Re: A List-Manager Issue: Dealing with attacks via personal email.

[SRE]

At 09:24 PM 2/20/01, J C Lawrence wrote:
>Yet, he is sabotauging the very community basis that found the list
>and its value without also providing himself as a target for
>moderation or removal.

If he can ruin the list without breaking any rules, you need to
announce NEW RULES! Try writing down how often and what he posts,
see if you can find a pattern, and see if it's REALLY different
from what others do (frequency, changing the subject, whatever).

When a poster generates more complaints than compliments, I tell
them (ON LIST, IN PUBLIC) that their attitude is burning up my
time dealing with complaints. If others come to their defense,
I have to leave them alone. If not, they get booted.

I even set up a "list-issues" list so the quiet people don't have
to listen to the yelling about who can say what. I filter the main
lists as needed to keep the issues discussion in "the back room",
and I invite people to contact me off-list if they don't want to
say something for or against the attacker on-list.

Sometimes I find out that no one but me is bothered, and I back off.
Most of the time I hear "hurrah for the good guys - nail the bastard"
and then it doesn't matter if he broke the list rules: The mob rules!

SRE

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  -- Adlai Stevenson