[Foundation-l] Jimbo's Sexual Image Deletions

[Andrew Garrett]

On Sat, May 8, 2010 at 10:07 PM, Samuel Klein <meta.sj at gmail.com> wrote:
> How can you call this 'affirmed'?  Jimbo has made strong suggestions,
> but it is the Commons community that must create and enforce its own
> policies.  The founder flag is an indication of respect, and provides
> 'crat rights on all projects, but doesn't provide any more 'power'
> over the project than any bureaucrat has.  The real power on wikis is
> social, not technical -- and where there is a vacuum without local
> consensus, Jimbo is often persuasive and effective at providing
> guidance.  However once the community decides how to proceed, it
> should do so with confidence.

Let's talk about Jimmy's role, then. What happens now is that he has
unlimited technical power over all projects, and everybody is of the
impression that they are not permitted to remove or limit it, lest it
be restored and their access similarly or more harshly curtailed.
Community efforts to reverse actions taken by Jimmy with the
assistance of his technical power have been immediately reversed by
him without any further explanation, and occasionally threats or
actual retaliation made against those reversing his actions.

This isn't an ideal situation. We should have a situation in which
Jimmy's technical power derives from the authority of the board of
trustees or from a community mandate, or we should have a situation in
which Jimmy does not have unlimited technical power.

-- 
Andrew Garrett
http://werdn.us/