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videodrome
21:08 / 27.04.02
Yeah, Mordant, avoiding the "t-word" in favor of a more gereal set of do's/do-not's would definitely be better.

A couple refinements:

To post, a non-user would login perhaps with their desired ficsuit name and a set password like 'anonymous'. I don't know what the implementation logistics are, but being able to keep track of these potential ficsuits would be nice if that's not a drag for Tom and Cal. If it's too much work to keep track of temp ficsuits, the login could be anonymous/anonymous (or anything - just using the FTP template here) with a method for people to sign their posts. A field for the person to enter a ficsuit name would be good, but then there's the implementation complexities again...

Login via this procedure generates a cookie that expires after 6 or 8 hours, and there's a limit (5? 10?) set on the numer of simultaneous non-member logins. I don't know how many apllicants can be expected at any one time.

As for the moderation of these non-member posts, perhaps a post anywhere in Spectacle could be open for acceptance by any Spectacle moderator? Same for Core, Revolution, Participation. That would increase the chance for fairly quick action on the part of the board - I'm not sure that deep knowledge of the thread in question would be needed to decide on acceptable posts.

I think it's important to make the process fairly transparent for non-members, while not-too-subtly stressing that this board is important to people, and is not a free-for-all. Although maybe it's better not to make it transparent so as to stress that.

The big question in this system is how to communicate that a post was declined and the reasons for doing so...
 
 
Tom Coates
22:50 / 27.04.02
This is actually quite a fascinating system you've outlined, and I can see some problems with it, but I don't think there's anything there that isn't fixable. I suppose the question is whether or not it's scaleable - whether or not there are enough moderators, and enough committed moderators, to carry the load.

The one thing that particularly appeals to me is that the initial restriction on posting turns itself off after a while, but that there is no restriction on people actually writing comments.

I would suggest an adaptation to the process you've outlined. Making someone register from the get-go is probably the best idea - you just have two grades of poster - one that needs a moderator to agree to all their posts and one that doesn't (full members). We explain from the beginning the problems and set them a posting limit per day (this is already a piece of functionality that we can use for everyone else, so it shouldn't be that hard to implement). That way the moderators don't get swamped.

We keep this process in place for a certain amount of time (say 30 days) and for a certain number of posts (say 30 posts) - whichever is the LONGER of the two. At which point they become full members by default.

Obvious problems occur to me... People signing up thirty different suits on the same day to avoid posting limits. Annoying people actually being prepared to really really behave themselves for thirty days JUST so that they can become arseholes at the other end. Workload on moderators.

And I suppose the big question for me remains - should there any way for a board lynching. I mean this relatively seriously - what is required to eject someone from the board? At the moment this is still basically done by me getting really annoyed with some arsehole and with the support of the board just deleting their suit. But there's got to be a better way... Surely? One thought occurred to me - once someone is being ignored by five people at the same time, this shows the 'ignore this poster' link actually on the thread as they post. If twenty people vote to ignore him, that person has a 24 hour suspension on posting and a mass vote action is sent out to all on the board (except the person it's about). 2/3rds majority vote expels kills their suit dead on the spot.

I know people don't like talking about this, but as part of my systematic attempts to rid myself of the vast majority of my administrative powers here I think it's important for us to have a mechanism we COULD use....
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
04:43 / 28.04.02
It sounds kind of unpleasant, but I can see the merit... btw, I like the "welcoming committe moderating the first few posts" thing. Could get new members into some good habits, too.
 
 
Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo
11:49 / 28.04.02
I like the idea being discussed except for one small thing...to have someone removed from the board, we should set up a VERY clearly defined set of rules that can get you booted.

I don't want to see a silly discordian dropped because he was making snarky comments, but I also don't want anyone who threatens anyone to be allowed to stay...but if we don't have some sort of list of things that aren't acceptable, the confusion can bog the board down in "I want this suit gone" "No, he's just being funny..." etc...

One idea that pops to mind is that the Moderators could be asked to give warnings to people, and if those warnings are ignored, the suit is gone.
 
 
solid~liquid onwards
12:08 / 28.04.02
agh

hows about this, its relatively simple...someone goes to try and join and when they get there, it'll explain a bit about barbelith, and say that you have to write a (short(?)) article for the webzine, which would have a seperate section for application articles, and a member of the board could rate it, so we know whats more worth reading. There article could be on practically anything of importance or interest to them. if someone writes something descent (or mabye just put in the effort), then you give them membership, and we get nice new articles on things we may have never thought about before

anyone who just wants to "butt-fuck" the forums probably wouldnt bother to write an article, and to make sure its not just been copied of another site, you could cut a section and check it in a search engine.

gives the 99.99956 % of the population that doesnt know someone whos already a member a chance to prove themselves (but why should they)

looking back my idea does sound a little fascist, and im reminded of american beuty... write an essay on why we shouldnt fire you type idea.

to make me feel better i reckon all current members (if my idea is implemented, which is probably highly unlikely) should also contribute an short article to justify their place, so old and new members are on an equal footing.
 
 
Steve Block
13:24 / 28.04.02
I think the ejection system you've detailed looks fine in the sense that it passes the administration of the board from you to the board, and doesn't seem undemocratic in anyway, as long as I've got it right that it would be a 2/3 majority of the board members and not a 2/3 majority of the people who actually voted.

The moderating of posts by new suits looks to be a workable and fair solution to a disappointing problem too.
 
 
Tom Coates
14:10 / 28.04.02
I think it would have to be 2/3rds of the people who actually voted, since only about 300-400 of the board members that have registered post regularly enough to be EVER able to vote. All it means is that we find a way of making a dynamically worked out percentage of the board (or a timescale) in which time people have to vote and dismiss the vote if there isn't enough turn-out. Since it's likely to generally be a click yes or click no kind of thing, I can;t imagine it would take too much time. Voter apathy shouldn't be an issue, but lack of voter presence when a vote was called could be...
 
 
videodrome
14:33 / 28.04.02
I like the ejection system. The levels of consequense are good, and I like the intermediate step of the 24hr lock on posting, etc. Good to have a warning track between mass recognition that the person is out of line and simple expulsion.

I don't like the idea of an article/essay writing system to determine board acceptance because it's not representative of typical daily action on the board. Very few people here write what can be considered articles; the emphasis is on conversation (or something like it) and I'd like to see a new member system representative of that.
 
 
Steve Block
18:12 / 28.04.02
Ooh, yeah, forgot about posters to members ratio. Sounds like a damn good system all round to me.

I have to say I'm not in favour of an essay writing entry system myself, for the same reasons as videodrome.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
21:54 / 28.04.02
Mulling all this over...

1) The democratic voting-off idea is good, but open to abuse. What if you had a popular suit who took it agin an unpopular suit and stirred up all their mates? Whilst I can't believe that anyone here would actually do that, it's important to avoid that kind of possibility.

2) Essay/composition: Good in theory, but might intimidate ppl who aren't confident when expressing themselves in writing. Non-native English speakers, the reading-disabled, and those with an idiosyncratic writing style might be put right off if faced with an essay.

3) If someone is really fixated with getting on the board for whatever reason, they'll find a way round the entry requirements. Once they're on, it's all about the damage limitation and eejit-spotting: i.e., the entry policy should be solid but, realistically, we can't hope for water-tightness. We should accept that destructive people will get in and look at ways of dealing with them once they get here, rather than looking for infallible pre-emptive exclusion methods.

(I'd also like to point out that this is not the only board on the goddamn net, and whilst we obviously rock harder than any other board it's not like there's nowhere else for people to post, eh? Stop drawing Hitler moustaches on Tom's suit.)
 
 
SMS
02:08 / 29.04.02
I would second having very clearly defined rules that are not to be violated. This makes the ejection policy less democratic and more fair. I also favor one warning before ejection.

As far as admitting new members, it would work something like this. When we're tense about troll problems, we will naturally be more skeptical about who we admit into barbelith, we will and require a bit more out of the short essays. When we have not had troll problems for a while, it will be easier to get into Barbelith. This sounds perfectly reasonable. It means that the laws of the land will be the most free when the problems of the land are smallest.
 
 
Steve Block
05:47 / 29.04.02
1) The democratic voting-off idea is good, but open to abuse. What if you had a popular suit who took it agin an unpopular suit and stirred up all their mates? Whilst I can't believe that anyone here would actually do that, it's important to avoid that kind of possibility.

Yeah, I was worried about that possibility myself. I seem to be rationalising it in a strange way, in that I guess if you let the majority decide the future of the board, that involves the possibility that the board is open to hijack by the majority. But then I figure, at some level, at the moment there is nothing to stop Tom becoming rather irrational and kicking everyone off, except for the fact that he won't.

I guess what I'm saying, rather badly, is that it would be an interesting experiment in some respects with regards to board dynamics. I'd be against the scenario you describe above as happening, which means it is vital for people to be honest in their voting patterns, but I'm not sure how you can prevent the scenario from happening. I think at that point a decision would have to made on a personal level as to whether the board is travelling in the same direction as myself.

The only way I can see to avoid the issue is to make the motion to vote need a very high percentage of yes votes. But then, if you make it too high it's going to allow discord to creep in when decisions fail. Unless you require a minimum number of votes, say 200, and a high majority of yes votes, say 95%, which would mean only ten votes against. That doesn't preclude the above scenario, just lessen it slightly. I guess it is a question of getting the balances right.
 
 
Ierne
12:34 / 29.04.02
One thought occurred to me - once someone is being ignored by five people at the same time, this shows the 'ignore this poster' link actually on the thread as they post. If twenty people vote to ignore him, that person has a 24 hour suspension on posting and a mass vote action is sent out to all on the board (except the person it's about). 2/3rds majority vote expels kills their suit dead on the spot. –Tom

I think it's a good idea to put the ignore button to use in this way. Perhaps five initial posters ignoring the offender is too low – fifteen or so might be a better indicator, with perhaps thirty or so posters voting for the 24-hour suspension.

It's important to remember that certain posters on this board have multiple fiction suits, so five inital posters may actually be one person. I suppose there could be a one ficsuit limit per poster, with those who already have multiples having to either consolidate them into one suit or choose one and delete the rest before such a voting process can take effect.

The democratic voting-off idea is good, but open to abuse. What if you had a popular suit who took it agin an unpopular suit and stirred up all their mates? Whilst I can't believe that anyone here would actually do that, it's important to avoid that kind of possibility.– Mordant C@rnival

Perhaps I'm being willfully naive, but I do think that with the diversity of people we have posting here at Barbelith the possibility of such a scenario would be remote. I'm not convinced that "popularity" is as big an issue as some make it. If any group of posters had such an agenda in mind, it would become rather transparent and backfire on them pretty quickly. People are ultimately judged by the quality and substance of their posts, not by who their online buddies are.
 
 
The headmaster
12:40 / 29.04.02
As a newbie, I just would like ya to know that i don't think you'd get any more members if you asked them to write essays to join. That sounds really naff.
 
 
grant
15:22 / 29.04.02
I'm a writer. I practically live on this board. And I don't think I'd write an essay to join.

Ierne brings up good points.

I like the idea of moderated posting. Is there a way *every* moderator on the board could help handle that load? Or else we'll just have to get more moderators in various forums. Unless - is there a way to make every member a "moderator" for new member posts? I can't think of a flow chart that'd accomodate that, but I don't know the innards of the system that well.
 
 
Tom Coates
07:20 / 30.04.02
Headmaster - how come you're a newbie if your suit number is in the six hundreds? Surely that means you've been around here for months!?
 
 
We're The Great Old Ones Now
10:30 / 30.04.02
And I've always wondered where Eagles actually did dare. I mean, in these days of random light aircraft, it's got to be tough.

We've never asked people to introduce themselves before they post - perhaps we should, so that we know a little about them - and how not to step on their toes and vice versa.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
10:34 / 30.04.02
Username: The headmaster
Registered: Oct 2001
Topics: 1
Posts: 13

Hacked much? PLONK.
 
 
The headmaster
12:26 / 30.04.02
Jesus...What's with the Spanish Inquisition? I just don't come here often.
 
 
pointless and uncalled for
16:52 / 30.04.02
There are some great ideas being discussed and introduced here but there is an issue of concern that I think deserves some consideration.

If the process of introduction to this board, stand alone or partner board to an alternative, is too lengthy or complicated then we either risk alienating a target desirable new poster or simply not providing enough interest value for people to go through the process to join.

Essentially, we should be aiming to meet the needs of both this board in terms of what we would want to see in a new poster but also what a new poster would want to see in terms of a board that interests them enough to want to come and post here and a joining process that doesn't appear overwhelming, excessively complicated or elitist. Appearances will be important and with the immense proliferation of alternative forums elsewhere on the net then there is a risk of loosing the opportunity of intruducing valuable new blood.

I'm sorry to say that unfortunately I don't have the answers at the moment and I'm sure that far greater minds than my own will be required to overcome them.

I apologise if anyone feels that I am attacking their ideas. I can see that a lot of consideration has been put into these proposals and certainly can see their value. I have no intention of discrediting these options for consideration or those that have developed them.
 
 
.
08:35 / 01.05.02
Not that I think this is necessarily the right place to bring up a debate that probably belongs in the Headshop, but voting will only work (or be fair) under the assumption that everyone will have the same end in mind when voting... Which is never really true in practise. Thus some people will vote to kick someone off the board because they think it will benefit the board, some people may vote that way because they think it harm the board (if they're that way inclined), some people may just want to stir things up, some people may want to stick with the mass opinion so as to not alienate anyone, some people may want to be deliberately contrary, some people may act utterly randomly, and some people who think strongly one way or the other may not vote at all... Some people will vote for what they want, and some people will vote against their self-interest in order to achieve some sort of higher motive. Ultimately it is not simple to tell who will be happy with the outcome of a vote. Voting may turn out to be the best way of dealing with this sort of thing, but it is a mine-field conceptually, and far from ideal.
 
 
The headmaster
09:43 / 01.05.02
That's what I was thinking. Just look at the situation in France at the moment. It swings both ways.
 
 
grant
14:25 / 01.05.02
We're talking about two things here: ejecting members and admitting members.
(Geez, this is getting all properly clubby, ain't it? Pass the port.)

* I like the idea of opening admission, with acolytes/recruits/junior members having all their posts moderated. OR being able to post in one area (the conversation?) freely, and with moderation elsewhere on the board. For, like, 30 posts.
I think that should give everyone that snuggly safe feeling.

* Ejection might be best handled by a popular vote that has to be seconded by a quorum of moderators as well. Thus: moderators become senators and the rest of you proles will be a vast lower house.
I expect to see the place spotless by this evening.
 
 
Lurid Archive
21:33 / 27.05.02
I feel like a newbie, but I wanted to discuss the membership policy. I don't have any good answers. Instead, I thought I'd tell you a story. It is entirely fictional.



I had a friend who, when they were younger, was bullied. They walked home from school and got harrassed by another kid and however hard they tried, couldn't reason with him. The bully seemed intent on making my friend's life difficult, almost obsessively so. My friend clearly had to do something. But what?

Well, luckily, a solution appeared. My friend was bright and had no problems with school work. They were able to negotiate getting out a little bit early and so avoid the bully. This worked perfectly. No longer harrassed, no longer intimidated.

The downside was that they had to give up all the extra stuff they wanted to do - clubs and such like. More than that, if you ever wanted to see my friend you had to arrange it with them in advance, because they studiously avoided the bully.

Life went on like that for a while and I thought everything was ok. Then, one day, this friend rejoined all the clubs and stopped getting out of school early. Predictably enough, the bullying started again.

My friend coped with it as best they could but I wondered why they bothered. So I asked, "You managed to avoid all the bullying and now you've thrown all that away. Why?"

The answer I got was this. "My life was easier before and I get beaten up a lot now. I deal with it as best I can because I have to. If I change my entire life because of one bully, then I'm being pushed around more than when I get hit in the face".
 
 
Tom Coates
14:12 / 28.05.02
That's a very nice story, but if you're trying to draw some kind of analogy I don't quite see how it fits. The fact is every single other web forum in the world has suffered the problems we have. The difference is that we're actively thinking about ways of self-governing so that these problems don't continue to happen. Software recapitulates politics. We're building a functioning way of resolving problems. And hopefully one that's as simple and self-evident as possible...
 
 
rizla mission
15:17 / 28.05.02
complete and total threadrot:

Software recapitulates politics.

Can I get someone to shout that in the context of an angry punk song?

It's perfect.
 
 
Lurid Archive
21:24 / 28.05.02
Sorry for being so frivolous and rather simplistic. I wanted to make the point that although a membership policy needs to take into account the presence of troubles it shouldn't be warped by them. I think it is a sad thing that the board is essentially closed to new members. I understand why that is, but I'd want see the board develop coping mechanisms while staying open. Even though these will leave the board vulnerable.

You are probably way ahead of me, but I felt like sharing a certain sentiment. Also, I am perhaps overstating the case when I say the board is essentially closed. It is not as open as some of us would like, including you I imagine?.
 
 
Tom Coates
11:49 / 29.05.02
Oh I definitely want it to be much more open than this. I think we all do. The move we're making is between us as a group debating every decision to death and then not being able to enforce them towards debating the first decision of its type to death, figuring out the principles involved in having done that, automating the process from that point on and then never having to fight the same fights over and over again. It's moving our need to figure out what to do each and every time into some kind of textual body of law, which can be automatically administrated because we each occupy an online body that's susceptible to those laws absolutely.

Ie - we can't break a law not to post, because we can have that ability simply removed.

The problems with that is that it could be too constricting and authoritarian, but the benefits are that we can develop political systems that wouldn't work IRL - ones that function effectively but are still essentially freer than those that we see in our everyday life. For example - there's no reason why we couldn't build a communist system that worked via a board like this, because we could literally remove the very possibility of corruption... We could build an anarchist system that worked, we could build a capitalist one. Etc. etc.

Everyone should be happy with the way in which we move, but I think we should probably start with a basic principle that it's important to preserve (or even improve) the level of dialogue we have here...
 
  

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