discussions, should you want 
to :)

> After all, since the proctors have gone, there's no one to respond in 
> anything like mail-list time in the (admittedly unlikely ;) event 
> that there is another flamewar on the dev list and more cogently
> no-one to mute a troublesome user (in real time). A dev who is
> consistently anti-social (especially out of the blue when they should 
> just ignore the thread) can be dealt with by devrel. (And have been 
> in the past.)
After the fallout from the "Bubble thread" that lead directly to the 
death of the proctors, -dev appears to have calmed down. I'm not sure 
if that's because the proctors got so much publicity over that one 
incident that everyone knows of it and reviewed their behavior, or if 
they have just gone on summer holidays. I think this list will help 
take the pressure of -dev too.
> 
> If the user is making a valid point, surely others will post in
> support, and in any event they can respond the next day. That would 
> minimise the chance that a user unused to the rough-and-tumble of dev 
> behaviour would react in a hostile manner, and can in no way be seen 
> as censorship of the user community, at least to my mind.
If you are making a valid technical point, your posts don't need to be 
throttled. If not, you should not post to -dev at all.

> 
> What do you think?
> 
Social problems demand human in the loop control. That's why courts 
have (skilled ?) judges for sentencing, not just a look up table of 
offence - punishment.

A part of Gentoos problem and probably other OS projects, is that most 
devs are still learning their social skills. They are school or 
university students.
> -- 
> gentoo-project@gentoo.org mailing list
> 

Regards,

Roy Bamford
(NeddySeagoon)
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gentoo-project@gentoo.org mailing list

Re: [gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Ferris McCormick]

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On Sun, 05 Aug 2007 12:16:23 +0100
Roy Bamford <neddyseagoon@gentoo.org> wrote:



> > 
> > What do you think?
> > 
> Social problems demand human in the loop control. That's why courts 
> have (skilled ?) judges for sentencing, not just a look up table of 
> offence - punishment.
> 

Actually, the US likes to play with look up tables of offence -
punishment.  We call that "sentencing guidelines".  Judges tend to hate
it and it doesn't work very well.  The thought behind it is that judges
tend to be to lenient, so the legislature has to "help" them get it
right, but the result turns out to be more injustice.

> A part of Gentoos problem and probably other OS projects, is that most 
> devs are still learning their social skills. They are school or 
> university students.
> > -- 
> > gentoo-project@gentoo.org mailing list
> > 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Roy Bamford
> (NeddySeagoon)
> -- 
> gentoo-project@gentoo.org mailing list
> 

Regards,
- -- 
Ferris McCormick (P44646, MI) <fmccor@gentoo.org>
Developer, Gentoo Linux (Sparc, Devrel)
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Re: [gentoo-project] Proposal to ease flames

[Thomas Scharl]

Steve Long schrieb:
> What do you think?
social problem + technical solution = wont work

Unfortunately self-control is something each individual needs to learn
on its own and this takes some years beyond becoming 'adult by law'.
Now take into consideration that a lot of devs (and users) are (very)
young and still need to find their place in life both mentally and
socially...

regards
Thomas
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[gentoo-project] Re: Proposal to ease flames

[Steve Long]

Roy Bamford wrote:
> Steve,
> 
> I've in lined my words of wisdom ... you may not agree with them but
> they are mine, after all.
> 
Heh welcome to the first amendment ;) UK, you say? That's the 51st state..
/me wanders back on-topic.
> On 2007.08.05 02:36, Steve Long wrote:
>> I was thinking about the recent discussion re flames and firefighting
>> on the dev m-l. One thing that occurred to me, as a user who has been
>> on one side of those, is that it would have been better if I had
>> never been able to post more than two posts in a day. (I mean this
>> for the technical dev m-l, not project.)
> That's ok as long as you only want to respond to flames and be off
> topic. It would limit the noise a non dev can create. As soon as you
> want to use -dev for its intended purpose, it would cramp your style.
> This could not be usefully automated
>
Yeah but this is a mailing list, not IRC. As a non-dev, my input 
necessarily has less technical weight, since I am unfamiliar with gentoo
development processes and policy. In normal circumstances, I usually just
read the list, and if i have any questions i try and answer them myself. If
i post, it means i haven't got a clear answer from irc, prior ml or
bugzilla discussions. Given the timescale on a ml, 2 posts per day is
plenty for me to ask about stuff that isn't clear.

>> 
>> That's plenty for me to say "I think that's out of order" and to
>> answer a response, but it also means I can't get too emotional if I
>> get flamed by a stressed-out dev.
> Nor can you easily take part in technical discussions, should you want
> to :)
>
See above (not being pedantic; not ignoring this point is all.)
>> After all, since the proctors have gone, there's no one to respond in
>> anything like mail-list time in the (admittedly unlikely ;) event
>> that there is another flamewar on the dev list and more cogently
>> no-one to mute a troublesome user (in real time). A dev who is
>> consistently anti-social (especially out of the blue when they should
>> just ignore the thread) can be dealt with by devrel. (And have been
>> in the past.)
> After the fallout from the "Bubble thread" that lead directly to the
> death of the proctors, -dev appears to have calmed down. I'm not sure
> if that's because the proctors got so much publicity over that one
> incident that everyone knows of it and reviewed their behavior, or if
> they have just gone on summer holidays. I think this list will help
> take the pressure of -dev too.
Agreed.
>> 
>> If the user is making a valid point, surely others will post in
>> support, and in any event they can respond the next day. That would
>> minimise the chance that a user unused to the rough-and-tumble of dev
>> behaviour would react in a hostile manner, and can in no way be seen
>> as censorship of the user community, at least to my mind.
> If you are making a valid technical point, your posts don't need to be
> throttled. If not, you should not post to -dev at all.
>
Yes, but for a novice user (in terms of interaction with the dev m-l) it's
hard, and people make mistakes. The first time i got flamed I was totally
bewildered by it. The three or four times that's happened since, I was
still totally blindsided, since I thought I was posting common-sense,
typically to try and present the other side of the argument when someone
was being misunderstood. (Please don't review all of my mistakes, I am
aware they /were/ mistakes.) You then find yourself drawn into a flamewar
which you were trying to calm, typically by one of the participants being
offensive to you.

>> 
>> What do you think?
>> 
> Social problems demand human in the loop control. That's why courts
> have (skilled ?) judges for sentencing, not just a look up table of
> offence - punishment.
>
Yeah but this isn't punishment. It's just acknowledging that the list is
specifically for technical development, and that devs have more to say in
that debate. Since there is a history of misunderstanding with users, it
makes sense to me to limit the user posts to two per day. If there is a hot
buzzing thread which I have to respond to, it'll still be hot tomorrow (if
I can't be bothered to review the threads first.)

And let's face it, more new users are interested in stuff that belongs
on -project (if not help from the user m-l) like "Why are devs so prickly?"

> A part of Gentoos problem and probably other OS projects, is that most
> devs are still learning their social skills. They are school or
> university students.

Heh ok. I'd also support a more proactive devrel in that regard, ie actively
monitoring the list, as a quid pro quo for limitation on users. This to me
is about helping devs to deal with users, which is part of the process for
being a dev in the real world.

OFC if everyone thinks this is a silly idea, no problem. List seemed
quiet.. ;P


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