[TowerTalk] New "management"

[Pete Smith]

I've volunteered to take over from Steve as administrator of the Towertalk
reflector.  I hope that most of the job will involve mundane duties like
managing the mailing list to delete addresses that, for one reason or
another, have permanently stopped working.

The reflector is set up so that most if not all spam will bounce to me,
where I can delete it.  Bill has also set up a list of filter words that is
intended to bounce mail on off-topic threads and objectionable discussions
to me, for a human decision on whether they go on to the list or not.  As
I've told Bill, I'm very uncomfortable with censorship, and realize that
filtering can have unintended consequences, so I'll be feeling my way with
the filter word list and will tend to lean hard over in the direction of
the free exchange of views.

I do have one strong bias, though -- I think that we can have active,
vociferous disagreements on the substance of things without getting
personally insulting.  Ppersonal insults have no place on this reflector.
There's all the difference in the world between "I totally disagree with
you [followed by technical argument]..." and "What a stupid message" or
"How dumb can you get..."  If I can see the difference, I'm sure you all
can, too.  

I intend to e-mail directly to individuals who get out of line, asking them
to follow the rules.  If a given thread seems to be getting too far afield
from the reflector's purpose, as expressed in the FAQ, expect to see a
message from me to the main participants or to the reflector suggesting
that enough is enough.  I will only short-stop messages or unsubscribe
people as absolute last resorts.

Please consider whether you reply to a reflector posting by direct e-mail
or via the reflector.  Some responses are of only interest to the
questioner or a small group of readers, and probably don't warrant the
bandwidth used by sending them to the entire reflector.  Others cry out for
broader distribution.  Just give it a moment's thought before you decide
which "reply" button to hit.

Comments welcome by DIRECT E-mail.  Let's see how things go, and judge by
results over the next month or two...

Thanks!   

73,  Pete Smith N4ZR
In wild, wonderful, only middlin' rare WEST Virginia



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