Hello everyone, with regards to the current mailing list (ML) split discussion, and one specific message deep down there by mgorny asked for someone providing moderator rules, I would like to propose the following ruleset for gentoo-dev
Right now the situation escalated in a way that forces to actually do
something and I hope we can recreate an atmosphere where technical
improvements can happen.
I suggest using a very specific ruleset to give a proper guide to future
moderators and users of the ML in addition to our *existing* Code of
Conduct[1].
As my personal experience showed me it might be good to add a good alternative
to every expelled bad one, so I added them.
As this is a RFC I’d welcome any discussion about that document.
Proposal
========
1. Idea and topic of the mailing list
----------------------------
The gentoo-dev mailing follows the main idea of discussing topics that are
part of the development of Gentoo itself. This limits to technical aspects
like eclass improvements, or GLEP development.
Off topic discussions or general user support are not part of this mailing
list and should be held on other, appropriate lists.
2. People or groups allowed to write to gentoo-dev ML
-----------------------------------------------------
Everybody who has the intention to contribute to the discussions according
to the mailing list’s topic has the right to do that after a subscription.
This explicitly excludes off topic discussions, flaming, trolling and verbal
attacks against other people or groups (which are defined under point 5).
On gentoo-dev it also excludes bug reports or support questions. Bug reports
can be filed in the bug tracker, support related questions can be asked on
other mailing lists, in IRC channels or in the Gentoo related forums.
3. Moderation
-------------
The moderation team has to consist of at least two developers. The moderators
have to do join the moderation team voluntarily.
Moderators are held to warn authors on the list if they ignore the rules of
this list and ban them for a limited time if they repeat the behaviour that
led to warnings in the first place.
4. Procedure of banning and ban times
-------------------------------------
As banning is a severe interaction it has to be strictly regulated.
When moderators perceive someone ignoring the rules, they have to go
through the following steps:
a) Warn the respective person once pointing out the exact rule
that was violated.
If the violation continues, moderators have to
b) ban the user for 24h noting this in a direct response the violation.
That way the violation, ban time and reason are documented.
Every third 24h ban results into
c) a 7 day ban with the same regularities as a 24 hour ban.
d) Every ban has to be notified to ComRel (com...@gentoo.org).
5. Reasons for warnings and bans
--------------------------------
The rationale for the whole moderation is to keep the list productive. To
achieve this, some specific actions have to be sanctioned:
a) trolling, i.e. provocation of aggressive reactions
b) attacks, e.g. insulting people or groups
(which does not include proper articulated disagreement)
c) spamming, i.e. flooding discussions with lots of messages in a row
d) constant postings off topic, i.e. disrupting discussions with unrelated
questions
(constant means more than two times in a row)
6. Preservation of transparency & discussions
---------------------------------------------
Maybe the most important aspect for moderation is transparency. To achieve it
the ban is
a) strictly regulated with regards to possible reasons
b) strictly timed,
c) logged via the mailing list archives.
If a warned or banned person thinks the action taken wasn’t correct, this
issue
might addressed with the moderator in a private discussion first. If there is
no
conclusion found, the discussion should take place with ComRel as a mediation
party.
[1] https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:Council/Code_of_conduct
--
GPG fingerprint: '766B 8122 1342 6912 3401 492A 8B54 D7A3 FF3C DB17'
Holgersson
signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
