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When we unite against a common enemy that attacks our ethos, it nurtures group solidarity. Trolls are sensational, yes, but we keep everyone honest. | Game Memorial
My review of customer service on SMF
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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ethankcvds
- Good news I finally have a new computer. Bad news I have to RMA the memory got a bad stick of RAM.
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You mean 'Death On Two Legs' from A Night At The Opera? That's not 'considered' a hate song, it's fairly clearly so :P The real trick is knowing who it was 'dedicated to...' ;)* Arantor is such a Queen fan, he even tracked down that truly, truly awful game based on Queen's music.
Thing is, that was 3 years ago and not really a lot has changed in that time. http://www.elkarte.net/index.php?topic=310.0 is also well worth the read.
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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Yeah I was referring to Death on Two Legs. Ex Manager Norman (I forgot what his last name is) if I'm not mistaken.
I was reading that yesterday and I agree with a few of the things that TestMonkey(Norv?) said.
xrunner
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Drafts! Duh! OK not used to that luxury ... :wow:Quote from Arantor on May 2nd, 2013, 02:39 AM Will do. I got some catching up to do.Quote Ha! Well I'll be. Out of the mouths of babes - so to speak.
Sure I'll continue to read along and play with the knobs as I see them.
One idea I've implemented on several forums (using the built-in permissions and such) is what I've called on one forum "The Asbestos-Lined room" on another "The Emergency Room" and on my current forum "The Isolation Tank". I think you are familiar with the concept. Instead of banning a member or placing them in moderation I send them to a board that is the only board they can see when logged in. This until they either understand how to behave (after being grilled by the other members) or, if they don't cooperate, get banned. Sometimes it works when other methods fail. I don't know if that could be a built-in option for moderation. A check box that would implement such a "room". Just an idea to kick around. For my type of forum "customers" it comes in really handy.
Topics like http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=498218.0 are the tail-end of it. It's all documented either here or on Noisen as to what happened and why we felt uncomfortable with things going the way they are going.Quote There must be (and from what I've read is) a lot of history leading up to this.
Thing is, that was 3 years ago and not really a lot has changed in that time. http://www.elkarte.net/index.php?topic=310.0 is also well worth the read.
The biggest thing I'd say is read up on what's going on, feel free to ask about any features you think would be useful (or that you miss in other systems, or just that would be useful to your community and that might benefit others)... for example I found an old topic of yours that gave me some interesting thoughts. I don't know that what I have planned will entirely resolve it but I certainly agree the tools are not up to the job as they stand.
Sure I'll continue to read along and play with the knobs as I see them.
One idea I've implemented on several forums (using the built-in permissions and such) is what I've called on one forum "The Asbestos-Lined room" on another "The Emergency Room" and on my current forum "The Isolation Tank". I think you are familiar with the concept. Instead of banning a member or placing them in moderation I send them to a board that is the only board they can see when logged in. This until they either understand how to behave (after being grilled by the other members) or, if they don't cooperate, get banned. Sometimes it works when other methods fail. I don't know if that could be a built-in option for moderation. A check box that would implement such a "room". Just an idea to kick around. For my type of forum "customers" it comes in really handy.
My Forum - Atheist Think Tank
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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Drafts! Duh! OK not used to that luxury ... :wow:
Will do. I got some catching up to do.
Ha! Well I'll be. Out of the mouths of babes - so to speak.
I think you are familiar with the concept. Instead of banning a member or placing them in moderation I send them to a board that is the only board they can see when logged in.
Board access underwent a huge overhaul. Access to boards is not a straight per-group yes/no any more, and hasn't been for a while. Firstly, seeing a board and entering a board are two separate things (by design), you can see a board without being able to enter it, good for paid subscriptions type boards perhaps. (The message shown for those boards defaults to 'This board is off limits to you" but is customisable.) The reverse is also true, it is possible to enter a board without it being on the board index if so configured.
Secondly, and perhaps more relevantly, it is possible to deny sight/access to boards to groups. So a troublemaker group can easily exist, can easily be 'deny access to all boards except <this one>'. But I'm a bit leery of implementing it, I just don't know why.
Hmm, that gives me another idea for infractions but there really is no good way to implement that cleanly at this juncture (I'm thinking that one of the infraction penalties would be 'restrict access to the Sin Bin board' or whatever it's called but that presents a variety of other matters that are troublesome from a UI standpoint as well as a logical standpoint (but certainly not insurmountably so, perhaps as a plugin)
Kindred
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well I'll say this, Arantor, Norv is at least consistent in her delusions. 90% of her post is delusional ramblings and is incorrect in the general and the specifics. About the only thing she has right is the current state of development (unfortunately)
then again, her constant poison does kinda taint the waters even when people want to consider helping out.
then again, her constant poison does kinda taint the waters even when people want to consider helping out.
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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And I'll say this - you are consistent in your denial of the state of affairs. Like it or not, she's more right than wrong in this whole sorry state of affairs. I wonder what the SFLC will say in response to her comments to them about it.
Your constant denial and pretending that half the issues aren't present or aren't important taints the waters too. That entire fandango today that Yoshi raised, and the way it was handled by the people in charge, that taints the waters too. It's not for nothing that so many people who 'can do' have all upped and left over the years, far more than the usual churn that is expected with F/OSS development.
How many people on the project and/or organisation actually have contributed to *other* established F/OSS projects? How many people have any idea what it's like to do so?
Your constant denial and pretending that half the issues aren't present or aren't important taints the waters too. That entire fandango today that Yoshi raised, and the way it was handled by the people in charge, that taints the waters too. It's not for nothing that so many people who 'can do' have all upped and left over the years, far more than the usual churn that is expected with F/OSS development.
How many people on the project and/or organisation actually have contributed to *other* established F/OSS projects? How many people have any idea what it's like to do so?
xrunner
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I'm slightly hesitant to straight-up implement that, though I'm not entirely sure why.
If they have to confront their peers (regular members) and can't blow it off, they will sometimes "get it". Now of course all this may be over-featureizing your design which is a very real concern. But even if you don't want to do it, it may lead to a new idea. I'm full of ideas if nothing else. :hmm:
I'm not a php guru, but I have seen the best and worst of forum politics, and had to deal with some very nasty situations. After all, isn't this interaction between people what it's all about? :)
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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Oh, the concept of having a place to blow off steam that won't materially affect the rest of the forum populace is fairly well understood as a concept. I don't have a problem with the concept as a whole, I have a problem with one-click-ifying that concept. Right now it is fully possible to implement as a manual thing (create the group, create the board, set the access, manually move people to that group as needed)
I'm aware there is already the setup for a 'ban' group as it is, which is a group users get moved to when fully banned. Mostly for the visual aspect (since it's possible to format users by their primary group, and that is more than just colour, it's bold, italic, underline, strikethrough or any, short, otherwise arbitrary CSS), so the concept of a sin bin group is not unfamiliar to me and as I said, there's already some precedent in the design for it. But I'm just hesitant - and I don't know why (and I don't like not knowing why I don't like something!)
PHP doesn't really come into it much, most of this work is little more than cloning the ban group logic which is small enough in itself really.
I'm aware there is already the setup for a 'ban' group as it is, which is a group users get moved to when fully banned. Mostly for the visual aspect (since it's possible to format users by their primary group, and that is more than just colour, it's bold, italic, underline, strikethrough or any, short, otherwise arbitrary CSS), so the concept of a sin bin group is not unfamiliar to me and as I said, there's already some precedent in the design for it. But I'm just hesitant - and I don't know why (and I don't like not knowing why I don't like something!)
PHP doesn't really come into it much, most of this work is little more than cloning the ban group logic which is small enough in itself really.
Kindred
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Arantor,
I don't DENY any state of affairs.
I DENY her accusations which are delusional.
Neither the org nor the project has "chased away" any members, developers or otherwise.
neither the org nor the project has told any developers how to code
neither the org nor the project has tried to take away anyone's right to their own code or "steal" copyright.
SM does not claim copyright to any individual code.
SM claims copyright to the work as a whole, compiled piece. The copyright statement was correctly updated to reflect copyright held by SM and individual contributors.
SHE is the one who illegally changed/removed the copyright statement. (and I will note, she did so after resigning from the lead dev position the organization and the team - so she had no right to change anything. yes, someone should have gotten around to fixing her commit rights before then, but that's a different matter)
(and we never said that developers must assign copyright to the corporation. We stated that the corporation owns the copyright to the compiled work, seeing as how the lead developer has final say on what code is included - and the lead developer is acting for the project and the corporation in that role (it's not an individual, it's a role which can be and has been held by many individuals over the course of the software))
and the org server and site teams have never denied access to resources for actual needs - for random and ill-thought meaderings, yes...for actual, conceived and stated purposes, no.
(and I'll note that, when Norv was granted root access to certain servers, she abused that access)
I don't DENY any state of affairs.
I DENY her accusations which are delusional.
Neither the org nor the project has "chased away" any members, developers or otherwise.
neither the org nor the project has told any developers how to code
neither the org nor the project has tried to take away anyone's right to their own code or "steal" copyright.
SM does not claim copyright to any individual code.
SM claims copyright to the work as a whole, compiled piece. The copyright statement was correctly updated to reflect copyright held by SM and individual contributors.
SHE is the one who illegally changed/removed the copyright statement. (and I will note, she did so after resigning from the lead dev position the organization and the team - so she had no right to change anything. yes, someone should have gotten around to fixing her commit rights before then, but that's a different matter)
(and we never said that developers must assign copyright to the corporation. We stated that the corporation owns the copyright to the compiled work, seeing as how the lead developer has final say on what code is included - and the lead developer is acting for the project and the corporation in that role (it's not an individual, it's a role which can be and has been held by many individuals over the course of the software))
and the org server and site teams have never denied access to resources for actual needs - for random and ill-thought meaderings, yes...for actual, conceived and stated purposes, no.
(and I'll note that, when Norv was granted root access to certain servers, she abused that access)
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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Neither the org nor the project has "chased away" any members, developers or otherwise.
You do realise there are other ways you can push someone out of a project without visibly appearing to do so, right? Cast your mind back to 2009 when I joined the team. Bryan and I didn't get along to start with. Then I realised that there was a problem: he was suggesting things and no-one was listening because it was him saying them, not because the ideas were bad. So late 2009 I started reiterating some of Bryan's ideas. Only now they were good ideas because it wasn't Bryan saying them.
Is that not pushing Bryan out of the project to some degree? Wait, wasn't he actually kicked out of the project at one time?
Oh I must be mistaken, no-one was ever kicked out of the project. Oh and January 2010 NEVER HAPPENED.
neither the org nor the project has told any developers how to code
neither the org nor the project has tried to take away anyone's right to their own code or "steal" copyright.
See, I'd listen to what you were saying if it weren't for the fact that YOU PERSONALLY told me I did not have the right to EDIT MY OWN FUCKING POSTS on sm.org at one point in time claiming they were under the CLA, because at the time the only method I had to protest what was going on in a way that could actually make a difference was by removing my own posts, because that was the only thing I had left. Then I didn't even have the right to edit or remove my own posts.
Yes, that happened, folks. And Kindred HIMSELF was the one who moved me into a group that revoked those rights as well as being the one who told me about it.
And that's not pushing me out of the project in any fashion? No, I suppose in your world that's not a method of pushing someone away.
SM does not claim copyright to any individual code.
SM claims copyright to the work as a whole, compiled piece. The copyright statement was correctly updated to reflect copyright held by SM and individual contributors.
The fact you STILL AFTER ALL THIS TIME DO NOT UNDERSTAND what we are trying to tell you is so saddening.
So you want to copy Apache. Fine, that makes sense. Except the bulk of the people in the Apache Foundation are contributors to the projects too. I don't see much contribution from SM to SM's actual project code. Unlike Apache.
SHE is the one who illegally changed/removed the copyright statement. (and I will note, she did so after resigning from the lead dev position the organization and the team - so she had no right to change anything. yes, someone should have gotten around to fixing her commit rights before then, but that's a different matter)
I would add, though, that it has prompted a necessary review and change that would not have occurred if she had not done so.
(and we never said that developers must assign copyright to the corporation. We stated that the corporation owns the copyright to the compiled work, seeing as how the lead developer has final say on what code is included - and the lead developer is acting for the project and the corporation in that role (it's not an individual, it's a role which can be and has been held by many individuals over the course of the software))
and the org server and site teams have never denied access to resources for actual needs - for random and ill-thought meaderings, yes...for actual, conceived and stated purposes, no.
(and I'll note that, when Norv was granted root access to certain servers, she abused that access)
The sad truth is that I'm wasting my time and energy telling you and the rest of the projanisation[1] this because you stopped listening a long time ago. I only respond to this to add the alternative point of view for those playing along at home.
| 1. | Not a typo. There is a real inability to differentiate the two because most of the members of one are members of the other and vice versa. Meaning that there's not really any need to have both. |
Kindred
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I actually did read the whole thing. :)
yeah... the whole deleting posts thing was a clusterfuck... I agree with that. Everyone was pissy and everyone was acting inappropriately at the time. (oh, and for the record, I was the mouthpiece, but I was actually expressing the will of the team at that point, including Norv, IIRC. but that's beside the point...
Anyway.... you are right. The bitching about the change from a CLA to the DCO was probably not needed. However, several of us felt that Norv had acted dishonestly in her justification for the switch.
You are right, there are many forms of contribution other than just "code". Heck, I have literally put thousands of dollars of my own money into the project. Admittedly, I have since been repaid - but there was never any assurance that would happen. Many of us (including you) have put YEARS of effort and attention into the project.
The team did not chase Illori away. As a matter of fact, many of us begged her to stay. There were some personality conflicts between her method and those who disagreed with her that she felt were insoluble - but to the bets of my knoweldge no one "Chased her out"
Yes, we have had two people (three?) removed from the team - 2 of them for fairly serious infractions.
I don't count them, because they were in violation of basic ethical guidelines, let alone the team agreement.
(heck even Runic admits that he kinda deserved it - just as he deserved the second chance once he cleared up some of his personal issues) but we never chased Norv away. I actually quite the org and the team so they could keep her, when it became clear that she could not work in any proximity to me. I only came back after she abandoned the project(s).
As for Norv contacting the SFLC... well, I don't know what they told her, but based on her rantings, I have to assume that the information which she provided to them was as slated in the other direction as she accused us of doing. (do note, I have not been privy to ANY of the communications to the SFLC on any side, per request of the SFLC itself, only the board was privy to the specific communications)
yeah... the whole deleting posts thing was a clusterfuck... I agree with that. Everyone was pissy and everyone was acting inappropriately at the time. (oh, and for the record, I was the mouthpiece, but I was actually expressing the will of the team at that point, including Norv, IIRC. but that's beside the point...
Anyway.... you are right. The bitching about the change from a CLA to the DCO was probably not needed. However, several of us felt that Norv had acted dishonestly in her justification for the switch.
You are right, there are many forms of contribution other than just "code". Heck, I have literally put thousands of dollars of my own money into the project. Admittedly, I have since been repaid - but there was never any assurance that would happen. Many of us (including you) have put YEARS of effort and attention into the project.
The team did not chase Illori away. As a matter of fact, many of us begged her to stay. There were some personality conflicts between her method and those who disagreed with her that she felt were insoluble - but to the bets of my knoweldge no one "Chased her out"
Yes, we have had two people (three?) removed from the team - 2 of them for fairly serious infractions.
I don't count them, because they were in violation of basic ethical guidelines, let alone the team agreement.
(heck even Runic admits that he kinda deserved it - just as he deserved the second chance once he cleared up some of his personal issues) but we never chased Norv away. I actually quite the org and the team so they could keep her, when it became clear that she could not work in any proximity to me. I only came back after she abandoned the project(s).
As for Norv contacting the SFLC... well, I don't know what they told her, but based on her rantings, I have to assume that the information which she provided to them was as slated in the other direction as she accused us of doing. (do note, I have not been privy to ANY of the communications to the SFLC on any side, per request of the SFLC itself, only the board was privy to the specific communications)
Arantor
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You are right, there are many forms of contribution other than just "code". Heck, I have literally put thousands of dollars of my own money into the project. Admittedly, I have since been repaid - but there was never any assurance that would happen. Many of us (including you) have put YEARS of effort and attention into the project.
We have some code in Wedge that was not written by Nao or myself. The notifications subsystem, as well as miscellaneous components (like jQuery).
In the case of jQuery, even though it is bundled, even though it is distributed with Wedge, it is not technically part of Wedge and even though our editorial decision was to bundle it, it is not legally under our copyright, nor can we claim it is part of the package for this reason.
In the case of Dragooon's notifications system... that's trickier. He originally put in a Wedge header listing copyright to the project, but technically that's not correct. It's copyrighted to him, and licensed to us via BSD. We do not and cannot hold copyright on it except for the changes we've made to it, and we cannot technically even claim copyright on the totality of the work for this reason because no aspect of copyright *law* grants us that right.
Remember, the BSD doesn't even allow us to remove SMF's copyright per se. We are still required to acknowledge it which is why it is important that it is correct. Though as stated, I'm not sure SM holds the copyright. I still believe it is the SMF contributors as a totality who hold that copyright since no copyright assignation was given to SM, only a licence to use the code.
See, you call Norv delusional but I'm really not sure she is.[1] I'd contact IP lawyers myself for clarity but I can't seem to find any in the UK that have experience in dealing with software IP.
I am still not convinced that SM can truly claim editorial capacity over SMF's code. Nao and I can make that claim for Wedge because we're not just platform stewards so to speak, we do not act in a primarily editorial capacity.
Nuts and bolts: was Norv ever officially a member of the NPO? What about Spuds or emanuele?
See, this is where it gets really complicated. For SM NPO to be able to claim editorial stance, I don't see how it can unless people who are members of SM NPO are the ones making the editorial changes. While the lead dev is a position appointed by the project, nothing the project does is automatically or magically transferred to the NPO.
For the sake of simplicity, let us assume that every person signed the stock CLA to the NPO. That CLA grants the NPO the right to use contributions. Not the right to claim ownership of them in any fashion, but simply the right to use them without any ability to remove them. Essentially it is the same as me agreeing I can't remove my own posts.
For SM NPO to claim editorial stance, members of the NPO in a duly appointed position need to be the ones accepting new patches, and not accepting others. Not the project team, but members of the NPO. Now, I don't know exactly who is and who isn't in the NPO but as per emanuele's post, a significant proportion of the team are not NPO members.
Now it is entirely possible that there are people performing the editorial role at this time under the NPO umbrella.
However, when the project was relicensed to BSD, was Norv a member then? Because if she wasn't, I do not see how SM can actually claim an editorial copyright at all - because it doesn't hold any copyright, not even editorial stance. Contributions were not given to SM, but licensed to them, and the terms of that licence indicated firmly that copyright was not transferred.
If Norv was not a member, then the situation is simply that it is still copyrighted to SMF contributors, not SM NPO, and edited under licence. SM's copyright is at that point almost a matter of sophistry.
If Norv was a member, that changes things somewhat. It is still copyrighted to SMF contributors above all else, and contributions were licensed to SM, but the position of editorial stance is somewhat more tenable. Though the copyright clearly needs to indicate contributors and I'd even argue it should indicate the licensing situation (that contributions were licensed to SM). The entire thing's a clusterfuck, no argument.
The team did not chase Illori away. As a matter of fact, many of us begged her to stay. There were some personality conflicts between her method and those who disagreed with her that she felt were insoluble - but to the bets of my knoweldge no one "Chased her out"
Yes, we have had two people (three?) removed from the team - 2 of them for fairly serious infractions.
I don't count them, because they were in violation of basic ethical guidelines, let alone the team agreement.
Also don't forget TE who felt he could not contribute as a developer unless he became part of the NPO but was not able to do that due to other matters.
| 1. | Though it's an ad-hominem attack and I'd hope you were better able to construct an argument than that. |
Kindred
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well, I find it hard to be any sort of unemotional when Norv is involved. She has frequently attacked me directly and personally (admittedly, and I her) Anyway, that's beside the point.
I don't quite agree with your belief that the lead dev (aka the primary editorial controller) needs to be an NPO member. The PROJECT exists under the NPO and all assets belong to the NPO for use by, for and with the project(s). However, yes, Norv was not only an NPO member, she was also a member of the board from day 1.
I don't quite agree with your belief that the lead dev (aka the primary editorial controller) needs to be an NPO member. The PROJECT exists under the NPO and all assets belong to the NPO for use by, for and with the project(s). However, yes, Norv was not only an NPO member, she was also a member of the board from day 1.
Arantor
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- As powerful as possible, as complex as necessary.
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well, I find it hard to be any sort of unemotional when Norv is involved. She has frequently attacked me directly and personally (admittedly, and I her) Anyway, that's beside the point
I don't quite agree with your belief that the lead dev (aka the primary editorial controller) needs to be an NPO member.
The PROJECT exists under the NPO and all assets belong to the NPO for use by, for and with the project(s).
Do you *own* Windows on your computer? No, you do not. You own a licence to use it on your computer. Do you *own* Linux on your server? No, you do not. You own a licence to use it on your server.
Just as I don't own SMF. I own a licence to use its code. You don't own SMF. You own a licence to use its code.
SM does not own its code. It owns a licence to use that code. That is what the CLA grants, and that's all it grants, once you distil the wording. The DCO is pretty explicit in this point, actually.
I own the things I make myself. I own large parts of Wedge's code. Nao owns large parts of Wedge's code. We don't own the totality of Wedge's code, we have a licence to use it in the way we are using it. The licence even permits us to relicence it but only on the totality of the work, even if we go closed source, the reality is that we're only relicensing our changes on top of SMF as a distributed work also incorporating other projects in conjunction with their licensing terms.