[Opensim-users] OpenSim users list purpose (was Re: Opensim-users Digest, Vol 40, Issue 30)

[Justin Clark-Casey]

On 19/12/10 14:08, Fleep Tuque wrote:
> Hi Adam,
>
> This has nothing to do with educators.  This has to do with the fact that the sign up page for opensim-users has
> absolutely zero information about the posting guidelines - which appear to be far more restrictive than other lists
> people have used - and instead of politely explaining the situation to newcomers, the norm here appears to be to respond
> to anything perceived as off topic with rudeness and short replies calling perfectly useful information "spam".  (Or a
> sincere attempt to be helpful "pontificating".)   A very polite suggestion for how to better communicate the
> expectations /in advance/ so people know what the ground rules are is not unreasonable and in fact would go a long way
> in helping preserve the norms of the list.

Chris, I would say that restricting the users list to topics immediately concerned with the project is the normal 
practice in the open source world.  If there are too many irrelevant topics then knowledgable people will stop looking 
through them and the purpose of this list (to provide help to users of OpenSim) will be lost.

I've added one sentence to

http://opensimulator.org/wiki/Support#Getting_support

but it's hard to know how to express this norm.  Any editing of this wiki page is welcome (or discussion of what to put 
- this is probably best done in the page's discussion tab rather than on this list).

The OpenSim core developers (of which I am one) have moderation control over opensim-users and opensim-dev.

That being said, clearly there are people interested in broader topics.  I would recommend joining the virtual worlds 
group on LinkedIn on the first instance - there have already been a number of interesting discussions there.  Or if 
anybody wants to set up another group then please feel free to post the link - I might quite possibly join them myself.

>
> I'm sure it's difficult to deal with sudden influxes of new users who may not be used to the particular culture of this
> list, I'm merely suggesting that there are better ways to keep things on topic than being mean.

Yes, discussion on these lists should be kept civil.  In fact, as other people have pointed out, OpenSim's lists are 
pretty polite compared to some other project lists out there.

-- 
Justin Clark-Casey (justincc)
http://justincc.org
http://twitter.com/justincc