Re: Nature of this list
Hi all, On Sunday 24 Apr 2011 03:20:39 Joel Limardo wrote: I must have skipped the previous e-mails when all of this discussion about swearing started. I think there are times when a good curse word most adequately describes a situation, but these instances are exceedingly rare. When I look back in history and think of some barring my rights to vote or the starving masses of France glaring up at Marie Antionette's window or something like that I am totally for a good shout of You dirty sons of a b! However, in everyday conversation, and this goes for mailing lists, foul potty-mouthed language is just not appropriate. And in truth, there are ALWAYS limits to freedom of expression depending upon the venue. For instance, it is illegal to scream Fire! in a theater if there is indeed no fire. It is illegal to call up someone and make harassing or threatening statements. Etc., etc. The rules of the venue determine the freedom. In most cases, if you are in the U.S., the limits on freedom of speech are normally very few and have more to do with public and personal safety. The Internet and other social gatherings on the web have to set their own standards. The restriction on swearing in many places is among them. Joel, thanks for supporting and elaborating on what I said. I couldn't have phrased it better myself. Joel++ . I agree that there is a place for swear or unpleasant words, and some people's styles seem to be uttering them consistently (e.g: reportedly http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Stern and Perl's very own http://www.trout.me.uk/ ), but they are usually not appropriate and should be avoided in most contexts. Paul Graham discusses it here: http://www.paulgraham.com/resay.html . As much as freedom of speech exists, a lot of things you say can get you in trouble and even if technically legal, may be considered as a verbal offence. For example, at one point, someone at a mailing list I'm on claimed that I should take a shower, because after he visited the Technion, where I studied for my bachelor's, he discovered that my body odour was still a legend after my departure. I was told that spreading such rumours may be considered as defamation, and one could successfully press charges against such things (and yes, I had been guilty in the past of similar acts of defamation, which I had conducted due to negligence and lack of awareness on my part.). There are natural restrictions to free speech such as defamation/slander/libel, conducting deceit or fraud, risking human lives, matters of national security, privacy, secrecy and personal matters, copyrights and trademarks (possibly even patents), and naturally there are things you can say and are perfectly legal (and ethical) which will incur a negative reaction and are not recommended. (see for example http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html ). Sorry for getting carried away here a little elaborating on what Joel said. I'd like to return to the main topic of the proper conduct on beginn...@perl.org because I feel it could be improved. I'll reply to a different message later. Joel, thanks again. Regards, Shlomi Fish On Sat, Apr 23, 2011 at 6:48 PM, Brian Fraser frase...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, Apr 23, 2011 at 7:37 PM, Shlomi Fish shlo...@iglu.org.il wrote: Hi Brian, and all. Well, there's a difference between repressing emotion (which is saying No! I am not feeling this way now) and realising you're feeling something and acting in a rational manner in accordance or opposite the emotion. I many times was frustrated at open source software applications having annoying bugs and thought with many F-words and curse words, but when phrasing the bug report, I phrased it politely, rationally, and factually (not always though, of course). Emotions are nature's guidelines, and should not be repressed, and one should not feel guilty for feeling anything (Sermon on the Mount/etc. put aside), including not a desire for murder and mayhem. But acting based on these emotions by words or deed may not be a good idea. You could have phrased yourself more calmly. Hey Shlomi. What part of my reply, exactly, was not calm or rational? Profanity is expression, which is both trivial and all-important; it's a flavor of words, like poetry or song. They all have impact in their own way, but we should no more condemn an obscenity shouted in frustration than we would poetry whispered in love. As you imply, there's a time and place for every kind of language. I wouldn't be screaming profanity in a business meeting (although my last PM was extremely fond of this...) but frankly, I thought better of the list - I assumed we were all adults and wouldn't be getting our knickers in a twist over a couple of words. (If I wasn't calm, rather than addressing your mail, I'd have some strong words to say about you and a horse) In any case, I still
Re: Nature of this list
On Sunday 24 Apr 2011 04:29:14 Peter Scott wrote: On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 19:08:49 -0400, Uri Guttman wrote: PLEASE (i am being nice but loud) get this off the advocacy list. it has nothing to do with it. I agree. The description of this list is: A discussion list for Perl advocacy. There are usually success stories, news stories about or involving Perl and discussions about how to make Perl be accepted in the workplace. Not sure where else it belongs (email?) but the current thread is a netiquette debate. I can't see a sufficient relationship to advocacy. Feel free to create a perl-flames list :-) Heh, well: 1. I suggested setting up a beginners-c...@perl.org or perl-c...@perl.org (or maybe just c...@perl.org) where we move discussions that go tangential. Of course, I'm not a @perl.org mail admin (though I can create such list on Google Groups, Yahoo Groups, etc., but these places tend to have worse spam protection than @perl.org does[Spam].) 2. The focus of advocacy@perl.org has changed a bit since the original description that you quoted and now also covers some ways in which we can better promote Perl. And I believe that proper treatment of newcomers in the masters beginn...@perl.org mailing list is such an issue, and a very critical one. I'm aware of other mailing lists whose focus changed a bit or that various rules they had changed in time (for better, or for worse, naturally). 3. I nonetheless agree that it may be of relatively little interest to most people here, so I suggest that Ask (CCed to this mailing list) will set up a $SOMETHING-cafe mailing list on @perl.org. 4. It's possible Uri referred to the fact that I went out-of-line in the discussion of Ethics-vs.-Law, which is off-topic and inappropriate here, and I apologise for that (I got carried away). So let's drop this particular discussion. Regards, Shlomi Fish [Spam] - God bless the souls of the @perl.org mail admins who make sure the @perl.org mailing lists are almost entirely spam free, despite the fact one can send an E-mail to most lists without being subscribed. It's a lot of work, and often goes unnoticed. -- - Shlomi Fish http://www.shlomifish.org/ Rethinking CPAN - http://shlom.in/rethinking-cpan You name it - COBOL does not have it. Please reply to list if it's a mailing list post - http://shlom.in/reply .
Re: Nature of this list
Shlomi Fish wrote: wanting to help them. As a result, I suggest moving it to advocacy@perl.org (or maybe beginners-c...@perl.org or possibly perl-c...@perl.org , if Ask and friends will be kind enough to set it up (modelled after the haskell-cafe concept, where discussions are moved from the main haskell mailing list). Anyone can send an email to advocacy@perl.org , even if they are not subscribed and everyone can subscribe to it by sending an email to advocacy-subscr...@perl.org . Anyway, it was a good place to discuss social issues in the past, and it's very quiet now so I don't think people will mind the action. I mind the action. Not because I mind discussion on this mailing list, but because I do mind having a conversation dumped in here that doesn't make any sense. This might be a good place to discuss social issues, but only within the limits of how those social issues impact on Perl advocacy. The conversation fragment we've been subjected to so far does not seem to have any relevancy. If you want to have a different mailing list set up, then go about getting that done the right way; not by dragging an unrelated and irrelevant (and not particularly friendly) conversation onto a list where it doesn't belong. It is not this mailing list's responsibility to get you a -cafe set up. In the future, if you feel you feel you do need to redirect a conversation from one mailing list to another; and it is relevant to the new mailing list, please provide context for the new mailing list readers, rather than just continuing the conversation as if everyone else has been following it already. (Context in the form of a link to existing archives is better than nothing, but poor form all the same.) J
Re: Nature of this list
Hi Jacinta, (top-posting) Very good advice, thanks! Yes, you are perfectly right. OK, now we'll need to wait for the @perl.org mail admins to set up a $something-c...@perl.org mailing list (hoping they would agree.). So I'm killing this thread here. Regards, Shlomi Fish On Sunday 24 Apr 2011 12:50:44 Jacinta Richardson wrote: Shlomi Fish wrote: wanting to help them. As a result, I suggest moving it to advocacy@perl.org (or maybe beginners-c...@perl.org or possibly perl-c...@perl.org , if Ask and friends will be kind enough to set it up (modelled after the haskell-cafe concept, where discussions are moved from the main haskell mailing list). Anyone can send an email to advocacy@perl.org , even if they are not subscribed and everyone can subscribe to it by sending an email to advocacy-subscr...@perl.org . Anyway, it was a good place to discuss social issues in the past, and it's very quiet now so I don't think people will mind the action. I mind the action. Not because I mind discussion on this mailing list, but because I do mind having a conversation dumped in here that doesn't make any sense. This might be a good place to discuss social issues, but only within the limits of how those social issues impact on Perl advocacy. The conversation fragment we've been subjected to so far does not seem to have any relevancy. If you want to have a different mailing list set up, then go about getting that done the right way; not by dragging an unrelated and irrelevant (and not particularly friendly) conversation onto a list where it doesn't belong. It is not this mailing list's responsibility to get you a -cafe set up. In the future, if you feel you feel you do need to redirect a conversation from one mailing list to another; and it is relevant to the new mailing list, please provide context for the new mailing list readers, rather than just continuing the conversation as if everyone else has been following it already. (Context in the form of a link to existing archives is better than nothing, but poor form all the same.) J -- - Shlomi Fish http://www.shlomifish.org/ First stop for Perl beginners - http://perl-begin.org/ * Backward compatibility is your worst enemy. * Backward compatibility is your users' best friend. Please reply to list if it's a mailing list post - http://shlom.in/reply .
