On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Bryan Pope wrote: That, and going back and re-reading every one of Dick's messages since he joined CC. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote: Was that a troll, Dick? Hey, you know how a "dick" was like a private eye back in your day? Times have changed. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

"Gene Buckle" <geneb(a)deltasoft.com> wrote... I've restrained from commenting on this whole thing, because I didn't want to post off-topic... but now there's a big "meta-offtopic" thread of complaints about flames, trolls, and off-topic threads. Ironic, huh? :) Personally, I just suggest quietly killfiling and moving on. Keeps the S/N ratio down. GSL

Agreed! The list owner should make the rules, and has the option of enforcing them. It's his list, after all. Participants in the list should be required to follow the rules absolutely and even the tiniest infraction on these rules shall disqualify the violator from any further participation, i.e. posting to the list, for a specified period, say, seven years. He/she can still receive the list, can still communicate with other participants, but, for that specified period, posts from that violator will not be made part of the list. That way we can avoid (1) inappropriate language, (2) promotion of current commercial activities, (3) personal attacks, and trolliing for them as well. I doubt anyone will disagree that it would be desirable that topics be adhered to and that persons posting to a thread with subject matter that has changed content. Nevertheless, the list owner should be the one to make and enforce the rules. The safest way to do that, however, is to establish a set of rigorously enforcible criteria that can be automatically parsed, and start with those. Dick ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com> To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2001 8:30 AM Subject: RE: NOTICE FROM THE LIST HOST -- a vote in favor of limited moderation

At 09:42 AM 8/22/01 -0600, Richard Erlacher wrote: Yeah, but does that filter out the messages where the moderator is doing the swearing or insulting? :-) - John

Would "Dick" be included in the list of expletives? On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote: Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

BTW, having been to a VCF, I can vouch that the "Good" Sellam is the one in charge there. As for the "Bad" Sellam, the swearing is strictly an anomaly, possibly brought about by an over-reliance on Microsoft products. Regarding the Dr.-Jeckyl-and-Mr.-Tourette's syndrome thing, we can all hope for a swift remedy. John A.

On Thu, 23 Aug 2001, John Foust wrote: You just come off as a glib smartass at times, so tit for tat, eh? The list is the list. People act differently here. I just can't stand the displays of stupidity that sometimes make an appearance here, and occasionally feel compelled to point it out, but oh well. I don't hold that against anyone in the "real" world. Well, except for one certain individual who seriously crossed the line several times, and who passed by my table at a recent ham fest giving me pause to consider whether I should get up and kick his pasty white ass. I just called him a "dork" out of earshot instead :) In that case I'm covered. P.S. If, as an adult, you still think words are "dirty" then you still have maturing to do. Think about it. My opinion. Accept it as that and move on. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

On Thu, 23 Aug 2001, John Foust wrote: Kind of. People are bolder and feel freer to express themselves when behind the glass of a CRT. I would never stand there amidst a group of people and tell R.D. what an ass he is at the top of my voice (unless, say, we were all familiar with each other). That's not appropriate. Then again, I don't think he would start off on an obnoxious rant either (unless he's got Wayne-Greenitis). I know that I act much differently in e-mail than in public, and I suspect he does too, which is why in real life I would cordially greet him if we ever met. You've never been in the boardrooms that I have. And you've obviously never met my attorney. He's worse than me, and that's a whole lotta naughty curse words being bandied about. There really should be no need for moderation on this list, but it is plainly obvious that some of the folks here just don't have manners when it comes to staying on topic. In those situations that required it, sure. But once you get chummy with your clients and find out they aren't uptight, the "dirty" words start to flow. In this environment, I feel like we are all fairly well acquainted with each other. Some of us have "known" each other for literally years now. It's not like we are just meeting each other in a public forum for the first time and have to keep our facade of social graces up. If you come to the list, you should feel like you're walking into a bar, and in bars, people feel free to express themselves any way they want without having to worry about being chastised, with the exception of those jumping onto the bar and delivering a screaming rant about politics or whatever. That person would get his ass booted to the curb. Stay civil, and courteous to your bar mates, and keep within the proscribed topic, and everyone will be happy. All that being said, I don't have an aversion to using the English language to its fullest, including certain words that some people may find "dirty", "naughty", "foul", etc. That's a silly concept. Words are words. They are pure. It's the emotions that people assign to them that make them "dirty", etc. If you have a problem with a word, it's yours alone, not mine. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

I was on BBSs a lot before the net, and bad, ie dirty, language was a sure sign of pimpled teenager taking dads computer for a test drive. I can be dork in real life more than sufficient for my needs, so why wave a flag on the net where people can think you are a civilized decent person?

On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, John Foust wrote: Just what is "foul" language? How can any spoken utterance be "foul"? That whole concept strikes me as being truly foul. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org

On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote: That's a hard d4mn list for one sh1thead to make. It would take too fscking long, and some 455h0l3 b4574rd will always come along and think of some other p1550ff variation that breaks it. k-r4d 31337 h4X0r!!!!! I'm sorry if that was offensive, but I believe it sufficiently illustrated the point. -- Jeffrey S. Sharp jss(a)subatomix.com

People propably will become extremely creative in dreaming up insults and ranting topics. These will subsequently have to be filtered. Filter updates will then become a weekly event. Maybe McAfee can do that for us. They already do it for virus-signatures ;) I basically believe in people's own responsability. Having a gadget do it for them will actually make them inclined to act less responsable. Periodically stating the rules -clearly- would certainly help. I for one have never seen the classic.comp FAQ and I've been on the list for over a year. Everybody will make minor offenses once a while but I would endorse the removal from the list of those who repeatedly produce foul language, bigotries or extreme (fringe) politics. It's also obvious that thimble- or car- collection rants should go elsewhere. As to the use of weird idiom, local U.S. news topics and sometimes bizar acronyms, bear in mind that a lot of the list members are not U.S. natives and sometimes simply do not understand fragment of rants. Allthough I sometimes think that thats my luck anyway, since I simply don't wanna know ;) Sipke de Wal ------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://xgistor.ath.cx ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- Original Message ----- From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com> To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2001 5:42 PM Subject: Re: NOTICE FROM THE LIST HOST -- a vote in favor of limited moderation such together hence, of

On Thu, 23 Aug 2001, Sipke de Wal wrote: Just the 'extreme' politics? What do we care about each other's political beliefs? We're here to discuss classic computing, not to punish nonconformists. Let's keep *all* of the politics external. -- Jeffrey S. Sharp jss(a)subatomix.com