On Wednesday, November 13, 2013 15:52:35 Chris Egeland wrote: > Hey hackers! > > I've been watching the mailing lists very closely for some time now, and > have noticed a general uptrend in the volume of email sent to the > discuss list. Sometimes we get offtopic and go off on tangents about > toast, or other topics which are fun to talk about, but are ultimately > irrelevant to the space itself. Usually, this isn't a problem, but for > someone who is interested in the space, but not the minutiae of every > little bit of day-to-day operations, it can quickly turn into an > overwhelming amount of email. > > Today, I'm asking for input on how we should proceed with the mailing > lists. As you may know, we currently have 5 lists, two of which are > public, one semipublic, and two private. discuss@synhak.org and > annou...@synhak.org are the two that everyone knows about. Members may > know that they are automatically subscribed to memb...@synhak.org. > Board members are subscribed to bo...@synhak.org and us sysadmin folk > are members of sysad...@synhak.org. > > My recommendation is to create an "offtopic" list, which would have very > very lax rules on what can be posted. Anything you want to chat about. > Want to debate why the RubberDucks is a terrible team name and the Aeros > was WAY better? Sure, no problem. Got a pothole on Market street that > irks you every day? Have at it. Joke threads? Toast? No problem. The > other side to this idea is that the discuss list would have some basic > rules imposed that mean that any topics to the discuss list would be > required to be relevant to the space itself. Projects occurring at the > space would be relevant topics, open hours discussion, meeting minutes, etc.
Looking through the archives, I can see three sources of off-topicness: * A newbie comes to SYNHAK and has no idea what the unwritten rules for discuss@synhak.org are and starts an irrelevant thread * A newbie comes to SYNHAK and has no idea what the unwritten rules for discuss@synhak.org are and makes an irrelevant reply to an on-topic thread * Someone who is familiar with the unwritten rules for discuss@synhak.org is purposely going off-topic. For the first two, how will they know that offto...@synhak.org is for off- topic stuff if they signed a mailing list signup sheet at a booth? Should we tell them "If you want to hear and make mustache jokes or other off-topic drivel that isn't about hacking, you can subscribe to offto...@synhak.org." For the third, its usually overlooked as only established members of the community do that and they have a feel for when it is acceptable. Here's a solution that'll actually work: Just tell the people going off-topic that you don't want it on the discuss list. Usually you only need to tell a newbie just once and they'll learn the ropes. The reason I know that this will work is because this is what happens in the real world. Have a look at archives of Usenet groups around September of every year before 1993. They'd get a batch of fresh-faced newbies who don't understand the culture. The regulars would quickly jump in and inform them that, while they are welcome to participate, there are a few social norms that should be followed regarding staying on topic, being polite, and other netiquette. Then again, we are a do-ocracy. If someone wants to throw the discuss list into moderation and enforce a rule that every post is on-topic, you're more than welcome to take over my job as mailman administrator. I'd feel as though I'm being treated like a child with no manners for something I didn't contribute to. Thats a quick way to make everyone feel unwelcome. If someone wants to put together a web-based forum for us to use, go ahead. I'd wager that none of the technically minded people who live on email will use it for any significant period of time. As evidence of both of these statements being true, I encourage folks to find me a successful hackerspace near our end of the peer-to-peer driven spectrum of community involvement that satisfies both conditions which appear to be the ones that this thread is trying to solve: * Doesn't use an email list as their primary asynchronous discussion channel * Has infallible enforcement of topicalness on their primary discussion list > > So, let me know what you guys think. I'm not officially proposing this, > but we may chat about it at the next meeting as a discussion topic, > because it would fundamentally mean we change how the mailing lists are > organized and structured. > > Thanks, > Chris > > > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@synhak.org > https://synhak.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list Discuss@synhak.org https://synhak.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
