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Pastimes : How to best deal with KOOKS at this web site -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill Ulrich who wrote (1727)	7/13/1998 10:32:00 AM
From: Iceberg	Respond to of 1894

>in the case of somebody really stepping over the line, how much "lee-way" do you give them? >Flagrant libel without a shred of evidence is quite another matter. To what degree do we make exceptions >How much do they have to be responsible for? MrB, Just some thoughts on your [self-described <g>] kooky questions... I assume you are talking about how to deal with SI posts. IMO, each person's post, regardless of the poster's mental condition, potentially affects many other people. Those potentially affected include not only anyone who happens to read the post, but SI's operation as well. My impression [and I could be wrong here - I'm no lawyer] is that under certain circumstances, SI could even be held liable for posts made by its members. In addition, SI, it seems to me, is much like a private club in that it has a responsibility to its members to maintain a reasonably civilized atmosphere. To accomplish that end, SI can boot out members at will. If I were running SI, I'd be kicking out more people . In other words, and generally speaking, the "lee-way" and "exceptions" you mentioned, would be far less than it is now if I could throw people off this web site. I'd tend to lean toward protecting the environment of the site and less toward protecting what some would call "freedom of speech". SI members pay, in part, for a sense of civility at this site. In order to maintain civility, some kooks simply have to be booted out. On the other hand, SI needs the revenue, so throwing out too many paying members would hurt their bottom line. So I suppose it's quite a balancing act for SI management to perform, at least from a business perspective! BTW, what some might call "borderline kooks" are capable of adding kaleidoscopic effects of color, fascination and interest for many SI members, even though a few other members may not think so. In that regard, it seems to me that putting up certain mischief-making members to a vote for maintaining SI membership would be an interesting thing to do. Let SI members themselves vote on whether the less extreme kooks stay or go. Ice

To: Bill Ulrich who wrote (1727)	7/13/1998 11:00:00 PM
From: John Sladek	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1894

Bill, When you say 1. rational but just an idiot 2. just an idiot I really think that you're understating thinkgs a little bit. In so many cases "just an idiot" should be replaced with "A TOTAL FREAKING ANTISOCIAL MORON". Seriously though, I think that SI should have less tolerance of people who are truly obnoxious, especially repeat offenders. The problem seems to be increasing, so SI really is going to have to deal with it. Some people seem to have no social skills at all - maybe they don't recognize the "virtual people" at SI are real people or maybe they just don't care. If someone gets out of control once in a while that is one thing. If they violate the SI rules, maybe in the "heat of passion" so to speak, then I would assume that a stern warning or brief suspension would smarten them up. Turboe mentioned that he was warned (presumably by SI) to stick to discussing the companies, so maybe SI is trying to cool things down a little bit. But for some people I think that S.I. is a form of therapy. Some miserable S.O.B. just got chewed out by his boss, or was dumped on by his wife, or treated disrispectfully by his children, or was bitten by his dog, or lost his trailer and half ton in a poker game, or whatever ... and feels like crap. So he decides that what would make him feel better is to make someone feel like crap. So he picks someone out on the internet, and posts a (Check as many boxes that apply [] Threatenting, [] Racist, [] Obnoxious, [] Misogynist, [] Misandryst, [] sexist, [] Degenerate, [] Vile, [] Obscene, [] Physically Impossible, [] Heretical, [] Offensive, Other _____ post to someone. Maybe he feels like crap for a couple of days, or weeks or ... The other thing that they gotta do is get rid of the amateur stock manipulators. They're Crooks though, not Cooks (curious, only one letter difference between the two). Regards, John Sladek