Proposal for ML conduct

[Jesse Keating]

On Fri, 2009-05-15 at 07:21 +0200, Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:
> I completely agree that there is a problem but sorry, I strongly dislike 
> how the board acted/acts here.
> 
> IMHO those that complained should have first made attemts to discuss a 
> proper solution on the effected lists (which didn't really happen 
> afaics) before going to the board for asking for help. Everything that 
> comes from the board like this feels like "some magic group at the top 
> of the hierarchy decided something without even bothering those that are 
> effected first". That is IMHO not how community project should act.

This isn't the first time we've tried to fix things.  Previously we
tried to employ a manner of policing ones self, by responding to the
negative posts and pointing out in public that the actions were not
appreciated.  It hasn't worked.  It's not really the board's fault that
people got tired of nothing happening on the lists and brought it to the
project overseers.  We're trying to get something in place to correct
the problem ASAP.

> 
> IOW: yes, we need a board for the hard decisions, but it IMHO should 
> only get involved after other ways to solve the problem have failed. 
> Otherwise the contributors feel like small unwanted bees that are needed 
> to do the leg-work, but there opinion doesn't count.
> 
> > The proposal:
> >
> > To resolve this, the Board appoints one or more Board members or other
> > Board-approved volunteers to monitor Fedora Project mailing lists.
> > The Board will warn violators of our "Be excellent to each other"
> > policy in the form of a one-day list moderation (with notice to the
> > poster).  Messages not allowed through will be returned to the poster
> > with explanation as to why they were not allowed.  If after one day of
> > moderation, the violation continues, the case will be brought to the
> > Board for further action, which could include permanent moderation,
> > complete removal from the project, or other remedies.
> >
> >    Being excellent to each other == No personal attacks, profanity
> >    directed at people or groups, serious threats of violence, or other
> >    things seen by the monitor as to be purposefully disrespectful.
> >
> >
> > * * *
> 
> Counter proposal: Let the community regulate itself. Ran all the mails 
> through a procmail recipe or something like that adds to links at the 
> bottom of all mails like this:
> 
> **
> You mostly agree with the poster? Click here:
> http://ml.fedoraproject.org/<msgid>&status=likedit
> 
> You think the poster was not nice to others
> http://ml.fedoraproject.org/<msgid>&status=notnicetoothers
> 
> Check how others see this mail:
> http://ml.fedoraproject.org/<msgid>&status=query
> **
> 
> Of course we need a small app on the server to count that.
> 
> If someone then was "not nice to others" then at least some of the 
> people will click the link. The one that wrote the mail gets direct 
> feedback from those that read the mail and not from a magic board police 
> guard that should use his time for better things.
> 

Are you willing to spend the time to create the app, and create it in
such a way that it can't be 'gamed' to silence somebody without proper
reason?  Would you have it done in the next week?

There isn't a reason why something like this couldn't be created at some
point, but I doubt that it'll be ready to use in the next week.  If it
ever were, the board could seriously look at dropping the human monitors
and turning the lists over to self policing via karma.  Until then, I
think we have to move forward with what we can accomplish after our next
board meeting.

-- 
Jesse Keating
Fedora -- Freedom² is a feature!
identi.ca: http://identi.ca/jkeating
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