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The flamewars on public communication channels is out of hand. it's having an negative effect in many parts of gentoo, even those that are not directly affected by the said war. This is something that urgently needs to be addressed. So, here is my proposal. I hope it's not the only one. creation of a etiquette enforcement group. This group should be a subproject of devrel, but should not be made up of devrel members. I say this because the actions and powers of this group need to be separated from devrel. This group should be composed of well respected members of our dev community that have demonstrated the ability to diffuse situations that would have otherwise became a flamewar. The new group would act like our current ombudsman group, except that the target is different. I'll try to give some examples. IRC: <clueless> Hi, I'm writing an ebuild and I want to install stuff to /usr/local <informed> Well, that's a bad idea. ebuilds should never install to /usr/local <troll> clueless: you moron! ebuilds can't install to /usr/local, go jump off a bridge! <enforcer> troll: if you can't say something constructive, then please don't say anything. .... <clueless> I still want to install to /usr/local. my ebuild isn't meant for the tree, only my private use, and I feel that I should be able to do it. <informed> Well, then you want to check out http://foo.bar/blah as it explains how to use insinto and doins. <troll> You fucking moron, you can't do that! <enforcer> troll: you were warned, and now you're banned for the next hour. please go do something else and cool off. - - enforcer sets modes +q troll for #foobar Mailing list enforcement is the same concept. One warning and then a short term ban.(yes, we have possibly found a way to enforce short term bans on MLs) Why does this work? I believe that most people who get caught up in trolling do it unintentionally. Usually a "hey, you're being an asshat" will be enough to stop the flamefest. Sometimes people need a bigger kick in the ass though, which is where a short term ban helps. When I say a short term ban, I mean 30-90 minutes. it allows everyone to cool off without them using bad judgment and popping back in. I do similar enforcement in #-amd64 and it works very well. This still doesn't address repeat offenders and people who troll for sport. It's possible that the short term bans will work, but that is something that we will only find out with experience. Preventing abuse of short term ban powers: one of the first things that everyone will(and should) be worried about is this group abusing their powers. To prevent the enforcement group from abusing their powers, the following safety checks would be put into place. 1. any and every action that the enforcer uses to enforce etiquette needs to be immediately and publicly documented. as a start I recommend sending a email to gentoo-devrel ML. This includes full logs/archive pointers. 2. enforcers are not allowed to use their power more than twice consecutively on the same person/group. 3. every action that an enforcer takes will be reviewed by at least 2 devrel members. 4. if an enforcer has effected a ban on a person/group and the subject was a time sensitive topic, then the enforcer is obligated to relay messages verbatim from the person/group for the duration of the ban. 5. any group/person affected by the ban may request a devrel hearing about the ban in question. These need to be handled as fast as possible. At devrel's discretion, devrel may immediately remove the enforcer from the enforcement group or issue a warning to the enforcer. 6. no enforcer shall have more than 2 warnings in a 6 month period and never more than 3 in a year. So, these are my thoughts. there is still a lot to be worked out if we decide that this is the best approach. All comments are welcome, and if you want to troll, direct it to your nearest brick wall. - -- ======================================================= Mike Doty [EMAIL PROTECTED] Gentoo/AMD64 Strategic Lead PGP Key: 0xA797C7A7 Gentoo Developer Relations ===GPG Fingerprint=== 0094 7F06 913E 78D6 F1BB 06BA D0AD D125 A797 C7A7 ======================================================= -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.3 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFEbM3P0K3RJaeXx6cRAgskAKDITJIYHgKshXPir3CTHi1HtpnPSgCg4Pot 6v1cACeqj6/2njYZsUG/+uU= =apF6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list
