On 4/27/05, John Bradley john@ontobus.co.uk wrote:
I haven't seen anything saying "we the mail list admins are blocking you break policy 4.13"
Hello, John. I must say I am not surprised you have been banned from Wikipedia. Your extremely antagonistic attitude in my dealings with you were a good indication.
You are right in that there is no specific policy relating to banning users from the mailing list. I, for one, have never done it before and needed help even finding the feature in the software. In lieu of actually having clear policy, it is up to the mailing list administrators to use their discretion. They (we?) weren't made administrators of the mailing list for nothing, you know.
In an effort to pre-empt situations like this, I inserted the followin text on the Mailing List information page (http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l):
"There are no formal rules for the mailing list. However, users are generally expected to follow good practice similar to Wikiquette. That is, users should assume good faith and be polite and constructive. Users who are extremely disruptive or uncivil may be banned from the mailing list by the administrators."
For more about Wikiquette, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikiquette.
I know it's probably a bad thing making up policy like this, but as I'm sure you'll agree, John, it's better to have some policy rather than none at all, as you had been complaining. Since I unilaterally made up this guideline, I welcome input from the mailing list and other administrators to help shape it into a practical policy that is acceptable to everyone.
~Mark Ryan