Tom Fitzgerald <fitz @
wang .
com> writes:
# I've unsubscribed from the list. The basic architecture of a firewall has
# been hashed over and over, and if it's now a policy to prevent the
# introduction of new, controversial topics on the list, then it can't teach
# me anything that I haven't already learned from it.
There's a big difference between controversy and flamewars.
I'm all for controversy; witness the discussions of whether it's worth
it or not to conceal DNS data. There are clearly two camps there, both
with well-considered arguments as to why their position is the correct
one. That debate crops up again periodically, and goes on for several
days at a time, but nobody descends to personal attacks against folks
from the other camp. I think we all learn a lot from such discussions,
regardless of what our own opinions are.
On the other hand, I don't think flamewars have a place on Firewalls.
The recent "anonymous email" thread almost immediately descended into
personal attacks: "What are you, paranoid?!" "Why are you trying to
hide?!". The topic _could_ have been discussed rationally, without
that, but it wasn't; it almost immediately erupted into flames. In
my opinion and experience as a list manager, once a flamewar erupts,
it's very hard to get the flames under control without killing the
topic altogether.
Normally, I leave Firewalls on auto-pilot; anything that's submitted is
automatically and immediately posted. The strategy I'm trying now is,
when flamewars threaten to erupt, to take the list off auto-pilot and
make it temporarily moderated. Anything that looks likely to fan the
flames, I'll intercept; anything else, I'll post.
I'm not going to try to edit inflamatory messages to make them
non-inflamatory; I'm simply going to accept or reject them on an
all-or-nothing basis. This means that discussion of the topic can
_still_ take place, as long as it's non-inflamatory. When it looks
like the inflamatory messages have stopped coming, I'll put the list
back on auto-pilot.
-Brent
--
Brent Chapman Great Circle Associates
Brent @
GreatCircle .
COM 1057 West Dana Street
+1 415 962 0841 Mountain View, CA 94041
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