Tavern on the Meta

1:00 PM

@Mgetz actually was thinking about the whole concept of an ombudsman. Jon talked about it a few times

Finding someone neutral would be difficult

The point stands, moderators and CMs are not impartial parties. That said they should have a say on if they feel they can work and trust with the RM

Magisch

They seem to like binding arbitration so much. Why not that

hire one of the people from the arbitration firm they use on retainer to sort these sorts of messes

Mgetz

I guess the point is that the new process for all it's a process is largely a sham show trial system

Journeyman Geek

@Magisch arbitration for mod removal.... Hmmm

Actually not a bad idea

user194636

sounds arbitrary 😁

George Stocker

1:03 PM

@Mgetz I'm not of a mind to ask for third party arbitration, as I don't think it will solve the problem. I have some useful ideas on how to fix this situation; but in order for that to happen the people at Stack Exchange inc have to want to fix the trust issue with the community.

Magisch

wikipedia has a whole comission for admin removals

David A

@Magisch Or you can just whine to connections in the T&S department and have them unilaterally remove someone without giving a reason.

Magisch

this process reads like creating a paper trail nobody gets to see you can claim exists to placate the masses

2

@DavidA look how that blew up

Mgetz

@GeorgeStocker Honestly nor am I. I think it would be better if SE just acknowledge that they can fire a mod at will and aren't bound to give a reason. Pretending due process is worse than none at all.

user194636

I can only assume they never read the mod agreement

Magisch

1:04 PM

@DavidA And they're about to summarily lose their ability to do anything like it in the latest meta RFC. In essence the community is restricting their banning privileges in response

Mgetz

@Magisch which has been bypassed and overriden

Magisch

I think next time they try to do that the CEO or the T&S director gets fired

David A

We just need to take over the WMF and vote out all the normies that want to go to conferences all year long.

Raedwald

T&S = ?

user194636

trust & safety?

Magisch

1:06 PM

fram may not have gotten his bit back but the WMF surely put itself on thin ice

I can't see the next batch of arbs to be company friendly, and neither the next batch of stewards

David A

Trust & Safety. It's a group that basically exists to preserve the ability of certain people to feel safe.

Stevoisiak

WMF?

Mgetz

@Magisch I doubt it, the fact of the matter is the company can operate how it wants when it wants. It is not bound by any such agreements and no formal contracts were signed.

Stevoisiak

Is that the Wikimedia Foundation?

David A

Yeah

Magisch

1:07 PM

@Mgetz The wikimedia foundation derives its privileges from the community

George Stocker

@Mgetz Seeing the initial version of the removal process solidified that in my mind there hasn't yet been that recognition from the SE team that there is a trust issue and that this process continues to hurt that trust. Also that they didn't engage moderators to help created it. They handed us a draft, said "give us your thoughts", and didn't take our issues into account.

Magisch

if the consensus in the current RFC is they can't ban people anymore, then they literally cannot ban people anymore

George Stocker

That's also what pushed me over the edge to resign. Things aren't going to change until SE inc changes how it views the problem.

2

David A

They're probably going by audience numbers which are likely unaffected by the meta noise.

Stevoisiak

@DavidA The drop in moderators seems like it would be a damage over time issue

David A

1:09 PM

All I know is that there's no limit to the harm you can do to yourself when you're 100% convinced you're correct.

Magisch

@GeorgeStocker The problem is even with all the resignations nobody seems to care

rene

@GeorgeStocker that .. doesn't sound hopeful ...

Magisch

not even a tiny bit

George Stocker

I spoke with someone last weekend at my daughter's soccer game who visits stack Overflow regularly. they saw a blip of the issue, but they don't really visit meta, and they don't really know what's happening.

Magisch

if they did we would have seen something that isn't PR speak by now

Stevoisiak

1:10 PM

I'm really surprised this event didn't have more news coverage

George Stocker

I work with clients who use Stack Overflow every day. None of them have peeped up and said, "hey, I saw that you were a moderator, and that you resigned."

this really is a localized "invested community" issue.

Journeyman Geek

@GeorgeStocker that requires.... Long range thinking

terdon

@Mgetz actually, SE's right to fire mods at will is enshrined in the mod agreement.

Journeyman Geek

That's literally been in short supply imo

Mgetz

@GeorgeStocker I think there might be at the CM level, but I don't think it extends beyond that. I think there is a bunker mentality above that.

Journeyman Geek

1:11 PM

@terdon and it's happened before

Just quietly

George Stocker

@Mgetz Let me be clear. Every. Single. One. Of the CMs I've talked to really 'gets it'.

I've spoken to a lot of CMs.

I mean really gets it.

Mgetz

@GeorgeStocker yep... it's not them I'm worried about, it's the people that should really really be listening to them

Stevoisiak

When this first blew up, I debated sending the story out to tech news sites. I decided against it since a moderator's personal image is involved

George Stocker

@Mari-LouA I like to think of it this way: With the decade of public footprint Shog, Tim Post, et. al., have; if they could reach out and improve things, they would have done so. We know this because we can go through their history and see past examples of how they've done so. Something happened that we're not privy to that caused them to stop being able to help make things better. It's evident from their public answers and the shift and tenor of Stack Overflow Inc., in general. — George Stocker Oct 15 at 14:29

terdon

Yeah, the CMs actually know the sites and the community. Apparently, loads of folks working at Stack Overflow Inc. don't even know the term SE.

Stevoisiak

1:13 PM

I didn't want to damage their public reputation any more than they've already been damaged

I have an email list from back from when I volunteered managing social media

Journeyman Geek

@terdon and tbh there is no real push to.

Which is a bit of a cultural problem :/

Raedwald

One thing I've learned over the decades is that "manager types" hate technical people. "Manager type" people want obedience because they have a position high up the org. chart, and all beneath them should do what they are told. Technical people want things to be done the "right" way, and have no respect for seniority, only for technical competence and being right.

Feeds

The Stack Overflow Podcast – Episode #125: ~Tilde Club~ and Mechanical Keyboards

Ben Popper on October 22, 2019

Welcome back to the another episode of the newly rebooted Stack Overflow podcast. This week we’ve got a very special guest, Cassidy Williams of React Training. Cassidy is a coder, mechanical keyboard enthusiast, and prolific Twitter comedian. She also curates our newsletter. On this episode, we talk about Paul’s career as a a club promoter, Ben’s brush with terrifying bitcoin spam, and Sara’s favorite Kanye tweet. Enjoy, subscribe, and leave us a rating if you like the show. …

Journeyman Geek

Funny thing is there are good technical managers

Mgetz

@terdon I'm reminded of a conversation with someone that deals with several major computing hardware vendors who said that VPs at some vendors don't actually know what their company actually does.

Journeyman Geek

1:19 PM

They're just terrible at politics

Raedwald

@JourneymanGeek They tend to be junior managers, not senior managers.

Mgetz

and you see this with their flailing strategies

Journeyman Geek

Lol. My dad was one

Retired as a VP for engineering somewhere a lot bigger than SE o suspect 😁

@Mgetz I don't know what my company does 🤣

Mgetz

@JourneymanGeek That should be a bit scary

Stevoisiak

Something from my favorite manager: when they saw I had daily meetings on my calendar, they asked "Do you find these meetings helpful? If no, why are you going to them"

They trusted me to know what work would be productive

Had nothing at all to do with their technical knowledge

terdon

1:23 PM

@Raedwald I've spent most of my adult life in academia, but I'm working at a startup now, and I'm lucky enough that all managers are also techies. Including the CEO. There are exceptions!

In fact, I think SE is one. Most of the higher ups have a technical background AFAIK.

rene

@Stevoisiak but ... meetings! ... how am I going to be in control otherwise? I need someone to tell me what I don't know and don't understand. And probably never will.

Magisch

1:53 PM

friendly reminder we don't talk about specific staff members here

It is better if we avoid this line of discussion alltogether and friendly-bin this

user310756

can we get some flags on this meta.stackexchange.com/questions/336177/…

Catija

@terdon I have 204 hours of unused parental leave and 196.8 hours of vacation time to prove it!

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