{PL] Small suggestions for Pricelessware.Org

[Susan Bugher]

Semolina Pilchard wrote:



Ah, I see you missed my point. Susan asked for input, and several of us
*did* respond. There was quite a lengthy debate over the categories and
subcategories, with omega and myself being two of the main contributors.

IIRC that was pretty much an all-day affair and we three were the *only*
contributors.

In the end, Susan adopted some of our suggestions and ignored the rest.
Again, this was her perogative. Not everything about the PL is a
democracy, nor should it be. There are certain areas where the webmaster
has discretion to make personal decisions. It goes with the job.

ISTM you are confusing democracy and *personal* opinion. You are talking
about three people and two or three opinions. It does not seem
*undemocratic* to me to prefer my own opinion to yours. . .

Susan

 

[jason]

ISTM you are confusing democracy and *personal* opinion. You are
talking about three people and two or three opinions. It does not seem
*undemocratic* to me to prefer my own opinion to yours. . .

Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude in how
you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you have some
latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you determine the cutoff
rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did that policy change last year?).
At any rate, it's a myth to say that *everything* is decided upon by
members. Somebody has to be at the helm who makes the hard decisions.
That same person also has leeway to make some of the creative decisions.

 

[Susan Bugher]

Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude in how
you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you have some
latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you determine the cutoff
rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a *rule* last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the
absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion *now*. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review Procedures"
thread.

The proposed procedures for PL2005 are here :

http://www.pricelesswarehome.org/acf/PL-Procedures.htm

The ACF thread is more current (I need to update the web page). PL2004
procedures are here:

http://www.pricelesswarehome.org/2004/2004proceduresPL.htm

I *didn't* propose set cut-off levels - since there is no way to predict
how many people will vote or how the votes will be distributed.

The preliminary cutoff levels used for PL2005 will be subject to
discussion in the newsgroup in the final stage of the selection process.
The *final* cutoff levels will be different if there is a group
consensus that they should be.

At any rate, it's a myth to say that *everything* is decided upon by
members.

I agree.

Somebody has to be at the helm who makes the hard decisions.

Somebody has to make decisions that the group is not *interested* in
making. Last year that included most Category and Subcategory decisions.

That same person also has leeway to make some of the creative decisions.

I agree.

Susan

 

[Garrett]

Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude
in how you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you
have some latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you
determine the cutoff rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did
that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a rule last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the
absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion now. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review
Procedures" thread.

Ah, so you did what you thought was the right thing to do, right? Did
you consult the group though? From what I understand here, before you
make any decisions to this effect, they are suppose to go through the
group. You, nor I have the right to make any such decisions without
the group's consent.

I'm probably being an ass about this, but this is what it sounds like
to me here. Susan can do as she wishes without the need to consult
anyone, but if anyone else attempts to do anything without consent,
they are wrong.

Disregard this, it will most likely only start a flame war or
something. But at least you can see how this looks to someone else
outside of the Susan group.

[snip]

-Garrett

 

[Mister Charlie]

Susan Bugher wrote:

ISTM you are confusing democracy and personal opinion. You are
talking about three people and two or three opinions. It does not
seem *undemocratic* to me to prefer my own opinion to yours. . .


Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude
in how you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you
have some latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you
determine the cutoff rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did
that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a rule last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the
absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion now. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review
Procedures" thread.

Ah, so you did what you thought was the right thing to do, right? Did
you consult the group though? From what I understand here, before you
make any decisions to this effect, they are suppose to go through the
group. You, nor I have the right to make any such decisions without
the group's consent.

I'm probably being an ass about this, but this is what it sounds like
to me here. Susan can do as she wishes without the need to consult
anyone, but if anyone else attempts to do anything without consent,
they are wrong.

Disregard this, it will most likely only start a flame war or
something. But at least you can see how this looks to someone else
outside of the Susan group.

My impression was the group was given a chance to comment or decide on a
number of things, and they did...but there were things ignored due to
lack of interest and those things Susan did her job as in fulfilling the
best she can. Just as you unilaterally 'fixed' the pricelessware page,
you did what you felt was right.

I don't see an issue here, really.

 

[Ben Cooper]

Susan Bugher wrote:

ISTM you are confusing democracy and personal opinion. You are
talking about three people and two or three opinions. It does not
seem *undemocratic* to me to prefer my own opinion to yours. . .


Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude
in how you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you
have some latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you
determine the cutoff rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did
that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a rule last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the
absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion now. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review
Procedures" thread.

Ah, so you did what you thought was the right thing to do, right? Did
you consult the group though? From what I understand here, before you
make any decisions to this effect, they are suppose to go through the
group. You, nor I have the right to make any such decisions without
the group's consent.

It looks like you missed part of this thread; the part where jason said,
"Susan asked for input, and several of us did respond. There was quite
a lengthy debate over the categories and
subcategories, with omega and myself being two of the main
contributors."

I'm probably being an ass about this, but this is what it sounds like
to me here. Susan can do as she wishes without the need to consult
anyone, but if anyone else attempts to do anything without consent,
they are wrong.

Yes, you're being an ass. Something, it seems, you are accustomed to.

Disregard this, it will most likely only start a flame war or
something. But at least you can see how this looks to someone else
outside of the Susan group.

Disregard your starting a flame war, how quaint.

No need for another lengthy post... I already understand that you think
I'm an idiot.

 

[Garrett]

[snip]My impression was the group was given a chance to comment or decide
on a number of things, and they did...but there were things ignored
due to lack of interest and those things Susan did her job as in
fulfilling the best she can. Just as you unilaterally 'fixed' the
pricelessware page, you did what you felt was right.

I don't see an issue here, really.

Then she was wrong. She's not allowed to make changes without the
group's permission. If she was not able to get permission, then
whatever it was, should have been left as-is. This is what all of her
followers have boldly stated to me several times. This is what all the
bickering was about. I made some changes, I was told I needed
permission do this, but then I find that Susan makes changes without
even consulting this group. And made changes when consulting the
group, but not getting permission do them. Doesn't matter how anyone
looks at it, either way, it's wrong.

My point is this. If she can make changes without permission, then she
is no longer abiding by the wishes of this group, and, she should
return the site and list to it's original content prior to those
changes that she has made that were not approved by this group. If she
would like to try and get the group's permission again, then she should
bring up these issues again.

Whether they said no, or just were not interested in the subject, does
not make any difference or give her any right to assume the roll of
this group on her own indiviual opinions.

There can't be any vague lines on this... Either we abide by the
group's wishes, or we don't.

I really despise hipocricy, and there's a bit of it going on here.

My post may be a bit strong here, and I'm sorry if it is. I'm trying
not to get upset and make my reply sound like it's an attack or
anything, so please do not take this reply as anything other than reply
to you on this subject. I'm not mad at you, I'm just mad at the
ignorance of some of the excuses I've heard regarding this subject.

-Garrett

 

[Roger Johansson]

Ah, so you did what you thought was the right thing to do, right? Did
you consult the group though? From what I understand here, before you
make any decisions to this effect, they are suppose to go through the
group. You, nor I have the right to make any such decisions without
the group's consent.

I'm probably being an ass about this, but this is what it sounds like
to me here. Susan can do as she wishes without the need to consult
anyone, but if anyone else attempts to do anything without consent,
they are wrong.

There is a big difference between the way you handle things and the way
Susan handles things.

When there are problems, which could be taken as an attack, your way of
reacting is to immediately write 4-5 very long messages, lots of upset
feelings and lots of words to express only one or two ideas.
Such messages cause reactions from others and you get even more problems
and you respond to them too, and you get into long confrontative
discussions.

Susan reacts by saying nothing for a day or two, then comes a short and
very well written, well balanced reply, trying to take everything into
consideration. She avoids taking things in a confrontative way while you
jump at every chance of getting into a confrontation.

She gives a much more mature and well-balanced impression, you sound
like you have problems with controlling your feelings.

She tries to find a good balance between seeking approval from the group
and taking initiatives by herself. You sound like you are looking for
weapons to use in a power struggle.
In the beginning you did things unilaterally, treating the web site as
if it was your own site, then you heard about democracy and now you try
to use democracy as a weapon against Susan.

You are getting better (you don't use foul language now) but you still
have a long way to go before you can show the kind of maturity,
self-control, social skills and personality in general which makes Susan
so suitable for these tasks.

You often sound like a young boy who is learning how to handle himself,
learning the rules of the society, and Susan sounds like she is a school
teacher, well trained in handling a bunch of noisy kids, and doing it
with a smile.

Don't take this as an attack, if you can. I am only trying to help you
understand where you are and what you are doing. You could change the
way you appear to others. You could try to be a positive and uniting
factor instead of causing confrontation.

By the way, I got interested in your personal web site (Garretts World)
and spent hours exploring the links from it yesterday, found a lot of
interesting stuff, thanks.

 

[jo]

Susan sounds like she is a school
teacher...

This has been mentioned before.

 

[Roger Johansson]

This has been mentioned before.

I did not mean it in a negative way. Maybe I should have said she sounds
like a grown-up person who can control herself and can take care of kids
who often behave irrationally and create a lot of unnecessary noise.

 

[BillR]

jason wrote:

Susan Bugher wrote:

ISTM you are confusing democracy and personal opinion. You are
talking about three people and two or three opinions. It does not
seem *undemocratic* to me to prefer my own opinion to yours. . .


Right. Poor choice of words. I simply meant you have latitude
in how you structure the site. In fact, to a certain extent, you
have some latitude in what programs gets included on PL, as you
determine the cutoff rules in terms of number of votes. (Or did
that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a rule last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the
absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion now. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review
Procedures" thread.

And I hope will retain plenty of flexibility as long as the result is
presented before it is "final" -- as it was. This is not perfect, but
something reasonably close to consensus is eventually reached (if only
through exhaustion). And I say this as a person whose opinion has
been "not preferred" a time or two.
Presenting results, clearly stating "this is what I did", and
presenting the revisions is a reasonable way to express the "right
thing".

My impression was the group was given a chance to comment or decide on a
number of things, and they did...but there were things ignored due to
lack of interest and those things Susan did her job as in fulfilling the
best she can.

I agree with the above (despite being one whose opinion was "not
preferred" on a few occasions), but somewhat disagree with the the
remainder.

Just as you unilaterally 'fixed' the pricelessware page,
you did what you felt was right.

I don't see an issue here, really.

Some of the information was changed by Garrett, et al., not just
reformatted (i.e., cosmetics), broadly omitted (e.g., no
subcategories), or supplemented (e.g,, assigning additional keywords).

While I do see some issues here, the specific examples being cited
don't warrant the conclusions.

BillR

 

[Garrett]

not >> > > seem undemocratic to me to prefer my own opinion to yours.
. . >> > > latitude >> > in how you structure the site. In fact, to a certain
extent, you >> > have some latitude in what programs gets included on
PL, as you >> > determine the cutoff rules in terms of number of
votes. (Or did >> > that policy change last year?).

That wasn't a rule last year - it was the way I chose to do it in the >> absence of a specific rule. The proposed PL2005 rules are under
discussion now. See the "[PL] Revised Pricelessware Review
Procedures" thread.

Ah, so you did what you thought was the right thing to do, right?
Did you consult the group though? From what I understand here,
before you make any decisions to this effect, they are suppose to
go through the group. You, nor I have the right to make any such
decisions without the group's consent.

It looks like you missed part of this thread; the part where jason
said, "Susan asked for input, and several of us did respond. There
was quite a lengthy debate over the categories and subcategories,
with omega and myself being two of the main contributors."

No, didn't miss that, but you must have missed the part where she her
self said that in the absence of a specific rule, she chose to do it
her way. Ok, I see how this works now. Susan can do whatever she
wants, and anyone else is not allowed to work like that here. Ok, I
understand now.

Thanks for confirming this for me.

[snip]

-Garrett

 

[Garrett]

There is a big difference between the way you handle things and the
way Susan handles things.

No, there's not. She's even admitted that when there's no rule for
something, she does it her way, and, in the lack of permission from the
group, she will do what she wants. That's even worse if you ask me.

When there are problems, which could be taken as an attack, your way
of reacting is to immediately write 4-5 very long messages, lots of
upset feelings and lots of words to express only one or two ideas.
Such messages cause reactions from others and you get even more
problems and you respond to them too, and you get into long
confrontative discussions.

I react in kind to those who post. My initial posts are always
respectful and nice. It's when someone replies with an attack that
they get the same in return.

Susan reacts by saying nothing for a day or two, then comes a short
and very well written, well balanced reply, trying to take everything
into consideration. She avoids taking things in a confrontative way
while you jump at every chance of getting into a confrontation.

I jump at every chance to show the errors that are being made and how
there's a favoritism issue going on here.

She gives a much more mature and well-balanced impression, you sound
like you have problems with controlling your feelings.

She sure didn't when she did her shotgun vote a few months ago. Was
this ok? Not so much about the shotgun vote, but how she herself was
posting during this issue?

She tries to find a good balance between seeking approval from the
group and taking initiatives by herself. You sound like you are
looking for weapons to use in a power struggle.
In the beginning you did things unilaterally, treating the web site as
if it was your own site, then you heard about democracy and now you
try to use democracy as a weapon against Susan.

Look, you can't have it both ways. I'm told that everything needs to
be approved by the group, and that if no approval was given, that it
must not be changed. Susan must be binded to this aswell, but she is
not. How is this right?

You are getting better (you don't use foul language now) but you still

Never used foul language. You might have mistaken me for the others
who were going nuts when I opposed them. If I did use foul language,
it was a minor offense in response to someone else using constant foul
language.

have a long way to go before you can show the kind of maturity,
self-control, social skills and personality in general which makes
Susan so suitable for these tasks.

You often sound like a young boy who is learning how to handle
himself, learning the rules of the society, and Susan sounds like she
is a school teacher, well trained in handling a bunch of noisy kids,
and doing it with a smile.

Don't take this as an attack, if you can. I am only trying to help you
understand where you are and what you are doing. You could change the
way you appear to others. You could try to be a positive and uniting
factor instead of causing confrontation.

Not at all. Look, all I'm seeking here now is solidification of how
these things are suppose to be done. I'm told one thing, then see that
Susan doesn't follow these rules at all.

By the way, I got interested in your personal web site (Garretts
World) and spent hours exploring the links from it yesterday, found a
lot of interesting stuff, thanks.

I have no site called "Garretts World". It was called "It's just me
Garrett". Thanks for dropping by though. Sorry there's not much of
anything of interest there. :-(

-Garrett

 

[Garrett]

I did not mean it in a negative way. Maybe I should have said she
sounds like a grown-up person who can control herself and can take
care of kids who often behave irrationally and create a lot of
unnecessary noise.

LOL.... I know what you meant and did not take it the wrong way. Let's
not let something as little as this become something bigger. In my
view, there are bigger issues that need to be addressed.

-Garrett

 

[Mister Charlie]

[snip]My impression was the group was given a chance to comment or decide
on a number of things, and they did...but there were things ignored
due to lack of interest and those things Susan did her job as in
fulfilling the best she can. Just as you unilaterally 'fixed' the
pricelessware page, you did what you felt was right.

I don't see an issue here, really.

Then she was wrong. She's not allowed to make changes without the
group's permission. If she was not able to get permission, then
whatever it was, should have been left as-is. This is what all of her
followers have boldly stated to me several times. This is what all the
bickering was about. I made some changes, I was told I needed
permission do this, but then I find that Susan makes changes without
even consulting this group. And made changes when consulting the
group, but not getting permission do them. Doesn't matter how anyone
looks at it, either way, it's wrong.

My point is this. If she can make changes without permission, then she
is no longer abiding by the wishes of this group, and, she should
return the site and list to it's original content prior to those
changes that she has made that were not approved by this group. If she
would like to try and get the group's permission again, then she should
bring up these issues again.

Whether they said no, or just were not interested in the subject, does
not make any difference or give her any right to assume the roll of
this group on her own indiviual opinions.

There can't be any vague lines on this... Either we abide by the
group's wishes, or we don't.

I really despise hipocricy, and there's a bit of it going on here.

My post may be a bit strong here, and I'm sorry if it is. I'm trying
not to get upset and make my reply sound like it's an attack or
anything, so please do not take this reply as anything other than reply
to you on this subject. I'm not mad at you, I'm just mad at the
ignorance of some of the excuses I've heard regarding this subject.

Well, it's none of my business and I should learn to just keep out of
other's people's biz and all. I don't take it personally.

While I see your point, realistically the person running the site should
have SOME leeway (to my mind) since they are the custodians. That would
mean you, Susam, or anyone else doing all the work and not getting
feedback. Maybe (again, I have no knowledge of the initial spark to
this discussion) it wasn't her *changing* things but adding, subtracting
or simply arranging things. I highly doubt you will get concensus on
every trivial issue in this forum ... hell, no one knows what FREEware
even is!

Anyway, carry on, don't mean to add to the static.

 

[Roger Johansson]

I have no site called "Garretts World". It was called "It's just me
Garrett".

I read the url a little too fast, but many times, as I explored links.
The url can be read as garrettsworld but now I see that it is a part of
world.com. and there are two chacters too much in the middle of it.

Thanks for dropping by though. Sorry there's not much of
anything of interest there. :-(

I am interested in shells and skinning, and Basic dialects, among other
things.

 

[POKO]

No, didn't miss that, but you must have missed the part where she her
self said that in the absence of a specific rule, she chose to do it
her way. Ok, I see how this works now. Susan can do whatever she
wants, and anyone else is not allowed to work like that here. Ok, I
understand now.

Thanks for confirming this for me.

[snip]

-Garrett

Things would certainly go a lot smoother for you Garrett if you had a
sex change and revealed that your middle name was Sue. You are a patient
man to put up with these attacks. You'd think you were drawing a salary
for all the work you are doing.
i'dbetellingthemtofuckoffanddiePOKO
--
P. Keenan - Webmaster
Web Page Design
Manitoulin Island, Canada
http://manitoulinislandwebdesign.it-mate.co.uk/
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Garrett]

No, didn't miss that, but you must have missed the part where she
her self said that in the absence of a specific rule, she chose to
do it her way. Ok, I see how this works now. Susan can do
whatever she wants, and anyone else is not allowed to work like
that here. Ok, I understand now.

Thanks for confirming this for me.

[snip]

-Garrett

Things would certainly go a lot smoother for you Garrett if you had a
sex change and revealed that your middle name was Sue. You are a
patient man to put up with these attacks. You'd think you were
drawing a salary for all the work you are doing.
i'dbetellingthemtofuckoffanddiePOKO

I know, but that's not my intent of course. I'm just trying to do
something here, and it's starting to work.

-Garrett

 

[Garrett]

I read the url a little too fast, but many times, as I explored links.
The url can be read as garrettsworld but now I see that it is a part
of world.com. and there are two chacters too much in the middle of it.


I am interested in shells and skinning, and Basic dialects, among
other things.

Hey, then there was something of value there. But you know, those
links are pretty common one's for the skinning stuff... But if you're
really deep into that, then WinT's mods site is a excellent site for
the person who wants to really hack the system for modifications.

-Garrett

 

[jason]

I react in kind to those who post. My initial posts are always
respectful and nice. It's when someone replies with an attack that
they get the same in return.

And that's where you get in trouble Garret, my friend. It matters less who
is right or wrong, than how they handle themselves. And responding to a
negative attack in kind just elicts more negativity. You're a decent guy,
have a good sense of humor, and were brave to take on this position. But
seriously, the only way to deal with the bizarreness at this point is to be
respectful of everyone...even to people who don't necessarily deserve
respect. That's just pragmatics. I don't always agree with Roger, but
he's definitely right that negative replies usually elicit more negative
replies, and that results in ZERO forward movement for the Pricelessware
List.