User Guidelines doc?

[Tancorix]

Technopatra, I know you were attending a funeral and couldn't get to it...but are there plans to rollout the already approved guidelines anytime soon?

[technopatra]

Technopatra, I know you were attending a funeral and couldn't get to it...but are there plans to rollout the already approved guidelines anytime soon?

They've been approved by all but Bob and are in Spanky's queue to get posted. I'm reticent to promise a deadline as, nag as I might, it's out of my hands, but I'm hopin for EOD Wed.

[technopatra]

FYI the guidelines will show up on the registration page, and new accounts will have to agree to them to sign up. We will of course also link to them in the footer.

Bob, I wish I'd had your comments a week ago. We will have to wait for the next iteration as this is already in queue for posting. But I really like what you added to the intention of the eplaya and folk's contributions. I will try to move things along.

Anyhow -- please note the hopefully positive statements I inserted at the top of my edits, above. I'd prefer that eplaya users reading the guidelines be left more with the feeling that they are empowered to make or break the story of Burning Man, rather than fearing that if they fuck up by violating some subpart of some vaguely configured subsection they'll be subjecting themselves to virtual electroshock treatment.

Penalties are a fact of life on the eplaya now and they have to be communicated. I'm up for reviewing the tone, as I agree it should come across as empowering, however I think you'd have to have a fairly big chip on your shoulder to see these in such a threatening light. They're fairly simple - disrespect the community with these actions, and you'll get dinged.

I appreciate the effort of those working on all this, but I appreciate more those who demonstrate their commitment to eplaya culture by continuing to wade into actual eplaya discussions.

Let me turn that around and tell you that it would help me greatly if folks who claim the mantle of eplaya culture guardianship would come and help do the work with us. There is a tremendous amount of backend that needed (some of it still needs) to be done before we can have anythign to show you. So far Trey is the only one to even offer contributing some man-hours (beyond giving feedback). No one else is stepping up, so I have no choice but to rely on folks who may not have time to play in the eplaya. They are doing a fairly thankless job because they think it is important enough to contribute their time.

Eplaya meetings are every other Wed at 7pm at the Burning Man office . Next one is Feb 11.

Implicit user guidelines should already be in our heads, after all

Operative word there is "should". They are clearly not in the minds of many users, and why would they be? Even folks who have discussion board experience haven't necessarily had it here, and most of the new user accounts are folks who've never been on a discussion board before. They need to have more spelled out for them than you and other vets do. I beg your understanding that not everyone is as clued in as you, and I not only have to, but want to, cater to folks who wandered in out of nowhere.

I hope I can feel confident that Britton et al will continue to hack at the interface on their own per user requests made here, and make some effort to show us (l)users some progress on that. Can't be that hard to get rid of a few icons, omit needless alt-text, simplify the style sheets, condense the tables, and so on..

We are testing several mods and working to rebuild the skin...the first one experinced technical difficulties because it was developed outside of staging.

Ok just one soapbox moment before I hit the hay:

Good thing this is a draft.Ya'll need to, like, omit needless words. I've stayed away from the eplaya task force thing for a number of reasons -- the fact of the horse already being out of the barn and galloping down the road being the main.

Is this an example of "positive statements"? This is why some of my team lurk rather than get into discussions here. They're more sensitive than me and have less time & energy for the ego ping-pong that precedes all useful feedback. I'll happily award you the clever crown, however, remaining comfortably ensconced in derisive satire does not actually help anyone make the kinds of changes you want to see happen.

Respectfully submitted.

[DE FACTO]

Bob sholud be on the ETF as Devils advocate for all the right reasons and a nessasary asset.

as for the guidelines, are they going to be a popup? spanky gave legitament reasons of modifications and implimentations that needed to be considered.

A cookie thing, or not and then some.

[technopatra]

I don't think there's any need for a popup. They tend to piss off some folks needlessly. Hmm, I should check W3C's recommmendatoins for accessibility, just in case.

[DE FACTO]

I don't think there's any need for a popup. They tend to piss off some folks needlessly. Hmm, I should check W3C's recommmendatoins for accessibility, just in case.

Ooops yes yes you are right. my bad.

not that kind of popup.

Spanky came up with the idea about the java one time popup users would see once when they sign up with a cookie.

I said i would come up with a solution and it totally passed by me.
Let me work on it and see if I can come up with what I was talking about.
If it's not soon enough then hey....another time.

[technopatra]

ahhh...I see what you are talking about. That would be cool, but it's kind of a bell & whistle. I was just planning on posting int eh annoucement threads, and sending a system-wide message announcing the guidelines and the fact that folks are responsible for them by participating etc etc.

[technopatra]

Oh yeah Bob I forgot to mention that the Terms of Service (currently being reviewed by our lawyer) does spell out what illegal content is in detail.

[Bob]

Again, my user-guideline statement for the old eplaya:

We reserve the right to maintain this board for the benefit of all. Please behave.

The draft concentrates too much on specifics while ignoring a hell of a lot of potential abuses of the board. I would suggest staying as general as possible, borrowing heavily from (or referring people to) the Survival Guide if you must, and dealing with things as they crop up. Potential abusers will find mile-wide holes in an overly-specific document.

As part of this new policy thing -- how about brief, honest, illustrative case-by-case reports by admins in the Feedback section on extreme actions taken? More important than some vaguely-worded set of guidelines would be an evolving knowledge of who's actually doing what to protect us from ourselves, and why, rather simply leave everybody guessing.

And re: the ETF -- my philosophy would be to publicly vet everything on the eplaya that isn't already part of Burning Man's general policies and expectations of participants.

[Tancorix]

It's all good...but I'm curious...where were you weeks, no months ago as this process rolled out? I love the ideas but the ETF asked for feedback and only a few people responded. We had delays that gave more time, still no feedback. Then when we move forward with something you show up with ideas. Sheesh, I wish you were involved in this much earlier.

[DE FACTO]

I'm also curious about something that was said awhile ago.

I remember sometime ago someone offering thier talent in PHP programming to spanky.

there's lots of talk here. some people go for that sort of thing i guess.

If the post has'nt been changed I think I may go look for it sometime although I dont think it's all that important.

[technopatra]

Your user guideline, as used on the old eplaya, only "worked" for those who could stomach the old boards. All 30 of you. We have a bigger community that will continue to grow. They have repeatedly demanded more specific guidelines, so they are getting them.

I just had the weirdest deja vu. Did I write that exact same sentence before?

As part of this new policy thing -- how about brief, honest, illustrative case-by-case reports by admins in the Feedback section on extreme actions taken? More important than some vaguely-worded set of guidelines would be an evolving knowledge of who's actually doing what to protect us from ourselves, and why, rather simply leave everybody guessing.

You mean like I did in the case studies thread, following Trey's wonderful example? I agree with what you say here, but you are stating it as if it isn't already happening. We've taken no other "extreme" admin action, so no more reports have occurred.

And re: the ETF -- my philosophy would be to publicly vet everything on the eplaya that isn't already part of Burning Man's general policies and expectations of participants.

Right...as opposed to what we do now, which is pose questions on the eplaya, participate in that discussion, then go offline to do the grunt work - condense and refine and run by the lawyers et al and return to the boards with the results for feedback, then iterate again based on that feedback.

Feedback does not equal work. All the good info that comes in the discussions needs to be worked on before it can be presented and omplemented. Contradictory desires must be considered and decided. Plus, sometimes the Project just has to have something a certain way because they just do. The team is where we work to find the happiest medium.

OK back to the actual topic - Bob's comments are still too late to include in this iteration. They will be preserved for the next one.



[/url]

[herself]

hey Bob, where are you hanging out online these days anyways? I don't see you much on the 3playa. And I don't see you all that much here on the official board. So where have you gone? Your stalkers are dying to know...

I'm checking out the Well for its discussion groups but of course, one has to pay fees there.

best,
harriet

ps. For those who may be interested but haven't noticed, I abandoned my altplaya efforts when work matters severely constricted the amount of time I could spend on the project.

[III]

>>We have a bigger community that will continue to grow.

i'm not sure this is true. i can't find statistics under phpbb to back me up, but it seems that, despite having over 3000 registered users, the actual number of active participants is fewer than a couple dozen. to me it *feels* likie a smaller group of people, or perhaps just less participatory ones. i'm also willing to admit a bias towards the old interface, which may be slanting my views. still, despite those caveats, i'm not ready to admit that the current online eplaya community is larger or broader than the previous one.

[herself]

hey trey, for what it's worth, I think the 3playa forum provides an inviting place in which to exchange thoughts and ideas that may be, but are not necessarily, related to burning man. I understand that burning man seems to want to limit its bbs scope to the event itself and concerns therein but that's not what I came to the original eplaya for. I came to the eplaya to share and discuss ideas. I think the 3playa is a good place for that now, but I worry that its community may become somewhat inbred, through no one's fault.

The old burning man eplaya was a great forum because it invited such discussion, but also, since it was a burning man thing, to paraphrase electrolux, "you just never know when some random freak might show up." That was the charm of having an affiliation with burning man. Without that affiliation, the arrival of random freaks may become circumscribed. I just wonder if the random freaks that show up on this site now will feel inspired to participate, and I wonder whether such random freaks will find their way to the 3playa. And I regret the loss of hearing the thoughts of these random freaks, but oh well, life goes on.

hh

[Bob]

Based on my reading, uncircumscribed random freakishness will be Unwelcome or otherwise proscribed against on the post-User-Guideline eplaya (pUGplaya?).

We are told to keep a civil tongue in our mouths, and that it better be our own.

Where am I? After letting go my ISP in a randomly freakish fit of poverty, I am simply a Yahoo.

[herself]

Dear Bob,

Never mind that PM I sent you about orkut.
You would hate it. It's not a replacement for
the eplaya because you have to be "sponsored"
by someone else to post. It's ridiculous and flies
in the face of everything I (and I think you, and
perhaps even burning man itself) hold dear about
anti-exclusivity. So never mind. The feed-in of fresh
minds is undeniably important. Maybe there's hope
for the eplaya yet.

hh

[technopatra]

Harriet, it's great to see you here, but please stay on topic.

The user guidelines & TOS are finalized (for this iteration) and will be posted when Spanky gets back from outta town.

Trey, I dunno what the stats of "active" users vs. passive users are, but passive folks are truly as important to me. Many would become active if they weren't so afeared of the boards the last time they looked - whether it was pre- or post- phpbb install. If I had a nickel for everytime sometime told me they checked the boards they bailed becuase of the tone, I'd be able to pay myself a salary and get all this done way quicker.

That said, I agree that the active, repeat users does not appear to have significantly increased...will this change as we get our ducks in a row? I sure as hell hope so.

[III]

""passive folks are truly as important to me""

agreed. i'm not excluding lurkers, i'm just finding it hard to believe that there are 3000 regular visitors, but only a couple dozen active participants.

i don't see how you can claim that the community is larger now than it was a year ago, if the number of active participants has dropped, unless you have some way of showing that the number of people lurking has increased. (and i *don't* think that's something you want to do, because it would point out that incentives to actively participate have decreased since a year ago.)

i'm not questioning the effort or desire you've put into this. i am doubting, however, the effectiveness of the results so far...

[blyslv]

moribund
bereft
empty-space
vacuous
hectoring
do as I say
command and control
guide me
sucked dry
tempest in a teapot
bruised
deleted
banned
persona non grata
needs trump desire
lowest common denominator
only 30
callous indifference
non-topic
off-topic
tangenital
standards
organic community
like-minded
cat in bag?
concordance
serendipity
happy coincidence
absolutely clear
the tone of your voice
chip on the shoulder
fruit falls close to tree
as ye sow, so shall ye reap
run with sicsors
turn coat
lurkers
sockpuppets
noobs
no boobs
shifting sands
community standards
you can't
you can't
you can't
I know you are but what am I?
me too
<insert smiley>
look at me
touch me
affirm please
bollocks
lox
hopelessly contentious
confounded
confusing
too much
not enough
there she goes again
that's not how I read it
good luck
fare thee well
I know I can I know I can
I wish I may I wish I might
it's all good

[Tancorix]

So when are the rules going to be posted again? It's been so long now that I forgot the timeline. Do they still exist?

[III]

btw - i'm not trying to be antagonistic. when i said "so far", i meant it, and i still have hopes that something worthwhile will come out of this. and i think the guidelines are a small first step, and the mods are another, though they don't address the major issues, and the structural/navigational reorg will be yet another. even then, there is a social component that hasn't been addressed - i've got an idea of what wasn't liked about the old (previous) eplaya, i'm not sure what the intended replacement vision is...

[herself]

dear blyslv

Please stay on topic dearie!!!!!

best
harriet

[Bob]

We have met the topic, and they is us.

[Chai Guy]

(and i *don't* think that's something you want to do, because it would point out that incentives to actively participate have decreased since a year ago.)

Yeah, where's my toaster you guys promised me for 100 posts?

[Bob]

Fewer than 500 Chai posts, and I'm not much closer to 1000. Go figure.

Hmm. Some BBSs I have known had user time limits on access -- only a total of an hour or two a day, due to the limitations of dialup modem access, less robust servers, etc. I suppose it would be a bit of an anachronism in these days of unrestrained posting abilities.

[attydog]

I have no idea what the 8 pages of undoubted drivel say. The eplaya seems to be 'useful' ony to a dozen chatty friends. Democratic forums like this one will always crumble to the same ruin. I'd much rather see an autocracy in place.

[DVD Burner]

So now that some of the mods are in place and once the rules are in place what are those that like to complain about eplaya going to do.







I love eplaya.


P.S. the delete function works just as well in place of the edit function for right now.

[Guest]

i just reviewed the ToS agreement, clicked "I do not agree to these terms" and it put me back into the threads. my dissent to the ToS is legally covered, and i can still post.

sweet.

[precipitate]

Not exactly. The TOS to which you agreed when you created your
account were different. They also probably said something like, "We
reserve the right to change these at any time. You agree to abide by the
current set of rules or fuck off."

The links are on the TOS page because that's the thing you have to go
through to register. I bet if you click "I agree" you get an error because
you're not in the middle of the registration process, or you get a new
account screen. Lessee ... yep, you get an error saying your username
has already been taken.

It'd probably be good to have the links not show up if you're not actually
registering.

And I'd be willing to bet that legally you're still bound by whatever the current
terms are.