Re: OT Why is everyone so grouchy?

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To: For users of Fedora Core releases <fedora-list@redhat.com>
Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 12:50:45 -0400

Tom:

I'll second the below, and add this: Yes, we have rules of etiquette.
But--those *same* rules prescribe a *procedure* for correcting a person
who breaks them. Yes, some people will say something rude. But there's a
polite way and a rude way to *tell* them that they are being rude.

Also, surely there's no such thing as "a stupid question," unless it's a
question to which one might *reasonably* be supposed to know the answer.
"Look it up in the archives" is all very well, but I've never been on
any list whose message archives are organized well enough for such a
search to bear fruit in what I would call an efficient manner. This is a
fault that plagues literally *every single on-line community* of which I
have been and am a member, so don't say that I'm picking on this
community. I am not. Various members have taught me some very valuable
things about running Linux in general and the Fedora Core distro in
particular. But I'm just waiting for the first person to have time to
take a snapshot of the archives and extract from them a definitive
Fedora Core textbook that we could distribute as a PDF either in the
disk images or as a separate download at the Fedora Project site. Until
someone steps forward to do this--well, all you veterans, it's up to
you, but you might consider cutting the kids a little slack.

Now I'll also allow that we ought not to bring our various
(geo)political opinions into the list, either directly (by posting
actual political observations) or indirectly (by letting those emotions,
which the current US Federal election campaign is rubbing raw, find
their way into the language we use even when *on* topic).

Last of all: Just who *are* the moderators of this list? I think every
list ought to have some kind of moderating team, and *everyone* ought to
know *who are the members of that team* so that we can know who might be
talking out-of-school. Or if the moderators want to remain anonymous,
then we all ought to have a contact address (say,
fedora-list-owner@redhat.com) that we can use to forward complaints to,
if we have any.

Needless to say, I am *not* a moderator of this list. I'm just someone
trying to learn how to use this wonderful operating system that is
available free-of-charge and has behind it the support of a community of
dedicated volunteers who are at least ready to fix a problem that comes
up, and are far more nimble as a body than a large company ever could
be.

Temlakos

On Fri, 2004-10-22 at 12:05, Thomas Cameron wrote:
> It's the anonymity of the keyboard.
>
> Example - A list member is in the store and someone walks up and asks
> "Do you know where the tomatoes are at?" I can't imagine that list
> member would yell so everyone in the store could hear "What are you,
> STUPID?!? Don't you know that you don't end a sentence with a
> preposition? And besides, the store map is right up there at the front
> of the store - look there for for where the tomatoes are! SHEESH, the
> NERVE of some people!!!"
>
> But that same list member, cozy behind their keyboard, will publicly
> shred some poor newbie for top posting, posting in HTML, posting a
> question about something that has been asked before or some other
> alleged breach of "netiquette." Never mind that in almost every case,
> the person posting is asking for help and is so new that they couldn't
> possibly know about "the rules." I mean, come on - do these self-
> appointed "list police" really think that they are helping in any
> constructive way?
>
> Let's be serious, OK? I see so many people point to some web posting of
> "netiquette" as if it were {$your_deity's} own Word. Please!
> Etiquette, whether on a mailing list or in person is *suggested* as best
> behavior. It's not The Law. Someone who breaches etiquette should
> either be gently reminded *in private* about it or ignored. A person
> who publicly belittles another for an etiquette breach is just as guilty
> - probably more so as they are being incredibly hypocritical.
>
> If you don't like a posting, delete it! If you publicly respond that it
> somehow doesn't fit your model of how life should be, you have really
> only hurt yourself - you are wasting your time, your bandwidth, and your
> frustration. You're not helping anyone really. If you flame the poor
> poster, you're actually damaging the community.
>
> It's sad, really. Behavior a list member would never engage in in
> person seems to be the norm in this forum. I first started dealing with
> Linux back in 1995, and I used Usenet pretty heavily. I had to, I was
> as rank a newbie as anyone! I really loved the sense of community and
> helpfulness I found in the various comp.os.linux.* newsgroups. It's one
> of the main things that drew me into the Linux community. Now when I
> see a member's post begin with self deprecation like "I'm just a newbie,
> please don't flame me for asking this" it really makes me sad. They've
> seen so many people take beatings that they come in like a scared puppy
> and roll over on their backs hoping not to get smacked around. Is that
> really how you want people to think of the Linux community? "I better
> prostrate myself in front of them so they won't embarrass me publicly."
> That's just wrong. If you are on this list out of a sense of service to
> the community, I applaud you. I encourage you to be of service to all,
> not just the ones who format their messages in the way you like. If you
> are on this list to prove that your geek weenie is somehow bigger than
> everyone else's, please go somewhere else or at least spare us from your
> ego.
>
> I know how easy it is to fall into this aggressive/confrontational
> behavior - I've done it myself. But I've taken a long hard look at
> myself and I don't like it when I act that way. I'm going to do better.
> I wonder if anyone else who regularly engages in this kind of bad
> behavior will try.
>
> Someone on the list (I think) recently quoted Thumper's mom from the
> movie Bambi. I think it's completely appropriate: "If you can't say
> something nice... don't say nothing at all."
>
> Now let's please get back to helping each other with Fedora issues, not
> flaming each other over everything else, OK?
>
> Thomas

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• Previous message: Philippe: "Re: openoffice.org-i18n 615 megabytes!!!"
• In reply to: Thomas Cameron: "Re: OT Why is everyone so grouchy?"
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• Reply: Colin Charles: "Re: OT Why is everyone so grouchy?"
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