Proposal for ML conduct

[Luis Villa]

On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 10:40 AM, Jonathan Roberts
<jonrob at fedoraproject.org> wrote:
> 2009/5/18 Lyos Gemini Norezel <lyos.gemininorezel at gmail.com>:
>> Without vitriol and obnoxious people, some of the best ideas would be lost
>> forever.

And with vitriol and obnoxious people, some of the best people (and
their ideas) are lost forever as well. This is a no-win situation, but
thousands of years of social experience suggest to us that on balance
you lose more by tolerating vitriol than by not tolerating it.

> Right, but there are a million and one different ways to say something
> to someone.
>
> You can say "Hey *******, I think you're a ******* ******, and you're
> ideas are complete *********" and the chances are that person is not
> going to be very responsive to whatever change you're proposing.
>
> Or you can say, "Hey, I really like the basic idea of what you're
> working on, but think it would be better if we took it in this
> direction instead, because a) .... b) ...." and then chances are that
> person would be far more responsive, engage in real, constructive
> dialogue, and something might actually be achieved.
>
> The first of these two is not constructive, and actively prevents
> others from joining in and progressing the project.

Exactly.

Luis