Quality, and list discipline issues

[davewitley]

I should make clear before getting into the meat of this that I used 
to serve on the administrative team for HPFGU, but have not done so 
for over a year now.  This post therefore reflects experience but 
not authority or current practice.

I'll start with an observation.  When, from time to time, people 
raise the issue of the 'quality' of posting on the list, meaning the 
quality of the content, part of the response tends to be along the 
lines of "yeah, I know, I can't stand it when people don't 
snip/combine/attribute etc".  This response may miss the point of 
the original poster, but it does show that, where there is general 
dissatisfaction, a fair portion of it stems from relatively simple 
infraction of our posting conventions.

I do think, on the whole, we will make more progress if we keep the 
issue of content quality (where there is a significant body of 
opinion that there simply isn't a problem, or a problem worth 
bothering about, as far as I can see) distinct from the issue of 
list discipline, and address them separately.  I am not denying that 
getting discipline right has a knock-on effect on the more elusive 
content quality.

The rest of this post is about list discipline.  I will try to 
address content quality issues in another (hopefully much shorter) 
post.

1) Principles

I think we have to be careful in the way we perceive discipline 
issues.  It's easy to see, for example, poor snipping practice as a 
longstanding issue, and thus to deduce that there is a reservoir 
of 'bad posters' about whom something should be done.  ("We must do 
*something*.  This is something: therefore it must be done.")  Now, 
there may be a few of those, but I believe that the reality is more 
that there is a dynamic population who join the list and take time 
to get to grips with our conventions.  With approximately 10 people 
joining every day (check the homepage), it doesn't take a very large 
proportion to generate posts that appear to represent a significant 
problem.

If I'm right, then the thing to do is address the learning 
opportunites we provide and ask if they are the best they can be, 
within the natural constraints of administrative effort.  This 
chiefly concerns the moderated status of new members, and the 
guidance we give through welcome letters, etc.  The policy 
discussion is then likely to devolve to detailed matters such as the 
balance between rejecting and editing a pending post, the criteria 
for getting off (or being put back on) moderated status, etc.  It's 
hard for those of us not actually administering this process to 
contribute intelligently, but I think the experience of those only 
recently off moderated status is very valuable indeed, particularly 
whether they felt helped in understanding and complying with our 
list conventions.

2) Snipping

I would, however, like to say a bit about snipping, which I get the 
impression is the issue where poor practice most irritates other 
list members.

I often get the impression that many people genuinely struggle with 
with it, and, when faced with a long post to which they wish to give 
a short reply, don't know how to snip well.  They hardly snip at 
all, or, knowing that this can't be right, snip virtually 
everything, leaving the reader at sea.  We then tend to get rules of 
thumb suggested, like 'ensure that the quoted portion is about the 
same length as the reply', which in my view are unsatisfactory as 
they don't help the poster know *which* part to snip, and still lead 
to posts which feel unbalanced in terms of content.  They can also 
be plain wrong: sometimes the amount of original post needed to 
understand the response is much greater, or less, than the amount 
that is new.  They tend to fail to address more complex situations, 
such as the marshalling of quotes from a number of previous posters.

Here's what I do, which while it might be slightly harder work, is 
in my view simpler in principle than most of the rules of thumb, and 
more accurate in indicating what to snip.

The starting point is the rather obvious requirement that only that 
which is necessary to make the post comprehensible should be left: 
the rest should be snipped.  I'll just say that again: the principle 
that underlies good snipping is that that which is needed to make 
the post understood should be kept; all else is superfluous.  It's 
as simple as that.

So what I do is to read through each major section of the post I am 
replying to (including earlier quoted material) and ask myself "If 
this portion were removed, would my post still make sense?"  If the 
answer is 'yes', out it goes.  If the answer is 'no', then that does 
not mean the entire section remains, rather I then go through 
paragraph by paragraph, asking the same about each paragraph and 
again snipping the redundant ones.  If after removing redundant 
sections and paragraphs, the quoted material seems long, I try it 
with sentences within paragraphs, and even clauses or words within 
sentences.  Usually I don't feel I have to go as far as editing 
sentences (and of course one has to be careful not to distort the 
original meaning) but I have done it many times.

The end result should be a post in which pretty well every word of 
the quoted material counts as far as the post as a whole is 
concerned.  After a while, it has become virtual second nature, and 
I usually know before I start writing my own material which bits of 
a long post I am actually addressing.  In fact, I usually know what 
I am responding to, and so don't have to re-read the other bits; I 
just snip them anyway.

I hope that helps.

3) Universal moderated status

My understanding of Kneasy and Caroline's proposal that posts be 
reviewed is that it is essentially moderated status for all 
members.  Posts would be reviewed only for compliance with list 
conventions, not for whether their content is worthy of the august 
intellectual space that is HPFGU.  I get the impression that there 
is very little enthusiasm for this proposal, either from list 
members or the list-elves, so what I am about to say may be 
redundant.  If I have this wrong, please let me know.

I think that, when the list-elves pointed out that this proposal 
would add unacceptably to the administrative load, that is 
technically true but a little misleading as to the real cost of this 
proposal.  Yes, more man-hours would be required to review, approve, 
edit, or reject posts, but that is not why this proposal would be 
hideous to administer.  The problem, as I see it, is administrative 
stress and conflict, not ergonomic workload.

I am of the opinion that even moderated status for newbies generates 
quite a lot of stress for the list-elves, and tends to act both to 
stimulate and exacerbate conflict within the administrative team.  I 
think moderated status for all list members would make that a whole 
lot worse.

The reason for this is that to reject a post, or to edit it, is 
never easy.  This is particularly the case with borderline posts, 
which may contain a lot that is good.  Posters justly identify with 
their posts, and tend to take rejection personally, as everyone here 
who has been through the moderated process can testify.  Fine 
judgements have to be made, and different elves will take a 
different view, with results that will then be apparent onlist.  A 
rejection letter has to be written to accompany a rejected post, and 
if a post is edited, it is essential that a letter explaining what 
has been done and why be sent, otherwise the poster will learn 
nothing.  You should try it: if you think it is easy, or that it 
would be quite fun to whip these newbies into shape, then I think 
you are very definitely bad list-elf material.

I think all this generates considerable stress for the elf team.  
Moreover, pending posts, over time, have a way of forcing the list-
elves to consider exactly what is and is not fit for the list - to 
what extent the movies can be mentioned; what language counts as 
offensive; how much fanfic material can be included, and so on.  
(This is of course not wholly a bad thing.)  Because there is a real 
live pending post requiring a decision, and a rapid decision at 
that, stress and conflict when the elves (who are themselves posters 
with an interest in the movies, fanfic, etc.) address them is 
inevitable.  However, if an unmoderated post that is borderline in 
one of these respects makes it to the list, all the elves have to do 
is note it: the chances are at least ten to one that the post will 
not become a precedent, and the whole thing can be forgotten.  If a 
definite trend begins to occur on the list, then it becomes easier 
for the team to agree about heading it off and to use ADMIN notices 
and offlist reminders to control the problem.

For dealing with newbies, who mostly do recognise that they are 
learning the ropes, this is probably a price worth paying - just.

It should be obvious by now how much more difficult this would be if 
established posters, who probably regard themselves as the equals of 
the list-elves, are subjected to this process.  I think the elves 
would be subjected to complaints of unequal treatment, of having 
changed the rules because there was no problem with the type of post 
back in 2002, of rejecting posts because they themselves are party 
to the thread in question, of not posting themselves to the same 
standard, of using the review delay to get their own posts in 
first... the list is endless.  Some of these complaints would almost 
certainly arise from within the administrative team, as elves look 
at each other's decisions, leading to conflict.  I also suspect that 
the additional numbers of elves needed might lead to the situation 
where a substantial minority is seen as sitting in judgement on the 
rest, with substantial representation in actual posts from both 
groups.

I think it would be an administrative nightmare.

Finally, I'll just add that any new rule, such as the one about 
individual daily posting limits, tends to generate unexpected new 
situations that have to be considered by the team, and that is a 
consideration to bear in mind.

David