Sandy and I will run a cypherpunks "moderation" experiment in Jan
I agree with Sandy Sandfort and many others that things have gotten way out of hand on the list. He and I feel that the only proposed solutions likely to succeed involve inserting human judgement in the cypherpunks posting process, rather than mere automation. So I am supporting this experiment, primarily by setting up a few more mailing lists on Toad and by automatically moving the current set of subscribers to the moderated list. You will be able to move yourselves back to the unedited list if you don't want to participate in the experiment, or if, partway through, you decide you don't like the results. Sandy will be gone til Tuesday evening, so don't expect further answers from him (or many from me, I'm swamped with other activities) until then. Meanwhile I'm interested in your discussion (on the list) of the idea. We'll modify it before starting, with good ideas from you. John Gilmore ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C'punks, Like many of you, I have become very disenchanted with the quality of discourse on this list. As others have pointed out, I believe a great deal of the blame can be laid on the lack of civility between list (and non-list) members. I think this, in turn, is the result of the list being open. As such, it has no feedback mechanisms to discourage gratuitous insults and personal attacks. The result has been an escalation of such behavior--something that no amount of personal mail filtering can rectify. Recently, I made a couple of rough proposals to John Gilmore to see if there was some way to reverse this trend. We have gone back and forth on several issues, but we finally reached an agreement whereby I would partially moderate the Cypherpunk list for a one-month test period. If the consensus of list members is that the test is going well, it can be extended. If members think it sucks, it can be dropped or modified. Even before we start, though, you may wish to contribute suggestions. The following is our general plan. I'm sure there will be questions that have to be answered as they arise, but the basis outline is a follows: 1) The test will run from January 11 through February 12. 2) I will review all incoming messages for purposes of preserving decorum and reducing obviously unrelated spam. Other then that, I will not overly concern myself with off-topic posts. I will, however, expurgate all posts containing flames, insults and other irrelevant personal attacks, as well as spams, before forwarding the remaining posts to the Cypherpunk list. 3) Cypherpunks who wish to read all posts to the list may do so by taking advantage of either of two optional lists. The first (cypherpunk-flames@toad.com), will consist solely of messages expurgated from the main Cypherpunks list. (Those who subscribe to "flames" will be able to easily monitor my moderating decisions.) The second (cypherpunks-unedited@toad.com), will contain all posts sent to Cypherpunks. It will be the equivalent of the current open, unmoderated list. It will appeal to those who don't want list moderation. 4) During the test month, polite discussion of the test will always be on topic. In the last few days before the 10th of February, I will call for opinions as to whether moderation should be continued, modified or eliminated. John has agreed to abide by the consensus of the group with one proviso. Because of the large volume of bandwidth eaten by the lists, he does not want to maintain both the "flame" and "unedited" versions of the list. If list members decide to continue to have the list moderated, one of those lists will probably have to go. 5) If list members decide on a moderated list, I will be happy to assist in the ongoing process. Though I will continue to be available for duty as moderator from time to time, we will need a set of rotating volunteers to take turns acting as moderator. Volunteers are always welcome. 6) Because every message submitted to Cypherpunk will be posted to two of the three sister lists, I don't intend to lose much sleep over whether or not this or that moderating decision was perfect. I will do the best job I can, within the constraints listed here. If I err, it isn't fatal. Everyone who wants one will have two Cypherpunk venues for their posts. Sounds fair enough to me. What do you think? S a n d y ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ PS: The new lists aren't set up yet, so there's no point in trying to subscribe or unsubscribe to them yet. We'll let you know when they are working. -- John
Thank you. I look forward to more of the best of C'punks, without having the hassle of continually weeding out the vapid bullshit. Apparently because of your philosophical orientation, you have stayed open -- and kept the List open -- to this pattern of eggregious harassment far longer than I would have thought possible. I applaud your patience, but for myself -- I have had more than enough! I think the way you choose to resolve the problem is admirable; indeed, fair beyond belief -- and I wish any masochist who continues to read the completely unmoderated list the best of luck. It has been painful to watch an often-challenging array of voices, from a wide variety of POVs, become swamped by drivel from assholes whose only goal was to burden the List with dung. As was doubtless their goal, they chased many once-faithful readers away. I trust the List will remain open to varied POVs. Sternlight, FC, and any others who might offer substantive challenges to Libertarian boiler-plate should never be feared or denied a hearing. I don't mind strident voices. I enjoy a conflict of ideas. But I abhor the emply spams and automated gratuitous-insult machines we've all had to endure for so long. Suerte, _Vin Vin McLellan + The Privacy Guild + <vin@shore.net> 53 Nichols St., Chelsea, MA 02150 USA <617> 884-5548
Vin McLellan wrote:
Thank you. I look forward to more of the best of C'punks, without having the hassle of continually weeding out the vapid bullshit. Apparently because of your philosophical orientation, you have stayed open -- and kept the List open -- to this pattern of eggregious harassment far longer than I would have thought possible. I applaud your patience, but for myself -- I have had more than enough!
Well, Vin, without commenting on your plug for censorship, I can only say that I hope you are *very* fond of Sandy Sandfort, since he becomes YOUR LORD GOD for cypherpunks list purposes. How many other gods do you have, Vin (if that's your real name, Vin)?
Dale Thorn melodramatically stalked in from Stage Right.
Well, Vin, without commenting on your plug for censorship, I can only say that I hope you are *very* fond of Sandy Sandfort, since he becomes YOUR LORD GOD for cypherpunks list purposes.
How many other gods do you have, Vin (if that's your real name, Vin)?
When I get jumped by a guy like you, Dale (that your real name, btw?) I am all but overwhelmed by the urge to snarl in response. (It makes me wonder if _everything_ from _everyone_ hits you this way? That would explain a lot.) And I generally enjoy weirdness. Many Gods? Real names? As usual -- I swear by all the Gods;-) -- I haven't the faintest fucking idea what you are fussing, hinting, and going into a hissing fit all about! Where, pray tell, is your "censor" when a moderator is merely identifying a selection of the List's traffic as substantive? (While you and others of strong stomach are allowed to wallow in all the rest to your heart's content?) I'd be willing to defend a far less liberal mechanism against the slander of censorship. No one signed up to be force-fed this crap! (You need a audience, Dale, earn it -- don't try to trap the C'punks.) On any day in the past two years, John G. could have selected his proxy moderators by blind lottery from among the C'punks' subscribers... and 90 percent of the slime-balls and empty rants (and most of Thorne) would have been filtered out without going near a gray area. Personally, I don't mind the flames and smoke -- I just want a little meat somewhere on the grill too. (Yeah, priceless prose like this post might not make the cut either -- but I feel bad about enriching Dale's therapist further anyway.) I wish it wasn't necessary, but I think it is. (I know maybe 8 folks who fled the List in recent months.) I'm also heartened and impressed by the balance of process and human judgment that will inform the moderation. Suerte, _Vin Vin McLellan + The Privacy Guild + <vin@shore.net> 53 Nichols St., Chelsea, MA 02150 USA <617> 884-5548
Because of the large volume of bandwidth eaten by the lists, he does not want to maintain both the "flame" and "unedited" versions of the list. If list members decide to continue to have the list moderated, one of those lists will probably have to go.
You could maintain all options *and* still strictly reduce traffic on toad.com by encoding the moderator's decision in a header line. Then letting people subscribe to one of cypherpunks@toad.com or cypherpunks-unedited@toad.com. The first could forward only messages somehow approved, and the other would forward *all* messages, *with the decision shown in the headers*. Those of us who want to use the moderator's decisions as only advisory or who want to monitor the moderation process can subscribe to the full list and use the header in whatever manner we want. If the decision is available as a message header in the full list, there is no need for the "flames" list. The drawback is that the full list is now delayed by the moderation process (for the very few here who still seem to read in real time.) Keeping two versions of the list one delayed and one not delayed is not so good anyway because it makes it harder to use the decision as "advisory". Advantages of moderation headers: a) A more general solution, maybe later letting more than one moderation group step in (should we ever manage to muster that much manpower) maybe even letting people filter (on their own machine) on the basis of several moderator's decisions. At any rate, leaving space for any option we may want later. Initially, subscribing to moderated and flame is equivalent to a header solution. For that matter, it *is* a header solution. b) Strictly reduced traffic on toad.com by keeping some on the full list, and others on the reduced list. No need to ever subscribe to any two lists as the full list would show the moderators' decision(s). c) Keeps the two versions of the list more in sync (same delay), making it painless to switch from one version to the other at any time. 'more reading time' vs 'less volume'. d) If the moderators are into that level of dedication and software complication, they *could* now detail their decision: 'grumph, ok', 'mostly drivel', 'drivel', 'utter drivel', etc... ;-) Otherwise, I fully agree that if some are willing to help filter, I would like to be able to use their review (and I would provide reviews myself now and then), Pierre. pierre@rahul.net
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
[...]
dropped or modified. Even before we start, though, you may wish to contribute suggestions.
The following is our general plan. I'm sure there will be questions that have to be answered as they arise, but the basis outline is a follows:
1) The test will run from January 11 through February 12.
2) I will review all incoming messages for purposes of preserving decorum and reducing obviously unrelated spam. Other then that, I will not overly concern myself with off-topic posts. I will, however, expurgate all posts containing flames, insults and other irrelevant personal attacks, as well as spams, before forwarding the remaining posts to the Cypherpunk list.
A specific statement of what constitutes "flames, insults" and etc. might be a good idea. How will borderline posts be dealt with? Posts that contain a great deal of content and thoughful discussion and still manage to contain flames? Will flames be an automatic boot for a post (zero tolerance), or will they be balanced against post content? What is the threshold which, for example, constitutes an "insult" ? "Louis Freeh couldn't identify a directed well managed crypto policy if it bit him on his pimple speckled ass." "You are so turned around on this issue one is prompted to wonder if you have any background in higher education at all." "For the new members of the list, [insert list member here] has a history of posting idiotic and useless posts, and generally wasting the list's time like an asshole." All of the above? None of the above?
3) Cypherpunks who wish to read all posts to the list may do so by taking advantage of either of two optional lists. The first (cypherpunk-flames@toad.com), will consist solely of messages expurgated from the main Cypherpunks list. (Those who subscribe to "flames" will be able to easily monitor my moderating decisions.) The second (cypherpunks-unedited@toad.com), will contain all posts sent to Cypherpunks. It will be the equivalent of the current open, unmoderated list. It will appeal to those who don't want list moderation.
Excellent idea.
4) During the test month, polite discussion of the test will always be on topic. In the last few days before the 10th of February, I will call for opinions as to whether moderation should be continued, modified or eliminated. John has agreed to abide by the consensus of the group with one proviso. Because of the large volume of bandwidth eaten by the lists, he does not want to maintain both the "flame" and "unedited" versions of the list. If list members decide to continue to have the list moderated, one of those lists will probably have to go.
I believe the "flames" list should be maintained as long as possible. Continuing checks on the moderator (whoever it may be) are necessary and appropriate. What better way than to directly provide a means to identify what the moderator has excluded? (Also, if the flames and non flames lists are maintained, how is this more bandwidth than the former condition where both flames and nonflames will posted together? In fact, if this has a deterant effect on flames (one of the main reasons for instituting the policy) the bandwidth should be less. Its only more bandwidth if the unmoderated list is maintained. Perhaps the unmoderated list should be eliminated, as subscribing to both the flames and the non-flames will have the same net effect...?
5) If list members decide on a moderated list, I will be happy to assist in the ongoing process. Though I will continue to be available for duty as moderator from time to time, we will need a set of rotating volunteers to take turns acting as moderator. Volunteers are always welcome.
A diversity of moderators makes a detailed stated policy on moderation an absolute must.
6) Because every message submitted to Cypherpunk will be posted to two of the three sister lists, I don't intend to lose much sleep over whether or not this or that moderating decision was perfect. I will do the best job I can, within the constraints listed here. If I err, it isn't fatal. Everyone who wants one will have two Cypherpunk venues for their posts. Sounds fair enough to me. What do you think?
Excellent until the flames list is eliminated. -- Forward complaints to : European Association of Envelope Manufactures Finger for Public Key Gutenbergstrasse 21;Postfach;CH-3001;Bern Vote Monarchist Switzerland
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C'punks, On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, Black Unicorn wrote:
How will borderline posts be dealt with? Posts that contain a great deal of content and thoughful discussion and still manage to contain flames?
Will flames be an automatic boot for a post (zero tolerance), or will they be balanced against post content?
Zero tolerance will be my first approximation. I may modify that as I see how things really work out. So far, though, I don't recall see any of those "high content with flames" animals. Most posts are one or the other.
What is the threshold which, for example, constitutes an "insult" ?
"Louis Freeh couldn't identify a directed well managed crypto policy if it bit him on his pimple speckled ass."
Truth (and relevance) are a defense. :-)
"You are so turned around on this issue one is prompted to wonder if you have any background in higher education at all."
"For the new members of the list, [insert list member here] has a history of posting idiotic and useless posts, and generally wasting the list's time like an asshole."
All of the above? None of the above?
Sorry Black Unicorn, no declaratory judgments. Everything gets posted one way or another. Let's see how it works in the real world.
I believe the "flames" list should be maintained as long as possible. Continuing checks on the moderator (whoever it may be) are necessary and appropriate. What better way than to directly provide a means to identify what the moderator has excluded?
This is my opinion as well. However, John makes the very good point that the unedited list has one very important advantage-- timeliness. The other two lists (polite and flames) have a build in delay time because of the moderation. I don't see it as a problem, but John feels that quick turnaround is an advantage that some list members would prefer.
A diversity of moderators makes a detailed stated policy on moderation an absolute must.
I agree. We are not at that stage yet, however. We are still finding our sea legs for now. S a n d y ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Sandy Sandfort wrote:
On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, Black Unicorn wrote:
What is the threshold which, for example, constitutes an "insult" ?
"Louis Freeh couldn't identify a directed well managed crypto policy if it bit him on his pimple speckled ass."
Truth (and relevance) are a defense. :-)
If your approval is your certification of truthfulness of articles, you might be held liable for libel. Is that correct? - Igor.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C'punks, On Wed, 8 Jan 1997 ichudov@algebra.com wrote:
Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Truth (and relevance) are a defense. :-)
If your approval is your certification of truthfulness of articles, you might be held liable for libel. Is that correct?
Gosh, I hadn't thought about that. Maybe I should reconsider this whole crazy idea. S a n d y ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
C'punks,
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997 ichudov@algebra.com wrote:
Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Truth (and relevance) are a defense. :-)
If your approval is your certification of truthfulness of articles, you might be held liable for libel. Is that correct?
Gosh, I hadn't thought about that. Maybe I should reconsider this whole crazy idea.
Call me crazy, but is there any way to set up an anonymous moderator scheme? The messages hit toad.com, and are forwarded via the remailer network to someone. The actual moderator can change from time to time. Only posts that aren't "preapproved" are actually forwarded to the moderator. The moderator approves the postings by signing them with a PGP key. It's then sent back through the network to another address at toad.com, and passed on to the list members. Or does this just put toad.com in hot water? -- Good government. Good government. Sit. Stay.
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
C'punks,
On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, Black Unicorn wrote:
How will borderline posts be dealt with? Posts that contain a great deal of content and thoughful discussion and still manage to contain flames?
Will flames be an automatic boot for a post (zero tolerance), or will they be balanced against post content?
Zero tolerance will be my first approximation. I may modify that as I see how things really work out. So far, though, I don't recall see any of those "high content with flames" animals. Most posts are one or the other.
Haven't you been reading my stuff? -- Forward complaints to : European Association of Envelope Manufactures Finger for Public Key Gutenbergstrasse 21;Postfach;CH-3001;Bern Vote Monarchist Switzerland
Black Unicorn wrote:
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
C'punks,
On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, Black Unicorn wrote:
How will borderline posts be dealt with? Posts that contain a great deal of content and thoughful discussion and still manage to contain flames?
Will flames be an automatic boot for a post (zero tolerance), or will they be balanced against post content?
Zero tolerance will be my first approximation. I may modify that as I see how things really work out. So far, though, I don't recall see any of those "high content with flames" animals. Most posts are one or the other.
Haven't you been reading my stuff?
Indeed, I suggest a zero tolerance policy for posts of Prof. Black Unicorn where content is mixed with flames. - Igor.
ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home) writes:
Black Unicorn wrote:
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
C'punks,
On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, Black Unicorn wrote:
How will borderline posts be dealt with? Posts that contain a great de of content and thoughful discussion and still manage to contain flames?
Will flames be an automatic boot for a post (zero tolerance), or will t be balanced against post content?
Zero tolerance will be my first approximation. I may modify that as I see how things really work out. So far, though, I don't recall see any of those "high content with flames" animals. Most posts are one or the other.
Haven't you been reading my stuff?
Indeed, I suggest a zero tolerance policy for posts of Prof. Black Unicorn where content is mixed with flames.
- Igor.
I suggest zero tolerance of Black Unicorn unless and until someone reveals his real name. ObModeratorFodder: Fuck the Armenians. Asshole censor John Gilmore likes to suck big dicks. --- Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps
Sandy writes:
Sounds fair enough to me. What do you think?
I think temporarily moderating c-punks is a good idea. It could be that, if we are indeed the target of a cancelable attack on usenet, all this garbage could go away after a while (he said, wishfully). However, I think our current problems are more a function of the size of the list itself. So, if, in fact, the crap *doesn't* abate over time, it wouldn't be the end of the world if the more abusive behavior here were removed mechanically -- before it went out to almost 2,000 people. Thus, I don't think that moderating the garbage out of cypherpunks is the functional equivalent of a neuticle installation. :-). Measuring the effectiveness of this exercise, with the ability to peek ocassionally into Sandy's sludge pile, keeps the whole thing honest. Frankly, if we could figure out a way for Sandy to easily split the feed into "cypherpunks" and "trash", that would be the best *permanent* solution. Unfortunately, the physical mechanics of list moderation will probably swamp poor Sandy as it is, much less the permanent addition of forwarding the dreck somewhere else at the same time. I hope he understands that he's about to take a shower with a firehose. For instance, it's work enough mechanically for me to filter out the good 40% of cypherpunks, and the 10% average of the 30 or so other lists I follow on a daily basis for e$pam. If I were also responsible for sending the relevant contents of my trash folder to another feed, it would probably be too much to mess with, because I've got other stuff in there besides email list noise. Of course, having an intellegent moderator of cypherpunks also cuts down on the value of e$pam itself... Hmmm... Heavy sigh. ;-). Oh, well, it's all in the cause of a good signal... Go for it, Sandy, and good luck! Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox, e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "The cost of anything is the foregone alternative" -- Walter Johnson The e$ Home Page: http://www.vmeng.com/rah/ FC97: Anguilla, anyone? http://offshore.com.ai/fc97/
Robert Hettinga wrote:
solution. Unfortunately, the physical mechanics of list moderation will probably swamp poor Sandy as it is, much less the permanent addition of forwarding the dreck somewhere else at the same time. I hope he understands that he's about to take a shower with a firehose. For instance, it's work
With STUMP robomoderator, the great majority of posts are autoapproved, because they come from preapproved posters. In the newsgroups moderated by STUMP, moderators review only a small fraction of incoming messages. It gives two benefits: 1) Saves lots of potentially billable time for moderators 2) Increases speed with which posted articles reach the public. - Igor.
I believe that every "EASY $$$ MONEY" posting ought to be forwarded to the webmaster at the site from which it originated. Those who are harboring these generous souls should also be afforded the opportunity to rake in the cash. I can hardly see how anybody could possibly resent being reminded of the wonderful opportuninties they are making it possible for us to learn of. Toto
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C'punks,
Measuring the effectiveness of this exercise, with the ability to peek ocassionally into Sandy's sludge pile, keeps the whole thing honest.
I also think it allows the moderator to shoot from the hip a bit more loosely. Nothing gets lost, after all, just sorted. I'm going to cut myself a fair amount of slack for occasional mis-sorts.
Go for it, Sandy, and good luck!
Thanks, I'm sure I'll need it. S a n d y ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
my moderation bot, STUMP, may be just for you. It is now used in four usenet newsgroups (comp.os.ms-windows.win95.moderated, soc.culture.russian.moderated, misc.invest.financial-plan, soc.religion.paganism) and it can also handle mailing lists. features include preapproved list of trusted posters, list of suspicious keywords, optional (at the posters' discretion) positive poster authentication via PGP, signing of approvals with PGPMoose, multiple moderators, moderators' mailing list, and much more. There is a plugin for Netscape that I called Modscape that allows moderators to work with a pretty Netscape-like user interface for moderating (see the picture at the web site). Modscape currently works under linux and can be easily ported to any other unix where netscape plugins are supported. http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov (go to STUMP page) John Gilmore wrote:
I agree with Sandy Sandfort and many others that things have gotten way out of hand on the list. He and I feel that the only proposed solutions likely to succeed involve inserting human judgement in the cypherpunks posting process, rather than mere automation. So I am supporting this experiment, primarily by setting up a few more mailing lists on Toad and by automatically moving the current set of subscribers to the moderated list. You will be able to move yourselves back to the unedited list if you don't want to participate in the experiment, or if, partway through, you decide you don't like the results.
Sandy will be gone til Tuesday evening, so don't expect further answers from him (or many from me, I'm swamped with other activities) until then. Meanwhile I'm interested in your discussion (on the list) of the idea. We'll modify it before starting, with good ideas from you.
John Gilmore
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
C'punks,
Like many of you, I have become very disenchanted with the quality of discourse on this list. As others have pointed out, I believe a great deal of the blame can be laid on the lack of civility between list (and non-list) members. I think this, in turn, is the result of the list being open. As such, it has no feedback mechanisms to discourage gratuitous insults and personal attacks. The result has been an escalation of such behavior--something that no amount of personal mail filtering can rectify.
Recently, I made a couple of rough proposals to John Gilmore to see if there was some way to reverse this trend. We have gone back and forth on several issues, but we finally reached an agreement whereby I would partially moderate the Cypherpunk list for a one-month test period. If the consensus of list members is that the test is going well, it can be extended. If members think it sucks, it can be dropped or modified. Even before we start, though, you may wish to contribute suggestions.
The following is our general plan. I'm sure there will be questions that have to be answered as they arise, but the basis outline is a follows:
1) The test will run from January 11 through February 12.
2) I will review all incoming messages for purposes of preserving decorum and reducing obviously unrelated spam. Other then that, I will not overly concern myself with off-topic posts. I will, however, expurgate all posts containing flames, insults and other irrelevant personal attacks, as well as spams, before forwarding the remaining posts to the Cypherpunk list.
3) Cypherpunks who wish to read all posts to the list may do so by taking advantage of either of two optional lists. The first (cypherpunk-flames@toad.com), will consist solely of messages expurgated from the main Cypherpunks list. (Those who subscribe to "flames" will be able to easily monitor my moderating decisions.) The second (cypherpunks-unedited@toad.com), will contain all posts sent to Cypherpunks. It will be the equivalent of the current open, unmoderated list. It will appeal to those who don't want list moderation.
4) During the test month, polite discussion of the test will always be on topic. In the last few days before the 10th of February, I will call for opinions as to whether moderation should be continued, modified or eliminated. John has agreed to abide by the consensus of the group with one proviso. Because of the large volume of bandwidth eaten by the lists, he does not want to maintain both the "flame" and "unedited" versions of the list. If list members decide to continue to have the list moderated, one of those lists will probably have to go.
5) If list members decide on a moderated list, I will be happy to assist in the ongoing process. Though I will continue to be available for duty as moderator from time to time, we will need a set of rotating volunteers to take turns acting as moderator. Volunteers are always welcome.
6) Because every message submitted to Cypherpunk will be posted to two of the three sister lists, I don't intend to lose much sleep over whether or not this or that moderating decision was perfect. I will do the best job I can, within the constraints listed here. If I err, it isn't fatal. Everyone who wants one will have two Cypherpunk venues for their posts. Sounds fair enough to me. What do you think?
S a n d y
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PS: The new lists aren't set up yet, so there's no point in trying to subscribe or unsubscribe to them yet. We'll let you know when they are working. -- John
- Igor.
John Gilmore <gnu@toad.com> writes:
I agree with Sandy Sandfort and many others that things have gotten way out of hand on the list. He and I feel that the only proposed solutions likely to succeed involve inserting human judgement in the cypherpunks posting process, rather than mere automation. So I am supporting this experiment, primarily by setting up a few more mailing lists on Toad and by automatically moving the current set of subscribers to the moderated list. You will be able to move yourselves back to the unedited list if you don't want to participate in the experiment, or if, partway through, you decide you don't like the results.
Have you considered using a system like NoCeM (see http://www.cm.org)? I think such a system has many advantages over centrally controlled moderation. The basic idea of NoCeM is that instead of moderating a newsgroup or mailing list, people post lists of articles to be ignored, and you can configure your mail/newsreader to pay attention to NoCeM's by whichever people you trust. NoCeM would prevent any message delays which moderation might introduce (sure, I might see the last few hours worth of spam, but at least when I come back after a week away I don't have to wade through a week's worth of "Timmy May hurt my feelings, blah blah blah"). This means the more frequently you read the mailing list, the more spam you will see--quite an acceptable trade-off given that people who check the list often are probably those who would want to avoid message delays. NoCeM would also prevent anyone from accusing you of censorship. Even if such accusations are weeded from the list (via moderation), it's still a drag to lend credibility to such asinine accusations by actually blocking those people's posts. NoCeM would ensure that no one is held legally responsible for the contents of someone else's messages. If we continue to get important messages like implementations of the RC2 and RC4 ciphers, a moderator could be found responsible for approving such an article. Obviously there are some issues related to NoCeM. Not all mail- and newsreaders support NoCeM. However, there are definitely solutions to those problems. For instance, a perl script could be used to delay messages and apply NoCeM's, so that people can subscribe to customized filtered versions of the list. I might even be willing to write such software if there is interest.
Against Moderation writes:
Have you considered using a system like NoCeM (see http://www.cm.org)?
NoCeM doesn't appear to do mail yet. At least not according to the info on the web site
I think such a system has many advantages over centrally controlled moderation. The basic idea of NoCeM is that instead of moderating a newsgroup or mailing list, people post lists of articles to be ignored, and you can configure your mail/newsreader to pay attention to NoCeM's by whichever people you trust.
There's nothing in John and Sandy's proposal that forbids doing that. Just apply it to the cypherpunks-unmoderated list.
NoCeM would prevent any message delays which moderation might introduce
NoCeM for mail would require a delay (for the 'retromoderation' or whatever it's called message to arrive) otherwise you'd see the spam. Unlike news, once email's delivered it can't be deleted by a cancel.
NoCeM would also prevent anyone from accusing you of censorship.
The unmoderated version of the list doesn't do that?
If we continue to get important messages like implementations of the RC2 and RC4 ciphers, a moderator could be found responsible for approving such an article.
If such a message were to arrive and the moderator felt it would be too illegal to post it, it would still go to the unmoderated list. Remember, _everything_ goes to that list, before it's looked at by the moderator.
Obviously there are some issues related to NoCeM. Not all mail- and newsreaders support NoCeM.
It appears that NO mailreaders support it. :-)
However, there are definitely solutions to those problems. For instance, a perl script could be used to delay messages and apply NoCeM's, so that people can subscribe to customized filtered versions of the list. I might even be willing to write such software if there is interest.
I don't mean to sound really negative, NoCeM looks like an interesting solution to the problem of Usenet spam. But it's not ready for mailing lists. We need a solution now, and the proposed solution does not make it any harder to use something like NoCeM when it's ready. -- Eric Murray ericm@lne.com ericm@motorcycle.com http://www.lne.com/ericm PGP keyid:E03F65E5 fingerprint:50 B0 A2 4C 7D 86 FC 03 92 E8 AC E6 7E 27 29 AF
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On Sun, 5 Jan 1997, John Gilmore, quoting Sandy Sandfort, wrote:
3) Cypherpunks who wish to read all posts to the list may do so by taking advantage of either of two optional lists. The first (cypherpunk-flames@toad.com), will consist solely of messages expurgated from the main Cypherpunks list. (Those who subscribe to "flames" will be able to easily monitor my moderating decisions.) The second (cypherpunks-unedited@toad.com), will contain all posts sent to Cypherpunks. It will be the equivalent of the current open, unmoderated list. It will appeal to those who don't want list moderation.
To reduce the load on toad.com, I think it would be better to have just "cypherpunks" and "cypherpunks-unedited". Messages approved for the moderated list would be tagged with an "Approved:" header and sent to both lists. Rejected messages would still go to the unedited list, but would not have an "Approved:" header (this would, of course, require that the moderation software rename or delete "Approved:" headers). The only problem with this is that the lag time for distribution of the unedited list might increase.
6) Because every message submitted to Cypherpunk will be posted to two of the three sister lists, I don't intend to lose much sleep over whether or not this or that moderating decision was perfect. I will do the best job I can, within the constraints listed here. If I err, it isn't fatal. Everyone who wants one will have two Cypherpunk venues for their posts. Sounds fair enough to me. What do you think?
I think it's a good idea. As long as an unedited version continues to be available, it shouldn't effect people who want unfiltered list traffic. Mark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3 Charset: noconv iQEVAwUBMtAw8SzIPc7jvyFpAQGIqwgAhXQ373u94xnUag34nzusF6L6w4b9ml26 IiA4QbdXqtJWq+9wgG7znnobbL+y9EsMc9CzjAslwcyh7WMYTxRPXlM1z1r/m/Jm 8j6MJW5UHbhHZoTZiLdXYJqhBm3saPgSVqUle4+0dJ06pzvG6FrARB1SitFbnxn6 C+lKBLWbBmF1tBVzz/tswetNJLf9hcn1P1NeVLNHgMFOYfr46tZOuxkUqYWM1+UI VSp9i7U79seLAo2C9aopr7t6JyjSMAXA0EG9swwJ4omoQeePQTYRa2URjOgQ0VJx zWHKzX99b34BvhGhenFDyj/cHSDXoHznLNr6eZaRar7381cUkobC7g== =MoCG -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
"Mark M." <markm@voicenet.com> writes:
To reduce the load on toad.com, I think it would be better to have just "cypherpunks" and "cypherpunks-unedited". Messages approved for the moderated list would be tagged with an "Approved:" header and sent to both lists. Rejected messages would still go to the unedited list, but would not have an "Approved:" header (this would, of course, require that the moderation software rename or delete "Approved:" headers). The only problem with this is that the lag time for distribution of the unedited list might increase.
Other people are suggesting things like this. I think it is a bad idea to tag the -unedited version of the list with moderation decisions, because then even the -unedited versions of messages would be delayed until a moderation decision had been made. Some people already have suitable mail/news filters, and would rather make their own article selections. Please don't make those people wait for moderation decisions. Instead, moderation summaries (for instance in NoCeM format) could be posted to another list, for those who want to know about moderation decisions. No matter what happens, there should definitely be some address through which people can receive a completely unedited, undelayed, unmoderaded copy of the mailing list. So if you want a tagged version of the list, there should also be a cypherpunks-raw or something.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On 6 Jan 1997, Against Moderation wrote:
Other people are suggesting things like this. I think it is a bad idea to tag the -unedited version of the list with moderation decisions, because then even the -unedited versions of messages would be delayed until a moderation decision had been made.
Some people already have suitable mail/news filters, and would rather make their own article selections. Please don't make those people wait for moderation decisions.
The problem with making an undelayed, unedited version of the list available is that it would increase the burden on toad.com. I suppose someone could run a mail exploder that would receive the raw version and mail it out to all subscribers. I don't see the increased lag as much of a problem. If an automatic moderation program is used, the lag should be insignificant for most posts.
Instead, moderation summaries (for instance in NoCeM format) could be posted to another list, for those who want to know about moderation decisions.
This would not only increase the load on toad.com, but would also make it more difficult for people who want to receive the moderated version and monitor the moderators decisions. Mail filtering can be done simply on many mail programs, but checking a list of moderation decisions against the mailing list traffic would be just too complicated. NoCeM is a nice idea, but most people on this list probably do not have the platform needed to run the software.
No matter what happens, there should definitely be some address through which people can receive a completely unedited, undelayed, unmoderaded copy of the mailing list. So if you want a tagged version of the list, there should also be a cypherpunks-raw or something.
This would cause the same amount of load as having the three separate mailing lists. In fact, it would be even worse if cypherpunks-raw was treated as a completely separate mailing list instead of being aliased to the spam and moderated lists. Mark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3 Charset: noconv iQEVAwUBMtGKxSzIPc7jvyFpAQE/lgf/W8sUlvNHYUUOoGwVNlNJpJeQ/PH7z3EA bu7hNEDVFmV4igSjcnGLQF3EiMaPVM8d3VWMkT6NHXs2OzLomsJqgKkaSV6l6GG7 fcYazsht9rtjo04ru/mYhl5EpZUbFUo/G2QC2giIcvaW1zyEYuQBXaRHD1hf0UuM 5H4U9b+nnzYOBVY22MmFI8b9xsOjOPTYV+tB9lKEOXNnZJeq6s37ainElh63eiXZ Ur90sX7StVQqWiXLJb62vIINBJd0/rkoHtAVQIrJxaqudOKgqQLv/vPGAhscy1Up 4/JKdzPobG37984/AwkpfbuV1jMO4tcyJVWQjawnxlNHxOW2L+mvRg== =kzCe -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
I like it. My take on the issues I see here: 1) Moderator liability and anonymous posting. The open nature of the list means that "copyright violations" threads and the like are thought more or less safe for the people who own toad.com. With moderation, this is less likely to be as "safe." Without calling for a blanket assault on copyrights (I do have friends who make their living as writers), and speaking only selfishly, I think it would be a shame to lose the "copyright violations" posts. So I think we need a way to diminish or at least distribute moderator liability. Let's revisit the "Member of Parliament Problem" thread of a month or so ago for solutions. Presumably STUMP or some other moderation tool could be modified to support a secure anonymous- approval protocol. 2) "Vote of confidence in Sandy." No. I agree with Igor Chudov. Absolute power corrupts; confidence, and particularly votes of confidence (this isn't a popularity contest), are the wrong way to go. Try "trust, but verify." As many of you know, I'm still barred from a list run by another cypherpunks subscriber for reasons I consider totally invalid. While I have confidence in much of what this person writes, and don't mind if other people have full confidence in him (because he's usually on the right side), this content-based censorship, and particularly the lack of transparency about it (his list never had this kind of discussion, nor do most of his subscribers even know that some people are banned), bugs me. 3) Full v. filtered v. flame lists. I'd choose to dump the full list, keeping the flame & filtered. People who want to can simply subscribe to both, and filter them into the same incoming mailbox, for the same effect. Only minor problem I'd forsee is that the flame list might propagate faster than the filtered list because it would have fewer subscribers. 4) "Qui custodiet ipsos custodes." When I first saw that thread title, I thought it pertained to the moderation proposal. It could. That's why I'd like to see the rejected messages archived, at least for a while, as they are with Chudov's STUMP. What I'd like best, since I don't particularly want to waste bandwidth or my disk space with what would, by definition, be mostly crap, is a hks.lists.cypherpunks.flames on the open nntp port I'm using to read cypherpunks today. As some of you have noticed, I'm not on the list now, because most of it is junk; I just point Netscape at HKS Inc's open port whenever the whim strikes me, and grab the few messages that look interesting. I'd like to do the same with the "flame" list, every couple days. Of course, HKS and the other public archives would make that decsion, and I thank them for the free service they've provided me so far. 5) "[Mostly libertarian] off-topic political junk." As someone who disagrees with a lot of, variously, Tim's, Lucky Green's, and attila's politics, I strongly agree with them that that's what I'm on cypherpunks for. The alternative is not just coderpunks, but also Perry's cryptography@c2.net, which is dedicated to the issues that cypherpunks were apparently originally about. (I can't really say for sure, because the majority of messages have been off-topic since about January 1996, and I only joined in October 1995.) I don't think it's a capitulation to admit that cypherpunks has evolved/devolved to a forum that bears little resemblance to its original charter. What we are is a bunch of mostly (but not all) libertarian ranters and ravers who are, for various and not necessarily consistent reasons, interested in the theme that ubiquitous strong crypto is a good thing. (I just edited the previous sentence to change "believe that it's a good thing" to "are interested in" because I wouldn't mind having a Denning or a Sternlight here.) Not all threads need have *anything* to do with that theme for the forum to be useful to me. This happens to be the only place I get to hear people like Lucky Green and Tim May rant and rave about all sorts of other topics (I mean that in a good way; I read most of what they write, and while I don't always agree with it, it's always important). I don't want to lose that unique opportunity just because it's "off-topic." -rich
Thanks, Rich, for a thoughtful post. Rich Graves wrote:
My take on the issues I see here:
1) Moderator liability and anonymous posting. The open nature of the list means that "copyright violations" threads and the like are thought more or less safe for the people who own toad.com. With moderation, this is less likely to be as "safe." Without calling for a blanket assault on copyrights (I do have friends who make their living as writers), and speaking only selfishly, I think it would be a shame to lose the "copyright violations" posts. So I think we need a way to diminish or at least distribute moderator liability. Let's revisit the "Member of Parliament Problem" thread of a month or so ago for solutions. Presumably STUMP or some other moderation tool could be modified to support a secure anonymous- approval protocol.
I hope that lawyers here could comment on this, and I hope that it is relevant to the cupherpunks issues at hand. You gave us another example of why charters that restrict moderators' ability to reject posts are good. In soc.culture.russian.moderated we had a similar problem (now resolved completely), when certain anonymous posters posted articles that looked like articles from newspapers. After long thinking, moderator board has come with the following solution: 1) We do not know for sure if a certain post violates some copyrights or not 2) We do not have a duty to verify copyrights or check whether posts are libelous. Verifying it is not very practical. 3) Our co-moderators reside in different countries and these countries may have different copyright laws 4) Since the moderation is done by many people, it is hard to say (as long as you did not see our logs which we regularly delete) who really approved the questioned article 5) Our charter does NOT give us a permission to reject copyright violations (which may be and are freely posted to unmoderated groups and lists anyhow). There is also a related issue of moderators' responsibility for libel. Our position was the following: libel involves some lies that damages people's reputations. We cannot verify truthfulness of articles, therefore we cannot tell libel from non-libel. A classical example was the following: we have an Orthodox Jewish poster. Suppose someone else posts an article where he describes that poster as eating pork regularly. Such an article can, in theory, be rather damaging for that person, and would be libelous if untrue. We are not necessarily aware that Jewish customs involve prohibition on eating swines, and so we cannot know that the post could be damaging. Nor do we have any practical way of checking what that person eats. We are required to reject flames if we consider them harassing, but we do not accept responsibility for telling libel from non-libel. We also add the following header fields to each article: X-SCRM-Policy: http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov/usenet/scrm/index.html X-SCRM-Info-1: Send submissions to scrm@algebra.com X-SCRM-Info-2: Send technical complaints to scrm-admin@algebra.com X-SCRM-Info-3: Send complaints about policy to scrm-board@algebra.com X-Comment: moderators do not necessarily agree or disagree with this article. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ X-Robomod-Version: STUMP 1.1, by ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov)
4) "Qui custodiet ipsos custodes." When I first saw that thread title, I thought it pertained to the moderation proposal. It could. That's why I'd like to see the rejected messages archived, at least for a while, as they are with Chudov's STUMP. What I'd like best, since I don't particularly want to waste bandwidth or my disk space with what would, by definition, be mostly crap, is a hks.lists.cypherpunks.flames on the open nntp port I'm using to read cypherpunks today. As some of you have noticed, I'm not on the list now, because most of it is junk; I just point Netscape at HKS Inc's open port whenever the whim strikes me, and grab the few messages that look interesting. I'd like to do the same with the "flame" list, every couple days. Of course, HKS and the other public archives would make that decsion, and I thank them for the free service they've provided me so far.
STUMP also regularly (once a week if so instructed) creates really pretty WWW archives of rejected articles, like this: http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov/usenet/scrm/archive/maillist.html (see also http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov/usenet/scrm/index.html) - Igor.
ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home) writes:
You gave us another example of why charters that restrict moderators' ability to reject posts are good. In soc.culture.russian.moderated we had a similar problem (now resolved completely), when certain anonymous posters posted articles that looked like articles from newspapers.
Since not a lot of people on this list read soc.culture.*, I'll give a slightly different view of how Igor's moderation works in practice. The charter of s.c.r.m prohibits flames and gratuitous obscenities. However this rule is not enforced. Certain friends of Igor (including some of the s.c.r.m moderators) habitually cross-post articles between soc.culture.russian.moderated, soc.culture.russian (unmoderated), and a dozen other newsgroups saying things like: "<The s.c.r FAQ maintainer> is a cocksucker and a motherfucker and has been arrested for sexually molesting small children". The targets of the flames are not permitted to respond on soc.culture.russian.moderated (there's a "blacklist" of people whose submissions are junked automatically, w/o a human moderator ever seeing them). Some time ago Igor invited me to post to s.c.r.m. I submitted an article and was given to understand that I'm not welcome to post to s.c.r.m irrespective of what I have to say. I'm sure that this model suits "cypher punks" well. --- Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps
Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM wrote:
ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home) writes:
You gave us another example of why charters that restrict moderators' ability to reject posts are good. In soc.culture.russian.moderated we had a similar problem (now resolved completely), when certain anonymous posters posted articles that looked like articles from newspapers.
Since not a lot of people on this list read soc.culture.*, I'll give a slightly different view of how Igor's moderation works in practice.
The charter of s.c.r.m prohibits flames and gratuitous obscenities. However this rule is not enforced. Certain friends of Igor (including some of the s.c.r.m moderators) habitually cross-post articles between soc.culture.russian.moderated, soc.culture.russian (unmoderated), and a dozen other newsgroups saying things like: "<The s.c.r FAQ maintainer> is a cocksucker and a motherfucker and has been arrested for sexually molesting small children". The targets of the flames are not permitted
That is incorrect on several counts. First of all, our charter does not prohibit flames. It prohibits harassment and spells out what should be considered harassment: Charter> Posts of the following types shall be off-topic in Charter> soc.culture.russian.moderated: Charter> Charter> 6. Harassing posts (of the typical form "[...] is a Charter> [Nazi|pedophile|forger|...]. Complain about [his|her|its] Charter> evil ways to [ISP|employer|Unesco|Cthulhu|Usenet Cabal|...]." Charter> Charter> The proponent recognizes the distinction between patriotism and Charter> jingoistic hatemongering. Further, the distinction between Charter> good-natured jokes and harassment is necessarily subjective. The Charter> moderators will use their best judgement to extend unbiased and Charter> thorough consideration to submissions. Charter> Second, nobody on scrm called Alex Iatskovski, whom you mentioned above as SCR FAQ maintainer, "cocksucker", "motherfucker", or "child molester". In fact, Dejanews search and my private archive indicate that words cocksucker, motherfucker, molester were not used at all in our group. Note that I do not suggest that s.c.r.m. moderators are always fair or always right or that we always interpret our charter correctly or that our charter is perfect. The proposal and practice of moderation is controversial. As you and I know, there are cases when we think that moderation is justified, and there are cases when we think that it is not justified.
to respond on soc.culture.russian.moderated (there's a "blacklist" of people whose submissions are junked automatically, w/o a human moderator ever seeing them).
This is, again, incorrect. Neither Alex Iatskovski nor any other person associated with you has ever been on the black list. The purpose of the black list is not to ignore people whom we do not like, but to prevent mailbombing of moderators. - Igor.
This is an example of soc.culture.russian.moderated traffic. This is what Armenian forgers want. From: ivan@manifesto.nihonkai.jp (Ivan Zimogorov) Newsgroups: soc.culture.russian,soc.culture.russian.moderated Subject: Re: Where can I find extensions for Russian TeX? Message-ID: <5535100AXW.0AXX091996@manifesto.Nihonkai.jp> Date: Sun, 3 Nov 1996 18:16:18 CST References: <199611032246.QAA13585@manifold.algebra.com> Organization: Bacterial Bee Peekers Lines: 38 Approved: SCRM Approval Key <scrm-approval-key@algebra.com> X-SCRM-Policy: http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov/usenet/scrm/index.html X-SCRM-Info-1: Send submissions to scrm@algebra.com X-SCRM-Info-2: Send technical complaints to scrm-admin@algebra.com X-SCRM-Info-3: Send complaints about policy to scrm-board@algebra.com X-Comment: moderators do not necessarily agree or disagree with this article. X-Robomod-Version: STUMP 1.1, by ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov) X-No-Archive: yes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Auth: PGPMoose V1.1 PGP soc.culture.russian.moderated (0) Go to your Linux CD, change directory to where your tex is; (1) cd ./lib/texmf/mf; grep -i vulis * It should print out "cyrti.mf:% I wouldn't even know the real one existed were it not for Dimitri Vulis" (2) you're on your own now :) Igor Chudov <ichudov@algebra.com> wrote:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Newsgroups: soc.culture.russian,soc.culture.russian.moderated Subject: Where can I find extensions for Russian TeX? Date: Sun Nov 3 16:45:13 CST 1996
subj sez it all.
thank you
igor
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_ / Ivan Zimogorov, _/\_ pupil of deliverance ========================================= MODERATOR COMMENT MOD: The right file is _usr_local_tex_texmf_doc_help_TeX-index . Thanks. Igor. --- Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps
Rich Graves <rcgraves@disposable.com> very correctly mentions:
1) Moderator liability and anonymous posting.
I agree that this is actually a critical problem with a filtering moderation scheme. Such a scheme appears to provide the capability to filter out possible "copyright violations" posts. From what I remember of the Netcom/CoS case (without going back to the sources), that may mean more liability for the reviewers (and the operator of the machine). That's a major point against simple filtering moderation. (Which is considered principally because that's way that's most compatible with current mail readers, really.) ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home) responded:
[in another forum] After long thinking, moderator board has come with the following solution:
1) We do not know for sure if a certain post violates some copyrights or not [and more in the same line 2,3,4,5]
Would any of this have mattered in Netcom/CoS? Instead, a system that would forward reviewers' opinions *after the fact* does not have any of this problem. And we have already mentioned, it is also more powerful (real time initial feed, easy multiple feedback feeds, fully compatible with anything else...) although it does not reduce bandwidth requirements. Pierre. pierre@rahul.net
participants (15)
-
Against Moderation -
Black Unicorn -
Dale Thorn -
dlv＠bwalk.dm.com -
Eric Murray -
ichudov＠algebra.com -
Jason Burrell -
John Gilmore -
Mark M. -
Pierre Uszynski -
Rich Graves -
Robert Hettinga -
Sandy Sandfort -
Toto -
Vin McLellan