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Andover News, the sequel: A Well Braziered Bryar
About a week ago I posted a rebuttal to a column by Jack Bryar as published in Andover News to this forum." Click below for the full text from knarf-it's not pretty what happened - and check out the follow-up from Jack Bryar, as a cautionary mea culpa.
[From knarf]
Unfortunately, the original header I included with the message was edited out. In this header I stated that the author of the column had already received a copy of the message. A couple of minutes later someone suggested that people mail my rebuttal to Jack Bryar.
Well, they did, it now seems. And they did many more things. Like send insulting messages, flood his mailbox with repeating messages, and other kindergarten-tricks.
In his current column, Jack Bryar apologizes for the errors he made when writing that column. He also points out the difference between the readers of /. and Linux Today. I originally learned about Jack's first column from Linux Today, as did many others. Like me, some of them took up the issue with the author by correcting his errors and explaining the intricacies of the free software model(s).
Then my article arrived on /.
Hell broke loose. I quote Jack Bryar's current column:
After the "/." posting I got letters that began "hey sh**head go f*** yourself with the money you?re taking from Microsoft! What drugs are you on?" (Way too much coffee, actually). One writer, running out of invective finally sputtered that I was another Jesse Berst! (Somebody should be deeply insulted). After reading these things for a while I became convinced that I could make a fortune distributing a good Linux-compatible spell checker.
Folks, ranting and yelling is not taken as a proof of intelligence by most people. This is supposed to be a forum for "nerds", people with above-average intelligence. Let's make sure we do not spoil the reputation of the free software community by behaving like we just graduated from kindergarten then...
And if in doubt, just query your copy of the Jargon file. Look up the description of `Hacker Speech Style' and draw your own conclusions.
Frank de Lange
In every society or community, there are always those that seem to be unable to express themselves without the use of childish behaviour, invective, or just out and out disrespect for others.
There are also those who defend this behaviour under the auspices of free speech, and that it is wrong to arbitrarily silence them, and they're right.
The solution, as I see it, is not to restrict or remove those opinions, but to demonstrate (by our example) that these members of our society are immature (like children), and just like children everywhere, most will grow out of it with time.
We do this by presenting our own views in a mature, objective manner. We do this by demonstrating that these opinions are the minority opinions, regardless of how many times they are repeated. In cases like the one described here, we should make a point to contact the author / poster in question, letting them know by our example that there *are* adults in this community, whether or not we agree with the posted position.
The simple fact of the matter is that you get back what you give. If you flame, you will be flamed in return. By expressing ourselves in a vitriolic and immature manner, we are essentially saying to those we are trying to reach that we aren't worth listening to, and any position we have, however valid, will consequently be ignored.
Nunc Tutus Exitus Computarus.
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Open Source + Sensibility = Open Sense
How about a web site where one email can be formed and culled from the cream of all arguments and distilled down to what a majority would like to send?
Have a registration area where people of Open Sensibility can gather and suggest bullet items that can come to a vote with no anonymous ones. Have a core group that have to vote before any email can leave from the announcement area. That one email could serve as the voice of an entire group.
All someone needs to do is register this domain and start writing the backend process to form topic, references areas, bullet items collection, voting systems (like moderators here on /.) and you could have a very loose framework for a group voice that is unified.
It would seem that a reasoned and sense filled email would lend more cred and be easier to handle than 4000 emails bombs.
Also, an area where headers and example flame could be placed for public view could be used to regulate from within and deny access to membership within the opensense community.
Someone has probably thought of this before but I just wanted to throw it out and see who is interested in such a concept.
Feel free to poke at the flaws in this idea
Still... its just a thought... :)
"You cannot uncook Mushoo pork once is has been cooked" -- wiseman
http://fudge.org
Years ago, as USENET was threatening to dissolve in chaos for the first time, an old ARPAnaut told me that what was happening was the "Four-Sigma Effect." It's a statistical fact, he said, that as a population grows, it becomes more and more likely to contain members more than four standard deviations (i.e. "sigma") from the mean. And it is these individuals (the technical term was "kooks") who yell the loudest, longest, and most frequently, leading to the mistaken impression that the whole population has taken a turn for the worse.
Of course, the net provides a wonderful way for kooky folks to find each other (to either join forces or do battle), so an amplification phenomenon occurs, enhancing the basic four-sigma effect.
My point is that this is just a normal aspect of Linux's and Slashdot's popularity. There are now millions and millions of folks on the Linux bandwagon, so it should be of no surprise that a few riders enjoy throwing rocks. The rest of us have to be careful not to let them speak for us, and maybe encourage them to ride elsewhere.
When the wingnuts start to show up at your party, it's tempting to call it a night. It's getting so I don't really talk about Linux at all with most people, except in the most hedged tones ("oh, I run a few operating systems - NT, Linux, BSD - they all do some things well," blah blah) for fear of being associated with rabid fanatics.
Most of you probably agree with me, that the lunatics are just sadly life-deficient hangers-on who just stumbled across Linux as jihad-material. I have despaired of them ever calming down, however - they are here to stay, and for the sake of my reputation as someone who is NOT a wingnut, it forces me to disassociate.
The fact that almost no one likes Microsoft as enthusiastically as they like Linux is almost a blessing for Microsoft, because their advocates largely end up coming across as reasoned, equitable, and balanced.
Oy.
...that he said that could make a fortune by selling a Linux-compatible spell checker. Wait a sec? Sell a spell-checker in the land of free software? Naaaaa......
"Dogs and cats, living together...it's mass hysteria!"
my god
/. think that it is a good thing to attack their enemies thru email.
that's the last time he'll write something bad about the open source community
a small minority of people who regularly read
not a good idea, especially if you're looking for acceptance by the mass media. if corporations get the impression that the linux crew is a bunch of little kids ready to email bomb, smurf, crack, and generally attack all that oppose, (some have already made this assumption) they're never going to seriously consider using it.
of course the people that are doing these things might not want the software to be publically accepted. they like being different and "more advanced" by running a minority o/s. running papasmurf doesnt make you more advanced -- it makes you a script kiddie.
if you're gonna flame someone, at least have the decency to include some arguement in your flame instead of "fuck"ing the hell out of them.
One of the major bogus sides of the expansion of Linux is that it's not really a community anymore. We've gone from a small town feeling to a large city, complete with all the nuts, gomers and unsupervised 10 year-olds that come with it.
Personally, I think something needs to be done to curb this sort of ridiculous behaviour before any sense of community is lost and we start to really alienate the people that we're trying to attract -- businesses, media and developers.
The problem is, what can be done? Well, I believe it's time to start shutting out the troublemakers. Everyone can still have free speech, but we're not obligated to listen to them or provide them with a forum or encouragement. As much as I'd hate to say it, /. is going to have to be the first place to change (it's the most popular Linux-related website, and therefore attracts the most goons; you don't see this sort of thing at Linux Today).
Does this mean more moderation? Probably; maybe even banning the IPs of some of the worse offenders, or some other form of punishment. We need to tell the trolls and the flamers that we don't want them because they're effectively ruining it for everyone.
In an ideal world, everyone would be mature, rational and adhere to the Advocacy FAQ. But its not going to happen. I guess my main concern is that in a year I will switch jobs and suggest Linux to my boss, who will answer back, "No, we don't want to get involved with those kind of people."
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I don't want my boss to think I like Linux because I'm just another "Anything But Microsoft" whiner. That's the increasing impression among the uninitiated, however, because of some of these flamers and wannabes.
PS: I just got a Linux box into our NT-only shop. Off topic, but I'm so happy that I won't be getting 3AM pages to restart IIS anymore that I just had to tell somebody....
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Wondered what would happen if 15 year old lamer gets shown that the veil of anonymity on the net is wafer thin?
http://www.planetcrap.com/929372550/
It's an interesting thread. And Open Source related to boot. Go nuts.
You know, there's a reason nobody's suggested a WWRMSD bracelet. The sooner he figures that out, the sooner he's likely to garner support for the Hurd.
Just a thought. Not that I don't hold his programming ability and ethics in the highest possible regard.
This is just like television, only you can see much further.
ESR can flame with the best of them, but I very much doubt that he'd employ childish tactics like that.
Since I didn't see any suggestions in the other threads that would make any practical differencereal change in behavior for the better, here are a couple of things "we" (Rob) could do to cut down the number of times Slashdot is made to look stupid by a bunch of immature children:
/. folk can send copies of the flame mail to for "our" action. (Copies of such flame mail could also be added to such a database by others "observing" the exchange...)
/. (the moderators would get more points/better gifts based on the number of mails they review yea/nay, not how many emails they vote as "guilty")
/. which are the source of this stuff with some sort of "banner" that no one would want to have associated with them ... Like any time that person posts on /., their posting is bracked with bold letters "A POSTING FROM AN IMMATURE JERK" or ? ... This would tend to reduce their participation in /. and hopefully make them think twice before they decide to "punish" someone else...
/. altogether, and post all known identifying information about them in a "hall of shame" some where...
/., that masking can often be penetrated, especially by people and software as powereful as we have here. Besides, forcing "bad" /. "members" to go through the extra work of becoming so annonymous we can't track them, may slow them down enough that they think better of "flaming".
1) Develop a "complaint" folder that people who've been flamed by
2) Encourage moderators to pick up extra moderator points (or free gifts ) by taking some time and going through the "flame mail folder" and basically voting on whether each piece of mail is so lacking in redeeming social value as to constitute an "offense" against
3) For people guilty of such "offenses" (as "voted" by their "peers"), an escalating set of punishments could include:
A) "flagging" those accounts people on
B) after a certain # of "offenses"... block the offender from
While there are ways to try to mask your identity when flaming someone to try to avoid punishment on
I'm sure that if he's read this, Rob has already got the code written in his head to implement all this ()!
When he implements this, we can continue to become one of the most successful experiments in self moderating, yet remarkably free information flows around. If we don't do something, the "slashdot effect" could become an expletive...
Steve
C'mon people...this isn't right.
This isn't directed at Linux advocates or anyone else in particular. If this letter is for you, well, you know who you are.
They are everywhere, IIRC, Douglas Adams (a Mac advocate) once referred to some of his Mac-loving kin as "blithering zealots". Perfect. That is exactly the description of many Linux/MS/Mac/BeOS/OS/2 etc. ad nauseum "advocates". The funny thing is...most of the "blithering zealots" don't have a clue.
"Blah, blah, blah...use FooOS," they say.
"Why?" BarOS user says.
"Because anyone who doesn't use FooOS is lame," blithering zealot intellegently replies.
I've been around, in communication with other savvy, bleeding edge computer users, for quite a while now. It's always the same. There seems to be this "blithering zealot" gene. Without exception, there is always someone who will find something (anything!) and cling to it religiously without anything intellegent to back it up.
For those who fit the above description, this message is for you.
Stop it. If you find yourself:
1. NEVER installing a different OS because, "FooOS is better".
2. Flaming anyone who likes another OS better.
3. Flaming anyone.
4. Bashing MS (or any other software company) in response to an article about Linux....
You may have a problem. Step back and think, because you are just like the people you say you hate. "MS lemmings" is a rich term I've heard a lot. Well, ask yourself this: If FooOS started to suck...for whatever reason, are you past the point where you can objectively say, "Wow...FooOS has started to suck. Maybe I should start to look for something new." ?
Or, better yet, "Wow...FooOS has started to suck. Maybe I should work to fix it."
There is a pattern that I've noticed, and it involves most (almost all) zealots going down with their chosen sinking ship, just like they say their "opponents" are.
Wow...this turned from what I originally intended (an honest to god open letter) to more of a rant. I appologize for that. But IMHO, what I said needed to be said, so I'll leave it at that.
I appologize for the spelling errors that are probably scattered about in this.
Casey
Look at the OSS movement more as a guerrilla war; we have to develop a superior product against the onslaught of an overwhelming foe who can change standards as fast as Bill changes his shorts. We need to win people over to our way of thinking, not run in and burn their villages and shoot their grandmothers.
This sort of sh*t alienates potential users, backers, business allies and developers. Call it a war if you insist, but this isn't the way to win. Instead, we should politely provide information, demonstrate that we can connect with people (a collective sense of humor would be a good place to start) and respect other peoples' opinions, even if they don't agree with us.
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Hmm...my point...can't we just all get along?
The whole idea behind Linux is freedom, but
if we as a community squash anyone who doesn't agree with our opinions or is misinformed about the facts, we're making Linux that much more worthless.
So please, before you hit the send key next time,
think about what you're saying.
Deepak Saxena
Project Director, Linux Demo Day '99
Deepak Saxena
"Computers are useless, they can only give you answers" - Picasso
Science fiction author Larry Niven, that is. Jerry Pournelle is fond of quoting it, and I've heard Niven himself say it a time or two:
"There is no cause so noble that it will not attract fuggheads."
Linux advocacy proves to be no exception.
-- Alastair
While this makes the most sense from the point of view of conveying the most relevant information and eliminating redundancy, in practice all this would accomplish in the short-term is to make the signal-to-noise ratio that much worse. Instead of 100 polite emails and 10,000 flames, the authour gets 1 polite email and 10,000 flames.
The loophole is that if the 1 email is from a well-respected entity whose opinions carry weight, it would be useful. Open Sense, if implemented, could eventually gain such weight. However, it won't have such weight when first implemented - this would be a medium-term effect at best, long-term at worst.
OTOH, those of us who write sensible letters could always post to both. That would give the best of both worlds.
As a side idea - it might be a good idea for someone who _does_ carry weight - for instance, Linus - to write a letter to the publisher that both states that the flamers do not represent his views (possibly apologizing), and then politely taking issue with the inaccurate points presented in the article. This might actually accomplish something.
Going to the publisher helps in that the article's authour is probably just ignoring all Linux-related emails. Coming from Linus or another noteworthy and level-headed developer/advocate would give it the credibility to get read.
In any event, if you do get Open Sense off the ground, please let me know. I'd be happy to contribute.
This about it; can you see Linus flaming the hell out of someone for forgetting to mention that Linux runs on SPARC? No way! So, the next time you're tempted to mail out some giant foul-mouthed tirade against someone who has issues with the OSS movement, ask yourself: WWLD?
Man, I should have some wrist bands made up; I'd make a mint.
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I'm sure the post on Linuxtoday (where I first read it) was more hits to this guy's online column than he had ever seen before. I'm sure he also got more feedback than he had ever gotten before. Then Slashdot was probably another order of magnitude more hits for his column. Combine this with the fact that this was probably the most error-ridden piece he's ever written before, and it's not surprising that he was treated this way. I'm not saying it's right. In fact, shame on you guys (you know who you are)! But if he had written something sexist and inaccurate that somehow got into the hands of several tens of thousands of feminists, what's he expect? Say something that's an opinion that people disagree with, you'll get some flack. Say something wrong and you'll get a lot. That * /. = bad news for him. He wrote an incorrect story and it was viewed by lots of people who disagree with him. Surely he realizes that a lot of us read it, dismissed it, and went on with our lives and that the people who flamed him are not in the majority (or I'm sure mail.andover.net or whatever would have died a quick death)
Hmmm, that feminist sentence makes no sense. s/[feminist setence]/[something really, really clever]/
By simply not focusing so much on Microsoft. I say don't post MS related stories on slashdot unless they really are newsworthy. And don't post them on LinuxToday unless they are related in some way to Linux.
This would take away forums that seem to be used mainly to stir anti-ms feelings and (sometimes subtely) encourage flaming.
If we all just back away from talking about MS all the time, several good things will result:
1. We will continue to grow for the same reasons we always did: not worring about marketshare, deadlines, acceptance, etc. These things will come in time if you produce good software. These have always been touted as the linux community's greatest strengths. Let's keep it that way.
2. We will attract people that are interested in free software instead of people that want to feel cool or 3L1te or just hate microsoft. Without a place to read and post anti-ms stuff those people will lose interest and leave. I say good riddance.
Bottom line - it's not out of the control of the leaders in this meritocracy. An example can be set, and would be followed.
Vidi, Vici, Veni
In the me-too department: I share the feeling of shame at having the name of "Slashdot" associated with agressive flaming. I was so embarassed (because I really like Slashdot and visit several times a day -- I even post from time to time what I think I have something of value to contribute) that I posted onto the apologia at Andover very clearly in my own name, identifying myself as a Slashdot reader and expressing my personal shame.
In the "off topic" department, I sometime wonder if the growth of the electronic community will eventually increase or decrease civility. I rember reading David Brin's Earth in the late 80s. We had USENET by then, the Web wasn't in existence (except maybe at CERN) and the word Internet meant something to only a handful of us. In that novel, Brin imagined a global network that everyone had access to. (This stuff was very incidental to the story, BTW). Each person had a credibility rating. You would read messages filtering by credibility. I think the Slashdot moderation figure is a very primitive form of this.
What if access to the net was denied to no one, but every other participant on the net could adjust one persons credibility by one point once and only once? (What if this could be applied to sub nets and addresses at the IP level, but I get ahead of myself). What if we could put the real flamethrowers in Coventry (as we used to say)?
Everyone if free to be as abusive as they want, but they would be heard by fewer and fewer people as their credibility fell.
Perhaps persons should be rated in various categories, or a standard system eveloped to build this into a new kind of HTML compatible nntp? I'm not really suggesting anything seriously here, but the issue is real.
In some ways, despite all the evils of television, it has brought a certain increased sophistication to distant and disparate places (and also a certain lack of sophistication as well, but I don't want to go too far down that tangent right now).
The net can do the same, only more so.
Whatever. I'm a programmer by vocation and avocation, so I always seek a technological solution.
For now, I hope that each of us who feels proud to be a part of something Big and Important (open source, free software, the Internet, free speech, individuality) and who gives vent to that through fourums like Slashdot will take a little time to (gently) remind some of our more rambunctious fellow travellers what it means to be civilized.
My thinking then which I still think is accurate:
EvangeListas, remember when the guy from Wired wrote that net access with a PowerMac and a T1 is slower than with a 386 and a 9600 baud modem? And then proceeded to defend that as a factually correct statement? After all, he got tons of stupid mail; therefore he must have been correct...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
The Linux scene has changed a lot in the past year. That's not to say that there weren't crazed fanatics here before, but I do think the ratio has chnaged. Now that Linux is 'cool' and 'alternative' (a brief digression: did you ever notice that by the time anything is called alternative, it isn't, really?) More and more folks are using it because it makes them feel superior.
When someone attacks Linux, these people feel it as a personal insult. After all, if they are only cool because they use a cool OS, what does it mean when someone says the OS sucks? It means they suck.
All in all, though, I am proud of our community. Don't let the insecure, vocal minority of jerks blind you to the fact that a lot of smart, polite, reasonable, and downright nice people use Linux. I see it every day, here, in my user's group, in the newsgroups & mailing lists, and of course, on the ftp sites where the code lives: people helping each other out, sharing what they know with no thought of profit.
I think the time has come for the vast majority of us who believe in that quaint, old fashioned concept known as "good manners" to stand up to the jerks, in a non threatening way, of course. Maybe a quick email here and there (don't take criticism public) saying something like 'I know you probably didn't mean to, but your tone was a bit rude..." and pointing out the fact that good manners are simply a more effiecient way of changing behaviors and beliefs than vitriolic rants.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Good grief. Is it just me or does this sound more like an IRC war than a discussion? Hanging out on IRC changed drastically after the internet went mainstream. You always had your schmucks, but after tens of thousands of IRC clients started showing up, we ended up with a lot more schmucks. I have always had a hard time grasping the concept of saying things in text that you would never have the balls to say in real life in front of a person. I type as I would speak to you in person.
Rioting and mob mentality is understandable IMHO if tanks and soldiers are rolling down Main Street USA, but not when somebody says something dumb. Had he said he was going to rape the mothers of all RedHat investors, fine, attack. But he didnt.
If I went full force after every dumb comment made to me in person, there would be a lot less dumb comment makers in the world, and I'd be in prison *grin*.
One last thought: Ever notice that the religious nuts who run up to your car screaming about hell while holding a fistful of pamphlets hold a LOT less credibility than the preacher sitting quietly in a church doing his thing? Not that I'm a religious man, but heh, it's a thought.
I'll shaddup now, but damn people, relax.