Re: We have a troll

>> I can give you several just from the single libertarian (or whatever) forum
called, Free Republic. In between 'pledge drives', they would unceremoniously toss so many subscribers for saying the wrong thing by the standard of whatever moderator that month or year, who supported some rude clique, and however politely the offending opinion was stated, that entire sites and boards have been created from those tossed for various religious and political causes. I wonder if it was simply the same with Compu$erve, back when? <<

Yes and no, for the Compu$erve days. Each forum had a few moderators, who were volunteers. I was one for an SQL forum for a short time and spent a lot of time with "Food & Wine" back then. We had no manuals or guides, but just a vague mission to keep slander, profanity, porn, and evil out of "Virtural World" -- nobody was quite sure what the legal requirements were back then. Hell, we were still working on defining a culture, standardizing emoticons, TLA's and all that stuff!

But for every restrictive forum, there were several more that would invite opposing views, like a newspaper with a good editor. This was what passed for a Blog in those days (".. and then we invented dirt and the Stone Age came to an end!")

People have on-line personas that are not like the real person. I am much nicer in the flesh than I am with posters who want to get their homework/job done for them when they are too lazy to have even read a basic book on RDBMS. I also have the attitude that a Newsgroup is a corner bar, where we drink virtual beer and talk shop. If I want to be more formal, I submit an article to a magazine. If I want to be very formal, I submit a paper to a journal or a conference.

Another tip for measuring people. If you get to trade shows and conferences, you can ask people who have physically met the person about them. Better yet, ask the conference people about them. The Prima Donnas can be nice to their audience (i.e. possible clients), but they treat the conference staff like crap. Do you see them as servants or as partners or co-workers?

The "Good Guys", on the other hand, are good to everybody, all the time. We are the ones who bring an extra presentation with us, so that we can fill in when someone gets hit by a truck just before they were to present. Example: if you get a chance, buy Mr. Zackman a scotch. He has the credentials for a five star Prima Donna with his framework. But he has always been a Gentleman, always ready to step in and help.

Now talk to a conference staff member about Fabian; this will cost you another scotch :) Received on Thu Mar 23 2006 - 00:09:13 CET