Propriety (was: BD: Re: SCN: "Free-Nets" in Los Angeles Times)

[Al Boss]

Patrick, I normally respect your opinions and I always appreciate your 
committment and the fact that you care so much about our online 
community. This time, though, I hope you reconsider some of what you had 
to say.

> First, this topic is totally appropriate for scn at scn.org. It is a
> topic that involves the public and would benefit the public...


This sounds to my ears more like a difference of opinion than a 
statement of fact. By your definition here, I would guess we should be 
doing all our discussions on scn at scn.org, since I imagine everything we 
do either involves or benefits the public. If that's the case, I can 
understand why you are not using some of the interest/task-specific 
sub-lists. Though the concept of the cc to the Board still confounds me.


> Second, the mailing list page sucks. It looks awful.


I guess I don't understand your definition of "sucks". The page I 
visited certainly performed the task I needed from it. If I hadn't 
included a URL I'd wonder if we were even looking at the same page. And, 
regardless of the perfectly human typo or whatever that duplicated a 
couple of list names, it looks to me as if one of my fellow volunteers 
has put more than a little of their time and effort into the pages that 
provide overviews of our mailing lists.

I didn't create the mailing list page, but I can imagine the humiliation 
its creator must feel about having our Webmaster broadcast the above 
opinion to the hundreds of people on scn at scn.org, as well as cc'd to our 
SCNA Board of Directors. If it were my page, I wouldn't know how to take 
this other than very personally, regardless of whether or not the 
perceived disrespect was the intent.

 > If you run a mailing list, or are on a mailing list here at SCN, then
 > please let me know who the intended audience is. And the purpose of
 > the list.

Since I am able to look at the awful mailing lists page and immediately 
read who the lists' intended audiences are, and what the purpose of each 
of the lists is, do I suck too? Or am I just missing your definition of 
"suck"? At the very least, it appears that our opinions of propriety 
differ, not only on the appropriate venue for a discussion but also on 
the quality and specificity of feedback offered on one's work.


> There is no reason SCN should have more lists than volunteers.


Maybe, but if anyone in an SCN leadership position were to take it upon 
themselves to email the Board and all of scn at scn.org that one of _my_ 
pages sucks, there would likely be one less volunteer for our number of 
lists, too.

May I respectfully request that the points be re-stated? I find myself 
unclear on what the issue is.

Also, if the list owners have read this far, could I trouble some of you 
to share with us additional information about how we can best use our 
lists? I have read what's on our site:

The Web interest list is for discussion among SCN's webeditors 
volunteers and others who are interested in SCN's Web site, the Board 
list is for communication to and among the board of directors, and the 
SCN list is for discussion among SCN's webeditors volunteers and others 
who are interested in SCN's Web site

but from that it seems to me that I'm not correctly understanding these 
words, or that we're misusing our lists (is updating a page on SCN 
really a Board issue?), or that our documentation no longer matches the 
way we use our lists and is in need of updates from the list owners.

Not for the first time in my life, I'm confused. I'll look forward to 
clarification.

Thanks,

Al

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