Samuel Klein wrote: > I just forwarded a bunch of mail from non-subscribers from the past two > weeks. I am looking for 1-2 people to help moderate this list -- this > involves filtering spam, passing on messages from non-list members, > keeping heated discussions on-topic, and moderating the rare overzealous > poster. Please reply to me off-list if interested.
Some time ago, I posted the following comments about moderation to a closed OLPC list. This is not to say there shouldn't be someone managing the list. Just that they should not apply a strict moderation policy. Do you agree on this? -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: on transparency Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:38:29 +0200 From: Bernie Innocenti <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Samuel Klein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> CC: Marco Pesenti Gritti <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] Samuel Klein wrote: > If we can clarify this, the list mods can be encouraged to keep > discussion on topic. Strict moderation and splitting into micro-topic groups was attempted by the venerable FidoNet and Usenet, two very large pre-Internet networks. In my experience, it created more trouble than benefit. A large part of the traffic was moderators bitching with subscribers about what is on topic and how the policy should be modified to allow or deny a particular behavior. Lots of posting would begin with disclaimers: "I'm not sure this is on topic, please forgive me if it's not...". The most popular argument was: "you are wasting everybody's bandwidth!", along with estimates of how many bytes were transferred to convey the inappropriate topic. Then when bandwidth was not a problem any more, it became a S/N ratio issue. Some individuals cannot suffer to hear others expressing their own ideas and bring up bandwidth and S/N excuses as a way to censor them. This is why moderation in public forums was a bed idea and was dropped in modern Internet. What works very well, instead, is self moderation and peer-to-peer moderation, because people in general learn to avoid behavior that upsets everybody else. I think the Wikipedia works on the very same principle. -- \___/ _| o | Bernie Innocenti - http://www.codewiz.org/ \|_X_| "It's an education project, not a laptop project!" _______________________________________________ Sugar mailing list Sugar@lists.laptop.org http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/sugar