Re: Sergeant at arms: please deal with [e-mail]

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Tuesday, October 22, 2013 21:21 +0000 Ted Lemon
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> On Oct 22, 2013, at 4:55 PM, Randy Bush <[e-mail]> wrote:
>> i am a bit taken aback by the vigilantism.  
>> 
>> it was just an email message, and a factual one at that.  the
>> usual example is _falsely_ shouting "fire" specifically
>> because it can cause *actual* *physical* *harm*.  get a
>> delete key.  get procmail.  get a grip.
> 
> Right, that's not the policy.   If that were the policy, a
> number of notorious abusers of the mailing list would still
> have posting privileges.
> 
> If the first message had been the beginning of a conversation,
> I would have taken it a lot differently, but the way it was
> dropped on the list with no discussion, it just looked like an
> attempt to start a massive flame war.   That's exactly the
> sort of thing that the sergeant-at-arms is supposed to deal
> with.

Ted, that is, IMO, an entirely reasonable comment about
inappropriate content, but, even then, our normal practice is
for the sergeant-at-arms or some other appropriate parties to
discuss and warn (usually and preferably in private first), not
take preemptive action.  "Discuss and warn first" may be a
first-order approximation to Randy's observation about due
process, or at least part of it.

The other thing that may make this situation special is that
several people are convinced that, despite the new address, the
person who made the posting is a serial (or, in your terms,
"notorious") abuser who has been banned from IETF lists before.
If that is actually the case, then preemptive action to prevent
further postings is appropriate, possibly including initiating
the RFC 3683 procedure and being done with this.

But none of that has anything to do with anonymity.  

I think it is reasonable to expect that, if the sergeant-at-arms
concludes that public action is necessary, that action and the
reasoning for it be carefully and precisely explained and even
adjusted for the record after the fact if the explanation wasn't
quite right.  If nothing else, getting the right documentation
in place is very important should anyone ever decide to
initiation a 3683-style global posting rights action.

I do not intend to criticize Jordi in any of this.  We
(fortunately) rarely have the provocation and need to do this.
We need to rely on good judgment rather than collections of
specific-seeming rules that would, themselves, be likely sources
of controversy and his judgment has generally been good.  We
should, however, all try to learn from experience, including
this one.

And, fwiw, I think we should try to see what can be learned that
might apply to harassment complaints.  By their nature, IMO,
those complaints are much more likely to be subjective and
difficult than whether someone has abused or improperly used a
mailing list.

   best,
   john