board77

I'm sure the forum is worth saving as it is, Wilma. But that isn't an option if it stays on b77, don't you see that? This is an open board now. Not only an open board, but an open board that boasts about certain principles.

Either the forum will have to go off the board, or there will be change. Things can't stay the same, because it will soon no longer be a closed system.

Another option would be to tackle this from the other end and amend the Mission and Statement and Key Principles to remove everything inconsistent with the idea of one group of posters having the power to secretly and anonymously keep people out of a certain forum. I don't think anyone has proposed that, yet.

So ToE shouldn't exist on B77 since we are trying to keep a dangerous person out?

I am sorry but currently I am bit floored by what you have said. I think i have to stay way from this conversation a bit.

Wilma wrote:

So ToE shouldn't exist on B77 since we are trying to keep a dangerous person out?

We sure aren't communicating well, that's for sure.

I do think ToE should be able to keep a dangerous person out. I think if you believe a person is dangerous, you should be able to write two sentences explaining why you think the person is dangerous, and PM them to a Ranger or email them to the Admin. account. I think if a person is dangerous, you will not be the only person who knows it. Enough people will know it (5) that they will be able to keep him out.

Well for the guy who hit on me and didn't get the hint, who would judge whether him touching my friend without permission is really leading to dangerous behaviour or not?

that is what I would like to know.

What about the friends I tild about it (3). Who said at the next convention they the guy better watch out if he comes near me. Do theri opinions count?

Heck the third person is form the convention comitte willing to ban the guy on 2 complaints. (I undertsand these are RL situations, and what we would be dealing with are online.)
What do you think about the massage without consent. I would like to gague if that was bad behaviour by most peoples opnion.

So if it's not the email the admin thing the forum shouldn't be on the board?

I am going to stop after this. Sorry if it seems like I am escalating.

Wilma, I think any kind of 'off' behavior or behavior that makes you uncomfortable is exactly the kind of thing we're talking about writing down as an explanation. Yes, you could write down that your friend had a bad experience with the person. Yes, your friends' opinions count.

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So if it's not the email the admin thing the forum shouldn't be on the board?

If people aren't willing to say why they don't want someone in the forum, then I think having the forum on this board is a problem because of the things we have said the board stands for.

Also, I had a very bad thing happen with the same guy at the same time but I do not feel I should recount it. In detail.

There should be no need to recount any uncomfortable incidents in detail (I'm so sorry you had a bad thing happen!).

OK I said I would stop, but I had a thought, it seems that objections should be made but to in my mind to voice them to one or two persons leads to too small a number of people deciding whether these objections are valid or not. For each person to voice them publicly could lead to gossip (it is feared).

How about sending them to an admin or mayor and then the mayor instead of listing who said what post the objections in a neutral fashion without attaching names to the objections? Then if people have to vote or something they can. While feeling slightly educated. The voters can decide how valid these objections are, instead of 1 or 2 people.

For example if 2 people had a negative personal experience with an applicant. they can send those objections in detail to an admin. Then the mayor or whoever instead of posting those comments in detail can say that person X has applied to join ToE. Two current members of ToE have lodged objections. The names of these people objecting are not to be listed. The nature of these objections are 'harmful personal contact' as in harmful RL situation with said poster. Then people can vote on it. Or something to that effect. Now I am off to bed.

Just to take Wilma's experience as a test, let us say for argument's sake this person enters the board and basically behaves himself. How does Wilma protect herself in ToE using these rules presuming she PM's a Ranger saying in general terms why she is worried. Basically she has to tell 5 to 10 other ToE people hoping they will support her otherwise he is in. Am I right?

Speaking in the abstract, if this person came to B77 and behaved himself, even if he did not seek admittance to ToE, would Wilma feel comfortable posting with him in the other fora?

I'd think probably not.

These interpersonal issues are broader than ToE and doubtless some of the membership may have to face having to interact on this board with someone who makes them uncomfortable at some point or another.

I suspect that such an eventually would probably cause the loss of a member.

In the specific case of this person seeking admittance to ToE, I guess you are quite correct: Wilma would have to make her objections known to at least 4 (or 9 depending on what threshold is decided upon) other people in order to ensure this person is not admitted - for if she doesn't do so, how are others who are unacquainted with this otherwise well-behaved person to know that there is a potential problem?

I suspect that whatever guidelines are put into place, an unforeseen eventually will occur and we'll have to examine our souls all over again.

Wilma wrote:

it seems that objections should be made but to in my mind to voice them to one or two persons leads to too small a number of people deciding whether these objections are valid or not.

I think the only judgment will be to make sure there is nothing wildly out of the guidelines or nonsensical ('because he has blue eyes').

Quote:

How about sending them to an admin or mayor and then the mayor instead of listing who said what post the objections in a neutral fashion without attaching names to the objections? Then if people have to vote or something they can. While feeling slightly educated. The voters can decide how valid these objections are, instead of 1 or 2 people.

For example if 2 people had a negative personal experience with an applicant. they can send those objections in detail to an admin. Then the mayor or whoever instead of posting those comments in detail can say that person X has applied to join ToE. Two current members of ToE have lodged objections. The names of these people objecting are not to be listed. The nature of these objections are 'harmful personal contact' as in harmful RL situation with said poster. Then people can vote on it. Or something to that effect.

That is a very interesting idea. I'll post it in the Jury Room for discussion.


Tosh, we're currently working with a threshold of 5 for either 'I have reason to believe this person is a danger to the community' or for the new text based on the behaviors prohibited in the charter. Perhaps we need to treat personal (that is, RL) harmful experiences as extraordinary? Would you agree this would be exceptional rather than common?

I agree totally that we are talking about exceptional problems. I just want to avoid a situation where we have to have a new amendment passed for each exceptional case. The process has to be flexible enough to deal with what normal life might throw at us. Wilma's real life example shows us that bad behaviour is not necessarily widely known by board members and that people can feel vulnerable sharing information about it. Wilma moeover has a wide circle of supportive friends here and I can imagine other ToE posters without that advantage.

Cerin wrote:

Well, perhaps they will build something new, based on the dynamic of an open board this time? It won't be the same, but maybe it will still be nice.

I guess that this is what I am so scared of.

I feel that this forum has lost an immeasurable amount since it opened to the public. By this I do not mean that having new members is a negative thing - I think that they should (almost) all have been allowed in - but to the closed and insular and yet vibrant and fun community that we had and now have lost. I am disappointed that I only got to see how wonderful this community in that form was for three months.

I voted against both the goals (only member to vote against, because I did not want the board open) and the mission statement (one of four to vote against, because I did not agree with "culture of...openness"). I feel very strongly that these things have detracted from poster security and ability to share their thoughts and feelings on this board. Merely protecting certain fora from Googlebots has done little to change this. I have tried my best to be as open and to share as much as I would have with the b77 membership on a closed board, but I find that it is not the same, it actively does not feel safe, and I truthfully believe that we have selected openness at the expense of trust. I have never hated the word "openness" so much as before this board, and never felt as strongly that it is a word that must not be embraced as an absolute value.

I want ToE as closed to the outside as it possibly can be. To whatever extent we can preserve the feeling of safety that it has on a closed board, I want to do so. I want the current membership of ToE to have the maximum control over new admittees possible. I will vote for the very most restrictive option available on this ballot. And if this is not possible, I want ToE off board77 and on a new board - preferably a board that allows us to incorporate the types of discussions that we would have on "m77t & geek" and "The Members' Lounge" as well. A board where people like the one Wilma mentions simply would not be allowed in - a board where members can post without "just having to deal with" the possibility that people with whom they have had significant negative real life or online experiences could show up and compromise or entirely destroy their posting experience. And a board where we can post without the nervousness that other people we know in real life could go looking for what we have written, or where someone entirely unknown to this board could use the information posted on it to compromise a member's safety. A board, in essence, that offers some safety from the various dangers that the Internet poses, and in so doing, enhances immeasurably the joys of the posting experience.

I should have spoken more vigorously during the Charter Ratification process. I did not for two reasons: (1) I felt certain that I would be massively outnumbered and (2) I felt too new to speak about what "we" should have been doing.

I just needed to get that all out - to say how very, very much I hate the "dynamic of an open board" and feel with the utmost fervor that ToE should not be compromised as the rest of b77 has been by being subject to this dynamic. And in so saying, I want to emphasize, again, that I don't think this means that the members who joined after the opening of the board shouldn't be here - it just means that I would rather have seen them join through a different process.

EDIT

Cerin wrote:

Another option would be to tackle this from the other end and amend the Mission and Statement and Key Principles to remove everything inconsistent with the idea of one group of posters having the power to secretly and anonymously keep people out of a certain forum. I don't think anyone has proposed that, yet.

I have no problem with proposing this, especially since I've already voted against the Mission Statement (and have no idea why I didn't vote against the Key Principles, because I remember disliking those too). Consider this my proposal. I do not expect that anyone else will be interested, just as they were not in the spring, but if they are, I would be willing to take this on.

I envision, and would prefer to see, ToE just as Fixer describes it in the Symposium - a private club within a larger, public democracy (perhaps there could also be the option to create other private clubs as well). Looking around me, I find that I am currently living in a democracy, but that I'm able to attend a school that has certain features of a rather private and rather exclusive club, and that I am continually excluded from other people's private clubs and gatherings. Indeed, if I tried to intrude on their private clubs or gatherings, the government would enforce their right to exclude me by escorting me off their turf, very possibly in handcuffs. This is all part and parcel of a democracy. Democracy does not mean openness to everyone at all times in all manners. In fact, I would love it for a private forum from which I am excluded to be created on b77 to demonstrate my strong belief in this principle.

The thing is tp, that at least some of them could not have joined through another process... never, ever.

Wilma wrote:

who would judge?

That is the upshot of my objection to the options requiring explanations. Who will judge whether someone's explanation is good enough? Cerin? Me? Lidless? The poor Rangers at the time, forced into making decisions that they should not have to make?

TP, thanks for speaking your mind so honestly. Although I very much disagree with you, I appreciate you speaking your thoughts so openly.

I do not believe that a closed board could have survived very long. Then none of us would have had anything.

But I also disagree with Cerin that the issues with ToE require a rethinking of the guiding principles of the board at large. I think they require recognizing that ToE requires special rules because of its particularly sensitive nature. Flexibility can be a virtue, too.

tolkienpurist wrote:

I feel that this forum has lost an immeasurable amount since it opened to the public. By this I do not mean that having new members is a negative thing - I think that they should (almost) all have been allowed in - but to the closed and insular and yet vibrant and fun community that we had and now have lost. I am disappointed that I only got to see how wonderful this community in that form was for three months.

But what new people can have joined -- you must be talking about people who joined before we opened, because none can have entered ToE since. Or are you saying that the nature of the forum changed just because of the anticipation of what would happen?

You've articulated exactly why it is so clear to me that the forum should have been moved off the board for it's own protection. I find it hard to understand why people are still entertaining a hope that it can be protected on the board. tp, what reason do you have for trying to retain an anonymous poll rejection mechanism when you feel that the forum that should have been saved is already lost? I find it hard to understand in view of these sentiments why the attempt wasn't even made to take the forum to a new venue and keep it totally private (invitation only). (I don't mean this critically, just in puzzlement.)

Quote:

I have tried my best to be as open and to share as much as I would have with the b77 membership on a closed board, but I find that it is not the same, it actively does not feel safe, and I truthfully believe that we have selected openness at the expense of trust. I have never hated the word "openness" so much as before this board, and never felt as strongly that it is a word that must not be embraced as an absolute value.

Again, all in support of the awareness that the attempt should not have been made to keep ToE on an open board when it became obvious that the prevailing sentiment was to open the board.

Quote:

And if this is not possible, I want ToE off board77 and on a new board - preferably a board that allows us to incorporate the types of discussions that we would have on "m77t & geek" and "The Members' Lounge" as well. A board where people like the one Wilma mentions simply would not be allowed in - a board where members can post without "just having to deal with" the possibility that people with whom they have had significant negative real life or online experiences could show up and compromise or entirely destroy their posting experience. And a board where we can post without the nervousness that other people we know in real life could go looking for what we have written, or where someone entirely unknown to this board could use the information posted on it to compromise a member's safety. A board, in essence, that offers some safety from the various dangers that the Internet poses, and in so doing, enhances immeasurably the joys of the posting experience.

Again, you are clearly describing a private forum (and there is no reason it should not have had every quality you describe). Why, oh why was this not even attempted if people felt this way?

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I will vote for the very most restrictive option available on this ballot.

According to the charter requirements, tp, the options for the ballot are dealt with in committee so that there can be one amendment brought before the membership for either ratification or rejection, just as we have always done with Charter articles. For people who want to have active input at the committee level, there is always the option of volunteering for the committee at the outset of the amendment process. I believe at this point committee members are turning their focus to putting forward an amendment that has the best chance of passing.

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I should have spoken more vigorously during the Charter Ratification process. I did not for two reasons: (1) I felt certain that I would be massively outnumbered and (2) I felt too new to speak about what "we" should have been doing.

I'm sorry about that, and sorry for what you have lost. Maybe it can still be largely salvaged if someone who has the expertise will take the steps to get you off the board in your current manifestation.

Quote:

I just needed to get that all out - to say how very, very much I hate the "dynamic of an open board" and feel with the utmost fervor that ToE should not be compromised as the rest of b77 has been by being subject to this dynamic.

Don't you see that there can't be an attempt to maintain ToE as inconsistent with the rest of the Charter? The solution is taking it off. Or, if you had the time, proposing a Charter amendment that deals with this from the Charter end -- amending those portions of the MS and KP that are inconsistent with your vision for ToE.

Cerin, I think you've missed TPs point. She would have preferred that B77 remain closed, not just ToE.

Yes, I realize that, Alatar. I'm saying that seeing where the prevailing wind was clearly blowing on that issue, something should have immediately been done to get ToE off the board (IMO, according to the sentiments tp has expressed).

Voronwe wrote:

That is the upshot of my objection to the options requiring explanations. Who will judge whether someone's explanation is good enough? Cerin? Me? Lidless? The poor Rangers at the time, forced into making decisions that they should not have to make?

This really isn't an issue. Whatever people offer will be good enough -- unless it simply has nothing to do with a behavior or attitude that has made them uncomfortable. 'Because I happen to know he owns a Pomeranian and I can't stand those mangy things' won't and shouldn't be a 'good enough' reason. (And I'm not suggesting people would say that type of thing. I think your point is therefore a non sequitur, if that is the correct term.)

Unfortunately Cerin it's very easy to show both extremes, explanations that would certainly be valid and those that would certainly not. The problem becomes who decides where the line is drawn? What is a valid reason for me may not be a valid reason for you.

Incidentally I see no problem with having a closed forum on an open board. I know you do. But I don't.