[Coco] Re: bit.listserv VS. these moderated lists

[John E. Malmberg]

[This and my immediately prior post were originally made to the gmane 
newsgroup yesterday and for unknown reasons have not shown up.
After this, I will make some test posts from gmane to see if they go 
through]

Dennis Bathory-Kitsz writes:

>> 
>> If you can assure the 'good part' will continue, I'd guess your
 >> suggestion is welcome news for everyone. Until John Malmberg can
>> resurrect the Princeton management to reconnect their mailing list
 >> gateway, here's what I would suggest:

If anyone is waiting for me to do that, they will have a long wait. :-)

John Malmberg is not doing anything with Princeton management or with 
the newsguy management.

John Malmberg is only posting the procedures that need to be done by 
someone with more time to get things done correctly and stable so that 
there will not be any nasty surprises.  Those posts seem to be either 
being mis-read or ignored.

The Princeton management requires that one of their faculty members or 
students sponser the mailing list and take full and active 
responsibilities for all issues with it.

I have no contacts with anyone that is even remotely close to 
Princeton.edu to lobby them to become such a sponser.

Technically the Princeton management also owns the bit.listserv.coco 
newsgroup which is managed by newsguy.com along with all the other 
bit.listserv newsgroups

Feeding it with a different mailing list with out their permission could 
be considered abuse by them or by newsguy.com if anyone (including the 
troll) filed an abuse complaint.  And newsguy.com could just start
either blocking the posts that came from an unauthorized gated list, or 
just delete the group altogether.  I have doubts that either would 
happen, but I can not expect the management of the server that I could 
run such a gateway to accept such a risk.

And as I have stated before.  If newsguy.com pulls the plug, the 
newsgroup is gone.

Now anyone here or on the former mailing list or still posting on the 
bit.listserv.coco has an equal non-existant standing as far as 
newsguy.com is concerned.  Only Princeton.edu has a right to say what 
can and can not be posted on bit.listserv.coco.  Of course it is quite 
possible that given the current state of confusion that Princeton does 
not realize this.  (Or even care)

It is highly likely that Princeton.edu and newsguy.com would agree to 
transfer the ownership of the bit.listserv.coco news group to a 
different COCO mailing list operator if there was a clear undisputed 
mandate.

However if the issue was disputed, then it could get messy.  When such a 
change is proposed in newsgroup ownership because the former owner has 
abandoned it, usually a posting is made on the newsgroup to see if there 
are any objections.  I do not know what happens if there are any.  The 
issues I have seen have basically passed unanimously.

 From what I can see of the politics and mis-representations about how 
this mailing list came into existence, there is a probability of a 
dispute of who should be designated an owner or co-owner of the 
bit.listserv.coco newsgroup, should it come to a public vote.

As far as I am concerned, I do not know if there is anyone on this forum 
that I would object to being a owner or moderator of a revitalized 
bit.listserv.coco.

I do not have the time or the energy to pursue the issue my self though.

Right now, what I am posting to is a mailing list/newsgroup where there 
is clear designation of who is responsible for the operation of it, and 
this is working quite well.

The main reason I would see to make sure that there is undisputed and 
active ownership of the bit.listserv.coco is to have a set of 
moderators, that if nothing else has the clear right to delete abusive 
postings or spam, or to install a moderator program like many other 
newsgroups use that prevents repetitive abuse.

I am reasonably sure that I could get permission from the management of 
encompasserve.org to have it run a auto-moderator script, and the 
advantage of that is that multiple members of this community can be set 
up to mind it and fix problems.

The prototype of the script has been running quite well since before 
Dennis started this list, and has only required a few tweaks to fully 
remove the troll.

-John
wb8tyw(at)qsl.net
Personal Opinion Only