RFC: #ubuntu op misuse or not?

[Rohan Dhruva]

Hello Terence,

Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my email. All your
points are well taken, and I appreciate it.

On Fri, May 16, 2014 at 10:37 PM, Terence Simpson <tsimpson at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> Hello Rohan.
>
> I'm going to try and reply the points you made in this email. And
> then, in another email thread, I'm going to expand a little on some of
> the issues you raise.
>
> On 16 May 2014 07:45, Rohan Dhruva <rohandhruva at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi ubuntu-irc,
>>
>> I hang on out #ubuntu as "rohan", generally a lurker -- once in a while I
>> ask questions and answer things I know.
>>
>> Today, I encountered something I found disturbing. There was a
>> misunderstanding between two users, and an op decided to silence one of
>> them. The discussion was civil (no swearing or flooding), but also
>> off-topic. I feel silencing a user in this case is overreaching and rude --
>> especially a user who might have been new to the IRC community (and maybe
>> new to Ubuntu itself).
>>
> The way we use quiets (+q) in the Ubuntu channels is as a measure to
> protect the channel from some continuing disruption. The idea being
> that we can talk to the user in private or in #ubuntu-ops while
> preventing them from continuing to disrupt the channel.
>
>> On complaining about this in the channel, I was directed to to talk in
>> #ubuntu-ops, which I joined and then stopped talking on #ubuntu. On the -ops
>> channel (which is logged), I had a few heated words exchanged with the op
>> who originally took the wrong action (in my opinion). Eventually, it boils
>> down to whether words like "blitzkrieg" and "dictator" are offensive or not.
>>
> Well I think you can agree that any name-calling is going to be
> counter productive. Respect is at the core of the Ubuntu community and
> any kind of personal attack is really just not acceptable. Although I
> can understand your frustration and the points you were trying to
> make, resorting to that only damages your side of the debate.
>

I agree with you, and the sentiments expressed by others regarding
name calling.

>> Since the logs are public[1][2], I'll cut a long story short: the op chose
>> to ban me from #ubuntu for a week. This was without me talking in #ubuntu or
>> provoking drama in the main channel at all. The reason given was that I was
>> likely to misbehave in #ubuntu, without there having been any evidence of
>> having done so. As the logs will show, I tried to make my point in various
>> ways, sometimes being drawn out. In interest of list readers' time, I can
>> summarise the ensuing discussion as unfruitful and borderline hostile -- in
>> (large) part due to my own insistence of remaining in the channel. I was
>> unequivocally told to leave the channel at multiple times, with various
>> people suggesting I get a life, or my insistent complaining as pathetic.
>>
> No one seems to have come forward with this, but in team discussions
> regarding what happened we've come to the consensus that the ban on
> you was a mistake and should not have happened.
> Although the discussion in #ubuntu-ops wasn't exactly civil, I (and
> others) see no reason to believe it was likely to spill over into
> #ubuntu.
>

Thank you for that update, I appreciate it. I agree with you that the
discussion was not as civil as it could have been, and I take my share
of responsibility for it.

>> I apologise for an already long email (but as people in the channel will
>> tell you, it's much shorter than reading the whole scrollback!).. but here
>> are the things I wanted to request members' views and comments on:
>>
>> * Is it ok to stifle discussion by silencing one person when an argument
>> seems to be happening in the channel, under the pretext of avoiding drama?
> If someone is continuing an argument after being asked to stop etc, yes.
>> ** This is also against the guidelines of when to ban/kick a person -- there
>> was no flooding, nor were there any swear words or unappealing language.
> The guidelines are not the only circumstances an op is allowed to act,
> preventing disruption to the normal flow of the channel is the primary
> purpose of having operators.
>

You have addressed this in your follow-up email and put it in much
better words than I could have myself.

>> * Is it ok for an op to ban someone in the main #ubuntu channel for
>> discussion happening in a completely separate channel?
> Generally, no that's not OK.
> If an operator has a reasonable belief that someone intends to disrupt
> another channel then it's reasonable to act to prevent that. I think
> that's a relatively rare situation and wasn't the case here.
>> ** Especially when the discussion was exactly about the op overreaching:
>> this seems like an obvious conflict of interest. Also, should an op's
>> personal bias towards words like blitzkrieg and dictator be allowed to
>> affect a user's ability to enter a channel?
> Name calling is bound to provoke, or at least intensify a situation.
> One reason to avoid doing it at all.
>
>> * What can be done to make #ubuntu-ops a more friendly place? The discussion
>> was very obviously hostile, and I was penalised for speaking up against the
>> very two ops I had a problem with, and in general the channel's attitude was
>> "write an email and gtfo, you're just repeating the same things over and
>> over". I don't understand the insistence to leave the channel, nor the very
>> obvious ganging up of the "ops vs. users" -- at least I felt that way from
>> the get-go. After I left the channel, the logs show people suggesting each
>> other to skip reading the scrollback and offer sympathies for people who
>> actually wanted to read it. If that can be written off as humour, I would
>> like to ask why the same kind of humour leads to a ban in #ubuntu.
>> ** This is especially important, because #ubuntu-ops is the first forum in
>> the appeals flow, and the experience there was extremely elitist and
>> hostile.
> I noticed the "discussion" in #ubuntu-ops quite some time after it had
> begun, and it seemed to be going around in hostile circles (hence the
> quotes). This is why I suggested to you that email may be a better
> medium, as it's easier to put points across in a thoughtful manner
> when you remove the real-time aspect.
>

In hindsight, I now see your point, and regret not having done what
you said earlier :)

> The comments you refer to about the scrollback were intended as
> humour, even ops aren't serious all the time. There is a difference
> between what is acceptable in #ubuntu-ops and what is acceptable in
> the #ubuntu support channel. The acceptable content in a purely
> technical support channel, especially with a large number of users, is
> restricted to technical support.
> (I want to address your views on #ubuntu-ops in my next email.)
>
>> * Why is it so bad to suggest an op be penalised? Why does doing that
>> instantly evoke allegations of being childish and immature (as opposed to
>> people claiming they themselves are intelligent adults)? If an op can ban
>> someone for a week in a completely unrelated channel for discussion in
>> another channel, why is it sacrilege that there should be at least some kind
>> of disciplinary action?
> We have a process for appeals against operator action and we have a
> governing council which is responsible for oversight of the IRC team.
> Coming into #ubuntu-ops and asking for some action to be taken against
> an operator is simply not going to lead to an action there and then.
>
> We (the IRC team and the council) would generally rather discuss what
> happened and use it as a learning experience than simply administer
> some arbitrary punishment. That's not to say no one should ever be
> reprimanded or punished for anything, just that it's not something
> taken lightly.
>

My frustration here stemmed from the disconnect between ops being able
to hand out arbitrary punishments without any process to experience
this from the other side. It was not a personal witch hunt (words used
in the channel) against a specific person, at least it was not
intended to be one.

> I think the comments you made about allegations of being childish and
> immature were made after people trying to explain the process to you.
> Though I think the frustration on all sides made this difficult to get
> across and understand.
>
>> * Continuing from the previous question, the general feeling I got is that
>> the accountability of ops in general is not up to the usual Ubuntu
>> standards. Whereas packages in the repo are vetted in several different
>> ways, there seems to be no similar vetting for the whole ops flow. People
>> claiming that "puppies don't die" if an op makes mistakes shows that the
>> general feeling of responsibility seems low. Another way of thinking about
>> this is if that puppies are not going to die anyway, why go out of your way
>> to ban someone for a joke here and there?
> Operators are accountable to the Ubuntu IRC Council, which is itself
> accountable to the Ubuntu Community Council. We also try and promote a
> culture of peer review, where other operators (even of other channels)
> can express if/where they think a mistake/overreaction happened.
>

Thank you -- this email thread and subsequent interactions have shown
that I was wrong about lack of accountability.

>> * Turning the tables onto myself, was I annoying? In short, yes. Could I
>> have done things differently? Yes. Feedback on my behaviour is as much
>> appreciated as the discussion on the above bullet points.
> I think others have given you plenty of feedback on your behaviour,
> and you do seem to understand it could have been handled better on
> both sides.
>

Yes, especially on the last part.

>> If you actually made it this far -- thank you! I am looking forward to
>> hearing other points of view, and as someone on IRC suggested, I will try my
>> best to ensure that this goes better than the discussion on IRC was :)
> I've subject the IRC community to horrifically long emails, I guess I
> should be expected to read them too ;)
>
>> Cheers,
>> Rohan
>>
>> [1]: http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2014/05/15/%23ubuntu-ops.html
>> [2]: http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2014/05/16/%23ubuntu-ops.html
>>
>> --
>> Rohan Dhruva
>>
>
> I was going to write some of my views here, but as you said this is
> quite a long email (especially with the quotes). So I'm going to
> compose my thoughts into another reply.
>
> To be continued.
>
> --
> Terence Simpson (tsimpson)
>
> --
> Ubuntu-irc mailing list
> Ubuntu-irc at lists.ubuntu.com
> https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-irc

Thank you again for your email, and the follow-up. It is greatly appreciated.

-- 
Rohan Dhruva