At 10:56 02-05-2002 -0500, you wrote: >Well, IMHO, its not BS. Everyone has the ability to either subscribe to the >list or not. They can choose whether or not to receive email messages and >whether to receive them one by one or as a digest. They can choose to have >a killfile for posters who they don't want to read. They can choose to post >or choose not to post. > >List owners can do more. They get to decide who is on the list and who is >off the list.
That is not correct. People makes that decision for themselves. Any individual can choose to subscribe at any time, every member can choose to unsubscribe at any time. Theoretically, listowners can deny someone access to this list, but in a previous discussion it has already been stated that such a decision will be made by the members of this list, not the listowners. In such rare cases, the *members* are judge and jury, the listowners are only there to carry out the sentence (that is, send the "unsubscribe member X" command to the listserver). >A few keystrokes and a listowner can boot anyone they want >to. That is a measure of power on the list. True, we *can* boot anyone we want, but we do not actually do that unless the list as a whole decides that someone has to be removed. With the power to remove someone also comes the responsibility to not abuse that power. In my years on this list, I have never seen anything that lead me to believe listowners cannot handle that responsibility. > >If he wants to play Nixon and create an enemies list, that shouldn't > >threaten the list any more than if anyone else did so. > >Why not? Only two other people have the power to kick people off the list. In the past, some other people have had that power as well. IIRC, in the six years of its existence, Brin-L has had five individuals who acted as listowners (Hector Yee, Stewart Blandon, Eileen Tan, Julia Thompson, and me). None of them ever abused his/her powers. Given the possible consequences for a listowner who abuses his/her power, as well as the stated policy on use of powers, I see no reason to expect that any listowner will abuse his/her powers in the future. > > I could have "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" up and running in minutes. Any of you > > could do the same via a number of free hosting services. > >That's true. We could get a list full of ads in each message. Any one of >us could do that. However, lets consider the case in which person A and B >are in a flame war. B cannot stop A from posting whatever A pleases, but A >can boot B off the list at any time. True. However, I need three things in order to boot someone: means, motive and opportunity. Do I have the means? Yes, my status as listowner gives me the means. Do I have the motive? Sure, I have been attacked often enough and removing the offenders would have made my on-line life a bit happier. Do I have the opportunity? Yes, it will only take one message to the listserver to boot someone. But despite the fact that I could have booted certain people, in the eight months I have been a listowner I have never done that. If I *would* do that, I would almost immediately loose my listowner status and probably find myself booted not much later. IOW, I have nothing to gain from abusing my powers. And that, my dear friend, should be enough reason to have no fear I will ever act otherwise. If you insult me today, you will still be subscribed when you wake up tomorrow. Jeroen _________________________________________________________________________ Wonderful World of Brin-L Website: http://www.Brin-L.com Tom's Photo Gallery: http://tom.vanbaardwijk.com
