North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Thomas Olenio" <tolenio@sentex.net>]

Helllo,

Very sane, and I have seen similar rules in most email groups that do not  
dissolve into chaos.

No one is condeming our moderator.  If the moderator does not have time to  
enforce some rules of civility, and keeping the group focused, possibly  
there is another NAFEX member who does have the time.  No one is asking  
that the burden fall to someone without the time to do it.

I have seen older, larger, more established listserv groups destroyed by a  
single individual who takes glee in their destructiveness.

I realize we have an open posting format, but when something really nasty  
come across the forum we all can recognize it.  There is no harm in a  
moderator warning and barring repeat offenders.

I know of one exellent moderator who not only warns and bans, but deletes  
threads from the archives that are not appropriate to the forum's  
archives.  Foolishness is not enshrined in the listserv archives forever.   
He takes the position that a moderator has the job of moderation.

We can always do things better, does no harm to consider changes.

Later,
Tom


On Sun, 07 Nov 2004 08:06:58 -0500, Pat Meadows <pat@containerseeds.com>  
wrote:

> On Sun, 7 Nov 2004 00:31:19 EST, you wrote:
>
> > Dear list,
> >
> > My 2 cents worth also stands with Greg. To ban or not to ban is the  
> > question.
> >
> > Where is the fine line in the wind blown sand?
>
> I've been on email lists a long time and Usenet newsgroups
> for a long time (until they mostly became worthless because
> of spammers and trolls) - 16 years, to be exact - since the
> days when the Internet was available to anyone but
> universities and the government.  That's an aeon in
> 'Internet time'.
>
> The policy that I have generally seen adopted on mailing
> lists is this:
>
> 1.  The desires of the list-owner are the rules.  He/she
> gets to make the rules and to enforce them or not.
>
> 2.  It helps if there are written guidelines for the list so
> members can know what is or is not allowed.
>
> 3.  Moderators (if it's a moderated list) do *not* edit
> posts.  They either kill them or send them as is.
>
> 4.  On unmoderated lists - where all posts go directly to
> the membership (like this one) - listowners will generally
> warn offenders at least once.  More patient listowners will
> warn offenders two or three times:  then they kick them out.
>
> This policy usually works pretty well.
>
> Total laissez-faire is very apt to wind up in chaos and a
> useless list.
>
> > Maybe a private censure statement could be privately sent to offenders  
> > by the
> > moderator. But again where is the line not to be crossed.
>
> It's - again - up to the listowner.
>
> On lists I have owned I did not tolerate spam, harassment,
> obscenities, stalking, bigotry, repeated irrelevant posts
> obviously meant to harass, flame wars, or discussion of
> verboten topics, if any (usually religion, politics, gun
> control, abortion rights).
>
> I am able to draw the line at an appropriate point (judging
> by the fact that lists I owned retained their membership and
> were lively and not 'sound asleep').  I think most people
> would be able to do this also.
>
> Pat



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