Posted by gardenergirl on April 13, 2006, at 8:19:11
In reply to Re: the blocking policies, posted by Dr. Bob on April 13, 2006, at 3:36:11
> > Isn't the cooling off block now in effect?
> Right. But (a) it can get kind of black-and-white, for example, 1 week if it's been more than x months or 1 year if it's been more, and
Um, what? I don't follow that at all. 1 year if it's been more than what?
> > 3) If someone is blocked for one thing, then later commits a completely different violation, everything starts over at PBC. So Dr. Bob could add a column to his spreadsheet so that Poster X (posting an illegal source of nonprescribed drugs) is on a different line than Poster X (uncivil to another poster)
>
> I do kind of do that already. Grouping together, as above, different types of incivility.That's great. But not having that information myself makes it hard to make decisions about what to do with incivility. I suppose I will adopt the "when in doubt, PBC" versus block someone when I know they've been blocked or PBC'd before.
> > suppose a poster with one PBC used a vulgur word without the asterisk, then negatively characterized another poster's post which was itself uncivil, then quoted uncivil material in their reply to someone, then mistyped and used another vulgar word accidentally. Under the old system, this person would be now be blocked for 16 weeks. Do we really need to be "protected" from this person for 4 months? It's not that simple. I can't imagine that each uncivil post could lead to an equivalent "amount" of harm. Viewing all uncivil posts as additive just seems too simplistic given the complexity of all the factors related to blocks.
>
> But you'd agree that it would be reasonable for the period of protection for that poster to be longer than that for a poster who posted just one of those posts? It's just how much longer that's the question?I don't know that I'd agree. Suppose these posts happened about 3 or more months apart? Is that different from happening all in the span of a month of posting (between blocks)? I guess I'm looking at the above types of "infractions" as less potentially "harmful" to the community than posts which accuse or put down another poster, or beliefs others hold, etc. Those seem to have a greater likelihood for potential harm than someone mistyping "p*m p*ms" as "p om p*ms" (typed intentionally to demonstrate the point). But then, as we've already discussed, I think the cap on blocking length should be cut down to 4-6 weeks max except in certain outlier situations, which would then require a judgement call and an explanation, imo.
gg
poster:gardenergirl
thread:628886
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20060412/msgs/632527.html