Re: [ga] Proposal:1. posting tax 2. adopt HA rules 3. Audit function

[Mark Measday <measday@ibm.net>]

Dear Kent,

Yes, a reasonable email from you (below). You are a reasonable man. I am a
reasonable man, so we can talk reasonably.

Proposal: posting tax

The economics of discussion groups are such that there is an incentive to write
and not to read, as Harald has just pointed out to me in a private
correspondence. Unlike the traditional publishing approach, which rationed access
to valuable information by price (books), we have a surfeit of contentious
debate, with several, including myself to be honest, raising their voices in an
effort to be heard or attempting demonstrations to prove the point, as there is
little or no cost of hitting the reply button..

I suggest that the group would benefit from a gradation of posting privileges,
where the right to post privately to the group is subject to a form of tax. Group
distributions from the Secretariat would obviously be exempt from this. A
Treasurer should be put in place to collect a small sum from each proposed
contributor, by whatever means appears best, giving the right to 100k of messages
or whatever. If some participants wish to post under multiple personalities, they
will need to make multiple payments. I am sure the Secretariat and Directorate is
not averse to receiving donations to fund its outreach campaign, whether
stochastically derived or not...

There are a number of objections to this. 1. It limits anyone's capacity to speak
to the size of their wallet. This is not a valid objection in my view, as anyone
with the time and money to sit and read the things in the first place has already
made a sizeable investment and can afford more. 2. It is unwieldly and
impractical. This may be true, the collection of funds often is, that doesn't
stop it happening. 3. Noone will post any more, we will all become lawyers. This
may also be true.

I do not believe that the suggestion that the vigorous debate taking place herein
'frightens others off'. If it does, it is because the quality is so high that
others feel intimidated. This will unfortunately always be the case, like walking
unprepared into a professional sporting event and being required to compete.

Reiterated proposal:

Mr Alvestrand's Rules as amended by the list be incorporated as the de facto
basis of discussion until such time as the working groups Ms Rony, Mr Greenwell
and others interested etc) have reported to Mr Gaetano on the manner in which the
discussion function above and the official outreach function have been
reconciled. If Mr Gaetano believes that this must wait until 10% of internet
users are involved, we may have to wait a long time, but so be it.

New proposal

Mr Gaetano or one of the officers should be mandated to solicit contributions
from non-members, specifically those supposed to be NC/DNSO members, IDNO
members, and ICANN Board members on their contributions, establishing an
institutional audit function. Andrew McLaughlin's post was a case in point.

I would also propose that Mr Mueller be reallowed posting privileges to this list
as and when an apology for the (baseless) charges made against myself and others
are withdrawn.

MM

Kent Crispin wrote:

> On Wed, Jan 26, 2000 at 08:51:47AM -0800, Ellen Rony wrote:
> > You see, i do think there are certain mailing list rules on which we should
> > be able to agree that do not involve moderation as to content but rather as
> > to behavior and technical concerns.  Size of file limitation.  Size of
> > attachment limitations, and, of course, prohibitions on spoofing emails.
> > There are three core elements in a mailing list rules policy that do not
> > touch censorship as to content.
>
> As well as a limitation on the number of messages in a given time.  In
> short, bandwith controls.  Putting these in place is a no-brainer.
> However, bandwidth controls alone are not sufficient.  Offensive content
> does have an impact all its own.  Threats have have an impact, as well.
>
> In effect, moderation is happening already.  At this point there is
> absolutely no doubt that the actions of baptista, williams, measday,
> and, to some extent, us talking about the problem, are causing people to
> not participate.  This is fact.
>
> So we are not chosing between "moderation" and "no moderation".  We are
> instead chosing between "conscious visible accountable moderation by
> good guys" vs "stochastic malicious moderation by bad guys".  As things
> currently stand, the "bad guys" are filtering "good guys" off the list.
>
> This is acceptable to you, Karl, and others, but it is not acceptable
> for ICANN.  It contradicts the very openness of which you are so fond.
> It discriminates in favor of those who have been on the net for a long
> time, who are familiar with email filters and other things.  It
> discriminates in favor of those who have a high tolerance for verbal
> abuse.  It discriminates in favor of those who don't care what they do or
> say.   It discriminates in favor of those who speak thoughtlessly.
>
> It may very well be that *you* are willing to eliminate gentle,
> sensitive, or internet-naive people from the discussion, but ICANN
> cannot afford to let that happen, and it would in fact be contrary to
> their mandate to do so.
>
> Dealing with this problem, of course, requires making a distinction
> between "good" behavior and "bad" behavior.  Unfortunately, there is no
> straightforward algorithm for this distinction.  That means there must
> be humans in the control loop, who will make judgements about the
> actions of their fellow humans.  This is a tricky area of human
> interaction, and one that must obviously be carefully watched for abuse.
> But we are fortunate that in this communication-rich envirionment the
> actions of the judges will be impossible to conceal.
>
> Our resident kooks and thugs have demonstrated unequivocally that there
> are people capable of doing these kinds of bad things, and therefore,
> we must have rules in place to deal with them, in advance of the next
> attack.
>
> I know it is comfortable to try to put all judgement of your fellow
> humans off on machines.  But it won't work, and it is in fact
> shirking a fundamentally human responsibility.
>
> Kent
>
> --
> Kent Crispin                               "Do good, and you'll be
> kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain