From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 10:44:04 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id KAA29691 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 10:30:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from deepthought.armory.com (deepthought.armory.com [192.122.209.42]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id KAA29675 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 10:30:41 -0800 (PST) Received: from clovis by deepthought.armory.com id aa13235; 1 Jan 97 10:30 PST Received: by clovis.nerdnosh.org (1.65/waf) via UUCP; Wed, 01 Jan 97 10:26:57 PST for list-managers@GreatCircle.COM To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: Re: List politics? From: Tim Bowden Message-ID: Date: Wed, 01 Jan 97 10:09:25 PST In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19961231234704.008b8964@znyx.com> Organization: NERDNOSH - the story conference as cyber-community! Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Alan Deikman ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 14:47:29 -0800 (PST) Received: from ra.cyberca.com (ra.cyberca.com [192.234.55.25]) by cyberca.com (8.6.8.1/SCA-6.6) with SMTP id WAA16495 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 22:47:10 GMT Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970101224314.0071467c@isis.cyberca.com> X-Sender: jennings@isis.cyberca.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Wed, 01 Jan 1997 17:43:14 -0500 To: list-managers@GreatCircle.com From: Penn Jennings Subject: Re: List politics? Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I have been reading several response to "List Politics?" and it appears that I'm in the minority. I guess that I could be wrong in thinking that list users that harass other list member and possibly disrupt the a list should have their actions corrected. However, before I decide that I'm wrong I would like to ask a question. There is almost no real community that a person can harass other people with some authoritative entity taking action. You cannot harass people at work and keep your job. You cannot harass you neighbors without suffering civil and/or criminal penalties. How long could you alienate people at a bar or night club before being tossed out. So my question is: Why is ok to harass people in mailing lists? I am forced to conclude that one of statements below must be true. 1. The net some how absolves people of personal responsibility. 2. The net removes normal expectations of protection and decency from online communities? 3. List managers should not police their list members or don't want to police their members. As I stated above, since I'm in the minority I must consider my position carefully. I'm not saying that the other opinions are at all wrong. I'm just stating a postion. __________________________________________________________________ Copyright 1996 (c) Penn Jennings Penn Jennings jennings@cyberca.com http://www.cyberca.com/~jennings/ The road to evil is paved with good intentions. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 15:13:54 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id PAA20016 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 15:11:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from mx1.eskimo.com (mx1.eskimo.com [204.122.16.48]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id PAA19990 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 15:11:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from eskimo.com (berg@eskimo.com [204.122.16.13]) by mx1.eskimo.com (8.7.6/8.6.12) with ESMTP id PAA11973; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 15:10:24 -0800 From: Berg Received: by eskimo.com (8.7.6) id PAA00914; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 15:10:22 -0800 (PST) Date: Wed, 1 Jan 1997 15:10:22 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199701012310.PAA00914@eskimo.com> To: jennings@cyberca.com Subject: Re: List politics? Cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Gotta agree with ya. If someone starts harassing other members of the lists I run, I warn them once, and if they keep it up, I bounce them, and then ban them from resubscribing for a month. If they keep at it after the moneth, I warn them one more time (not nearly as politely this time), and if they persist, they are not going to be allowed back on, ever. I make it clear from the start that abusive behavior is not welcome on my lists, and that regardless of what the listmembers say, the buck stops here, with me. I once got a little "delegation" of sorts from the members, and the end result was, after some investigation, warning some of the people who asked me to intervene, not the guy who they were trying to get rid of. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 17:28:53 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id RAA27828 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 17:21:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from netcomsv.netcom.com (uucp8.netcom.com [163.179.3.8]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id RAA27821 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 17:20:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from duke.sagarmatha.com by netcomsv.netcom.com with UUCP (8.6.12/SMI-4.1) id RAA28306; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 17:09:58 -0800 Received: by duke (Smail3.1.28.1 #64) id m0vfbYQ-000gdJC; Wed, 1 Jan 97 17:02 PST Message-Id: From: james@sagarmatha.com (James C. Armstrong) Subject: Re: List politics? To: jennings@cyberca.com (Penn Jennings) Date: Wed, 1 Jan 1997 17:02:42 -0800 (PST) Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.com In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970101224314.0071467c@isis.cyberca.com> from "Penn Jennings" at Jan 1, 97 05:43:14 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk According to unnamed sources, Penn Jennings is alleged to have written => I have been reading several response to "List Politics?" and it appears that => I'm in the minority. I guess that I could be wrong in thinking that list => users that harass other list member and possibly disrupt the a list should => have their actions corrected. However, before I decide that I'm wrong I => would like to ask a question. => => There is almost no real community that a person can harass other people with => some authoritative entity taking action. You cannot harass people at work => and keep your job. You cannot harass you neighbors without suffering civil => and/or criminal penalties. How long could you alienate people at a bar or => night club before being tossed out. So my question is: Why is ok to harass => people in mailing lists? I am forced to conclude that one of statements => below must be true. => => 1. The net some how absolves people of personal responsibility. => 2. The net removes normal expectations of protection and decency => from online communities? => 3. List managers should not police their list members or don't want to => police their members. => => => As I stated above, since I'm in the minority I must consider my position => carefully. I'm not saying that the other opinions are at all wrong. I'm => just stating a postion. If I remember correctly, the original complaint was not about abusive behavior in the list, but between list subscribers in private email. This is a very different situation. If someone is on one of my mailing lists, harrassing other users, they would get the axe. The amount of warning they get depends on the nature of the harrassment and my mood when I find out. Usually, it's pretty quick. When people are harrassing each other in email, then it isn't my responsibility as a list manager to discipline the users in question. I may be willing to mediate, but odds are I won't have the time. In this case, it is the business of the respective site administrators to discipline their users. The original situation, if I have remembered it correctly, falls under the latter category. -- James C. Armstrong, Jr. | It's time to taste what you most fear james@sagarmatha.com (home) | Right Guard will not help you here. | Brace yourself, my dear! | It's a holiday in Cambodia! From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 19:58:53 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id TAA02252 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 19:44:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from antares.mcs.anl.gov (mcs.anl.gov [140.221.9.6]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id TAA02243 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 19:44:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from mcs.anl.gov (obie.mcs.anl.gov [140.221.5.129]) by antares.mcs.anl.gov (8.6.10/8.6.10) with ESMTP id VAA29452; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 21:43:31 -0600 Message-Id: <199701020343.VAA29452@antares.mcs.anl.gov> To: Penn Jennings cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM, rackow@antares.mcs.anl.gov Subject: Re: List politics? In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 01 Jan 1997 17:43:14 EST." <1.5.4.32.19970101224314.0071467c@isis.cyberca.com> Date: Wed, 01 Jan 1997 21:43:30 -0600 From: Gene Rackow Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Penn Jennings made the following keystrokes: > > 1. The net some how absolves people of personal responsibility. No, it doesn't, but people do tend to flame in mail where they would otherwise get a punch in the nose or bounced from the bar, etc. Loss of personal contact means more that you'd think. > 2. The net removes normal expectations of protection and decency > from online communities? No, I expect people to act in a civil and responsible manner. I have a list of those that I do not think fit that banner and ignore them as much as possible. So far I haven't been presented a real "problem" with someone on a list. Most just go away on their own or they grow up. > 3. List managers should not police their list members or don't want to > police their members. This is the difficult one, and the one that could put you at risk. That said, I still think you could be right on most of your issues. I don't want to police my mailing lists, nor do I think I should need to. Tell the people to act like professionals and not like 2yr olds in the sandbox. If a couple kids start fighting, either everyone becomes unhappy or the trouble makers (both parties) get removed from the play area. :-( Why both parties? Well, because neither was able to act in a reasonable enough manner to stop the problem on their own. I don't really think that you are in the minority, but there tend to be lots of facts that get dropped when dealing with these situations. I've been down this road a number of times, and it tends to be that the ones complaining are also the ones at the root cause of the problem. Remember that email and usenet don't carry the facial expressions and facial tones as does personal contact. It's really easy to miss judge something and even easier to overlook the obvious. The procedure that I now take in mailing lists and user that I run systems for is: 1st, don't get pulled into the middle of it. 2nd, be really careful how you word things to both sides involved with the conflict. 3rd, do not assume guilt on either side. 4th, ask for copies of ALL the messages in regards to this matter from both sides. These messages should be the full message with all headers in tact. You can't make a decission with only part of the evidence. Dates are important as well as all the content. (This is where most complainers will fall short. They only keep the critical parts of messages to prove their point, and have deleted the slime they have thrown, in some cases first.) 5th, review the issues involved, and then if you think that someone is doing wrong, get someone else to review the facts for you and see if they agree. Now if action is warrented, cover your tush. Contact the admins of the machine/system that the mailing list is being run from and state the actions you are taking and give the evidence as to why. Make sure they are aware of what you are doing up front so that they can be prepared for any backlash that occurs. If it's a company machine make sure your boss knows what is going on as well and agrees. Then take the needed actions. If no action is needed, then reply to both parties involved that you can see how this "could be" a problem, but it is not something that warrents action by you as list maintainer. If they continue to have problems with each other, then they can take their evidence to a legal type and see what they want to do from there. (again I doubt if this will happen) Their other choice is to leave the mailing list and start their own where they can do what they want and not worry about the fight. The other problem that comes in to play is various "rights" that people think they have. If you leave the position of list maintainer and go into list moderation, which you would be doing if you cut someone from the list for their viewpoint or comments to others on the list, then you become a target of law suites as well. Since you stopped joe from posting, you should also stop sam, and since you didn't I'm going to sue for harrassment and stress, etc. Your the target now as well as the parties involved. I can't rememeber with of the big (aol, compuserve, etc) companies lost on this as they were doing content checks and failed to stop a flame war. The judge said that since they were acting as moderators, they couldn't do half a job so they lost big bucks plus all the legal fees. DON'T put yourself in such a position. --gene From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 20:44:01 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id UAA04411 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 20:42:54 -0800 (PST) Received: from cyberca.com (isis.cyberca.com [206.42.216.51]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id UAA04404 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 20:42:46 -0800 (PST) Received: from ra.cyberca.com (ra.cyberca.com [192.234.55.25]) by cyberca.com (8.6.8.1/SCA-6.6) with SMTP id EAA17914; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 04:42:21 GMT Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970102043822.0073bc28@isis.cyberca.com> X-Sender: jennings@isis.cyberca.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Wed, 01 Jan 1997 23:38:22 -0500 To: Gene Rackow From: Penn Jennings Subject: Re: List politics? Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.com Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 09:43 PM 1/1/97 -0600, you wrote: >The other problem that comes in to play is various "rights" that people think they >have. If you leave the position of list maintainer and go into list moderation, >which you would be doing if you cut someone from the list for their viewpoint or >comments to others on the list, then you become a target of law suites as well. I doubt that any court would conclude that any has a RIGHT to be on a list. Courts HAVE concluded that list managers have responsiblies to curtail list members behavior. >Since you stopped joe from posting, you should also stop sam, and since you didn't >I'm going to sue for harrassment and stress, etc. Your the target now as well >as the parties involved. I can't rememeber with of the big (aol, compuserve, etc) >companies lost on this as they were doing content checks and failed to stop a >flame war. The judge said that since they were acting as moderators, they couldn't >do half a job so they lost big bucks plus all the legal fees. DON'T put yourself >in such a position. I belive that it was Prodigy and I'm not talking about moderating. I am talking about protecting list members from Unusal attacks or abuse. I belive that a Texas court DID take some form of action against a person for "email harassment". In a civil suit I would belive that juries and judges would frown on a list manager more for not doing any thing in the face of numerous complaints from multiple people than they would for you booting someone off your list or doing nothing. My point is: As the man in charge you should try to stay out of things. However, you do have a responsiblity to sometimes step in and make the hard choices. Remeber, a list is NOT a right and it is NOT a Democrocy. It is a free service subject to the will of the party running it. __________________________________________________________________ Copyright 1996 (c) Penn Jennings Penn Jennings jennings@cyberca.com http://www.cyberca.com/~jennings/ The road to evil is paved with good intentions. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 21:28:55 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id VAA06320 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 21:19:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (chinet.chinet.com [206.158.147.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id VAA06302 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 21:19:50 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost by chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (8.6.10/SMI-4.1) id FAA05544; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 05:18:24 GMT Date: Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:18:23 -0600 (CST) From: "Adam H. Kerman" To: list-managers Subject: Re: List politics? In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970102043822.0073bc28@isis.cyberca.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >From: Penn Jennings >Date: Wed, 01 Jan 1997 23:38:22 -0500 >At 09:43 PM 1/1/97 -0600, Gene Rackow wrote: >>The other problem that comes in to play is various "rights" that people think >>they have. If you leave the position of list maintainer and go into list >>moderation, which you would be doing if you cut someone from the list for >>their viewpoint or comments to others on the list, then you become a target >>of law suites as well. >I doubt that any court would conclude that any has a RIGHT to be on a list. >Courts HAVE concluded that list managers have responsiblies to curtail list >members behavior. >My point is: As the man in charge you should try to stay out of things. >However, you do have a responsiblity to sometimes step in and make the hard >choices. The list manager has no responsibilities whatsoever for stopping the exchange of rude e-mail messages between 2 list members. He should not get in the middle, nor assume that he is capable of changing anyone's behavior. He certainly should not take it upon himself to examine the contents of the messages to decide whether or not there is harassment. If he really feels sympathetic, he could mention that procmail, elm's filter, and other such programs exist to deal with unwanted mail. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 22:14:16 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id WAA08133 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 22:05:54 -0800 (PST) Received: from kitsune.swcp.com (kitsune.swcp.com [198.59.115.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id WAA08126 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 22:05:48 -0800 (PST) Received: (from lazlo@localhost) by kitsune.swcp.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) id XAA10715 for list-managers@greatcircle.com; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:05:21 -0700 Message-Id: <199701020605.XAA10715@kitsune.swcp.com> Subject: Re: List politics? To: list-managers@greatcircle.com (lm) Date: Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:05:21 -0700 (MST) From: "Lazlo Nibble" X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25 PGP3 *ALPHA*] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I don't get involved in private-email spats unless they drift onto the list, but if one of my list members was ripping off other members -- as is alleged in the case that started this thread -- you bet your ass I would get involved, and I don't think any list admin should feel shy about doing so, either. -- ::: Lazlo (lazlo@swcp.com; http://www.swcp.com/lazlo) From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 23:28:53 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA10771 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:19:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from cyberca.com (isis.cyberca.com [206.42.216.51]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA10742 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:19:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from ra.cyberca.com (ra.cyberca.com [192.234.55.25]) by cyberca.com (8.6.8.1/SCA-6.6) with SMTP id HAA18588 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:19:15 GMT Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970102071516.0071d070@isis.cyberca.com> X-Sender: jennings@isis.cyberca.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 02:15:16 -0500 To: list-managers@greatcircle.com From: Penn Jennings Subject: Re: List politics? - The End Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 11:18 PM 1/1/97 -0600, you wrote: >The list manager has no responsibilities whatsoever for stopping the exchange >of rude e-mail messages between 2 list members. He should not get in the >middle, nor assume that he is capable of changing anyone's behavior. He >certainly should not take it upon himself to examine the contents of the >messages to decide whether or not there is harassment. > Lets look at a worst case: Lets assume that you run a free list for who cares what. In Jan and Feb many users complain that a list member threatens to kill them and they inform you and you do nothing and leave the person on your list. In Mar a new user joins your list and is threaten by the same user. In Apr the user does get killed by this person. The victims family sues you for negligence because you took no action. They claim that if you had just kicked the person off of the list in Jan or Feb this murder would have never occurred. They believe that a person could reasonably expect that the list manager would remove dangerous members or warn new members that a danger may exist. NEGLIGENCE involves carelessness that injures another person. There are 4 parts to Negligence: 1. Duty. 2. Breaking a standard of care. 3. Proximate Cause 4. Damages. 1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask Prodigy. I think that the judge stated that their duty began once they were aware of the problem or should have been aware. Duties almost always exist where danagers exist. In this case you do have a duty to do something. 2. The standard of care is based on what the ordinary, reasonable and prudent person would do. Such a person WOULD take some action against a user in the light of multiple complaints from multiple people about the same person. 3. Clearly, if you had kicked the vile user off when the problems first occurred the murder would not have occurred. If you had informed the new user was threating the kill poeple he/she may not have joined the list. 4. The dead person was obviously damaged. I would assume that Prodigy had as good attorney as you could get and a court stated that list manager ARE responsible for some actions. Why are you not? I'm not an attorney but I will share this with you. My day job is with a 30 Billion dollar corporation at which I am one of the Webmaster. The legal department demanded that we NOT receive email to the Webmaster account. Their reason was basically this "Once you are notified of certain types of events you have a legal and moral obligation to take action." They did not want a Webmaster responsible for a 30 billion corporation loosing a multimillion dollar law suit. The odds of you successfully defending yourself against the law suit above is slim I think. The question is not DO you have responsibilities. The question is HOW MUCH responsibly do you have. Although this has gone into legal areas my original Idea was this: If I, as a list manager, have spent months or years building an online community I am not going to allow 1 nutty member to destroy it? OK. I'm done with this topic. __________________________________________________________________ Copyright 1996 (c) Penn Jennings Penn Jennings jennings@cyberca.com http://www.cyberca.com/~jennings/ The road to evil is paved with good intentions. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 23:43:55 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA11126 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:31:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (chinet.chinet.com [206.158.147.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA11110 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:31:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost by chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (8.6.10/SMI-4.1) id HAA09395; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:29:44 GMT X-Received: from cyberca.com () by chinet.chinet.com ; 2 JAN 97 00:37:17 CDT X-Received: from ra.cyberca.com (ra.cyberca.com [192.234.55.25]) by cyberca.com (8.6.8.1/SCA-6.6) with SMTP id GAA18430; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 06:38:17 GMT Message-ID: <1.5.4.32.19970102063421.00729c5c@isis.cyberca.com> X-Sender: jennings@isis.cyberca.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 01:34:21 -0500 To: "Adam H. Kerman" From: Penn Jennings Subject: Re: List politics? Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 11:18 PM 1/1/97 -0600, you wrote: >The list manager has no responsibilities whatsoever for stopping the exchange >of rude e-mail messages between 2 list members. He should not get in the >middle, nor assume that he is capable of changing anyone's behavior. He >certainly should not take it upon himself to examine the contents of the >messages to decide whether or not there is harassment. > Lets look at a worst case: Lets assume that you run a free list for who cares what. In Jan and Feb many users complain that a list member threatens to kill them and they inform you and you do nothing and leave the person on your list. In Mar a new user joins your list and is threaten by the same user. In Apr the user does get killed by this person. The victims family sues you for negligence because you took no action. They claim that if you had just kicked the person off of the list in Jan or Feb this murder would have never occurred. They believe that a person could reasonably expect that the list manager would remove dangerous members or warn new members that a danger may exist. NEGLIGENCE involves carelessness that injures another person. There are 4 parts to Negligence: 1. Duty. 2. Breaking a standard of care. 3. Proximate Cause 4. Damages. 1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask Prodigy. Duties almost always exist where danagers exist. 2. The standard of care is based on what the ordinary, reasonable and prudent person would do. Such a person WOULD take some action against a user in the light of multiple complaints from multiple people about the same person. 3. Clearly, if you had kicked the vile user off when the problems first occurred the murder would not have occurred. If you had informed the new user was threating the kill poeple he/she may not have joined the list. 4. The dead person was obviously damaged. I would assume that Prodigy had as good attorney as you could get and a court stated that list manager ARE responsible for some actions. Why are you not? I'm not an attorney but I will share this with you. My day job is with a 30 Billion dollar corporation at which I am one of the Webmaster. The legal department demanded that we NOT receive email to the Webmaster account. Their reason was basically this "Once you are notified of certain types of events you have a legal and moral obligation to take action." They did not want a Webmaster responsible for a 30 billion corporation loosing a multimillion dollar law suit. The odds of you successfully defending yourself against the law suit above is slim I think. The question is not DO you have responsibilities. The question is HOW MUCH responsibly do you have. OK. I'm done with this topic. __________________________________________________________________ Copyright 1996 (c) Penn Jennings Penn Jennings jennings@cyberca.com http://www.cyberca.com/~jennings/ The road to evil is paved with good intentions. From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 1 23:46:50 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA11456 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:38:56 -0800 (PST) Received: from chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (chinet.chinet.com [206.158.147.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA11449 for ; Wed, 1 Jan 1997 23:38:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost by chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (8.6.10/SMI-4.1) id HAA09523; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:37:24 GMT Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 01:37:23 -0600 (CST) From: "Adam H. Kerman" To: list-managers Subject: Re: List politics? In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970102063421.00729c5c@isis.cyberca.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >From: Penn Jennings >Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 01:34:21 -0500 >At 11:18 PM 1/1/97 -0600, Adam H. Kerman wrote: >>The list manager has no responsibilities whatsoever for stopping the exchange >>of rude e-mail messages between 2 list members. He should not get in the >>middle, nor assume that he is capable of changing anyone's behavior. He >>certainly should not take it upon himself to examine the contents of the >>messages to decide whether or not there is harassment. [your hypothetical example of a series of threats and a murder] >NEGLIGENCE involves carelessness that injures another person. There are 4 >parts to Negligence: > 1. Duty. > 2. Breaking a standard of care. > 3. Proximate Cause > 4. Damages. >1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Sure, the duties of a responsible list manager. But, you are not a policeman nor a psychiatrist and you do not provide private security to your members. You are in no position to judge the seriousness of the threat. I suggest that you expose yourself to even greater liability if you hold yourself out to be a predictor of human behavior, or claim to be able to control the actions of your list members. You have no responsibilities in this matter. All you can do is to advise the recipient of the threats to make a police complaint or seek a restraining order. If the police or some other expert asks you to remove the threat maker, do it. But, don't just do it on your own; it could provoke him. >2. The standard of care is based on what the ordinary, reasonable and prudent >person would do. Such a person WOULD take some action against a user in the >light of multiple complaints from multiple people about the same person. A prudent person does not claim to be an expert in human behavior. In a situation this serious, a responsible person would seek expert advice. >3. Clearly, if you had kicked the vile user off when the problems first >occurred the murder would not have occurred. This is not logical. This person was not under your control. >If you had informed the new user was threating the kill poeple he/she may not >have joined the list. Not only that, a potential list member might conclude that the list manager himself was dangerous, as he runs a list that attracts psychopaths. >4. The dead person was obviously damaged. But, not by the list manager. >I would assume that Prodigy had as good attorney as you could get and a court >stated that list manager ARE responsible for some actions. Why are you not? It wasn't done on the list! You cannot claim to provide security to your list members, nor that you are an expert in violent behavior. If you know of criminal acts, you are obligated to report it. But, you didn't receive the threat, the list member did. The obligation is on that person to make the complaint. Use of e-mail to make threats is a criminal offense. Now, if the list member refused to cooperate with the police, what exactly could you do? You didn't receive the message; you have no evidence of a crime. >I'm not an attorney but I will share this with you. My day job is with a 30 >Billion dollar corporation at which I am one of the Webmaster. The legal >department demanded that we NOT receive email to the Webmaster account. Their >reason was basically this "Once you are notified of certain types of events >you have a legal and moral obligation to take action." They did not want a >Webmaster responsible for a 30 billion corporation loosing a multimillion >dollar law suit. Gee, you didn't know that you were the gatekeeper when you agreed to maintain the Web pages? How did your corporate attorney decide that you would be completely irresponsible with your e-mail messages? I trust that a responsible employee of your company who received an allegation of a product defect would notify someone responsible at your company. Do your attorneys require that all incoming mail is shredded in case of allegations? Your attorney is merely covering his own ass by giving you a worst-case scenario. It's not necessarily good advice, which is what you are paying him for. Don't read into it any more than that. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 00:29:02 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id AAA13129 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:26:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from server.postmodern.com (server.postmodern.com [207.33.130.54]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id AAA13106 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:26:36 -0800 (PST) Received: from 207.33.130.51 (derrida.postmodern.com [207.33.130.51]) by server.postmodern.com (8.7.5/mcb-960422) with SMTP id AAA08195; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:17:25 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <32CB711E.5D35@postmodern.com> Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 00:26:09 -0800 From: "Michael C. Berch" Reply-To: mcb@postmodern.com Organization: Postmodern Consulting, California USA X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01Gold (Macintosh; I; 68K) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: list-managers CC: Penn Jennings Subject: Re: List politics? References: <1.5.4.32.19970102063421.00729c5c@isis.cyberca.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I think this may be well on its way to being beaten into the ground, but I feel it's necessary to point out that there's some very suspect legal reasoning here, presumably generated by speculating from a few oversimplified principles. Penn Jennings wrote: > Lets look at a worst case: > [facts omitted] > > NEGLIGENCE involves carelessness that injures another person. There are 4 > parts to Negligence: > 1. Duty. > 2. Breaking a standard of care. > 3. Proximate Cause > 4. Damages. > > 1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask > Prodigy. Duties almost always exist where danagers exist. Vastly oversimplified; you have simply assumed into existence a duty which is unlikely to actually exist. Yes, a list manager has duties and responsbilities (especially to the owner of the site, for example), but I don't know of any theory of law that requires you to act as a guarantor of the safety of list members against harm from third parties, except under some very narrow and well-defined conditions. "Duty", in the law of negligence, is a very specific and technical term. One rarely owes a special duty of care to someone whom one has not directly placed at risk, or to whom one does not have a special relationship (i.e., a fiduciary). For example, in American jurisprudence, if you pass someone in the street who is bleeding to death, you cannot be held liable if you simply ignore them and walk on, so long as it wasn't you who put them at risk in the first place, or unless you owed them a special duty because of a relationship (your child, your employee, someone you had agreed to supervise, etc.) That may sound cold-hearted, but that's tort law. In the exact words of my Torts professor lo these many years ago, "Never assume the existence of a duty." > 2. The standard of care is based on what the ordinary, reasonable and > prudent person would do. Such a person WOULD take some action against a > user in the light of multiple complaints from multiple people about the same > person. It's unlikely that not doing so is a violation of the standard of care (even assuming there was a duty of care in the first place). Murders arising out of e-mail threats are sufficiently uncommon that it is arguably not unreasonable simply to ignore the threat. Or to analyze it and come to the conclusion that kicking the person off the list would make it *more* likely that harm would come to an innocent party. > 3. Clearly, if you had kicked the vile user off when the problems first > occurred the murder would not have occurred. Whoooah there, pardner! That's the greatest leap of faith yet! Proximate cause (legal cause) is just as tricky as the duty of care, and you can't just assume that since Y followed X, Y was caused by X. That would be a *very* tough proof problem. > 4. The dead person was obviously damaged. OK, 1 out of 4. :-) > I'm not an attorney but I will share this with you. My day job is with a 30 > Billion dollar corporation at which I am one of the Webmaster. The legal > department demanded that we NOT receive email to the Webmaster account. > Their reason was basically this "Once you are notified of certain types of > events you have a legal and moral obligation to take action." Sigh. More lawyers who do not understand the Internet. In a good company, they are overruled by managers who understand the risks involved but realize that business considerations often outweigh legally-valid but implausible worst-case scenarios. -- Michael C. Berch Member of the California Bar (and yeah, I did get an "A" in Torts) mcb@postmodern.com / mcb@greatcircle.com From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 00:58:56 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id AAA14642 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:46:26 -0800 (PST) Received: from plaidworks.com (plaidworks.com [207.167.80.66]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id AAA14633 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:46:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from [207.167.80.70] (zamboni.plaidworks.com [207.167.80.70]) by plaidworks.com (8.6.9/A/UX 3.1) with ESMTP id AAA14478; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:46:29 -0800 X-Sender: chuq@solutions.apple.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <32CB711E.5D35@postmodern.com> References: <1.5.4.32.19970102063421.00729c5c@isis.cyberca.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 00:44:14 -0800 To: mcb@postmodern.com, list-managers From: Chuq Von Rospach Subject: Re: List politics? Cc: Penn Jennings Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 12:26 AM -0800 1/2/97, Michael C. Berch wrote: >>The legal >> department demanded that we NOT receive email to the Webmaster account. >> Their reason was basically this "Once you are notified of certain types of >> events you have a legal and moral obligation to take action." > >Sigh. More lawyers who do not understand the Internet. In a good >company, they are overruled by managers who understand the risks >involved but realize that business considerations often outweigh >legally-valid but implausible worst-case scenarios. Good, god. What do those lawyers do with paper mail that's sent to the company? Lazlo Toth would be proud of them. You know, people make fun of Apple's laywers, but they know better than this... I'll have to pass it along to them, so they can get a good giggle... -- Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@solutions.apple.com) Software Gnome Apple Server Marketing Webmaster Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) ( +-+ The home for Hockey on the net) I got no name or number/ I just hand out the lumber. But if I get a chance to play/ I'm going to show 'em. -- Stick Boy (The Hanson Brothers, SUDDEN DEATH) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 06:44:19 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id GAA28162 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 06:34:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from gateway.segue.com (gateway.segue.com [192.12.233.12]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id GAA28155 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 06:33:56 -0800 (PST) Received: (from news@localhost) by gateway.segue.com (8.7.1/8.7.1) id JAA25147 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:33:29 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: gateway.segue.com: news set sender to using -f Received: from segue1.segue.com(192.12.23.1) by gateway.segue.com via smap (V1.3) id sma025141; Thu Jan 2 09:33:18 1997 Received: from [192.12.23.174] (natick.segue.com [192.12.23.174]) by segue1.segue.com (8.7.1/8.7.1) with SMTP id JAA09999 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:33:17 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199701021433.JAA09999@segue1.segue.com> To: "list-managers@GreatCircle.COM" Subject: Re: List politics? Date: Thu, 02 Jan 97 09:29:26 -0500 From: Rich Lenihan X-Mailer: E-Mail Connection v2.5.03 Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk There's one practical consideration that has been left unexplored in this thread. That is, if the dispute between the various list-members has gone "off-list," how does removing any of the parties from the list help anyone? I suggest that you point the complaining member to the offending member's postmaster and have them (the complainant) pursue the matter with that responsible authority. Having said that, I think that there are (at least) several good reasons for removing someone from a mailing list. Harassment is one of them. -Rich -- Rich Lenihan System/Network Administrator rich@segue.com 617.796.1247 (voice) 617.796.1610 (fax) Segue Software, Inc. 1320 Centre Street Newton Centre, MA 02159 USA From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 07:29:23 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id HAA01420 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:19:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from gauntlet-1.trusted.com (gauntlet-1.trusted.com [204.254.155.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id HAA01374 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:19:02 -0800 (PST) Received: by gauntlet-1.trusted.com; id KAA00460; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:24:04 -0500 Received: from dira.rv.tis.com(10.0.1.43) by gauntlet-1.trusted.com via smap (V3.1.1) id xma000458; Thu, 2 Jan 97 10:23:45 -0500 Received: (from mark@localhost) by dira.rv.tis.com (8.7.4/8.7.3) id KAA10718 for List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:12:24 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:12:24 -0500 (EST) From: Mark Sienkiewicz Message-Id: <199701021512.KAA10718@dira.rv.tis.com> To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: List manager duties Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask >Prodigy. I think that the judge stated that their duty began once they were >aware of the problem or should have been aware. Duties almost always exist >where danagers exist. In this case you do have a duty to do something. Prodigy imposed the duty on themselves. The court found that they were responsible for the material on their system because of the amount of filtering/moderating that they did. In the case you are probably referring to, they failed to follow through sufficiently. I never promised to protect my list members from being murdered by other list members. And, unlike Prodigy, I have no contract with them. It might be more interesting to ask what *are* the duties of a list manager. Here's what I can think of in a few minutes: 1. Prevent your list from interfering with other organizations network services. e.g. You have a duty to correct a configuration error that floods a non-subscriber with mail. This is a standard duty that everyone has -- you do not cause damages to your fellow citizens. 2. If people are paying to be on your list, you have a duty to keep it operating and a duty to do anything else you stated in your contract. If there is no contract with your subscribers, I don't think you even have a duty to make sure the list works, though under #1 above, you have a duty to process unsubscribe requests if your list is actually sending out messages. Can you think of any other duties? Where might they come from? From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 07:59:02 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id HAA03492 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:47:34 -0800 (PST) Received: from webdreams.com (www.webdreams.com [192.80.84.132]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id HAA03475 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:47:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost by webdreams.com (5.65v3.2/1.1.10.5/29Aug96-0251AM) id AA02107; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:46:40 -0500 Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:46:40 -0500 (EST) From: Brock Rozen To: Mark Sienkiewicz Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: List manager duties In-Reply-To: <199701021512.KAA10718@dira.rv.tis.com> Message-Id: X-Url: http://www.webdreams.com/~brozen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Thu, 2 Jan 1997, Mark Sienkiewicz wrote: > 1. Prevent your list from interfering with other organizations > network services. e.g. You have a duty to correct a configuration > error that floods a non-subscriber with mail. This is a standard > duty that everyone has -- you do not cause damages to your fellow > citizens. > > 2. If people are paying to be on your list, you have a duty to > keep it operating and a duty to do anything else you stated > in your contract. > > If there is no contract with your subscribers, I don't think > you even have a duty to make sure the list works, though under > #1 above, you have a duty to process unsubscribe requests if > your list is actually sending out messages. Agreed, on all points. But I'd like to further restrict things on the unsubscriptions. You have a duty to allow somebody to unsubscribe themselves from the list, if they originally requested the subscription. If you placed them on the list, then you should handle the unsubscription, if they cannot figure out how to use the list software. I have tens of lists, the biggest one having over ten thousand people on it. I can't handle all of the un/subscription myself, and I get paid for this! We never subscribe people to the list ourselves, and thus feel no responsibility to perform the unsubscriptions manually. Actually, whenever somebody asks me to do it, I send them a message telling htem how to do it themselves. Of course, if somebody tries and can't do it, then I'll help them. Otherwise, it's not a responsibility, just a nicety. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Brock Rozen | brozen@webdreams.com | http://www.webdreams.com/~brozen | ------------------------------------------------------------------------- From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 08:14:56 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id IAA04388 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 08:02:08 -0800 (PST) Received: from plaidworks.com (plaidworks.com [207.167.80.66]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id IAA04381 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 08:01:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from [207.167.80.70] (zamboni.plaidworks.com [207.167.80.70]) by plaidworks.com (8.6.9/A/UX 3.1) with ESMTP id IAA24452; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 08:02:07 -0800 Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <199701021512.KAA10718@dira.rv.tis.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 07:54:43 -0800 To: Mark Sienkiewicz , List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM From: Chuq Von Rospach Subject: Re: List manager duties Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 7:12 AM -0800 1/2/97, Mark Sienkiewicz wrote: >Prodigy imposed the duty on themselves. The court found that they >were responsible for the material on their system because of the >amount of filtering/moderating that they did. In the case you are >probably referring to, they failed to follow through sufficiently. > >I never promised to protect my list members from being murdered by >other list members. And, unlike Prodigy, I have no contract with >them. This, by the way, is an imprtant concept. You set expectations in your intro material and list rules. You can also legally limit your responsibilities there. -- Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@solutions.apple.com) Software Gnome Apple Server Marketing Webmaster Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) ( +-+ The home for Hockey on the net) I got no name or number/ I just hand out the lumber. But if I get a chance to play/ I'm going to show 'em. -- Stick Boy (The Hanson Brothers, SUDDEN DEATH) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 09:14:24 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id JAA09519 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:01:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from kitsune.swcp.com (kitsune.swcp.com [198.59.115.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id JAA09492 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:01:41 -0800 (PST) Received: (from lazlo@localhost) by kitsune.swcp.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) id KAA12805 for list-managers@greatcircle.com; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:01:07 -0700 Message-Id: <199701021701.KAA12805@kitsune.swcp.com> Subject: Re: List politics? To: list-managers@greatcircle.com (lm) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:01:07 -0700 (MST) From: "Lazlo Nibble" X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25 PGP3 *ALPHA*] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > There's one practical consideration that has been left unexplored in this > thread. That is, if the dispute between the various list-members has gone > "off-list," how does removing any of the parties from the list help anyone? People keep forgetting that the original question was about one list member who was apparently defrauding other list members. The actual transactions may well have taken place off the list, but I certainly don't think that's any reason to let the thief stay *on* the list. -- ::: Lazlo (lazlo@swcp.com; http://www.swcp.com/lazlo) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 09:24:49 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id JAA10479 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:13:46 -0800 (PST) Received: from netcom8.netcom.com (netcom8.netcom.com [192.100.81.117]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id JAA10453 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 09:13:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (grafolog@localhost) by netcom8.netcom.com (8.6.13/Netcom) id RAA20757; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:12:07 GMT Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:12:07 +0000 (GMT) From: jonathon X-Sender: grafolog@netcom8 To: Penn Jennings cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: Re: List politics? - The End In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970102071516.0071d070@isis.cyberca.com> Message-ID: x-no-archive: yes MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Thu, 2 Jan 1997, Penn Jennings wrote: > In Jan and Feb many users complain that a list member threatens to kill them > and they inform you and you do nothing and leave the person on your list. > > In Mar a new user joins your list and is threaten by the same user. In Apr > the user does get killed by this person. The victims family sues you for > negligence because you took no action. They claim that if you had just > kicked the person off of the list in Jan or Feb this murder would have never > occurred. They believe that a person could reasonably expect that the list > manager would remove dangerous members or warn new members that a danger may > exist. > NEGLIGENCE involves carelessness that injures another person. There are 4 > parts to Negligence: > 1. Duty. > 2. Breaking a standard of care. The only standard of care is to try to keep the list running. > 3. Proximate Cause > 4. Damages. > 1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask > Prodigy. I think that the judge stated that their duty began once they were Prodigy was filtering e-mail. More specifically, private messages that Prodigy considered to be inappropriate were deleted, prior to delivery. If your list is not moderated, this precedent is inapplicable. If your list is moderated, it might be applicable, if, and only if, the list-owner is not the only person who posts to the list. > aware of the problem or should have been aware. Duties almost always exist > where danagers exist. In this case you do have a duty to do something. Also note that said threats were heresay. Not admissable as evidence. > 2. The standard of care is based on what the ordinary, reasonable and > prudent person would do. Such a person WOULD take some action against a > user in the light of multiple complaints from multiple people about the same > person. Would they? Not true. Take a look at the meow-brigade and the havoc they play on systems. Take a look at how easy it is for CyberPromotions to get new net connections. Or even take the hypothetical death threat example. Does the person making the death threat have the means to carry it out? Does s/he have a stated plan? If either of those is unknown, the best assumption to make is that the death threat will not be carried out, but an awareness of what is going on around one's self is needed. Statistically, once a death threat has been made, the odds of it actually being carried out, are less than 1 in 100 000. From personal experience, I suspect it is closer to 1 in 1 000 000. > 3. Clearly, if you had kicked the vile user off when the problems first > occurred the murder would not have occurred. If you had informed the new Doesn't follow. Subscribers can resubscribe using different names and email addresses. > user was threating the kill people he/she may not have joined the list. Maybe I'm being blase, but death threats are a dime a dozen, and about as dangerous to the health of an individual, as smoking a straight camel. > I would assume that Prodigy had as good attorney as you could get and a > court stated that list manager ARE responsible for some actions. Why are > you not? Because the Prodigy case didn't state that. Reread very carefully waht it did state, and how it defined those terms. > The odds of you successfully defending yourself against the law suit above > is slim I think. Case dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. No defence needed. No trial ever comes about. > The question is not DO you have responsibilities. The question is HOW MUCH Only if the post is made to the list, does the list manager have any responsibilities. And even those are limited. xan jonathon grafolog@netcom.com *********************************************************** Are there any good books about "The War of Northern Agression"? Are there any good books about "The War of Southern Rebellion"? From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 10:59:13 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id KAA18888 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:47:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from hotstar.net (hotstar.net [204.191.136.8]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id KAA18866 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 10:46:57 -0800 (PST) Received: from widgette (ts11-12.tor.iSTAR.ca [204.191.138.32]) by hotstar.net (8.7.3/8.7) with SMTP id NAA23780; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:48:26 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970102185127.006d28d0@inforamp.net> X-Sender: dlj@inforamp.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 13:51:27 -0500 To: Mark Sienkiewicz From: David Lloyd-Jones Subject: Re: List manager duties Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 10:12 AM 1/2/97 -0500, Mark Sienkiewicz wrote: >>1. As a list manager you DO HAVE duties and responsibilities. Just ask >>Prodigy. I think that the judge stated that their duty began once they were >>aware of the problem or should have been aware. Duties almost always exist >>where danagers exist. In this case you do have a duty to do something. > >Prodigy imposed the duty on themselves. The court found that they >were responsible for the material on their system because of the >amount of filtering/moderating that they did. In the case you are >probably referring to, they failed to follow through sufficiently. > >I never promised to protect my list members from being murdered by >other list members. And, unlike Prodigy, I have no contract with >them. Whether or not this follows from the duties of a webmeister, it certainly follows from one's duties as a citizen. -dlj. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 12:15:05 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id MAA25709 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 12:00:27 -0800 (PST) Received: from chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (chinet.chinet.com [206.158.147.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id MAA25688 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 12:00:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost by chinet.chinet.com.chinet.com (8.6.10/SMI-4.1) id TAA16501; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 19:58:23 GMT Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:58:20 -0600 (CST) From: "Adam H. Kerman" To: list-managers Subject: Re: List manager duties In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970102185127.006d28d0@inforamp.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >From: David Lloyd-Jones >Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 13:51:27 -0500 >At 10:12 AM 1/2/97 -0500, Mark Sienkiewicz wrote: >>I never promised to protect my list members from being murdered by other list >>members. And, unlike Prodigy, I have no contract with them. >Whether or not this follows from the duties of a webmeister, it certainly >follows from one's duties as a citizen. Nonsense. Only an employed security guard has such a duty. Your duty as a citizen is to report a crime, and sending a death threat via e-mail is a crime. What are you planning to do? Follow your list member around all day? From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 13:05:30 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id MAA01771 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 12:53:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from mailjay.creighton.edu (mailjay.creighton.edu [147.134.2.15]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id MAA01261 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 12:49:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from bluejay.creighton.edu by mailjay.creighton.edu with SMTP (1.38.193.5/16.2) id AA02327; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:48:39 -0600 Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:48:39 -0600 (CST) From: Virtual Joe To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: findmail.com instructions In-Reply-To: <199612310900.BAA15261@miles.greatcircle.com> Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Go to http://www.findmail.com/faq.html and read #6. It offers easy instructions regarding removing findmail.com from your lists and who to contact to make sure they stay off. #7 offers help on keeping individual messages from being archived. This is purely informational and I have not tried any of this. I am not drawing moral conclusions by offering this tidbit- I just happened to find it on the net. I am in no way connected to findmail.com, so please, no flames required. *:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* *: Joe Ducharme jduche@creighton.edu :* *: Creighton University Omaha, NE USA 68178 :* *: < http://www.creighton.edu/~jduche/>> :* *: "Time flies like an arrow, Fruit flies like a banana." :* *:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 13:16:19 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id NAA03220 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:06:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from mailjay.creighton.edu (mailjay.creighton.edu [147.134.2.15]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id NAA03213 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:06:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from bluejay.creighton.edu by mailjay.creighton.edu with SMTP (1.38.193.5/16.2) id AA02327; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:48:39 -0600 Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:48:39 -0600 (CST) From: Virtual Joe To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: findmail.com instructions In-Reply-To: <199612310900.BAA15261@miles.greatcircle.com> Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Go to http://www.findmail.com/faq.html and read #6. It offers easy instructions regarding removing findmail.com from your lists and who to contact to make sure they stay off. #7 offers help on keeping individual messages from being archived. This is purely informational and I have not tried any of this. I am not drawing moral conclusions by offering this tidbit- I just happened to find it on the net. I am in no way connected to findmail.com, so please, no flames required. *:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* *: Joe Ducharme jduche@creighton.edu :* *: Creighton University Omaha, NE USA 68178 :* *: < http://www.creighton.edu/~jduche/>> :* *: "Time flies like an arrow, Fruit flies like a banana." :* *:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 13:59:57 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id NAA05900 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:47:30 -0800 (PST) Received: from hotstar.net (hotstar.net [204.191.136.8]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id NAA05878 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 13:47:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from widgette (ts11-12.tor.iSTAR.ca [204.191.138.32]) by hotstar.net (8.7.3/8.7) with SMTP id QAA01638; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:48:30 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970102215131.006d1294@inforamp.net> X-Sender: dlj@inforamp.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 16:51:31 -0500 To: "Adam H. Kerman" From: David Lloyd-Jones Subject: Re: List manager duties Cc: list-managers Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 01:58 PM 1/2/97 -0600, Adam H. Kerman wrote: >>From: David Lloyd-Jones >>Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 13:51:27 -0500 > >>At 10:12 AM 1/2/97 -0500, Mark Sienkiewicz wrote: >>>I never promised to protect my list members from being murdered by other list >>>members. And, unlike Prodigy, I have no contract with them. > >>Whether or not this follows from the duties of a webmeister, it certainly >>follows from one's duties as a citizen. > >Nonsense. Only an employed security guard has such a duty. Your duty as a >citizen is to report a crime, and sending a death threat via e-mail is a crime. > >What are you planning to do? Follow your list member around all day? > Nope. You got it right: I'd report the threat to the police where the guy lived. -dlj. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 14:14:26 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id OAA07223 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:01:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from garcon.unicom.com (garcon.unicom.com [192.108.105.37]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id OAA07212 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:01:33 -0800 (PST) Received: (from chip@localhost) by garcon.unicom.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id QAA07699; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:03:23 -0600 (CST) From: Chip Rosenthal Message-Id: <199701022203.QAA07699@garcon.unicom.com> Subject: Re: AOL DNS troubles? To: brad@his.com (Brad Knowles) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:03:23 -0600 (CST) Cc: cmilam@cap.af.mil (Milam Charles R. 1LT CAP), list-managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: from "Brad Knowles" at Dec 29, 1996 03:24:38 PM X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL0a10] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Brad Knowles writes: > At 7:18 PM -0500 12/23/1996, Chip Rosenthal wrote: > >Looks like AOL broke their DNS. The MX records used to point to round > >robins of A RRs. Now they are pointing to CNAMEs. That's illegal. > >They should fix it. > > I used to think it was illegal, too. However, after > conversations with Paul Vixie and other DNS gurus, it is now my > understanding that this is not the greatest solution, but is not > technically illegal OK ... so everything I know *is* wrong. I glanced through RFC-1912 ("Common DNS Errors"), STD-13 ("Domain Name System"), and STD-14 ("Mail Routing and the Domain System"). I've found lots of "should nots" and "ought nots", but the only "must not" was one specific case in STD-14 having to deal with elimination of target MXes. I'm kind of bothered that this deeply entrenched "fact" seems to be wrong. -- Chip Rosenthal * Unicom Systems Development * URL: http://www.unicom.com/ * 4868D8BE10C86BDE 6017000BA783998E Helmet good. Law bad. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 14:28:22 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id OAA08001 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:08:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from ayla.idyllmtn.com (ayla.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id OAA07959 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:08:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from gates.idyllmtn.com (gates.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.103]) by ayla.idyllmtn.com (8.6.12/8.6.9) with SMTP id OAA09505; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:03:11 -0800 Message-Id: <3.0.32.19970102135652.0076f71c@mail.idyllmtn.com> X-Sender: kynn@mail.idyllmtn.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0 (32) Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 14:17:02 -0800 To: Virtual Joe From: Kynn Bartlett Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 02:48 PM 1/2/97 -0600, Virtual Joe wrote: >Go to http://www.findmail.com/faq.html and read #6. It offers easy >instructions regarding removing findmail.com from your lists and who to >contact to make sure they stay off. #7 offers help on keeping individual >messages from being archived. Yes, this is known information, but it still doesn't excuse the fact that what findmail.com are doing is wrong. I very much dislike the concept that thousands of list owners would have to go and alter their mailing list setup _just_ because findmail.com says so. Sooner or later I'll get around to my rebuttal to the findmail.com FAQ statement that they're "just like the web search engines". Here's something to get you started, though: * Web search engines (such as AltaVista) may download your web pages, but their goal is to get people to visit your page, not to provide the information to everyone else and cut you out of the deal. When you go to any of them, you get, at best, a "summary" or maybe the first paragraph or so. * findmail.com, on the other hand, will apparently be providing _my_ content (the mailing lists' messages) on _their_ site. This is completely different. A search engine's quoting of the first few lines of my web page is "fair use" and serves to get people to visit the page. findmail.com's wholesale quoting of everything that's been sent to my mailing lists is _not_ fair use, and in fact detracts from the value of my lists. * robots.txt has pretty much been around as long as there have been web search engines; it's something that evolved early on in the creation of the web. Thus, most webmasters _should_ know about it; it's an official internet standard, right? * Mailing lists, on the other hand, have been around the net long, long before some Stanford CS dept employee got the idea of making findmail.com -- to try to come along now and say "okay, here's what you need to start doing, or else your lists are fair game for me!" is silly. Next week, slurpmail.com or findstuff.com might come and tell you, "okay, you have to put in X-Don't-Slurp" headers on your messages -- who _are_ these people, and why do they think that they have the right to dictate to me, in effect, "make these changes or else I'll consider your copyright null and void"? Bogus. Bogus, bogus, bogus. -- /\ /\ /\ /\ Kynn Bartlett / kynn@idyllmtn.com / \ / \/ \ / \ Idyll Mountain Internet / \ //\ /\ \ / \ '_| _` // \/ \__\ '_| _` HTML Writers Guild Governing Board Member From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 15:14:37 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id PAA14496 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 15:12:08 -0800 (PST) Received: from cinna.ultra.net (cinna.ultra.net [199.232.56.8]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id PAA14489 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 15:11:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from voyager (d129.wal.ma.ultra.net [146.115.77.129]) by cinna.ultra.net (8.7.4/ult1.04) with SMTP id SAA24948; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:09:03 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <2.2.32.19970102230918.00387554@pop.ma.ultranet.com> Reply-To: stanr@sunspot.tiac.net X-Sender: stanr@pop.ma.ultranet.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 18:09:18 -0500 To: David Lloyd-Jones From: Stan Ryckman Subject: Re: List manager duties Cc: "Adam H. Kerman" , list-managers Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 04:51 PM 1/2/97 -0500, David Lloyd-Jones wrote: >Nope. You got it right: I'd report the threat to the police where the guy >lived. Just how do you propose to determine where the guy lives? Or whether it's even a guy? Are you an expert at forged email addresses? (Hint: where am I sending *this* from? You can probably work it out pretty much from my headers, but I've done nothing to hide the actual source.) There's still *NO* duty here anyway. You can make a case for a "moral obligation" for some peoples' definition of "moral", but "duty as a citizen?" No. It's not there. Cite a law, please. Stan. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 15:23:30 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id PAA13383 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 15:00:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from netcom17.netcom.com (netcom17.netcom.com [192.100.81.130]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id OAA13166 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 14:59:47 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (grafolog@localhost) by netcom17.netcom.com (8.6.13/Netcom) id WAA08943; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:59:09 GMT Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:59:09 +0000 (GMT) From: jonathon X-Sender: grafolog@netcom17 To: Kynn Bartlett cc: Virtual Joe , List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions In-Reply-To: <3.0.32.19970102135652.0076f71c@mail.idyllmtn.com> Message-ID: x-no-archive: yes MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Thu, 2 Jan 1997, Kynn Bartlett wrote: > * robots.txt has pretty much been around as long as there have been > web search engines; it's something that evolved early on in the > creation of the web. Thus, most webmasters _should_ know about > it; it's an official internet standard, right? More or less true. And now that some of the search engines are also looking at the Meta Header "Robots follow, index" or "Robots no-index, no-follow" that seems to be evolving as a semi-unofficial, pseudo-standard, individual pages can opt out of web engine indexing. > * Mailing lists, on the other hand, have been around the net long, > might come and tell you, "okay, you have to put in X-Don't-Slurp" Findmail's header for non-submission is not the same as excite.com's, or any of the other things that archive usenet. How many people want to add 30 headers, so their message won't be archived in places they have never heard of, by people they don't know, for unknown reasons? Findmail.com seems to think that that is an acceptable practice, though. I'd seriously consider a SLAPP against FindMail.COM, except I don't have pockets that are deep enough. OTOH, setting FindMail.com up, as a defendent in an EEOC suit does have a certain amount of appeal. xan jonathon grafolog@netcom.com *********************************************************** Are there any good books about "The War of Northern Agression"? Are there any good books about "The War of Southern Rebellion"? From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 15:44:04 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id PAA16378 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 15:32:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from ibp.dti.net (ibp.dti.net [199.93.169.129]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id PAA16179 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 15:30:06 -0800 (PST) Received: by ibp.dti.net; id SAA14091; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:29:38 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.dti.net(206.252.128.10) by ibp via smap (V1.3) id sma014087; Thu Jan 2 18:29:35 1997 Received: from localhost (mrais@localhost) by mail.dti.net (8.8.4/1.2/rdf) with SMTP id SAA18700 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:29:26 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:29:25 -0500 (EST) From: Michael Rais To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Suggestions Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Does anyone have any suggestions about what lists deal with Majordomo code and administration... This list is interesting, but I need to focus on code and administration issues... --mrais@dti.net From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 16:14:44 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id QAA18524 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:02:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from bolero.rahul.net (bolero.rahul.net [192.160.13.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id QAA18505 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:02:32 -0800 (PST) Received: by bolero.rahul.net id AA22552 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM); Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:02:01 -0800 Message-Id: <199701030002.AA22552@bolero.rahul.net> To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions In-Reply-To: <3.0.32.19970102135652.0076f71c@mail.idyllmtn.com> Date: Thu, 02 Jan 97 16:02:01 -0800 From: Michelle Dick Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Kynn wrote: > > Sooner or later I'll get around to my rebuttal to the findmail.com > FAQ statement that they're "just like the web search engines". do they really say that? I agree that it is totally bogus. If findmail wishes to act like a web search engine and review my public list, summarize it in their own words, limit quoting to fair use excerpts, provide key word searching on contents with only a pointer to my list (not the content itself) as a result of the key word searching, then I'll gladly consider adopting a standard flag that will let automated reviewers know my wishes concerning review (I permit them provided there are no mailto: URLs pointing to me or my list addresses). I wouldn't even mind too much if the content copying included full-text of the *list intro* messages only. But, if they are going to be a *subscriber* to my list, they have to behave like one and read the human-oriented intro texts which detail the rules that all subscribers are obligated to follow if they wish to be a member of my list. Otherwise they are no different than spammers who use others' resources without consent. -- Michelle Dick artemis@rahul.net East Palo Alto, CA From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 16:24:20 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id QAA19792 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:13:15 -0800 (PST) Received: from server.postmodern.com (server.postmodern.com [207.33.130.54]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id QAA19750 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:13:03 -0800 (PST) Received: (from mcb@localhost) by server.postmodern.com (8.7.5/mcb-960422) id QAA11806; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:03:43 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199701030003.QAA11806@server.postmodern.com> From: mcb@postmodern.com (Michael C. Berch) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:03:43 +0000 In-Reply-To: X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.5 10/14/92) To: Michael Rais , List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: Suggestions Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Michael Rais writes: > Does anyone have any suggestions about what lists > deal with Majordomo code and administration... > This list is interesting, but I need to focus on > code and administration issues... Majordomo-Users@GreatCircle.COM for Majordomo-specific administration issues, including problems, questions, and suggestions. Majordomo-Workers@GreatCircle.COM for contacting the current developers and maintainers, information about patches and releases, etc. Both are available via majordomo@greatcircle.com. -- Michael C. Berch Great Circle Associates Postmaster/List Manager mcb@greatcircle.com / mcb@postmodern.com From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 16:44:42 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id QAA22237 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:33:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from kitsune.swcp.com (kitsune.swcp.com [198.59.115.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id QAA22230 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:33:31 -0800 (PST) Received: (from lazlo@localhost) by kitsune.swcp.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) id RAA21241; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:32:45 -0700 Message-Id: <199701030032.RAA21241@kitsune.swcp.com> Subject: Re: Suggestions To: mrais@dti.net (Michael Rais) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:32:45 -0700 (MST) From: "Lazlo Nibble" Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: from "Michael Rais" at Jan 2, 97 06:29:25 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25 PGP3 *ALPHA*] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > Does anyone have any suggestions about what lists > deal with Majordomo code and administration... > This list is interesting, but I need to focus on > code and administration issues... Try majordomo-users. It's run off majordomo@greatcircle.com. -- ::: Lazlo (lazlo@swcp.com; http://www.swcp.com/lazlo) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 16:58:54 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id QAA22792 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:40:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.proper.com (mail.proper.com [206.86.127.224]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id QAA22770 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:40:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from [165.227.249.100] (dharma.proper.com [165.227.249.100]) by mail.proper.com (8.8.4/8.7.3) with ESMTP id QAA03943 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:40:48 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: paulh@mail.proper.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <3.0.32.19970102135652.0076f71c@mail.idyllmtn.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:41:35 -0800 To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM From: Paul Hoffman Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >Thus, most webmasters _should_ know about > it; it's an official internet standard, right? No and no. There is no easy way to find out about it, and robots.txt is not even vaguely an official standard. Most people find out about robots.txt the same way you found out about the proposal from archive.org: from reading mailing lists or books about how to run a server. In other words, this is still a new field. Your opinions are as good as the next person's. It doesn't seem like there is consensus on this list about whether what findmail.com is doing is bad, ok, or good. --Paul Hoffman --Internet Mail Consortium From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 17:00:30 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id QAA23514 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:47:11 -0800 (PST) Received: from cinna.ultra.net (cinna.ultra.net [199.232.56.8]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id QAA23450 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 16:46:50 -0800 (PST) Received: from voyager (d103.wal.ma.ultra.net [146.115.77.103]) by cinna.ultra.net (8.7.4/ult1.04) with SMTP id TAA28576; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 19:46:17 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <2.2.32.19970103004631.0035799c@pop.ma.ultranet.com> Reply-To: stanr@sunspot.tiac.net X-Sender: stanr@pop.ma.ultranet.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 19:46:31 -0500 To: "Joshua D. Baer" From: Stan Ryckman Subject: Re: findmail.com Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 09:07 AM 12/31/96 -0500, Joshua D. Baer wrote: >Pardon the quotes from multiple messages... I hope to be saving bandwidth... > >> Which does not imply that anyone who feels like it is free to >>redistribute the >> contents of that forum. If you think otherwise, please point us to the >> relevant copyright law. > >Maybe my understanding of findmail.com is incorrect, but I saw them as >something like DejaNews. > >Are they like DejaNews? A publicly accessible search engine? AFAIK, they're just collecting right now, and will decide what they're "like" later. You can bet that they'll use the data to recover their investment and make money later, though. You are assuming that DejaNews isn't violating copyright -- something that I don't assume. Sooner or later, someone will probably sue them. >> >Those who ultimately will decide these issues use predecessors, >> >precedents. What would be the forerunner for the notion that anything >> >you write to a `public forum' may be freely copied? > >Are they selling the content, or making it freely available? If they give it away freely, but surrounded by all sorts of advertising (some of which you may object to), is it "selling?" Not that selling's relevant to copyright law; you have no right to take a book I write, photocopy it, and give away the copies. It's my intellectual property, thank you, and I get to decide how it's disposed of. Nor may you consider yourself "allowed to do so" unless I put "X-No-Redistribute" on the first page of the book. You just don't have the right to get around copyright by inventing rules like that. >> Think of building a cd-rom archive of Time Magazine articles. Think how >> quickly Time would own your car and computer.... > >Except that I wouldn't think of Time magazine as a public forum, since it >doesn't accept (regularly) contributions from all of the readers. I know of no mailing lists which are public forums. All are hosted on privately-owned computers, and both the computers and the lists are maintained and run by private citizens and/or corporations. Sometimes money changes hands, sometimes not; however, they are still private. The source of the contributions is irrelevant. For a list, the individuals retain copyright to their submissions whether or not they assert it, and the list owner has a "compilation copyright." In the case of Time, contributors are paid for their contributions (in return for which they assign copyright to Time), or in the case of letters to the editor, other details may apply between Time and the submitter, but in no case does an outside party acquire distribution rights to them. >> To use Usenet as an example, when you post an article, you set in >> motion a very large chain of automatic events which result in copying >> of your (implicitly copyrighted) work. Historically and currently, >> this has consisted of copies on news servers (the normal case), >> news-to-mail gateways, magnetic-tape-based feeds, news-to-Web >> gateways, online and offline private archives, online public archives >> (e.g., DejaNews), archival media (e.g., CD-ROMs) and distribution by >> printed copy. All of these are (or have been) normal ways of >> distributing netnews articles. and that's the distribution mechanism, which doesn't grant anyone rights for further distribution in any manner, such as printing a book full of Usenet articles (other than your own). >I'm not saying _all_ mailing lists are public forums, but some are designed >as such, including most of the lists I run. Which ones are? Unless you require submitters to explicitly transfer copyright to you, and then explicitly place the contents in the public domain, they (the submitters) *still* maintain copyright even if "public" by whatever definition you may have of "public." >Some obviously aren't. For >example, a mailing list which distributes a monthly newsletter on cooking >would obviously be copywrighted and protected. What makes that "obvious" as opposed to a mailing list discussing what Vanna White wears on every "Wheel of Fortune" show? I don't see the difference. >While anyone can subscribe >and the information is freely available, it's clearly not a public forum. >Then look at this list... when I post it I don't know exactly who is >reading it and I don't care... it's my contribution to the forum. And if it shows up in next year's Encyclopedia Brittanica, you're entitled to be incensed (and probably have a valid lawsuit), because it's not what you were writing for. >I don't think someone can resell this content. However, if I contribute it >freely to a public forum, I do it understanding that it may end up on >search engines and archives. Archives as *part of the list* are OK. Search engines are OK; if they point to my web page, I can take down or change the web page at my whim. As a list owner, I can take down or restrict access to my archives. But taking my list, copying it, and making it available to others (for profit or not, with advertising or not, in context or not) without advance written permission is a clear violation of copyright. Cheers, Stan Ryckman (stanr@tiac.net) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 17:29:45 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id RAA27294 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:27:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from ayla.idyllmtn.com (ayla.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id RAA27287 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:26:55 -0800 (PST) Received: from gates.idyllmtn.com (gates.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.103]) by ayla.idyllmtn.com (8.6.12/8.6.9) with SMTP id RAA11448; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 17:23:21 -0800 Message-Id: <3.0.32.19970102173101.006e7d14@mail.idyllmtn.com> X-Sender: kynn@mail.idyllmtn.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0 (32) Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 17:37:13 -0800 To: Paul Hoffman From: Kynn Bartlett Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 04:41 PM 1/2/97 -0800, Paul Hoffman wrote: >>Thus, most webmasters _should_ know about >> it; it's an official internet standard, right? >No and no. There is no easy way to find out about it, and robots.txt is not >even vaguely an official standard. Most people find out about robots.txt >the same way you found out about the proposal from archive.org: from >reading mailing lists or books about how to run a server. Oh? Okay, which book about running mailing lists mentions the archive.org proposal? I probably haven't bought that book yet? >In other words, this is still a new field. Your opinions are as good as the >next person's. It doesn't seem like there is consensus on this list about >whether what findmail.com is doing is bad, ok, or good. Sorry, did you really mean to say that mailing lists are a new field? Now, the _web_ might be a new field -- MAYBE -- but mailing lists have been around since the dawn of time. FindMail isn't doing anything that's in a "new field", sorry. By the way, your "consensus" argument is a straw man, you realize. No one ever claimed there's a consensus on the list, nor have any of us expected there would be. You're right when you say that my opinions are as good as the next person's -- as long as we're talking in generalities. When we're talking about _my_ lists, though, it's certain truth that my opinion is far more important than Joe Schmoe random person who's decided to set up a new company using my hard work. >--Paul Hoffman >--Internet Mail Consortium What is the 'Internet Mail Consortium'? And what is your role in it? -- /\ /\ /\ /\ Kynn Bartlett / kynn@idyllmtn.com / \ / \/ \ / \ Idyll Mountain Internet / \ //\ /\ \ / \ '_| _` // \/ \__\ '_| _` HTML Writers Guild Governing Board Member From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 18:14:23 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id SAA04064 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:11:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.proper.com (mail.proper.com [206.86.127.224]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id SAA04048 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:11:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from [165.227.249.100] (dharma.proper.com [165.227.249.100]) by mail.proper.com (8.8.4/8.7.3) with ESMTP id SAA04953 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:11:42 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: paulh@mail.proper.com (Unverified) Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <3.0.32.19970102173101.006e7d14@mail.idyllmtn.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:12:43 -0800 To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM From: Paul Hoffman Subject: Re: findmail.com instructions Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >Oh? Okay, which book about running mailing lists mentions the >archive.org proposal? I probably haven't bought that book yet? Nope, because (as far as I know) there are no books about running a mailing list. There are a few chapters in the O'Reilly "Managing Internet Information Services" book, but I have seen almost nothing else. >Sorry, did you really mean to say that mailing lists are a new field? No, I meant that coming up with generally accepted rules for them is. There are no RFCs, only a small handful of Internet Drafts, no books. Even this mailing list, which I think is the biggest one talking about how to run the non-technical side of mailing lists, probably represents well under 10% of mailing list managers. >FindMail isn't doing anything >that's in a "new field", sorry. I disagree. They're the first one to publicly state that they're archiving mailing lists with the intention of making the contents available in a probably-commercial product. As you corretly pointed out earlier today, what they're doing isn't even that much like the Web archiving services, and any publishing that they do will certainly break new ground in copyright and appropriate use discussions. >You're right when you say that my opinions are as good as the next >person's -- as long as we're talking in generalities. When we're >talking about _my_ lists, though, it's certain truth that my opinion >is far more important than Joe Schmoe random person who's decided to >set up a new company using my hard work. Absolutely agree. And the actions you take to follow up your opinions will be even more important, particularly to other list managers. >What is the 'Internet Mail Consortium'? And what is your role in >it? We're the trade group for the Internet mail industry, and I'm one of the directors. You can find out more about us at . Please don't interpret anything I say as supporting what findmail is doing: I don't and IMC doesn't. Like any other vendor, they'll generate good or bad will based on their actions with their customers and suppliers. So far, the reviews are pretty mixed. --Paul Hoffman --Internet Mail Consortium From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 18:28:57 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id SAA05225 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:23:29 -0800 (PST) Received: from cyberca.com (isis.cyberca.com [206.42.216.51]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id SAA05214 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 18:23:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from ra.cyberca.com (ra.cyberca.com [192.234.55.25]) by cyberca.com (8.6.8.1/SCA-6.6) with SMTP id CAA23160 for ; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 02:23:01 GMT Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970103021902.0070df8c@isis.cyberca.com> X-Sender: jennings@isis.cyberca.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 21:19:02 -0500 To: list-managers@GreatCircle.com From: Penn Jennings Subject: List Manager Duties - Legal Advice Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I have talked to 2 attorneys about this subject. I also sent mail to a friend at the State Attorney General Office but have not gotten a reply yet. Here is the conclusion from 2 attorneys as it relates to negligence. As the List MANAGER (Note the word manager) you MAY be negligent if you fail to protect members from dangers that are foreseeable and avoidable. If several users complain that one of your members has threatened to kill them and you do nothing you may be "knee deep in the doo-doo" if that member does kill or harm someone. Why? Once you were notified of the danger future damage was definitely foreseeable the next question is was it avoidable from the perspective of a ordinary, reasonable and prudent person. Since we all remove users when their mailboxes fill or their accounts are removed, member removal is a valid action. Both attorneys agreed that they would remove a threatening or very abusive user at once. One stated that he might give the member a warning. They both thought that the offending member had very few rights in this case, if any (That may change if the list charges money. A paying member might have more rights). One attorney thought that they would immediately post a disclaimer stating to all current and new members that: You shall hold harmless this list and the list administration for all... The list administration makes not warrantees about blah, blah... All list users assume responsibilities for use of this list... The list administration is not responsible for the action of list members... The administration remove users from this for any reason.... The list administrator runs this as a free service and shall not be held responsible for any income loss or damages. blah, blah.. I think that you get the idea. So the smart thing is to have a disclaimer. Both attorney agreed that as the manager you do have duties. One of the keys to avoiding a negligence suit is by doing (or not doing) what a Prudent, reasonable and ordinary person would do. PLEASE: Do not send me lay person opinions of law. My mail box is folding under the weight people telling me that list managers have no legal duties. After receiving legal advice from people who have passed the bar I think I'm all set. :) __________________________________________________________________ Copyright 1996 (c) Penn Jennings Penn Jennings jennings@cyberca.com http://www.cyberca.com/~jennings/ The road to evil is paved with good intentions. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 20:00:34 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id TAA11471 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 19:52:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from garcon.unicom.com (garcon.unicom.com [192.108.105.37]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id TAA11462 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 19:52:08 -0800 (PST) Received: (from chip@localhost) by garcon.unicom.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id VAA23401; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:53:11 -0600 (CST) From: Chip Rosenthal Message-Id: <199701030353.VAA23401@garcon.unicom.com> Subject: a tale of two archivers [was: findmail.com instructions] To: paulh@imc.org (Paul Hoffman) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:53:11 -0600 (CST) Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: from "Paul Hoffman" at Jan 02, 1997 06:12:43 PM X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL0a10] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Paul Hoffman writes: > Please don't interpret anything I say as supporting what findmail is doing: > I don't and IMC doesn't. Like any other vendor, they'll generate good or > bad will based on their actions with their customers and suppliers. So far, > the reviews are pretty mixed. It's fascinating comparing the responses towards Findmail and Reference. Reference is taking a bit of heat right now for a mass mailing they did, but I don't sense it's quite the battering that Findmail is taking. The two organizations take exact polar opposite approaches to the archiving issue. Findmail says, "If you don't say anything, we'll take it from you." Reference says, "If you don't say anything, we won't touch it." My vote: although the Reference mass-mailing raises some vexing issues, I award the clue to Eric Allman and the folks at Reference. -- Chip Rosenthal * Unicom Systems Development * URL: http://www.unicom.com/ * 4868D8BE10C86BDE 6017000BA783998E Helmet good. Law bad. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 21:45:30 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id VAA19200 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:30:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from mule0.mindspring.com (mule0.mindspring.com [204.180.128.166]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id VAA19131 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:29:56 -0800 (PST) Received: from tracey.mindspring.com (user-168-121-55-2.dialup.mindspring.com [168.121.55.2]) by mule0.mindspring.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id AAA12490 for ; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 00:29:28 -0500 Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19970103052945.006cc9fc@pop.mindspring.com> X-Sender: tracey@pop.mindspring.com (Unverified) X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 02 Jan 1997 23:29:45 -0600 To: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM From: "Enforcement Coordinator (Tracey McCartney)" Subject: Re: List Manager Duties - Legal Advice Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 09:19 PM 1/2/97 -0500, Penn Jennings wrote: >I have talked to 2 attorneys about this subject. I also sent mail to a >friend at the State Attorney General Office but have not gotten a reply yet. >Here is the conclusion from 2 attorneys as it relates to negligence. > >As the List MANAGER (Note the word manager) you MAY be negligent if you fail >to protect members from dangers that are foreseeable and avoidable. If >several users complain that one of your members has threatened to kill them >and you do nothing you may be "knee deep in the doo-doo" if that member does >kill or harm someone. Why? Once you were notified of the danger future >damage was definitely foreseeable the next question is was it avoidable from >the perspective of a ordinary, reasonable and prudent person. Since we all >remove users when their mailboxes fill or their accounts are removed, member >removal is a valid action. This makes *no* sense. If one of my users is threatening to kill another, what duty do I have to unsubscribe the threatening party? That will not prevent his threatening other users. I may have other duties, but I think taking the offending party off the list is not really aimed at the real problem. The issue, as you state, is whether the danger is avoidable. Maybe, but it likely won't be headed off by taking someone off a mailing list, unless I've missed something. > >PLEASE: Do not send me lay person opinions of law. My mail box is folding >under the weight people telling me that list managers have no legal duties. >After receiving legal advice from people who have passed the bar I think I'm >all set. :) Well, this is the opinion of someone who *has* passed the bar. I don't know what kind of scenario you laid out for those attorneys, but this really makes no sense. It's like saying, "You know that X is stalking Y with the intent to kill him/her, so you have a duty to immediately have X's car towed for being in a loading zone." Tracey McCartney, Esq. fair_housing-owner@majordomo.pobox.com From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 22:00:33 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id VAA20794 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:52:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from ayla.idyllmtn.com (ayla.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id VAA20787 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:52:26 -0800 (PST) Received: (from kynn@localhost) by ayla.idyllmtn.com (8.6.12/8.6.9) id VAA13686; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:48:56 -0800 From: Kynn Bartlett Message-Id: <199701030548.VAA13686@ayla.idyllmtn.com> Subject: Re: a tale of two archivers [was: findmail.com instructions] To: chip@unicom.com (Chip Rosenthal) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 21:48:55 -0800 (PST) Cc: paulh@imc.org, List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: <199701030353.VAA23401@garcon.unicom.com> from "Chip Rosenthal" at Jan 2, 97 09:53:11 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] Content-Type: text Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Interesting, I've not heard of Reference before. I must not be on their spam lists. :) Can someone summarize for me, or forward their mass mailing privately? Thanks. --Kynn From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 22:14:43 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id WAA22242 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:12:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from ayla.idyllmtn.com (ayla.idyllmtn.com [206.16.238.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id WAA22185 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:12:31 -0800 (PST) Received: (from kynn@localhost) by ayla.idyllmtn.com (8.6.12/8.6.9) id WAA13852; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:08:56 -0800 From: Kynn Bartlett Message-Id: <199701030608.WAA13852@ayla.idyllmtn.com> Subject: Re: List Manager Duties - Legal Advice To: jennings@cyberca.com (Penn Jennings) Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:08:56 -0800 (PST) Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970103021902.0070df8c@isis.cyberca.com> from "Penn Jennings" at Jan 2, 97 09:19:02 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] Content-Type: text Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Penn Jennings wrote: > I have talked to 2 attorneys about this subject. I also sent mail to a > friend at the State Attorney General Office but have not gotten a reply yet. > Here is the conclusion from 2 attorneys as it relates to negligence. Dumb question, are these people on the net? Do they use email regularly? Do they have any concept of what a mailing list is? > As the List MANAGER (Note the word manager) you MAY be negligent if you fail > to protect members from dangers that are foreseeable and avoidable. If > several users complain that one of your members has threatened to kill them > and you do nothing you may be "knee deep in the doo-doo" if that member does > kill or harm someone. Why? Once you were notified of the danger future > damage was definitely foreseeable the next question is was it avoidable from > the perspective of a ordinary, reasonable and prudent person. Since we all > remove users when their mailboxes fill or their accounts are removed, member > removal is a valid action. Just one question -- how will removing someone from a mailing list prevent them from killing someone? Seriously, that's not a joke. I really want to know why you think booting someone off a mailing list will prevent death. Please answer this for me, because I just can't see the connection at all. > [snip] > One attorney thought that they would immediately post a disclaimer stating > to all current and new members that: > You shall hold harmless this list and the list administration for all... > The list administration makes not warrantees about blah, blah... > All list users assume responsibilities for use of this list... > The list administration is not responsible for the action of > list members... > The administration remove users from this for any reason.... > The list administrator runs this as a free service and shall not > be held responsible for any income loss or damages. blah, blah.. Yes, but they're lawyers. They think like this. That doesn't mean that it's necessary to include something in my 'Welcome to the List' message reading, "Idyll Mountain Internet is not responsible if someone from this list goes to your house and shoots you." I think your anonymous lawyer friends are full of it. > I think that you get the idea. So the smart thing is to have a disclaimer. > Both attorney agreed that as the manager you do have duties. One of the > keys to avoiding a negligence suit is by doing (or not doing) what a > Prudent, reasonable and ordinary person would do. Please tell me again how removing someone from a mailing list prevents murder? Thanks. > PLEASE: Do not send me lay person opinions of law. My mail box is folding > under the weight people telling me that list managers have no legal duties. > After receiving legal advice from people who have passed the bar I think I'm > all set. :) Please state their names and qualifications. You have provided no proof of anything. I can make up a dozen anonymous lawyers who agree with me, if I don't have to tell anyone who they are. Better yet, get them to join this mailing list. They -are- on the net, and they -do- know what mailing lists are, right? (If they can join this list without your assistance, then I'll start believing that they know what they're talking about when they give "legal advice" about mailing lists on the net.) --Kynn Bartlett Idyll Mountain Internet Postmaster Mailing List Manager, HTML Writers Guild From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 22:44:26 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id WAA23921 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:35:27 -0800 (PST) Received: from shooter.bluemarble.net ([199.18.207.25]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with ESMTP id WAA23905 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:35:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (edit@localhost) by shooter.bluemarble.net (8.7.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id BAA14307; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:24 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:23 -0500 (EST) From: Paul E Kayak To: dlj@inforamp.net cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: ReList Mgrs Duties Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk David L-J, Thank you for your post, that to show concern is the duty of a citizen. It seemed (in my digest-form) the first note of compassion after a number of posts saying everybody for him- or her-self. Thanks. PK From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 22:58:56 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id WAA24715 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:46:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from garcon.unicom.com (garcon.unicom.com [192.108.105.37]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id WAA24692 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 22:46:06 -0800 (PST) Received: (from chip@localhost) by garcon.unicom.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id AAA00669; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 00:48:13 -0600 (CST) From: Chip Rosenthal Message-Id: <199701030648.AAA00669@garcon.unicom.com> Subject: Re: a tale of two archivers [was: findmail.com instructions] To: kynn@idyllmtn.com (Kynn Bartlett) Date: Fri, 3 Jan 1997 00:48:13 -0600 (CST) Cc: paulh@imc.org, List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: <199701030548.VAA13686@ayla.idyllmtn.com> from "Kynn Bartlett" at Jan 02, 1997 09:48:55 PM X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL0a10] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Kynn Bartlett writes: > Interesting, I've not heard of Reference before. I must not be on > their spam lists. :) Can someone summarize for me, or forward their > mass mailing privately? Thanks. No, because Paul J. Lucas uses X-No-Archive: in his news postings. I guess he doesn't want you to see it. -- Chip Rosenthal * Unicom Systems Development * URL: http://www.unicom.com/ * 4868D8BE10C86BDE 6017000BA783998E Helmet good. Law bad. From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 23:44:05 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA28636 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from plaidworks.com (plaidworks.com [207.167.80.66]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA28618 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from [207.167.80.70] (zamboni.plaidworks.com [207.167.80.70]) by plaidworks.com (8.6.9/A/UX 3.1) with ESMTP id XAA16806; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:05 -0800 X-Sender: chuq@solutions.apple.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970102230918.00387554@pop.ma.ultranet.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:25:29 -0800 To: stanr@sunspot.tiac.net, David Lloyd-Jones From: Chuq Von Rospach Subject: Re: List manager duties Cc: "Adam H. Kerman" , list-managers Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 3:09 PM -0800 1/2/97, Stan Ryckman wrote: >At 04:51 PM 1/2/97 -0500, David Lloyd-Jones wrote: > >>Nope. You got it right: I'd report the threat to the police where the guy >>lived. > >Just how do you propose to determine where the guy lives? It's not that tough, actually. Having done it once. You get on the horn with the admin of the machine, and you get them involved. Death threats and serious abuse generally get even hard to find admins to sit up and take notice. If not, whisper the word "lawyer"... (giggle) >There's still *NO* duty here anyway. I create a service for users to use. I have a duty to make that service as good as I can, and a duty to my users to make that service a thing they want to use. That includes making it a place where they don't feel harassed or abused. I would not want to invite people to a party at my home and have them beaten up in the back bedroom, either. I sort of feel I have a duty that if i have a guest in the house, they leave with all their teeth. I guess I'm retro or something. And, silly me, if I'm not willing to take on that duty, I shouldn't be running services for people. -- Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@solutions.apple.com) Software Gnome Apple Server Marketing Webmaster Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) ( +-+ The home for Hockey on the net) I got no name or number/ I just hand out the lumber. But if I get a chance to play/ I'm going to show 'em. -- Stick Boy (The Hanson Brothers, SUDDEN DEATH) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 23:46:49 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA28649 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from plaidworks.com (plaidworks.com [207.167.80.66]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA28641 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:30 -0800 (PST) Received: from [207.167.80.70] (zamboni.plaidworks.com [207.167.80.70]) by plaidworks.com (8.6.9/A/UX 3.1) with ESMTP id XAA16810; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:38:25 -0800 X-Sender: chuq@solutions.apple.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <199701030608.WAA13852@ayla.idyllmtn.com> References: <1.5.4.32.19970103021902.0070df8c@isis.cyberca.com> from "Penn Jennings" at Jan 2, 97 09:19:02 pm Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:29:52 -0800 To: Kynn Bartlett , jennings@cyberca.com (Penn Jennings) From: Chuq Von Rospach Subject: Re: List Manager Duties - Legal Advice Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 10:08 PM -0800 1/2/97, Kynn Bartlett wrote: >Just one question -- how will removing someone from a mailing list prevent >them from killing someone? > >Seriously, that's not a joke. No, but it's missing the point. Most abuse on lists falls way short of physical violence. REmoving a user from a list removes the list from the easy reach of that user for abuse. If he continues to abuse members via private mail, the next step is going to his admin to get help in making him stop. > I really want to know why you think booting >someone off a mailing list will prevent death. Death is a symbol for the issues we're dealing with here, not necessarily a hard and fast reality. You're dealing with a detail as if it's the essential issue, when in reality, it's off in left field and hidden in a gopher hole. >Yes, but they're lawyers. They think like this. That's because tehy're trained in preventing other lawyers from separating you from your wallet.... >I think >your anonymous lawyer friends are full of it. I think you'd prefer to think we're all friends here and can work things out amicably. Unfortunately, that part of the internet died years ago. -- Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@solutions.apple.com) Software Gnome Apple Server Marketing Webmaster Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) ( +-+ The home for Hockey on the net) I got no name or number/ I just hand out the lumber. But if I get a chance to play/ I'm going to show 'em. -- Stick Boy (The Hanson Brothers, SUDDEN DEATH) From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 2 23:49:36 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id XAA28563 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:37:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from plaidworks.com (plaidworks.com [207.167.80.66]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id XAA28539 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:37:23 -0800 (PST) Received: from [207.167.80.70] (zamboni.plaidworks.com [207.167.80.70]) by plaidworks.com (8.6.9/A/UX 3.1) with ESMTP id XAA16799; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:37:26 -0800 X-Sender: chuq@solutions.apple.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970103004631.0035799c@pop.ma.ultranet.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:21:00 -0800 To: stanr@sunspot.tiac.net, "Joshua D. Baer" From: Chuq Von Rospach Subject: Re: findmail.com Cc: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 4:46 PM -0800 1/2/97, Stan Ryckman wrote: >You are assuming that DejaNews isn't violating copyright -- something >that I don't assume. Sooner or later, someone will probably sue them. I wonder. They're only taking information avaialble on a public news feed and distributing it to users. Their only difference is they're not distributing it via NNTP, but repackaging it with different front end. I don't see that their decision to make it available via HTTP using a huge mother search engine instead of using INN and NNTP protocols does a thing about copyright. Why is what they're doing different than what UUNET does? As far as I can tell, it's only protocols and presentation. Both are publically distributing public information. How is one therefore a copyright violation? >If they give it away freely, but surrounded by all sorts of advertising >(some of which you may object to), is it "selling?" Yes. And, in fact, they can give it away and still be in violation. Copyright violations don't need a monetary value attached -- it's the loss of rights that causes the violation. >Not that selling's relevant to copyright law; you have no right to take >a book I write, photocopy it, and give away the copies. Brings up an interesting question -- is Alta Vista in violation of people's copyrights? They suck down web pages, index them, and distribute the consolidated data. So are all the other crawlers. If Alta Vista is legally clean, why wouldn't findmail.com be? They seem to be doing effectively the same thing, only against e-mail. Why is it okay to do it to web, and not e-mail? Is it because we don't like the concept? Or because we already know the value of Alta vista and not these guys, so they don't count? Or is there soem essential difference that makes it okay one way but not the other? >>I'm not saying _all_ mailing lists are public forums, but some are designed >>as such, including most of the lists I run. > >Which ones are? Unless you require submitters to explicitly transfer >copyright to you, and then explicitly place the contents in the public domain, >they (the submitters) *still* maintain copyright even if "public" by whatever >definition you may have of "public." Generally, I don't think it matters. The user retains copyright on the individual message, and the list owner maintains copyright on the compilation of messages that is "the mailing list". Compuserve, et al, have shown and used compilation copyrights for a long time. It's pretty clear from a legal standpoint... >>Some obviously aren't. >What makes that "obvious" as opposed to a mailing list discussing I don't think it's at all obvious, especially in the strict legal definition, which is what really matter. We're looking at two witches, calling one good, and one bad, based on the clothes they wear, when taste in clothes is a personal opinion, not a legal fact.... -- Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@solutions.apple.com) Software Gnome Apple Server Marketing Webmaster Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) ( +-+ The home for Hockey on the net) I got no name or number/ I just hand out the lumber. But if I get a chance to play/ I'm going to show 'em. -- Stick Boy (The Hanson Brothers, SUDDEN DEATH) From list-managers-owner Fri Jan 3 01:44:43 1997 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-960417-1) id BAA07655 for list-managers-outgoing; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from bolero.rahul.net (bolero.rahul.net [192.160.13.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.4/Miles-960830-1) with SMTP id BAA07630 for ; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from jive.rahul.net by bolero.rahul.net with SMTP id AA05799 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for ); Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:07 -0800 Received: by jive.rahul.net (5.67b8/jive-a2i-1.0) id AA17412; Fri, 3 Jan 1997 01:36:05 -0800 Message-Id: <199701030936.AA17412@jive.rahul.net> To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: findmail.com In-Reply-To: Date: Fri, 03 Jan 97 01:36:04 -0800 From: Michelle Dick Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Chuq wrote: > Brings up an interesting question -- is Alta Vista in violation of > people's copyrights? They suck down web pages, index them, and > distribute the consolidated data. So are all the other crawlers. If > Alta Vista is legally clean, why wouldn't findmail.com be? They seem to > be doing effectively the same thing, only against e-mail. Why is it > okay to do it to web, and not e-mail? Because Alta Vista doesn't provide the full-text of the web-pages at their site. They only provide content-based URLs pointing to the original data and a fair-use excerpt. > Or is there soem essential difference that makes it okay one way but > not the other? Yup, you can point to my actual content, you can review it, you can index, you can excerpt. But you cannot provide the actual full-text content itself without my permission. *BIG* difference. *CRUCIAL* difference. > I don't think it's at all obvious, especially in the strict legal > definition, which is what really matter. We're looking at two witches, > calling one good, and one bad, based on the clothes they wear, when > taste in clothes is a personal opinion, not a legal fact.... There is a cooking oriented book out which is nothing more than an index to several popular cookbooks. They indexed all the recipes, by title and ingredient. If you wanted oatmeal cookies you could look up in this book and it would tell you what page it was on in Joy of Cooking, in Betty Crocker, etc. You could then compare the recipes. Or if you remembered there was a recipe for stuffed zucchini in one of the books, but didn't recall which one, you looked it up in this index and found out which cookbook had it. This large recipe index book didn't have the actual recipes, just pointers based on the content in the cookbooks. This recipe index is like the web search engines. Findmail would be like doing this same in