Re: [ga] Comments from Pawlo

[Harald Tveit Alvestrand <Harald@Alvestrand.no>]

At 00:06 19.01.00 +0100, Mikael Pawlo wrote:

>Comments to suggestion posted at:
>http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/ga/Arc03/msg00447.html

General reply: The definitions were left *intentionally* vague.
"I can recognize it when I see it" has been an official ruling of an US 
court (Judge Brown on Pornography, I believe); any attempt at strict 
definition would be an invitation at rules-skirting.


> >Not indulging in personal attacks, insults or slander
>
>Define this.

One example of slander (IMHO) is referring to someone as "a young man who 
is very uncomfortable with his sexuality". This is completely irrelevant to 
any issue at hand.

A nice personal attack is this one:

"he is in fact a villainous liar, cheat, and dispicable wretch, who will 
sodomize and emasculate your cause by sheer association."

> >Not using offensive language
>
>Define this.

The word "feminazi", if used as a personal characterization, is offensive.
(I trust that my use of the word here is not taken as offensive by anyone..)

> >Certain persons appointed by the GA Chair (the Sergeants-At-Arms) have
> >the
> >task of monitoring the list for posts that violate these rules.
> >These are selected by the GA Chair for a given period of time, but may be
> >removed from the role by the GA Chair or at their own request at any
> >time.
> >Normally the appointment would be for 1 year.
>
>Maybe the SAA should have a more free role from the GA Chair, hence maybe
>the SAA should be choosen by the list subscribers.

If the GA had a procedure to agree on anything, I would support using this 
procedure to elect the SAA.

> >A Sergeant-At-Arms may impose 2 sanctions against offenders:
>
>I suggest there be only one (1) sanction, that is suspension. If the
>sanction is needed suspension is a fair punishment, monitoring
>(censorship) does not make sense.

In some cases, monitoring is needed, especially when someone tries to 
deliberately avoid filtering mechanisms.
I think the paragraph could be worded better.

> >Both sanctions are imposed for a limited period of time (typically 2
> >weeks), and are announced on the mailing list.
>
>Sanction time should be more clearly defined. I say 7 days for first-time
>offenders and 14 days if the same individual repeat an offense.
>
> >The period is decided by the sergeant-at-arms.
>
>No, the period is fixed as suggested above.

Sometimes, the period needs to vary. For instance, someone who deliberately 
and mischievously creates havoc on the list may get a longer suspension 
than someone who just spoke out in anger on a specific issue.
Or someone who was once suspended, but has behaved himself for the last 2 
years, may not get the doubled sentence if he is suspended again.

> >Note that due to technical issues, monitoring one member's postings may
> >cause monitoring to be applied to other members' posts.
>
>Obviously this is not acceptable - this just another reason to strike the
>sanction as such.

See above.

> >The action of the sergeant-at-arms may be appealed to the GA Chair.
>
>No. Three SAAs are choosen in majority election by the list members. If
>the member who's been punished by a SAA wants to appeal, he'll make his
>appeal to the SAA appeal board. The SAA appeal board will consist of the
>two SAAs who did not make the decision and of one randomly choosen list
>member. The SAA appeal board will make a final decision on the matter.

Once we have a GA able to make decisions, I think your suggestions make sense.

Remember that these rules aren't the end of the world - once we have a GA 
able to make decisions, we need to revisit them. And once we have 
experience with using them in practice, we need to revisit them.

The rules need to be good *enough*.

                            Harald


--
Harald Tveit Alvestrand, EDB Maxware, Norway
Harald.Alvestrand@edb.maxware.no