board77

democritus wrote:

Therefore I am going to politely ask the administrators here if they could do me a service by temporarily suspending my account until such time as the general board here becomes open and accessible to everyone in at least a read-only format.

After that I would be very happy to be a part of this community again, if you will still have me. :-)

And I am going to very politely reply that I won't do anything of the sort. The onus lies upon you not to visit, not upon anyone here to stop you. I'm quite sure that, as a member here, you will be notified before any opening happens.


Thank you, though, for your efforts and for your considered comments.

[edited: because there's nothing left to say]

TheLidlessEyes wrote:

Hugging Ber can be quite addictive.

Amen

Leoba wrote:

democritus wrote:

Therefore I am going to politely ask the administrators here if they could do me a service by temporarily suspending my account until such time as the general board here becomes open and accessible to everyone in at least a read-only format.

After that I would be very happy to be a part of this community again, if you will still have me. :-)

And I am going to very politely reply that I won't do anything of the sort. The onus lies upon you not to visit, not upon anyone here to stop you. I'm quite sure that, as a member here, you will be notified before any opening happens.


Thank you, though, for your efforts and for your considered comments.

[edited: because there's nothing left to say]

Thanks Leoba

No problems, as you say, I can choose not to visit, which is exactly the course of action I will take until the board is eventually opened.

It seems clear to me that there are differing ideas of what board77 is about, and about the values that are important to us. I'm not going to go so far as to ask for a temporary ban or restriction of my posting or reading rights, but I do have to say that my enthusiasm for board77 as it currently exists has waned. Until I am convinced that respect, compassion, and consideration of others is fully integrated into the ethos of the community rather then selectively given my participation here will be limited at best.

Hm, I'm surprised that anyone thinks that this board isn't going to be open at some point. I have seen nothing during my time here to indicate that anything but openness was the ultimate goal of the board. If a poll was done asking people if they want the board closed forever, I am quite certain you would get an overwhelming "NO!" answer.

Anyways, on the wilko situation - it seems pretty much settled, no? wilko threatened to break a rule about the Invite forum, his access to the Invite forum was denied per the rules, and that's pretty much that, right? Since it doesn't look like he has anyinterest in returning, it doesn't look to me like there is much of an issue here anymore. Unless some people are calling for a banning, but personally I would be opposed to the idea of banning someone for something they did off the boards without giving them a chance to defend themselves.

Edit: On respecting others, the rules of the forum is to respect the other posters. This is a good rule. However, it would be absurd imo to want to extend that to everyone in the world. If someone off the boards is being a jerk, I should feel free to say that they are being a jerk. And you can feel free to tell me I'm a jerk for calling other people a jerk. And we'll move on from there. That's what I envisioned this place as and it's what I like about it.

Voronwe_the_Faithful wrote:

... but I do have to say that my enthusiasm for board77 as it currently exists has waned. Until I am convinced that respect, compassion, and consideration of others is fully integrated into the ethos of the community rather then selectively given my participation here will be limited at best.

The different interpretations of said values make any attempt on "incorporating" them into rules obsolete. See the different interpretations of what "innuendo" may be that caused the rise of b77 in the first place.
Rules must work without ethical wallpapers. Until now, we don't have rules except mutual trust. Breaking that is even worse than breaking rules.

EDIT: Upon reflection, nevermind.

On balance, in my view, given the growth that has already occurred for B77, it would benefit from becoming open as soon as possible. I think as things stand right now, the cat is already out of the bag if people are looking for a very small community where people can post without fear of what they say going beyond that community. I suspect that threshold was passed well before I arrived on the scene here. At this point, other than the lingering issues with TORC, there does not appear to be any central theme to B77 -- other than a place for a bunch of people who know each other already or who have friends who know each other already can come together to chat -- that would tend to attract large numbers of "outsiders" to this place if it were to be made open. So, were B77 to open, we would probably see a bit of a flood at first from TORCers coming to see what the story is. Some would fit right in and enrich our community, others would take a sniff and move on, and a few would linger for a while to continue the B77 vs. TORC battles, but that too would fade under the sunshine policy of B77 (vs. the "let's bury the bastards" policy of TORC). After that, B77 would experience the drifters who poke their noses in, then either stick because there's a fit or move in because there's not. That's pretty much the experience I had with one of the fragments of the old Ringbearer messageboards that went on for a good 2-3 years after the disintegration with a simple core of people, ocassional additions and subtractions occurring from time to time, all in a completely open and un-modded atmosphere.

For those seeking to re-create the small private community where they can speak in an entirely unguarded manner, the practical reality may be that they need to make another pioneering attempt at creating a separate space for that community and keep tight reins on who can join. I'm not suggesting this in any way as an invite for those people to move on from here, as I think they could (subject to the next sentence) very easily participate both in that private community and in the rapidly evolving B77 community. However (hint hint -- this is that "next sentence"), the creation of this private community will of course potentially raise some of the hard feelings that some over at TORC have (or feign to have) about the invitation-only nature of B77. I, for one, am not bothered in the least by the fact that my friends may choose to spend part of their time in circles that I am not part of -- after all, if they were constantly exposed to me, they would grow even more sick of me than they already probably are!!!

Those are my two cents.

I see strong frustration with the fact that there is no appropriate place to discuss what many see as the most important issue facing these boards: whether and when we open. There have been threads on opening in the past, but they're locked now.

Would it be possible to have a thread in Business on opening the boards? I don't see why discussing it needs to prevent the work on the constitution from going forward, and it might help clear the air.

I suspect some of the unwillingness to air these issues is due to people who have said, "If the decision is X, I will leave this board." That kind of statement inhibits those who don't want those people to leave: they don't dare even bring the matter to discussion, because even seeing the "wrong" opinion prevailing in discussion might cause their friends to leave.

But anything that smothers discussion is potentially diasastrous--now we have people threatening to leave because the matter is not being discussed.

I think we need to talk about it. I am not proposing a vote or even a poll--just a thread where it can be discussed. If people have objections to that, please say so.

When people say "do x or I do y" it is coercive, whether it's a threat to reveal information or a threat to leave. In any case it is destructive.

I'm going to open that thread myself, in Business.

Please, go ahead and open a discussion in the Business Room (I would, but I am trying to work, having been dsitracted more than enough by this board in the last few days). I would suggest that we keep a poll out of it for the time being and just use the thread to toss around ideas about what level of openness we desire, as well as the various 'when' options and perhaps whether any filter on membership would be needed?

TORN wrote:

I, for one, am not bothered in the least by the fact that my friends may choose to spend part of their time in circles that I am not part of -- after all, if they were constantly exposed to me, they would grow even more sick of me than they already probably are!!!

Good point, TORN - and good for you that you can take it that way.

This board initially was nothing more than a big, continuing group chat. Maybe it has grown beyond this now, maybe it hasn't - I find it really difficult to define where we stand just now.

I know that I am jealous and hurt when I find that my friends have such private circles that I'm not part of (whether it's closed boards or group chats), but I can accept it as their right and a normal thing to happen.

nonmember screen name deleted apparently can't accept this to happen in any way and although I appreciate Demo's attempt to explain her take on it, I shall have to think about it some more before I can even begin to understand her stance.

Ranger edit 14 Nov 05

I confess I don't understand either Truehobbit. They were complaining about being excluded even before there was something to not include them in. Pretty much all the posts I can think of having seen that may be considered hurtful, stem from this attitude. It’s a great shame.

yovargas wrote:

On respecting others, the rules of the forum is to respect the other posters. This is a good rule. However, it would be absurd imo to want to extend that to everyone in the world. If someone off the boards is being a jerk, I should feel free to say that they are being a jerk. And you can feel free to tell me I'm a jerk for calling other people a jerk. And we'll move on from there. That's what I envisioned this place as and it's what I like about it.

That is exactly my view. In a private community I should be able to say whatever I like about people not in the community. Maybe others will strongly disagree with what I say, but I should still be free to express myself.

I'm getting the impression that a lot of people want to restrict this freedom of speech even while the board remains closed. I am beginning to feel unwelcome here. But the whole thing seems to be starting to unravel anyway.. maybe the goal of a cosy little place to hang out with friends was never going to be achievable.

Maybe a peaceful, democratic online community can never work.

Iavas_Saar wrote:

yovargas wrote:

On respecting others, the rules of the forum is to respect the other posters. This is a good rule. However, it would be absurd imo to want to extend that to everyone in the world. If someone off the boards is being a jerk, I should feel free to say that they are being a jerk. And you can feel free to tell me I'm a jerk for calling other people a jerk. And we'll move on from there. That's what I envisioned this place as and it's what I like about it.

That is exactly my view. In a private community I should be able to say whatever I like about people not in the community. Maybe others will strongly disagree with what I say, but I should still be free to express myself.

I'm getting the impression that a lot of people want to restrict this freedom of speech even while the board remains closed. I am beginning to feel unwelcome here. But the whole thing seems to be starting to unravel anyway.. maybe the goal of a cosy little place to hang out with friends was never going to be achievable.

Maybe a peaceful, democratic online community can never work.

At least from my perspective, I don't mean to imply that You (capitalized to emphasize that this is the collective "you", not the individualized "you") should be limited in anything You say -- however, unless the board remains truly private, You should expect, from time to time, that some others may say that they would not have said it, that they think that You should not have said it (that's their opinion) or that You're a jerk for saying it. I don't think anyone is saying that You should be forbidden from saying whatever you want. What seems to be at issue is whether You should be shielded from having others not on a specific list of individuals from seeing what You have said, and that the lack of this shield serves to create pressure for self-sensorship if You have concerns about others hearing about what You said. As I said previously, You have every right to create such a community, and perhaps that was the intent (at least for some) in the creation of B77. Without opining as to whether it was right or wrong for this to have happened, I believe that events have transpired that make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for B77 to be such a strictly private community, at least not without a significant upheaval occurring.

It can work, so long as people are willing to make some compromises, since no one is ever going to have a single "vision" that everyone will unite around.

If people aren't willing to make trade-offs, then no, it won't work. But that's true of life in general.

democritus wrote:

I also talked to [non-member screen name deleted] on Saturday night, at length, about it all, and it was made clear to me how genuinely upset she was at both some of the comments that have been made, but also the principle of having comments made about her and her boyfriend that she cannot see and, even more importantly, does not have access to and therefore is denied the right of reply (my words and emphasis, not hers) that those of us invited to this board take for granted

I understand that. But on the other hand, can one really claim to have access to and the opportunity to reply to everything that's been said about one everywhere on the 'net? Wouldn't we all look rather startled if [non-member screen name deleted] started demanding access to our emails and IM chat transcripts if she or [non-member screen name deleted] happen to be mentioned in those?

Ranger edit, 08 Nov 05

An analogy that I think is valid: What if [non-member screen name deleted], during the private conversations with her fellow TORC admins on their private board, had drunkenly threatened to make all their comments about certain banned posters known to those posters? At the very least her admin rights would have been revoked, and rightfully so.

I don't see how that's any different to wiko's threat. IMO he should have respect for the (temporarily) closed nature of this board.

Ranger edit, 08 Nov 05

I'm not entirely happy [non-member screen name deleted] is the focus of attention again, but since we're at it I'd like to state the following.

When all the TORC related brouhaha started, she began claiming that she'd lost friends over it, causing many here to go since we did not yet know that she was a mod and had no idea what she was referring to. I have to echo Leoba on this. It was a matter of claiming to feel excluded before we even had a chance to exclude them. Or something.

From where I'm standing, [non-member screen name deleted] is throwing a tantrum and demanding access to b77 so that she can kick the asses of those who've stated that they don't like her boyfriend. And now people start leaving because of the fact that b77 is not an open board yet. If that's supposed to make those of us who stay here feel bad, I can state that in my case it has worked perfectly.

Ranger edit, 08 Nov 05

Farawen is right, there will always be private conversations about us that we're "denied the right to respond to". Just because some idiot thought it best that [non-member screen name deleted] learn of what's being said in private, doesn't mean she can throw a hissy fit about a situation which occurs naturally all the time in all walks of life.

Ranger edit, 08 Nov 05