The trouble there is, everyone has a different definition of who the "troublemakers" are that we "need to lose". I'd not be surprised if I'm on your list, Jeff. I wouldn't say you are-your views may be unpopular, and sometimes you do go a bit overboard in defending them, but we've probably all been guilty of that at one point or another.
Yes, some people are damn fine editors, but pretty blunt. You get that type of thing when you work on a collaborative project. Maybe I've got a thicker skin than most, but I can certainly tolerate the occasional snippy remark from someone who really does know what the hell they're doing. On the other hand, if it gets to the point of harassment or running others off, that's where we've got to tell them "Stop it, leave, or get helped to leave," no matter how good they are. But there is no "one standard". If a brand-new editor made an edit that totally broke five tables in a list, they'd get a test1 and a revert. If you did that, I'd figure it for an honest mistake, and set about helping to fix them. That's just how it works.
If there was anyone I'd be first in line to run off, it would be article OWNers. That type of crap causes more needless trouble and headaches, and probably a higher percentage of ArbCom cases, than anything else. If you don't want anything you submit edited by anyone who damn well wants to, you're posting it in the wrong place.
Seraphimblade
On 5/1/07, Jeff Raymond jeff.raymond@internationalhouseofbacon.com wrote:
Matthew Brown wrote:
a) How do you select these less than a dozen people? Will everyone - or even a good solid supermajority - agree with you?
I think most of them would be clear to most people. On most, I think a good solid supermajority would agree we'd be better off without them, but there's no realistic way to guage it.
b) If you ousted the dozen worst troublemakers on the project - by whoever's definition - you also lose a bunch of their friends and a bunch of other people who would be pissed off by such an action. How do you handle that? Do you just write it off as the costs of fixing the place?
Absolutely a worthwhile cost. Chances are, if they'd leave because we lost such cancers, they weren't really all that worth having around to begin with.
-Jeff
-- If you can read this, I'm not at home.
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