[NTLUG:Discuss] NTLUG Discuss Guidelines

[Steve Baker]

greenglow484 at juno.com wrote:

>         Idea:  Should we focus on needing guidelines; or is the issue how
> actively the moderator ought to moderate?

Actually, I think the problem is that the guidelines published so far
have been to do with netiquette and moderation.

I don't think either of those things are a serious problem. People seem
to be reasonably polite - and moderation isn't needed.

What we *desperately* need IMHO - and what the previous 'guidelines'
don't address - is what is to be considered off-topic for this list.

That's the only thing that REALLY needs to be tied down.

Personally, I think that we would be better served having a set of
mailing lists.  The one's I've proposed are:

NTLUG-announce : A read-only list that only a few nominated people
                 can post to that carries notices of meetings,
                 special events and so on.

NTLUG-discuss  : A list which is only for discussion of NTLUG business
                 meetings and special events. Nothing else.

NTLUG-helpline : What this list currently spends most of it's time doing.
                 Answering Linux-related questions.

NTLUG-jobs     : Job offers, job requests, nothing else.

NTLUG-smallAds : Computers, peripherals for sale, 'want ads', etc.

The nice thing about this scheme is that it allows for things like
job adverts that annoy some people but are useful to others.  If
job adverts annoy you - don't subscribe to that list.

I'd find this pretty useful.  I'd greatly value an NTLUG-announce
list because I could read that as a high priority thing, I could
read NTLUG-discuss only when I feel like it - knowing that I wouldn't
miss anything important like cancelled meetings, etc.

In effect, this allows people to customize NTLUG's mailings to their
own personal tastes.

With modern mailing list software, it's not much harder to manage
five lists than it is to manage one.  The narrow focus of each
list will do more to deter off-topic posts because each list
has a very narrow range.  Just saying "anything that'll interest
Linux users" is hopelessly vague IMHO.

>  Please note:  I **do not**
> mean any criticism of the guys who have been moderating the last few
> months.

I agree.  Moderating a list is a truly thankless job.  Moderators
get flamed and criticised to a great degree - and the reason is
simple - what is or is not of interest to one person is different
from what is of interest to others.  By definition, nobody posts
anything that *they* consider inappropriate - so whenever anyone
gets 'moderated out', they feel hard done by.

At any rate, I dislike censorship.

-- 
Steve Baker                  http://web2.airmail.net/sjbaker1
sjbaker1 at airmail.net (home)  http://www.woodsoup.org/~sbaker
sjbaker at hti.com      (work)