Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote:
For my money, a properly stated case against an admin
from an editor
with a history and a decent reputation is never a problem. The vast
majority of complaints about admin behaviour are generic "rouge admin
abuse" crap and can safely be ignored, especially if they can't bring
themselves to state it in a civil manner. Sounds like this lot fails
on both levels.
An editor with a history and decent reputation knows the ropes, and that
alone helps to keep him out of trouble. There are exceptions, as the
recent complaints by Waerth have shown. His complaints about how Thai
open proxies are blocked made sense, but his presentation of the problem
and abuse of those who wanted to help was abrasive and disinclined most
people from trying to help him
The others probably don't know what they have at their disposal, and
need to be taught. One starts with the presumption that the claim is
valid, even if 95% of those claims turn out to be completely unfounded.
We can't really judge the validity of a claim without investigating more
deeply.
Some claimants are grossly abusive and offensive. This goes well beyond
simple claims of admin abuse, or the occasional cuss word. This should
receive a personal response from the moderator asking the claimant to
tone down his comment, and restate his complaint in a more civil
manner. The mederator could even promise that if he does that he will
let the revised complaint move onto the list. The moderator makes no
comment whatsoever about the merits of the claim; doing so would
compromise his neutrality. The moderator can let the claimant know that
list members are free to take up advocacy or not for the claim, and that
it is not uncommon to wait for up to 48 hours before there is any reply.
Once a complaint has reached the list it is up to the interested list
members to ask for diffs or other missing information. A very common
missing bit of information is the person's own user name, without which
nothing can be done with the complaint.
Assuming the complainant gets the message about how to civilly present
his case, arguments can be made against excessive e-mails or persistent
whining, but it is difficult to establish clear criteria about these
because the tolerance of list members varies considerably. Again
though, the moderator must avoid getting himself into the middle of a
fight that has nothing to do with him.
Ec