[Wikipedia-l] Manning's note and appology to the list (again)

[Daniel Mayer]

--- Manning Bartlett <manning at bartlett.net> wrote:
> Hi maveric and all
> 
> Just wanted to make it clear that I was not
> criticising your comments re Max 
> Weisman in any way! I'm quite sorry if you got that
> impression. I simply 
> started with what you said, but then went off on a
> tangent completely.
> 
> I hoped I had made that distinction clear in my
> original post, and if not, let 
> me make it clear now. I thought you had every right
> to question the validity of 
> the article, although if JHK says he has some merit
> then I certainly won't 
> argue.
> 
> Cheers
> Manning
> 

Yes the intention was made clear – and the comment, by
itself, was not 'overtly' critical of what I had done.
Implicitly, however, it was critical of my actions
because the example was from something I had done that
was being questioned. 

I really wouldn’t have minded (much) this 'particular'
example, except for the fact that it occurred right
after I screwed-up on another mater so severely that
Jimbo openly considered removing my sysop status. So
it was the timing that was the most sensitive issue,
not really what was said in this particular case. I
hope this distinction is clear, because I bear no hard
feelings towards you Manning. 

However, in general, it is oftentimes
counter-productive to cite very specific and
real-world examples when trying to spark a general
discussion on policy (not always mind you – actual
examples can be useful when they are appropriate – I
tend to prefer to make up my own examples whenever
possible though). Somehow, for me at least, Talk pages
are different. This might have something to do with
having the guy who owns the server and who is
editor-in-chief as part of the regular discussion. An
analogy would be telling a coworker in their cubicle
that they had possibly made a mistake (still audible
to others in adjacent cubicles) vs. telling a coworker
they had might have made a mistake during an official
meeting with all present including the coworker’s
boss.  

BTW, I’ve been far more egregiously guilty of using
unnecessarily specific examples than anybody I can
think of on the list (concerning an unfortunate and
totally incorrect and unfair statement I made about
another member of the list while making an argument
during the 24 fiasco). That’s the problem with
specific examples – they may not be good ones, may be
outright wrong or are special cases made under
extenuating circumstances. The devil is in the details
my friends.

So my suggestion is this: In order to move the
discussion along and try and prevent unnecessarily
hurt feelings and keep on topic, we should, <i>in
general</i>, avoid using specific examples of things
“gone wrong” when a general or hypothetical example
would suffice  – <especially> when a specific example
would concern another list member or something they
had done. In addition, we should also consider
<i>not</i> stating the names of who did what unless we
want to discuss disciplinary actions or warnings. Of
course, we can always start with the general and go
down to specific examples when and where appropriate,
if we keep in mind that the people on the other side
of the computer screen have feelings and egos too.

With that said, I do think that in no way should we
make this any sort of official rule for discussion on
the list (Free Speech rules!) – just something to
consider in order to keep on topic and have the best
and most productive policy discussion possible. 

Which, by the way, this is not -- I therefore (again)
apologize to the list for introducing unnecessary
drama. 

Power to the wiki!


--maveric149


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