moderation. was: The New Face of Ubuntu

[Ric Moore]

On 02/24/2012 12:09 PM, Cybe R. Wizard wrote:
> On Fri, 24 Feb 2012 08:45:41 -0800
> "Kevin O'Gorman"<kogorman at gmail.com>  wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 2:12 PM, Cybe R. Wizard
>> <cybe_r_wizard at earthlink.net>  wrote:
>>> If there is no policy what is the job of a moderator?   ...and why?
>>
>> As a moderator, I find myself wanting to answer that question, even
>> though it's tangential to the original thread.
>>
>> I deal almost exclusively with messages that the software has rejected
>> already.  Almost all of it is submissions that come from non-members.
>> The vast majority are non-english (I see chineese, hangul, cyrillic,
>> and a bunch of alphabets I can't even identify), or are obvious bounce
>> messages, frauds, phishing or spam.  Mostly it's a non-brainer based
>> just on the subject line. All of the above get silently discarded.
>>
>> The exceptions are reasonable Ubuntu-related English messages,
>> probably from members, who are sending from an email account that is
>> not subscribed, or messages that are larger than our size limit.  They
>> get a message telling them what the problem is, and advised to
>> subscribe/trim and resubmit.
>>
>> Note how little this has to do with content, or any policy about
>> content other than choice of language.
>>
>> Other things are possible, but exceedingly rare.
>>
> Thanks, Kevin, that was a great response, answers my question
> perfectly and is something that I had never even considered.
>
> Learning is happening!
>
> That said, I have now gotten two responses to my question in my inbox
> instead of in my Ubuntu-users folder (one sent directly and
> bypassing the mailing list altogether) which is /against/ the mailing
> list guidelines. Could you moderators possibly read and follow your own
> mailing list guidelines it would probably at least help to serve to
> insure that others abide by the same guidelines, too.

Seemingly the "guidelines" are a moving target. There USED to be an 
official sanction against top posting. Then it was removed. Then it was 
said to be re-instated. I don't see it now. It's JARRING to be reading 
nicely trimmed bottom post responses then WHAM! A top post, followed by 
another. It hurts my head. It makes the list a mishmash. Is there an 
~official guideline~ regarding that now?? Ric