I agree with you, and I think this community is populated with enough good people that we could self-police pretty well if anyone disruptive showed up. Having the guidelines may be enough to signal to people who don’t agree that there may be other places more appropriate for them to hang out.
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I think it needs more explicit clause around anything illegal or promoting stuff illegal
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I agree that we don’t need it. And in this day, it would be a refreshing breath of days yore to omit the threatening words. If someone is surprised by their foul actions having consequences, that’s their problem. It’s not like we make people sign a contract before letting them walk out their front door into reality, but they still go to jail if they break the law.
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That might be a reasonable hedge against bad actors. It probably wouldn’t need more than a sentence like, “Illegal content is illegal here.”
Oh, and welcome to our community, @benoitj!
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I think I can change that discobot text, I don’t like the way its framed either.
I was just turning @ashraz’s drawing into a funny face…
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lol, now I see it… makes sense
Its also a way have a clear position, in some ways protect the community
And thanks @alphapapa 
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I have some opinions about the last few posts that have show up 
I agree, but I will say that to me this is an argument for having more explicit rather than implicit rules. It seems to me that people with good judgement and character will have no issue with rules made by other people with good judgement and good character, you will follow those naturally. (I may be wrong, I frequently am) The rules are there for 2 other reasons:
- Having explicit rules about what is and isn’t acceptable can be a message to people who frequently don’t feel welcome in places that they are welcome here. If you say nothing about what is unacceptable it’s hard for people to determine whether they want to take a risk on a community.
- As David said, it is a message to people without good judgement and character that they are not welcome and maybe shouldn’t even try. Unless they are willing to try and improve their judgement and character by following the guidelines set out.
Now of course there is already an established community here, so maybe the intent isn’t to grow a larger community and we don’t have to make people feel welcome. And maybe people will feel welcome anyway because when you watch David on stream I think you can’t help but see that he’s a nice person doing awesome things hanging out with awesome people.
But at that point, who does it hurt to have these rules in place?
Wouldn’t this follow the same logic as above? People (moderators in this case, I guess) with good judgement and character would not allow people with bad judgement and character to become moderators, or stay moderators if they did? I think miscreants will always try to play lawyer and weasel their way out of trouble guidelines or no, and it’s the strength of character of the moderators and community that will either allow them to fail or succeed? And the strength of character of the moderators and community I think is influenced by the guidelines set out.
Also I’m assuming the guidelines will not be set in stone. I’m sure they will be changed and adapted according to the situation one way or the other
Could I suggestion we add whose definition of illegal we go with? My first guess would be wherever the server is located, which I would guess as being the US.
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It should be wider. In practice, in many countries, laws of where you are, and of your own country applies even outside it’s border.
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Hmmm, good point, so what does that mean? What is the line here exactly?
I think that having a lot of rules doesn’t generally make people feel more comfortable. A list of rules is like a list of threats, and who feels comfortable with a list of threats hanging over their heads. It’s like going back to grade school and having a list of rules posted on the blackboard and hoping that you never accidentally break one of this teacher’s pet peeves.
In contrast, what happens when you walk into a friend’s home for dinner or a party? Do they present you with a runoff of rules, things to not say? Or do they say, “Welcome, friend, I’m glad you’re here. Enjoy yourself,” with the knowledge that they wouldn’t have invited you if they didn’t think you were a reasonably well-behaved person.
Which environment do we want to present here? Well, it’s up to David, but I would like to feel like this is a home-away-from-home, a place where like-minded people congregate, and they don’t need to be told how to behave.
In reality, the vast majority of human relations and interactions happen without established rules. If a person joins a new group of friends, they take cues from the behavior they’ve already seen–which has guided their decision to join in the first place.
Ultimately rules are meaningless, anyway, because what really matters is what the authority does when misbehavior happens. There are a million places with strict rules that enforce them strictly–except when the bad guy is a friend of the guy who runs the place. Then what good are they?
The bottom line is that rules won’t make this place better. Good people will. And good people don’t need rules; and bad people don’t obey them.
So I advocate for minimal rules, if any. Let our behavior be the example for others to follow, to see when they are deciding whether to participate, and to measure against when unsure if something is acceptable.
I agree with you in large part, but I also think that there are many different kinds of people who would be great members of the community who also wouldn’t mind to at least see a few guidelines to know up front how we prefer things to operate.
I’ve received a lot of great feedback from this thread already and soon I’m going to use it to streamline what was written in the guidelines before. My hope is that everyone will be satisfied with it and it won’t feel heavy-handed or overly prescriptive.
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Different stuff is illegal in different countries, just sayin’… Some prohibit having a radio that can receive a specific frequency, much less using the Internet. I wouldn’t add that clause without stating that it’s US/EU law.
And, generally speaking, laws are codified good ideas rather than self-contained commandments. Not having that clause isn’t a carte blanche to post CSAM or whatever.
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I like the discussion here. Even though personally I wouldn’t like there to be a large list of rules to adhere to, I do find it useful to have a clear message of what the forum is for vs IRC. For example David said here that the forum would be mostly on-topic, yet there was also a request to introduce yourself without specifying where, which could lead to many new posts any time new user joins. Clear intentions on what the goals of different communities are could be a nice part of the welcome message.
I read the Kind Communication Guidelines - GDQuest's guidelines again, and I think a link to them in here would be great. After all, rule #1 tells you to be kind, but the link gives you some pointers on the how. Maybe like this?
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Yeah, I think that’s right. I wouldn’t say I’m suggesting we have a lot of rules here, but rather make certain things explicit. I think there is plenty of evidence on the internet that suggests that the people who feel comfortable joining a space with no explicit rules and no evidence that they’ll follow through with enforcement are people who’ve always felt safe in those places.
That is an interesting take on it! I have to say that is definitely not how I would view it. But that is definitely a way that it could be used by certain people.
In the case of the kind of rules I’m advocating for I’d say I think they’re more like promises. Promises of “we won’t stand for someone attacking you based on this aspect of who you are”.
Yeah I agree. And I think it works well with the analogy I’ve used in the previous paragraph. Having rules and then not enforcing them is like making promises and then breaking them.
Yeah I think again you’re right here. But I think that good rules attract good people more than no rules do. Bad people will try to do bad things regardless, but the more good people there are the better we’re prepared to face them as a community.
We might mean different things when we say “minimal”, but yeah I don’t think we should want or need a long list of rules. To be fair maybe I haven’t made it clear about what sort of rules I’m suggesting. I just think that being explicit about disallowing certain behaviors that I’m sure we can agree on as being bad would be more welcoming to newcomers than asking them to take a chance on a lawless utopia. The idea would be that the rules would only tell us not to do things that we wouldn’t do naturally anyway, so they wouldn’t get in our way.
Maye I’m naive, and maybe you and I have different ideas about the goals of this forum and community. And maybe you have a better idea of it since you’ve been a more active member of this community for a longer time, whereas I’ve just been watching from the sidelines. I don’t know, Ultimately it seems like we want the same thing. You want people to feel welcome and I want people to feel welcome.
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I apologize for only quoting a few select words, but I find these words illustrate a fundamental problem in codifying behavior. This is in part why I think it might be easier to say something about what the community is about, encourage good behavior, and expect (take for granted, even?) that joining members are excellent people. From the gist of this thread, I’d say that’s something everyone seems to agree on.
A quick note on illegalities: if it’s illegal, it’s illegal, and to be dealt with by law enforcement. End of story. Perhaps some legal disclaimer is warranted (even required) in certain jurisdictions, I wouldn’t know as I’m not a lawyer. Beyond that, I think my recommendation would be to avoid getting into that topic at all.
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Alright, I think we’ve got a lot of feedback in this thread now, I really appreciate everyone taking the time to send their input!
I’m going to work on a new iteration of the guidelines this week and post the update probably Wednesday or Thursday after I take care of some more pressing business.
My goal with the new draft will be:
- Get rid of “enforcement”
- Focus more on what this community is about than talking specifically what we’re not about
- Provide (or link to) some tips on what friendly, respectful communication looks like
- Make it clear which parts of the community (forum, chat, streams) have a particular purpose and how they’re meant to be used
I’ll run back through all the feedback and integrate as much of it as we can. In the end, we should have a simple guidelines document that is co-authored by the community thanks to your feedback!
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