Nice turn of phrase. Fact is, this dude has a Gmail account, so if he can't manage to unsubscribe, he could just set up a filter (More > Filter messages like these) -- as someone else suggest that others will have (likely) already done to filter out email *from* him (and as I am now planning to do myself).
On Sun, Sep 30, 2012 at 7:14 PM, Abd ulRahman Lomax abdlomax@yahoo.com wrote:
Harry, when you are in the middle of an amygdala hijack, you may not be able to respond to instructions clearly. See if you can do whatever you know to do to relax, have some tea or coffee, get to a place of calm, and then try unsubscribing, reading everything carefully. You may find that this fixes the interface, in a way that shouting doesn't.
I think it's reasonable to consider Harry to be "trolling" at this point (even if not intentionally).
Well, "unintentional trolling" is an oxymoron.
Harry, I'm cc'ing this mail directly to you. You are creating a huge amount of useless traffic, causing harm to people who have no power to handle your unsubscription request. If you actually want help, ask for it, and be responsive to what people write, instead of just "yelling" STOP. A full description of how to unsubscribe has already been given you today, and you apparently did not read it. You would have received one or two unsubscription confirmation mails, and if you had read them and followed instructions, you'd have been unsubscribed, almost certainly.
The rest of this mail is to the list, in response to Joe Cornell's mail.
It is possible that Harry's actions are designed to cause enough upset that *somebody* will do something, but the obvious goal is to resolve the unsubscription problem. If there were an active list moderator, this would not be happening. An international list should have enough moderators with enough commitment that anything gets handled within 24 hours. Faster is better. These breakdowns irritate people and some then unsubscribe for that reason.
I have deleted some of my mail from the list, but of what is still on my yahoomail system, I saw an all-caps unsubscription message from Harry back in July. Last Monday, six days ago, he wrote:
I HAVE UNSUBSCRIBED A MILLION TIMES! FOR CRYING OUT LOUD, PLEASE STOP EMAILING ME! STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Being in full-out hysteria mode, he's not able to accurately describe his experience, such that people could actually help him. He also, my guess, sees any mail from the listserv as an offense. That probably includes the unsubscription confirmation mails that have been sent to him. There would have been two of them today, at least. (Since anyone can initiate that process, at least two of us have done it.)
I'd guess that he's not reading any of this list mail describing his problem and giving advice how to unsubscribe, nor is he reading and following instructions in the unsubscription confirmation mail.
He doesn't seem to understand that he is dealing with a robot, that can only follow its programming. So he sends an unsubscription command by email, or uses the unsubscribe button on-line, but isn't careful to read the instructions, and doesn't respond as directed to the unsubscription confirmation mail.
He has not actually unsubscribed once, it's highly likely. Certainly not a million times....
Being focused only on his own survival needs -- that's what the amygdala is for -- he hasn't considered that list servers must confirm, in some way, that an unsubscription command actually comes from the subscribed mail. It does this in two ways: either the command is entered while logged-in with the password, or a mail is sent to the involved mailing address, containing a confirmation code. There are then two ways to complete the unsubscription, and simply replying to the mail with the subject header unchanged and no response text will do it. It's simple, but it must be done in a way that the listserv robot can recognize. Yelling is like yelling at a tree, or, more to the point, your computer or someone else's computer. Some day we will have computers that respond to yelling. Not yet, or, at least, not this listserv.
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax (413) 584-3151 business (413) 695-7114 cell I'm so excited I can't wait for Now.
From: Joe Corneli holtzermann17@gmail.com To: Abd ulRahman Lomax abdlomax@yahoo.com; Mailing list for Wikiversity wikiversity-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Sunday, September 30, 2012 4:54 PM Subject: amygdala hijack [...] I think it's reasonable to consider Harry to be "trolling" at this point (even if not intentionally).
going back further, I found http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikiversity-l/2012-February/000866.html
so Harry has been trying to unsubscribe since February. I looked back another year and found nothing.
(It's pretty common on mailing lists to see posts to the list requesting unsubscription. That is, it's common that people don't follow instructions. When someone writes, saying that they have tried to unsubscribe, but it didn't work, and giving exactly what they saw and what happened, usually anyone can help. But when all the person does is to start yelling STOP!, while giving no information, most people ignore it. Funny how that works.)
Jeffrey Peters mentioned Phillipe as the manager of WMF lists, but didn't give the email address.
Philippe Beaudette pbeaudette at wikimedia.org
is from a mail in the list archive. Personally, I'd rather solve the core problem, lack of active list administration, rather than bother Philippe over a small problem. But I suppose it's reasonable.
Normally, to handle obtaining new list moderators, see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists#List_administration
I've years of experience administering mailing lists, serving community consensus, and this is a very low-traffic job, I've seen nothing for a long time that would have required an administrator, except for these unsubscription requests.
But admins should be watching the list, as I have for years.
However, I'm blocked on Wikiversity, so I can see that some might think it a bit weird for me to volunteer...
Erkan Yilmaz is trusted, how about him?
Hello,
Not me. As said: I'd like the discussion on the WV colloquium, so more people see this If no one responds, I'd give it to either ALL bureaucrats AND/OR custodians.
Phillipe said: In the absence of a list moderator, our only options are to leave it as is, or shut it down. He just checked: Harry is not subscribed anymore
Erkan
On Mon, Oct 1, 2012 at 3:23 AM, Abd ulRahman Lomax abdlomax@yahoo.comwrote:
going back further, I found
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikiversity-l/2012-February/000866.html
so Harry has been trying to unsubscribe since February. I looked back another year and found nothing.
(It's pretty common on mailing lists to see posts to the list requesting unsubscription. That is, it's common that people don't follow instructions. When someone writes, saying that they have tried to unsubscribe, but it didn't work, and giving exactly what they saw and what happened, usually anyone can help. But when all the person does is to start yelling STOP!, while giving no information, most people ignore it. Funny how that works.)
Jeffrey Peters mentioned Phillipe as the manager of WMF lists, but didn't give the email address.
*Philippe Beaudette* pbeaudette at wikimedia.org<wikiversity-l%40lists.wikimedia.org?Subject=%5BWikiversity-l%5D%20IRC%20office%20hours%20with%20Zack%20Exley&In-Reply-To=>
is from a mail in the list archive. Personally, I'd rather solve the core problem, lack of active list administration, rather than bother Philippe over a small problem. But I suppose it's reasonable.
Normally, to handle obtaining new list moderators, see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists#List_administration
I've years of experience administering mailing lists, serving community consensus, and this is a very low-traffic job, I've seen nothing for a long time that would have required an administrator, except for these unsubscription requests.
But admins should be watching the list, as I have for years.
However, I'm blocked on Wikiversity, so I can see that some might think it a bit weird for me to volunteer...
Erkan Yilmaz is trusted, how about him?
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