BUD JAMISON:
I thought I'd catch up in an echo that I haven't had time for in several months, and ran across a recent rules posting that makes me wonder if there is ANY intelligence in Moderators any more.

And the WORST part is it's from a Moderator who experienced exactly the SAME thing from someone else just a few years ago, and should WELL know what disruptive effects it has on the echo.

The rule is..

Insulting messages written in other echoes about UFO echo participants or moderators may be cause to suspend your writing privileges in UFO.

Bud Jamison:
I thought I'd catch up in an echo that I haven't had time for in several months, and ran across a recent rules posting that makes me wonder if there is ANY intelligence in Moderators any more.

Holly Sullivan:
Some few of us, yes.

Bud Jamison:
Insulting messages written in other echoes about UFO echo participants or moderators may be cause to suspend your writing privileges in UFO.

Dale Shipp:
To me, that rule is totally out of place. What happens in another echo should have no bearing.

I have also seen a rule that goes something like "if someone is banned from echo X, then they are banned from echo Y" (different moderators of the two echos). Not only do I disagree with that, but I wonder how the moderator of echo Y expects to know that they were banned from echo X.

Bob Moravsik:
What...a bad moderator !!!!! Maybe they should be replaced

Russell Prater:
That's ludicrous. Personally, I have plenty to do just watching what happens in my own echo. I don't need to borrow trouble by trying to correct things that happen in other echos.

BUD JAMISON:
I understand the pressure Jack feels, with people trying to disrupt the echo, but I just beleive there are better ways than to make stupid rules that just give more fodder for the disruptors.

Pete Hopping:
And if they are disruptive IN YOUR ECHO you certainly are within bounds to kick them out. But you DO NOT have any say over what someone does outside of your echo. I would consider you to be one of the "stalinistic moderators" I rant about in here.

Jack Sargeant: If you were a user in my echo, we would be having this discussion in netmail, and you would then know the people the rule was intended for and why. But as it is, you are not, and are left with a mystery you are not likely to ever unravel.

Dale Shipp:
But he (and others) are having the discussion in this echo where moderators talk with each other about what ought and ought not to be the standards.

You can clearly run your echo anyway you want. If you want to ban everyone whose name is BOB then you can do so. But that does not make it right or proper.

What is right and proper is that you base your moderator decisions on what happens in and to your echo. What goes on outside of your echo should have no bearing and should not constitute grounds for censure inside of your echo.

Pete's descriptor of "Stalinistic" is appropriate for the sort of rule you have published and that we are discussing.

Pete Hopping:
I would consider you to be one of the "stalinistic moderators" I rant about in here.

Jack Sargeant:
For someone who has never posted in my echo, that is very perceptive of you. Sorry, but I don't consider you qualified to form as combative an opinion as that.

Roy Witt:
Pete speaks from experience in the matter, as do I and Jamison. Any moderator who makes such a rule, isn't what we consider to be the best of moderator material. There must be a better way.

Jack Sargeant:
If you were a user in my echo, we would be having this discussion in netmail, and you would then know the people the rule was intended for and why. But as it is, you are not, and are left with a mystery you are not likely to ever unravel.

Roy Witt:
Hopefully your aren't one of those moderators who cuts a feed for something said in netmail too.

Jack Sargeant:
For someone who has never posted in my echo, that is very perceptive of you. Sorry, but I don't consider you qualified to form as combative an opinion as that.

Pete Hopping:
I don't need to read your echo to have a negative opinion of your rule. And as far as my "qualifications" go, as a moderator participating in this echo, I'm as qualified as anyone else to give my opinion. You don't have to accept it or agree with it.

Jack Sargeant:
If you were a user in my echo, we would be having this discussion in netmail, and you would then know the people the rule was intended for and why. But as it is, you are not, and are left with a mystery you are not likely to ever unravel.

Pete Hopping:
I consider it a bad rule, irrespective of your reasons for having it. You overreach your jurisdiction when you apply sanctions against anyone for something not posted in your particular echo. If it isn't disruptive in YOUR echo, you have no grounds for removing someone. That would be like me removing your access to my echo because I don't like your dissmissal of my qualifications to form an opinion of your rule in here. Would that be fair?

Perhaps you would feel very differently if YOU were removed from an echo for something you wrote outside of that echo. Would you remove me for a netmail message you didn't like? How about removing me from your echo for my opinion in here? If I were to say that people who believe in UFOs are nuts? Does that count? Even if it's not posted in UFO? If so, then you do fall within my definition of a stalinistic moderator.

Jack Sargeant:
What the folks who have commented haven't realized is, I still have to nab the disruptive user for infractions in UFO before I can actually enforce the ruling. The same end result can be accomplished without the rule. It is interesting to read the comments though.

Pete Hopping:
"nab the disruptive user for infractions IN UFO?"

The rule relates to other echos, does it not?

I don't need to know about your enforcement to not agree with the rule in question. The mere fact that it is part of your echo rules is enough fact for me.

Jack Sargeant:
You have created imaginary scenarios, then passed judgement based on these made-up notions of yours. ...Plus, you have not even bothered to think the situation through, but have simply rejected my rule for its very presense. I can only assure you that the rule has a purpose-- Albeit, a purpose which still eludes you, or else you just plain don't care.

Pete Hopping:
The mere existence of the rule is unacceptable to me and yes, I don't care what the reasons are.

Sheppard Gordon:
Note Jack's implied lie that he never banned anyone using the rule he banned me with!!!

What a Jackass!!!

>> Pete speaks from experience in the matter, as do I and Jamison. >> Any moderator who makes such a rule, isn't what we consider to be >> the best of moderator material. There must be a better way.

Jack Sargeant:
The opinions of the three of you are not necessarily held by everyone else.

Roy Witt:
I believe there's more than just the three of us.

Jack Sargeant:
You first have to prove I used the ruling to sanction anyone.

Roy Witt:
The proof is in your rule sanctioning users outside your echo. There's nothing to prove beyond that fact.

Jack Sargeant:
...And as for you, you simply jumped on the bandwagon, thinking I am some kind of underdog here.

Roy Witt:
Not even in your dreams. Pete and I have been on this bandwagon long before you came around with this rediculous rule of sanctioning someone outside your echo.

Jack Sargeant:
I don't care what the three of you think of my rules.

Roy Witt:
I'm sure you don't. Jack Sargeant:
I've been moderator of UFO for almost 2 years. It is not that I don't appreciate the comments about my rule so much as it is nobody has bothered to check to see whether I have carried out the threat

Roy Witt:
It doesn't matter whether you've carried out the threat of the rule, it's a matter of the principal of the rule.

>> Hopefully your aren't one of those moderators who cuts a feed for >> something said in netmail too.

Jack Sargeant:
That is a suggestive remark that has no meaning. In a court of law, it would be called hearsay.

Roy Witt:
We're not in a court of law, this is fidonet where you'll be judged by your users as well as your peers. This judgement may or may not make you change the rule or eliminate it, but you'll know that it's not regarded as right in the eyes of those who are observant enough to catch such a rule.

Jack Sargeant:
I have sanctioned less than 10 users in 2 years. Most for repeated foul language. I have permanently banished less than 5 people. I have yet to enforce the rule in question.

Roy Witt:
I've been a mod for that long as well. I've only sanctioned one user, a moderator who thought he could use other echos to fight the battles outside his echo.

Jack Sargeant:
...But I reserve the right to moderate my echo according to my concept of fair play, not that of others.

Roy Witt:
No one wants to take that right away, either. We're just saying that the rule is a bad one.